{"id":84,"date":"2017-03-02T16:21:37","date_gmt":"2017-03-02T16:21:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/?p=84"},"modified":"2017-03-02T16:21:37","modified_gmt":"2017-03-02T16:21:37","slug":"far-from-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/2017\/03\/far-from-god\/","title":{"rendered":"Far From God"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

What do you picture\u00a0when you think of someone being far from God? \u00a0Sometimes we might feel far from God because we’ve been messing up big time. \u00a0Perhaps our life has just been full of sin.<\/p>\n

Same with looking at others. \u00a0We might often think of the person on drugs, or deep in partying, or just living a wild or troubled life as being so very far from God.<\/p>\n

Conversely, when you look at the person who has their life together, working hard, being responsible and a productive member of society, you might be less inclined to think of them as being far from God.<\/p>\n

If they go to church, then they are definitely not too far from God. \u00a0From birth many of us have learned what it means to be a good person\u00a0or a bad person. \u00a0We have learned what is acceptable and what is not. \u00a0If we were raised in a religious context, that standard got spiritualized and we are even more sure of what it means to be “good” or “bad” and what it means to be far from God.<\/p>\n

Of course, if we have a Biblical theology, that tells us something a bit different.<\/p>\n

If we have studied the life of Jesus, that tells us something different as well.<\/p>\n

What does it mean to be far from God? \u00a0Is it found in behavior, or in reception to the love <\/a>and forgiveness of Jesus? \u00a0We know from the Bible that the key to being close to God is to receive his love and forgiveness by repenting and turning to Him. \u00a0We do not have to clean ourselves up or make ourselves acceptable. \u00a0We need to admit that there is nothing we can do in ourselves to make ourselves presentable to Him.<\/p>\n

When Jesus walked the earth, there were a lot of really “good” religious people who were busy being good and following the rules. \u00a0There were others who were successful in life and impressive members of society. \u00a0Few actually followed Jesus. \u00a0We may know of the rich young ruler who admitted that he kept all the commandments, but wouldn’t follow Jesus because he also wanted to keep all his money. \u00a0Then there were all\u00a0the religious leaders who didn’t want to admit that they weren’t good enough.<\/p>\n

They were really far from God.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Meanwhile the poor, the destitute, the sinners of the world, the outcasts who didn’t have a place in polite society had a great reaction to Jesus. \u00a0It even became a bit of a scandal, seeing who Jesus tended to hang out with for dinner. \u00a0 \u00a0He was friends with some really bad people.<\/p>\n

They were much closer to God. \u00a0Having supper with Him.<\/p>\n

In Revelation, one of the churches that is rebuked the strongest, Laodicea, has a problem with thinking they are really good when what they really need is the work of God.<\/p>\n

Many very good polished people who even go to church are very far from God for the simple reason that they are good and polished people who think they do good things Humanly speaking, they are doing great things.<\/p>\n

Being close to God is not a matter of behavior, but is a matter of grace and mercy. \u00a0If you \"\"<\/a>are not fully aware each day that your closeness to God always rests in His grace, His mercy, His sacrifice on your behalf, on His work, then you miss what it means to be close to\u00a0God.<\/p>\n

Now to be sure, those who have been touched by the Amazing Grace and Mercy of God will be changed and will no longer live for themselves. \u00a0In other words, if you are close to God, you will live better, but living better does not earn you closeness.<\/p>\n

Our theology teaches us this. \u00a0Let’s live it. \u00a0 Make each day about His goodness, not your goodness.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What do you picture\u00a0when you think of someone being far from God? \u00a0Sometimes we might feel far from God because we’ve been messing up big time. \u00a0Perhaps our life has just been full of sin. Same with looking at others. \u00a0We might often think of the person on drugs, or deep in partying, or just … Continue reading Far From God<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-84","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life-in-christ"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":92,"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84\/revisions\/92"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.beanscorner.org\/zion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}