There’s an old saying: “If you’re going to be a flower, turn to the sun, if you’re going to be a rock be a diamond, if you’re going to be a bird, be an eagle.” Simply stated, be the best you can be. Even though there are no diamonds without flaws, when cut and polished they increase in value because they reflect so much light. The Gospel is the spiritual equivalent of that. Being the best we can be, not only doing good things, but most importantly, being the best we can be in our heart and soul to reflect His Light.
A friend and I were talking the other day and he made a statement that ‘it’s easy to dig the dirt but hard to find the gold.’ For Christians, the gold is located in our hearts, and not always expressed outwardly. It’s easy to watch people with our eyes and hear with our ears, but it’s a bit more difficult to interpret what’s in a person’s heart. Contrasting that, the Wisdom of God tells us that’s exactly what the Creator of the universe is capable of doing. We can physically display praying and worshiping; people can see that, we can verbally express both. We can do many things that appear with the eyes and ears to be ‘good’ but in reality our hearts are ‘far from God’ or perhaps simply lack the Wisdom and Love of God as their motivation. A lot of cultural behavior has the language of ‘sympathy-signaling,’ doing and saying to seek the approval of men. Human sympathy, as opposed to Godly compassion, in reality, can hurt not help because it can be without the Wisdom of God to give it appropriate purpose and credibility.
What I’m writing about is simply the difference between what I’ll call goodness versus godliness. Godliness is different than good. Good can be simply human logic good, godliness is defined and expressed only by the Father. Jesus stopped a questioner immediately when that person suggested that Jesus was good, stopping him with the words: Why do you call me good? None is good, save one, Jehovah. (Luke 18:19) Jesus expressed that he was only living out the Life that the Father had for him. Godliness has a different depth to it than good. You can be good at doing good or evil. That’s impossible with godliness; godliness is applicable to God only. It embraces purpose, character, integrity and compassion; I believe all those to be spiritual gifts.
In Scripture, Timothy and Peter wrote the most about godliness. They both pointed out the essence of a specific biblical Greek word. Godliness’ specific Greek meaning is: ‘The opposite of simple religion. It relates to a real, true, vital and spiritual relation with God.’ Godliness is not an outward act of religious observances or ceremonies which can be performed by the flesh. 1Tim 4:8 clarifies: …exercise yourself into godliness, flesh is profitable for a while, but (true) godliness is profitable for all things having promise of the life which now is and of that which is to come. (There can be a false godliness that takes advantage referred to in 2 Tim. 3:5-7.)
Our God problem originally began with a tree called the ‘tree of good and evil.’ That tree contained both good and evil. If used as a source for our lives, simple human good or evil can lead to a catastrophic event: separation from the Tree of Life (Christ). Jesus Christ is the Tree of Life of the New Testament; in the Old Testament it was separated from men with Cherubim and flaming sword to separate fallen man from eternal life. That tree was reestablished in the Garden of Gethsemane by the life and death of His Son. (1John 5:11)
Evil can dominate in our lives, or good can dominate. However, only God’s Tree of Life can give you Life as the Father would have it for you! Adam and Eve did not physically die upon consuming from the tree of good and evil; they simply separated themselves from God and His source of true different Life. They hid themselves from Him. That still happens today.
I once heard someone say that the spirit dies when it lives in the dark, not literal dark, but darkness caused by ignorance or evil. Jesus is the Light, meaning the Way to Life. His Light sustains Life. Physical ‘bio’ life begins in the darkness of the womb, is birthed into the light and lives. The Gospel is similar, being in darkness, born again and lives. The result of resisting the Light creates (in the Greek) Krisis, in the English: crisis! To reject the Tree of Life fulfills the promises of Deuteronomy 30:19-20 (I have set before you this day life and death, the blessing and the curse, … love God, obey His voice, cleave to Him, for He is Life…)
The Gospel is not just mental agreement; it’s having a comfortable, true relationship with the Creator of the world. I remember from a very young age I didn’t want to know about the God represented in the Bible but I wanted to know the God expressed in the Bible. I wanted more than a story or a theory; I wanted to experience the weight of His actual presence in my life. The Gospel is intended to be an individual relationship, not just reading the book about a Creator, but knowing Him as trusted and dependable companion. We’re not just to be a person that acknowledges His existence, but we’re to personally experience Him.
Currently, the percentage in America of people believing and having confidence in the Gospel doesn’t look good. It’s has been falling each year for the past 30 years. Christ actually taught us about this kind of future, alerted us of a time such as this. That said, he also taught us to be of good cheer and know the Grace, Mercy, Peace and Love of God, that those would remain a gift to whosoever will, no matter the culture or the popularity of the Message.
Look, there are at least 36-40 authors that wrote the 66 books found in the Bible; wrote those over a span of thousands years. How likely is it to get the continuity of that many writers, spreading them out over thousands of years, and still finding a consistent message among them? You have scholars, prophets, a shepherd, a doctor, a fisherman, a tax collector, a king, song writers, a Christian persecutor, writing with one ‘voice.’ The reality of social order, political order, economic order all resembling, in 2024, what was imaged over 2000 years ago. You have a secular ‘faith’ that life accidently progressed to what it is today. Contrast their faith with our certainty that no accident could ever produce the complexity of the world as we know it. Simply, where did that little thing called life begin-in some ‘blob’ of goo? Where is the first heart beat, what generated it and what’s the likelihood that it would have survived and re-created itself into today’s world? In the Bible we have a document that describes the human heart, the psychology, the economy, the social order and the history of humans, and that written thousands of years ago.
Imagine 40 authors; none ever having any conversations, never plagiarizing the others’ works, interpreting the condition and the psychology of humans so precisely; describing the world with the Gospel and people without the Gospel. Imagine a messiah that ‘reads your global newspaper’ 2000 years ago. You can read the same stories in a newspaper today; identical thoughts and patterns as Jesus’ sayings. You have to be super faithful to some pretty unbelievable things to believe that nothing is responsible for life, simply a onetime chemical reaction. Believing amino acids lined up, billions and billions of years ago to create what we observe today. I find it hard to believe anything but the Biblical account, much easier to believe that, than the other ‘amazing human theories.’
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