good?

what is 'good'?

slowly reading through "Problem of Pain" by C.S. Lewis. Chapter 5 is "The Fall of Man" and I just finished it. Something cool hit me as I was reviewing the chapter before heading into Chapter 6.

Background info:
The problem of pain is this:

"If God were good, He would wish to make His creatures perfectly happy, and if God were almighty He would be able to do what He wished. But the creatures are not happy. Therefore God lacks either goodness, or power, or both. This is the problem of pain...The possibility of answering it depends on showing that the terms 'good' and 'almighty', and perhaps also the term 'happy', are equivocal..."(p. 16)

At the end of Chapter 5 we read this: "The thesis of this chapter is simply that man, as a species, spoiled himself, and that good, to us in our present state, must therefore mean primarily remedial or corrective good."(p. 85)

This is so cool to me because we are always confused and we don't understand how God can be good. He does not measure up to our meter of goodness. Why is that? Because we are fallen, so our 'good' or 'fair' to us is not necessarily true goodness or fairness. We wonder and complain why we have to suffer, "It's not fair! Why didn't this happen to someone else? I don't deserve this!" But, no, it is good, it is fair. Just not by our fallen measure of goodness and/or fairness. It is good by the true measure (God's measure) of goodness and fairness.

Isaiah 55:8-9

"...in Christ Jesus"

Last month was the High School Summer Camp (aka H205). One night I spoke on "Peace, Rest, Joy". The key passage was Philippians 3:6-7.

I had memorized this verse before but never really studied it. Really thinking about it for the first time was an amazing eye opener. I looked at verse 7 and wondered why the phrase "in Christ Jesus" was there. Then I realized that that phrase is what makes the whole peace with God possible.

Without that phrase the verse would, at first glance, seem to make sense: "And the peace of God which trancends all understanding will guard your hearts and minds." Right? Doesn't that make sense? God's peace is powerful enough to guard our hearts and minds.

Another verse in Philippians is 'built' the same way and I was just meditating on it tonight. It is 4:19 which says, "And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus." Again, it seems that this verse would work fine without the last phrase: "And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory." God has a lot of riches in glory, and surely He could use them to provide for all our needs, couldn't He?

But the phrase "in Christ Jesus" is absolutely essential to both of these passages. How do we have peace with God? By having a good relationship with Him. What are our needs? I don't think these needs are the usual needs listed (viz. food, water, shelter, clothing, love). Those needs are necessary for our life on this earth. But is our life on this earth really and truly a need? I would argue that it isn't a need. What we really need is a personal relationship with our Creator God. That is our true need.

So basically we have broken both of these things (peace with God and the supplying of our needs) down to: having a right relationship with God. Now, how do we have a right relationship with God? God desires to give us peace and He desires to meet our needs. But we are sinful. God is holy and cannot forever tolerate sin in His presence. We cannot enter into His presence any more than darkness can enter the presence of light. You cannot hold darkness in your hand and bring it into the light. In many passages of Scripture we see sin being likened to darkness and God, Christ, and holiness being likened to light. This is one place where we can use that analogy. We are darkness (sin) and cannot enter into light (God's holy presence).

Except.

In Christ Jesus.

This phrase makes these two verses true. We can only have peace with God because of Christ Jesus and what He did. We can only have our needs supplied because of Christ Jesus and what He did. He lived a sinless life and thus did not have to die for His own sins but could be sacrificed for our sins. He took our darkness upon Himself so that we might become light and be able, then, to enter into the Light and to have peace with God and to have our true needs met...in Christ Jesus.

darkness

At YLI's TEAM conference this past week we heard a message on light and darkness. The speaker talked about being scared at night and how we think there might be someone in the room with us when we can't see anything.

I was thinking about this...I find it interesting that we always imagine someone scary is in there with us--we never imagine that when we turn on the lights we will see our fairy godmother waiting to grant us any wish we may have; it's always someone standing over us with a knife or something. hmm...thoughts anyone?

57 names

I recieved this offline message from a worried Yahoo! friend:

From the director of Yahoo, everybody sorry for the interruption, but yahoo is closing the system down because too many booters are taking up all the names, we only have 57 names left, if u would like to close your account, dont send this message, if you want to keep your account, send this message to everyone on your list. This is no joke, you'll be sorry if you dont send it. thanks director of yahoo, Tim Buiski, whoever doesnt send this message your account will be deactivated and it will cost $10.00 a month to use it. To send to everyone one your list right click on your group then click send.

HAHA. Gosh, well will people stop believing these things?

brevity

i write clever words on paper
i sometimes think i don't believe at all
i've never felt so fake so false and such a lie
i couldn't even look him in the eyes
he was 25 like i was
but he was deaf and slowly going blind
he made my faith seem worthless
the things i hoped were pointless
and he fought to stay
but always dreamed that he could leave this place

the angel's wings
will cover you tonight
halleluJah
press your head against the breast of Christ
halleluJah

it made me feel so empty
collapsing on some dirty bathroom floor
and isn't it just like me to mourn his passing breath
when he will never suffer anymore?
beautiful, his pictures
fading black and silver
and i sing of faith
but his was true and fierce
and i will miss him

HalleluJah

~Brave Saint Saturn
"estrella"

I open up a normally humdrum "Alumni Relations" email from my college. I scan through the article titles to see if there is anything interesting, expecting nothing. I read "Lynda Joy Varner (1979-2005)" and I gasp, "Oh, no!" in a hushed startled sort of way. I read the article and tears well up in my eyes.

Now, I had met Lynda a few times but never really knew her. I knew her parents better: Her mother I primarily knew because I worked on the school's website and met with her a few times to get information for her department to put on the website. Her father was twice my professor and in one class he really was involved with us (there were only 13 or so of us). He invited us over to his house a few times (which is where I met Lynda and became better acquanted with her mother).

But, reading of her death made me think of how hard that must be for her parents, extended family and close friends. And I began to think about death and what it meant and how we should act toward it. I was immediately reminded of the "Brave Saint Saturn" song I quoted above, and the line in it that says "and isn't it just like me to mourn his passing breath when he will never suffer anymore?" I thought of how she is now in heaven and does not have to be bothered/held back/restricted by the shackle of sin as she did in this world. She will never suffer anymore. And we should rejoice in that. Still, isn't it okay to mourn? I like to say that life is a balancing act. I think there should be a balance in regard to this as well. Of course it is okay to mourn, we will miss her. But at the same time, realize that she is now in heaven and able to worship God perfectly. In vain, while she was upon the earth, she strove to be holy...now she is. In this we should rejoice.

I am also reminded of the brevity of life and how we could die tomorrow, so we need to live for Christ today. I am reminded of a quote that was put on someone's door on my wing my sophomore year of college. It was one of Jonathan Edwards' resolutions: "Resolved never to do anything I would not do were it the hour of His coming." This is how we should live because it could be the hour of His coming, but it could also be the hour of our going.

Now all has been heard;
here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep His commandments,
for this is the whole duty of man.

For God will bring every deed into judgment,
including every hidden thing,
whether it is good or evil.

~Ecclesiastes 12:13-14