Monday, February 13, 2012

The Mountain

It’s long been said and known that God is in direct opposition by comparison to the nature of man. Even most theists, deists, agnostics and atheists agree that if God does indeed exist, He is incomparably better than the world. Some of those people will use this very argument to conclude that God does not exist, or does but is very hands off about it. However, I’m not getting into that argument today.
My purpose in this entry is to give you another analogy or allegory that strives/attempts to express the amazing story of grace.
It has become a popularized idea that all religions worship the same God, and we’re all going to heaven but taking different paths to get there. It’s like God is at the top of the mountain, and each of us is hiking towards Him, each taking our own path to the top. Some of us have harder paths while others have easier paths. Some have longer paths while others have shorter paths. No matter how toilsome or rugged, a spirit of pride has told us we each deserve to get to heaven and we will.
Christianity completely disagrees with this concept. “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father except through me.” –Jesus
What if I told you that God, instead of you working your way to Him, worked His way toward you? Selah.
What if I told you that God’s compassion so strongly compels Him to save you that He, in humility, approaches you? What if I told you that it’s not based on anything you have ever done, and nothing you ever could or will do? “While we were yet still sinners, Christ died for us.”
Grace. In the beginning God created The Mountain. There were 3 men, 1 women, and 1 spirit in perfect harmony as God the Father created it to be. After some unkown time, the woman was deceived and fell down the mountain, and the man after her.
One important note- Before the fall , God had perfect plans, a Word that made man perfect, and in man was a spirit God created to be loved, to dwell in perfect love and harmony. It was not simply that you were created to be loved, but God had plans to be with you in eternal bliss, and after He lost you, He would do anything to get you back. When Adam and Eve fell, not only did they fall but so did all of mankind, and the Father grieved.
The only thing that could keep them from God was the exact thing they committed- sin. In agony indescribable and compassion unbearable, the Father upheld justice- that the punishment for sin is death.
Again, in perfect love, God sent His Son to the bottom of the mountain to remind us of who He is, and make a way for us to once again dwell in purity and holiness with Him. And that way was death, followed by a wonderful resurrection. This was also to symbolize our own death to sin, and resurrection through grace.
This is where our story begins. This is where we find that God is at the bottom of the mountain with an outstretched hand, motivated by love to ask you to take it and follow Him.
God does not  see your sin and condemn you. He does not punish you in revoltion, but disciplines you in love. He is just. Love is here to bring us back to where we started, and that place is beautiful.

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