Ever Feel Bad for God?

Ever feel bad for God? I do. I feel bad for God when He is displayed as something less than He truly is.

Take, for instance, those who call themselves "Christians" and then engage in all kinds of obviously evil behavior. We have had to deal with this for centuries, from the Crusades to the Inquisitions to the Salem witch trials. Now it's the Westboro Baptist types or TV evangelists. Now it's false prophets telling everyone they should be healthy and wealthy or surrender any real Christianity in favor of "the social gospel". Now it's us, every time we sin. We bring dishonor to the Name of our Savior and portray to the world a false picture of God.

There are those who argue that baptism is required for salvation. Dig into this for a few minutes, and you will discover that they are speaking of a specific baptism. It must be "full immersion" and/or it must be "in the Name of Jesus" … or not. It must be by particular people, to particular people, done a particular way with particular words. And I weep for God. For centuries no one practiced "that particular way", and God failed to obtain the salvation of anyone. He tried, but just couldn't get anyone to listen. Sure, they responded to His call, confessed their sin, repented, and placed their faith in Christ, but they didn't know about "that particular way", so they ended up damned, and God failed again. I weep for Him.

There are those who argue that our task is evangelism and they like to use this kind of reasoning to urge you forward: "If you don't reach them for Christ, who will?" And I weep for God. He would like to reach people. He would like to save as many as is humanly possible. But we have severely limited Him by not reaching the people He intends us to reach. He has failed, again.

There are those that bemoan the tragedies of September 11 and the like. Atrocities of evil people as well as "acts of God" are all assigned to someone else. God didn't do it. He doesn't allow evil. He can't even be in the presence of sin. So He wanders about, trying to find someplace where He can be, and wrings His hands over all the evils, both moral and temporal, that befall His beloved world and His beloved children. If only He could do something about it, but, alas, evil reigns and He can only intervene at times to try to pull things out. I feel bad for God.

Now, try suggesting otherwise. Offer, for instance, that God is sovereign. That would mean that Man's "free will" is limited by God's sovereign will. Unacceptable. That would mean that God allowed, even ordained, the events of 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, that poor woman's miscarriage, or whatever other tragedy you might imagine. Inconceivable. That would require that those who misrepresent Christianity are not Christians at all, but deceivers – wolves in Christian clothing. Not likely. And that would mean that, regardless of whether you're baptized or I go to the mission field, God is able to save every single person He intends to save. Unthinkable.

Poor God. He'd like to be sovereign, but His creation has managed to take over.

Or should I simply be feeling bad for those who suffer from such an anemic God?