Stephen
Terry, Director
To Be
Pleasing to God
Commentary
for the January 18, 2025, Sabbath School Lesson
Jesus continued: "There was a man who had two sons. The
younger one said to his father, 'Father, give me my share of the estate.' So he
divided his property between them." Luke 15:11-12, NIV
As I write this commentary, the
citizens of Los Angeles County, California are continuing to battle horrendous
fires that swept through several densely populated suburbs, killing some with
the death toll still to be finalized and turning to ash thousands of buildings.
The damage to the communities, especially Pacific Palisades and Malibu, thus
far is several times worse than the damage caused by the Great San Francisco fire
of 1906 or the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. This is largely because those
earlier fires were not driven by hurricane force Santa Ana winds driving the
embers and relentlessly kindling new blazes before fire control could even
begin to contain existing ones. Those same winds kept airborne fire control attempts
grounded. With inadequate resources to quickly knock down the inferno, it
became impossible to prevent the scene from becoming apocalyptic. What began as
one blaze became as many as half a dozen north and west of Los Angeles, all of
them with no containment.
God must weep to see such
suffering and loss. But among those who professed to be his people a different
spirit soon manifested itself. With misplaced schadenfreude, the finger
pointers showed up eager to cry out that this happened as a judgment of God
against the people of Los Angeles County because they were so sinful. These
individuals cited judgment passages from the Bible to prove they were right, and
God is going to get everyone else except them, because those suffering are all
sinners. Seventh-day Adventists were part of that crowd. The only difference
was their addition of quotes from Ellen White with their finger pointing.
Sadly, those who are doing this and read this commentary may not even see the
evil their mischaracterization of God is producing. The god they believe in is
the same god the Jews believed in that rejected Jesus. They wanted a god of
wrath and vengeance who would drive the Romans from Palestine and put the Jews
in charge as his chosen people. They wanted a punishing storm god like Baal.They
had no desire to suffer a peaceful and loving God like the incarnation of Jesus
testified of. They felt those who preached such a loving God, who would send
his own son to die instead of judging the people, were heretics and deserved to
die. They acted on that belief and murdered Jesus and set about murdering his
followers, believing they were doing the will of their murderous, wrathful god
in doing so.
We are no different today. Too
many of us want a God who will deal apocalyptic judgment against our political
enemies, and we would absolutely love it if the government felt that way also.
After all, the Bible says that God sets up governments, so why shouldn't his
people make sure that the government acts according to godly principles as we
understand them? Why shouldn't such a government rain down fire on the heads of
evildoers in the name of God? And wouldn't it be great if we could sit on the sidelines
with our bags of micro-waved popcorn gleefully watching the "judgments of God"
enacted by such a government while we shout "Repent, Sinners! God is doing this
to you because of your sins! You are getting what you deserve?" What a
disgusting scene that would be. But it is not far from what is happening over
the Los Angeles fires.
Jesus revealed to us the true
character of God. He healed the sick, the lame, and the blind. He shared his
blessings with both the righteous and sinners. He did not quiz them first to
determine whether they were deserving of his miracles. In some instances, after
he performed a miraculous healing, he told the person to "go and sin no more."
Some see in this a revelation that God does not tolerate sinners. But the meaning
is quite the opposite. He wanted those witnessing those miracles to understand
that he was not healing them because they were righteous, but because God is
love and his love is bestowed on sinner and saint alike. God's grace and
compassion are beyond belief. Jonah could not stand the idea that God would
spare Nineveh from being destroyed because of his love for the Ninevites. (Jonah
4) I dare say that there are many Jonahs today who
would rather see the entire world go up in flames than allow the idea that God
could pardon someone who had lived a profligate life. Those who lived their lives
for decades obeying every command of God however slight would feel keenly the
imagined injustice as Jonah did. They denied themselves every joy in the belief
that they would receive greater joy in heaven. They feel sinners should do
likewise and give up their joy in the very blessings God has granted them to
repent in sackcloth and ashes before God who will witness their suffering and
reward them for it in the next life. But they are not in charge of who enters
heaven. God is.
Jesus told a story of two sons
of a wealthy man. (Luke
15:11-32) One of the sons became impatient for his inheritance and asked
his father for it while he lived. His father granted his wish and bestowed his
share of the wealth upon him. The son, who did not understand what was required
to produce such wealth, went to the city and found many friends who were eager
to help him spend his money. Once the money was gone, the friends vanished, and
he was left with no means to provide for himself. He eventually
found a job caring for pigs. Over time, he found that the pigs were getting
better treatment than he was. He remembered that those hired servants who
worked for his father were treated better than his employer was treating him.
He decided to go home and ask his father to employ him as one of the servants.
Surely that would be better than what he was reduced to now. He did not know
how much his father loved him, and how every day he would watch down the road
to see if his son was returning. When he did return, his father saw him coming while
he was still far off and ran to him and embraced him. The son recited what he
had planned to say to his father and asked to be hired as a servant. His father
would not hear of it. He dressed him as a son and threw a welcome home party
for the one who had wandered and now returned. His love overrode any wrongs that
might have been done. This created a bond of love
between their two hearts that would not easily be broken.
What a beautiful illustration of
the loving character of God. But the story does not end there. The man's other
son deeply resented his father's love and compassion toward his profligate
brother and refused to celebrate his return. Like so many who consider
themselves Christians today, he probably would have felt his brother got what
he deserved for his sins if he had perished instead of returning home. Whether
perishing in the flames of an inferno or dying of starvation and exposure far
from home, God takes no pleasure in the death of humanity. (Ezekiel
18:32) How dare his people rejoice over such a loss. Yet here we are doing
exactly that, and worse because it is magnified many times over through social
media, causing the name of God to stink in the nostrils of those he lovingly
created.
When Jesus was asked about some
who were slain by the Romans while offering sacrifices, he asked in return if
those who were asking thought those people suffered because they were great
sinners, and he also cited those killed when a tower fell on them and asked the
same about them. He said they were not, but that those asking about them should
repent lest they suffer a similar fate. (Luke
13:1-5) Thus, it is sin to think that a person's suffering is related in
any way to their sinfulness. Those who think that it is should learn from the butterfly.
When a caterpillar has reached maturity, it creates a chrysalis and over time,
a metamorphosis takes place. When the moment is right, a beautiful butterfly
emerges from its capsule and begins to struggle to unfold its wings. If we feel
sorry for the butterfly and try to help it unfold its wings, we risk crippling it
so it can never fly. The struggle is necessary to pump vital fluid into the
wings to not only expand but to nourish them to their full glory. When there is
genuine need that we fully understand and can truly help, we should. But the
point of this little parable is that suffering is not to be
taken as a sign of the loss of God's loving favor or as a punishment. Like
the butterfly, it may be to reveal the fulness of the glory of all we were
meant to be. We should love friend and foe alike and not judge in these things,
for judgment belongs to God, and he is love. (1
John 4:8)