When God Plays Hard to Get : Part 6

Out of Your Comfort Zone: Is Your God Too Nice?
by R. T. Kendall

(Page 6 of 6)

I therefore use the term "nice" for what often seems nice for a while. Parents may be regarded as nice because they have too few rules, administer very little discipline, or give in to their children's wishes as they grow up. But the cost down the road is incalculable. I used to be so resentful of my parents; they made me go to church it seemed like every time the door was opened, even on Wednesday evenings. I had to stop playing basketball when the kids in the neighborhood played in my own backyard - so I could be hauled off to church. I said, "Daddy, why can't you be nice like Richard's parents?" The parents of the other kids on our block were so nice. (A side note to this discussion - nearly all my old friends who had such nice parents either died early deaths in disgrace or ended up as total failures in life.)

God has given his Word, the Bible, as the road map for the way He wants the Church to glorify Him and the way He wants His children to govern their lives. The slightest deviation from His ways can seem so innocent and innocuous, at first. In the same way, if a jet plane leaving John F. Kennedy airport in New York and heading for London is the slightest degree off course, say only a few miles after takeoff, and if that deviation is not soon corrected, the same plane seven hours later will be circling over Spain rather than Heathrow Airport.

This book is written lovingly and earnestly as what will hopefully be a timely caution to a Church that has generally lost its way. I pray my words do not come across as moralizing or cause any kind of despair or even guilt. Yet if what I write makes sense to you and you feel God is speaking to you, it is a good sign, it seems to me, that God isn't finished with you - there is hope for a bright future.

One way God tests our loyalty and earnestness is to say things we clearly don't understand but which He wants us to believe none the less. This can seem unfair at times. Consider Jesus' words, "Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days" (John 2:19). Who understood these words at the time? Nobody, so far as I know, only the Lord Himself. This might have been a time for some of his followers to say, "Count me out . . . I can't take strange teaching like this." In any case, those very words were used against Jesus later when, at his trial, two men came forward to say, "This fellow said, 'I am able to destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days'" (Matt. 26:61).

Take Jesus' words to a mass audience, "I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life" (John 6:53-54). You can't get much more offensive than that. Jesus did not bother to explain what He meant here. He could have said, "Don't worry, this refers to divine communion after I am ascended to heaven," just as He might have said that the destroying and raising of the temple referred to His own body (John 2:21). It was part of the playing hard to get syndrome. Most registered their indignation with comments like, "'This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?' . . . And from this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him" (John 6:60-66). For some reason, the Twelve remained. Jesus did ask them, "You do not want to leave too, do you?" (v. 67). Peter replied, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life" (v. 68). I doubt the Twelve understood what Jesus meant by eating His flesh and drinking His blood any more than those who turned back, but they stayed with Him.

There are offensive teachings in the Bible, some of which I have chosen to deal with in this book. God wants us to accept His teachings even if we don't understand them. I don't know of anybody who understands the Trinity, Jesus being God and man simultaneously, the power in the blood of Jesus, why God is gracious and just yet lets evil continue, or why He instituted the doctrine of eternal punishment. I'll never forget Mrs. Martyn Lloyd-Jones' observation on the teaching of Hell: "I just go to Genesis 18:25 - 'Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?'" Some reject what they do not like in Scripture and yet feel God's approval in their comfort zone. God does not disturb them. Not now.

You could say that the central thesis of this book is that there is a sense in which the worst thing that can happen is for God to be nice to us, to let us stay comfortable where we are and never rouse us from our comfort zones. If His being nice means God graciously steps down and rescues us from our blindness and bondage, then may He ever be nice to us. But the worst thing is when He backs away from us, appearing to be nice, and just lets us be. Perhaps in the same way it was said of Ephraim, who was joined to idols: "Leave him alone!" (Hos. 4:17). Those in the Bible who would not accept the revelation of God - whether by creation or through conscience - were not struck down by lightning or brought to their knees by thunder. Instead we read that God merely "gave them over" to their desires and to minds void of judgment (Rom. 1:24, 26, 28).

What is described in Romans 1 does not directly describe the believer but the person who rejects the light of God on their conscience. But this truth is paralleled nonetheless when true believers foolishly say, "I wish God would leave me alone." Be careful or He may do just that. When a believer was sleeping with his stepmother and would not take godly counsel at first, the apostle Paul ordered that man to be handed over to Satan, "so that the sinful nature may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord" (1 Cor. 5:5). Though extreme, we know God can deal with His own people like this. "'The Lord will judge his people.' It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God" (Heb. 10:30-31). I don't want this to happen to you or to me, and yet I want Him to correct me if this is what I need.

Copyright © R. T. Kendall 2005

About the Author

Dr. R. T. Kendall served for 25 years as Minister of Westminster Chapel in London and now lives in Florida. From there, he continues his career as a popular Christian preacher and writer. His best-selling books include The Thorn in the Flesh, Total Forgiveness, and The Anointing.