The Wrath (love) of God (2)

Fires of love

PS:This is the second part of a 'two part post'. If you have not read part 1, pls click here.

SIN AND THE LAW

There is nothing that exists that is not governed by laws. Laws keep things in balance, laws ensure continuity of life. Our human body is governed by laws. The laws in our body are what make our organs function the way they do. When the law is kept inside of our body, everything works in harmony. When the law is broken, disorder, dis-ease, comes into existence.

Stones are not meant for the belly, not because stones are evil but because our intestines do not have enough power to break them down into a useful substance. To put stones inside of one's belly is to commit a sin against one's body. To sin is to do something that goes against the natural law and order of a thing; to sin is to do something that is not needed.

When unnecessary things are done, an imbalance happens and natural order is upset. Once natural order is upset, a ripple effect happens and tragedy soon follows. In the motor vehicle, to pour water where oil should be is sinful. The outcome that follows is what validates it as sin. Sin is always validated by the outcome it produces. Paul said: "the wages of sin is death".

Although the subject of sin has been communicated to us from the standpoint of morality, sin has more to do with 'mechanics' than it has to do with morals. The Hebrew word 'hata', translated as 'sin', literally means 'to shoot and miss the mark'. Sin simply is 'inaccuracy'; putting a stone where rice should be; putting oil where water should be; putting a lie where truth should be; putting speech where silence should be.

Once sins are committed, when inaccurate actions are carried out, when natural order is disturbed, a painful reaction comes into existence. A reaction that is as a direct result of the wrong action taken. Cause & effect, action & reaction, sow & reap, karma, or whatever we would like to call it.

This painful reaction could be an upset stomach; it could be faulty brakes; it could be civil unrest and riot in a country; it could be a venereal disease; it could be the burning of Sodom and Gomorrah down to the ground.

Because God is the one who made the laws or 'algorithm' by which the world functions, it is written in the Bible that 'God destroyed this' and 'God destroyed that' when people sinned and that is partly true. Sin however is its own reward and the consequences of sin will always be pain because sin always causes pain.

God has designed the world in a way that the consequences of broken laws are the very things that would teach us how to live in harmony with them. Pain is our body's way of saying 'something is wrong here, pay attention'. All suffering in the world comes as a result of man breaking the laws that God designed to help him.

If we are obese and want to look like Arnold Schwarzenneger or Jennifer Lopez, we can't be eating donuts and cakes everyday now can we? In the gym, the trainer says "Do this, do that. Eat this, eat that.". If we don't do as the trainer says and we remain fat, is it the trainer that did it or we? Laws are for our benefit.

God unveiled the laws for our benefit and improvement, similar to how Steve Jobs designed the laws of the iPhone. When God says: "don't do this", it is not because he is a tyrant but because we are the ones who are hurt by our anger, greed, jealousy, lust etc. As Jesus said: "the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath", "the law was made for man, not man for the law".

Nonetheless, God is not a fool, he knows we would break any law he gives to us and he does it anyway. He does it to help us discover our own flaws and inadequacies. He does it to help us realize our need for his support, his assistance, his light. This is why Paul said:

'What shall we say then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, “You shall not covet.” ' Romans 7:7

God is not a tyrant, everyone is free to do whatever they want to do. That however does not mean that there are not consequences to our actions. Consequences that will teach us what we should continue to do or what we should stop doing. Yes, we say God releases his wrath upon us when we sin but our own sins create the very problems we face. It is a paradox that needs to be understood.

It's possible that by now some of us might be thinking "I'm confused, I thought this topic was about the wrath of God, why are we talking about man's mistakes?". That is not a confusion but the truth itself. The wrath of God and the sins of man are directly related with one another.

After all, it's still the products of our own errors that are used to chasten us; to correct us. The beggars we abandon on the street and say to ourselves "not my business" are the ones who will plague us with armed robbery and terrorism tomorrow. Yes, we can say it is the wrath of God but is it independent of our own selfishness?

When Moses said "an eye for eye, tooth for tooth" people thought he meant that we ought to pluck out a person's eye if they pluck ours. Only a unloving heart will interpret that verse that way. That is why many look at the old testament as evil. For so long we've read these books without love.

That is why we find it is so hard to reconcile Jesus with the old testament and instead, we make false excuses saying that "Jesus is the loving one", "the old testament God and the prophets did not have understanding". Such contradictions, why won't people laugh at the Bible? Did Jesus not say:

'“Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfil. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. ' Matthew 5:17-18

Eye for eye, tooth for tooth simply teaches that "if you hurt your neighbor, you hurt your own self" Why? Because your neighbor is yourself. That is why Jesus said this:

And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”' Mark 12:29-31

To hurt our neigbour, our environment, is to hurt ourselves; it is to hurt God. It is not possible to separate God from his creation. God makes sure we understand that by letting us taste the sweetness or bitterness that we put into the world. The only alternative is to take free will away from us and he wouldn't. Instead, he lets us make our mistakes for the consequences to teach us why we ought to listen to him.

The beginning of knowledge is ignorance, the beginning of success is failure, the beginning wisdom is foolishness. Even Jesus learnt obedience through what he suffered because learning in any field is a bitter-sweet process; ask the doctor, painter, sculptor, singer, writer, dancer. Mistakes teach us not to make them.

Has this humanity not started to learn? Corporations have been hurting trees and destroying forests, believing that there is a separation between them and the plants. Have the consequences of that illusion not taught man otherwise? Now everyone is screaming 'go green', 'go green', because they've seen that when they hurt their environment they also hurt themselves.

It is at this point good to say that ‘evil‘ is anything good that is done beyond its sphere of use. To cut a tree down or to kill an antelope is not evil in itself. There is a time and a place for that. Everything must die for everything to live, all of nature is dependent of all of nature. Everything must be born and everything must die; reality is a cycle.

Even the killing of another human being is not evil in itself, there are angels of birth and angels of death. These angels are holy and terribly divine, they are pure and clean. They never do anything out of harmony with God and universal law. Many accounts of this are evidenced in the Bible. 'Good' and 'evil' are not static things. Some things that are good on monday become evil on tuesday and so on.

Everything must be born and everything must die. Something must kill a man, a tree, a beast, a planet, a sun. That however is not a very simple conversation and it honestly isn't important in this moment. Remember however, a death here is a birth there and a birth there is a death here.

That a man dies in London does not mean he no longer exists. Reality is not as linear as we've been taught. That many drowned in the time of Noah does not mean they ceased to exist. In true terms, one losing their physical body can be likened unto one losing a jacket or a car. The death of the body is not the end of one's existence. That however is another conversation, one which will be fruitless if we don't engage this present topic.

When things are done out of universal harmony, when I give more than I should or take more than I should, an imbalance is created which produces a ripple effect. This effect ultimately returns to me as a negative consequence and it will evidence why my original action was wrong in the first place. This consequence can be called the wrath of God.

Yes, with wisdom, one can say the melting of the ozone layer is the wrath of God. Is this wrath however SEPARATE from us cutting down more trees than we need? Indeed, God designed the world in a way that breaking the law will teach us why the laws exist in the first place. By breaking it and suffering the consequences we will see the need for love.

THE NEED FOR LOVE

Because of love, God doesn't allow us escape the consequences of our actions until we have learnt from the consequences of our actions. On the other hand we can also say that we can’t escape the consequences of our actions until we change them. Remember the famous Einstein quote? Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?

The wrath of God is not separate from the actions of man. As we say God unleashes wrath upon man, we can also say man unleashes wrath upon himself. Both are true together, not apart from each other. It is good that man knows the error of his ways.

No one can know what is left unless they know what is right, no one can know what is up unless they know what is down. Falling down is part of standing up. No one builds UP a house without laying DOWN a foundation. A seed does not break UP out of the soil before it breaks DOWN into it. Jesus did not ascend to heaven before descending to the depths hell. These are universal principles.

As we discussed in The Adversary 1 & The Adversary 2, Adam, humanity, was always going to fall. It was necessary that Adam, humanity, realized the need for living in harmony with God. It was necessary that Adam understands why God chooses love OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

A lot of choices that our parents made when we were young, we thought them foolish because we didn't know. A lot of things they encouraged us to do and not do, we thought them foolish because we didn't know. Growing up and seeing the realities of the world opened our eyes and we learned from the repercussions of our mistakes; we learnt from the wrath of God.

God is not foolish. He is the way he is for a reason. God is a part of man and man a part of God. "In him we live, move and have our being". Everything EXISTS in God; everything IS God. If God was anything BUT the way he is, he also will suffer the consequences of it. My friends, we are now in a thinking age, it is time to revisit a lot of things to understand them better.

God does not sin against you because to sin against you is to sin against himself. He knows that very well. It is we who don't seem to know this. Everything is related to and interdependent on everything. We cannot we pluck our neighbor's eye or tooth without plucking our own.

Sinning against ourselves and things around us is not separate from sinning against God. We cannot say that we are united with God but consider ourselves separate from everything and everyone else. "I will be kind to Alberto but cruel to Amanda". To be cruel to Amanda is to be cruel to ourselves; it is to be cruel to God.

Ultimately, that cruelty that I extended to Amanda will come back to bite me. If not me directly but me in the form of my third or fourth generations. All of us now are suffering from the wickedness of our forefathers. Their errors have brought tragedy to this world.

If we are wise, we will change the narrative and ensure that our children meet a better place. If we are not wise not then our children and grand children will also look at the world and say 'God is wicked, God is a bastard. See suffering everywhere. See this child they killed, see this woman they raped, see this city that was bombed'.

Yes, we can say that God is responsible because he created us and gave us free will, free will which we have used as license to become devils. Yes, God is the first person to take responsibility for the errors of man, that's why he sacrifices himself through anyone who aligns themselves with him. That is why he sent Jesus.

Nonetheless, that does not absolve us of responsibility for the evil in the world today. It is our own doing. As Jesus and every other messenger lived their life in sacrifice, paying for the sins of others, paying for the sins of the world, we also must do the same if this world will change.

'By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. ' I John 3:16

Yes, it is not only Jesus who needs to sacrifice himself; we do too. We also need to forgive, we also need to be patient, we also need to share our properties, we also need to lay down our pride, we also need take responsibility for the state of the world.

If God takes responsibility for us, how can we who are the criminals, the Barrabas, not take responsibility for our own selves? Friends, I will invite us to meditate once more on this saying "love your neighbor as yourself because your neighbor is yourself".

England doesn't exist on its own, BREXIT was a foolish move. Are they completely independent? Do they make all their products and services? Are they not equally dependent on the neighbouring nations? Now in their thoughtless pride and intention to hurt Spain and Germany and Sweden, they hurt their own selves.

O' foolish man, when shalt thou learn that thou art thy neighbor?

To withhold another's grace is to withhold one's own favor.

If Jesus or any other messenger that God sent to help this humanity did not IDENTIFY themselves with this humanity, they would not have willingly suffered the way they did. When Jesus or Paul or Ezekiel saw a person killing another, they said to themselves "I did that, I am my neighbor, my neighbor is me, I am responsible, I will fix it".

Until man understands that one thing is everything and everything is one thing, he will keep on living in this world as a victim. He will blame everything and everyone except himself. He will suffer and cry not because of God but because of his own selfishness.

If all the ants in the world perish, so also will humanity. If all the birds in the world perish, so also will humanity. If all the butterflies and cockroaches and caterpillars perished, so also will humanity. If we don't realize that everything is one thing and one thing is everything, we will keep punishing ourselves and think that this or that person is punishing us.

No one achieves success in business without aligning themselves with the laws of economics. The laws of economics are for our benefit, not we for the benefit of the law of economics. The economic laws were designed to make us better, not we designed to make it better.

We can't earn $10 and spend $25. If we do so, poverty is already on the way to our doorstep. Yes, someone with wisdom can say "The God of economics has poured his wrath on you for breaking the law, he has punished you with poverty". That however does not absolve us of responsibility of the consequence we are facing. Sin is its own reward.

Yes, I can say that Steve Jobs is to blame if I put my iPhone into water and it spoils; seeing as he made the laws of the phone. That however does not absolve me of being responsible for the damaged phone. Yes, I can say that the wrath of God is poured upon my nation by this economic recession we are facing. That however does not absolve us of responsibility for the consequence of our own greed and poor financial decisions.

Sin, in any way shape or form, is its own reward. No one can mock the law of cause an effect. When the consequences of our actions return to us, it is an opportunity to learn not to do them. If people don't forgive you and you feel hurt by it, that pain should teach you to also forgive. If people are not generous with you and you feel hurt by it, that pain should teach you to be generous.

God is love, his thoughts toward us is love, his intention toward us is love. Love seeks to heal, build and cultivate. Sometimes before one can cultivate, one has to first clear the obstruction. God clears the obstruction with his fires.

The degree to which a person is hardened is the degree to which the fires of God‘s love will burn. Fire only destroys that which is useless and preserves that which is useful. The fires of God tear down one thing and build another. Every end is a beginning and a beginning an end.

God is love.

Pls feel free to share thoughts, comments and questions. Shalom!