The Extremes of God

In God there is no darkness at all. There is no shadow of turning. He changes not. He is absolute in His expression. He is partial in nothing. He is absolutely pure and can not be otherwise.

Even as in His expression of love, God the Father does not love upon occasion, or to some degree, rather He is love. For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son. We can see the extreme to which He reveals Himself as love. God so loved the world, not when the world was lovable, nor when it was seeking to do His will, but when it was in total opposition to all that He intended it to be.

He loved the world even when He knew that when He sent His beloved Son, the world, would reject Him, treat Him unmercifully, they would spit upon Him, pull out His beard, mock Him and in the end, crucify Him. We see here the ultimate expression of His nature and should realize by this that unlike us, God does nothing in measure.

After such a display of how God loves, one would hope no one could say, how could God love me, after all I have done? God is infinite, God is love and love covers a multitude of sins.

We are looking at the extremes of God. When it is said of God that his mercy endures forever, there is no time limit put on those to which His mercy is extended. His mercy is forever because He is forever merciful. He changes not. All that is required, on the part of the recipient, is to enter into His mercy.

The same holds true for His forgiveness, His forgiveness is constant in Christ, it is only a matter of believing and entering into what is already there. One would say, if His forgiveness began in Christ, then His forgiveness had a beginning. His forgiving nature always was, Jesus Christ was the provision for that forgiveness, remembering, He was the lamb slain from before the foundation of the world.

So God made provision for His forgiving nature before the fall took place. He did not have to contemplate what He would do when man fell. He already had made provision to reveal his true heart through His Son. If you have seen me you have seen the Father.

What an impossibility for the, earthly nature of the religious Jews to understand, who were busy trying to earn their way, by a mixture of good and evil. To them it was unthinkable that Christ was the end of the law for righteousness and salvation a free gift through faith in the atoning work of Christ, forgiveness being a part of the package.

God’s people had become so hardened of heart and accomplishment oriented, judging themselves by themselves that they could not recognize the Fathers heart and the express image of His person. He came to His own and His own received Him not.

I fear this could happen to the church as well. If the Lord Himself stood among us and revealed the heart of the Father toward us, would we put Him out of the church and think that we did God service if we crucified him. Would we reject the extreme expression of His goodness and grace? Would we stand in disbelief of the extreme to which his forgiveness and mercy reaches? Would we have difficulty with the extremes to which God will go because He would that none should parish?

Would we say, the good news cannot be that good.
Would we say, the free gift cannot be that free.
Would we prefer the law and receive the wages of sin?
Do we not hear the law, that they that do these things shall live thereby?
We can have law, our grace. We cannot have both.

This is another example of the extremes of God. God in his wisdom, has determined that we should either keep the law or receive His son as our Savior and deliverance from the law. It cannot be a mixture of both. You see, by the law shall no flesh be justified before God, because by the law is the knowledge of sin. The law is death unto me. That which is good is causing death in me because of sin. The law is perfect, even as God is perfect and it must be kept perfectly. However, I cannot be made perfect through any works of law, because of the weakness of my flesh.

If you kept the law all your years but only failed to keep it on one small issue, the law will slay you because it is the law of sin and death. You can only live by it if you don’t sin in it. God gives us two options, one is to save ourselves through the law and the other is to realize our salvation in the finished work of Christ.

The law is fulfilled in Christ. He is the end of the law for righteousness. So it follows that if we are still trying to be in good standing with God through works or law or out-word forms and rituals of law, we cannot please God.

God is extreme in his position, it is either works or grace. The apostle Paul put it this way, if it is works then it is no more grace. God will not say of one of His children, as we might, "oh, isn’t that nice he is trying to keep the law." God is extreme in His position, it is either the law of sin and death, or the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. He will not except a mixture.

In that day they will say Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name? And in your name have cast out devils? And in your name done many wonderful works? And He will say, go thy way, I never knew you: depart from me, you that work iniquity. Behold the goodness and severity of God.

These are the acts of the children of a harlot. They have learned from their mother, who is a spiritual harlot, having more than one husband. Her first husband not being dead yet she married another, which Paul taught against in Romans chapter seven, if you do so you are committing spiritual adultery. The church is still operating as under the law of her first husband, yet has married another.

God, the Father will not tolerate mixture, He would that you were cold or hot, warm is not acceptable. He is pure and we must be pure in heart, with clean hands. The only way we have clean hands and a pure heart is through the grace of God in Christ, not the result of our performance of law and ritual.

The keeping of laws and rituals only genders to a false humility when in actuality there is an underlying pride of self-accomplishment, which will eventually rear it’s ugly head. It will always rise up in the condemnation of others not able to keep the same laws and rituals. True humility is the result of the Lord alone receiving the glory which sets us free through His promise of the free gift. Much, if not all of what we have come to know as religion, is nothing more than self righteousness, or self exaltation, resulting in wolves in sheep’s clothing.

God help us to know the will of God, in Christ. God loves to the extreme and he hates to the extreme. He is pure and cannot be corrupted. The only way we become pure is through his provision, we cannot climb up some other way.

Art Groesbeck