Basic HTML Version
God's
FAITH
84:12).
or by grace are ye saved
through faith ; and that
not of yourselves: it is
the gift of God'" (Eph.
2:8). ' 'O Lord of hosts,
blessed is the man that
trusteth in thee" (Ps.
Faith and trust in God are para–
mount for sa lvation-no one ques–
tions that. God is fai t hful to perform
all the promises He has made to us;
He is merciful, forgiv ing, always
a live and on hand to help His people;
holy, just, eterna!, loving- perfect in
a ll His ways. Again, no one argues
with this premise.
But man, on the other hand, is just
the opposite: He is vile, evil , fallible–
the wickedness of man is so great that
every imagination of the thoughts of
bis hea rt is only evil, continually. Full
of vanity, lust and greed, the best of
them is asa briar, and the most upright
as a thorn hedge. David sums it up for
us when be says: "God looked down
from heaven upon the children ofmen,
to see if there were any that did under–
stand, that did seek God. Every oneof
them is gone back: they are altogether
become filthy ; there is none that doeth
good, no, notone"! (Ps. 53:2-3.)
Helpless Clods
Tsaiah nails it on the head when he
quotes God as saying, "Thou worm
Jacob" ! (Isa. 41: 14.) Peter tells us:
" ... If the righteous scarcely be
saved, where shall the ungodly and
the sinner appear? "
(I
Pet. 4:18.)
Pa ul lays it on the line in bis first
The
PLAIN TRUTH June·July 1979
inMan
by
Jon
Hill
book to the Corinthians where he
tells us what kiñd of people the breth–
ren are: foolish, dumb sheep, weak,
base, despised, helpless clods!
Don't worry, nothin's goin' to turn
out all right! Even after you have
done everything God commanded,
you are supposed to recognize that
you are an unprofitable servant, only
doing your duty (Luke 17:1 0).
Faith and trust are formen to have
in God. But you don't suppose your
Father in heaven and your Savior put
any trust or faith in you, do you? O
wretched man that I am, 1 die daily
and beat my body into submission.
1
can't so much as lift my eyes to God,
but just hang my head and say,
"Lord, havemerey on me, a sinner."
Sometimes we outrival the "hu–
mi lity" of Job. We know God is so
good and perfect and we are so evil
and bad that there is nothing we can
doto please Him, yet "though he slay
me, yet will
1
trust in him" ! (Job
13: 15.) We develop a nega tive as–
sumption: God is so good. He is
bound to do bad things to us bad
people, and we deserve every bit of
it!
All these scriptures quoted or re–
ferred toare in God's Word, and they
are true- but often we, with our
guilt complexes, allow them to all
gang together to make the situation
look hopeless. We forget all the thou–
sands of positive comments God's
writers make about Him, and quote
Him as making about His people.
Poor George
Sometimes we allow ourselves to get
into an attitude where we picture
ours elves s piritually like poor
George. George fell off a scaffold
from three stories up, broke half the
bones in his body, scalded himself
with hot tar and lay in the hospital
covered with bandages from head to
foot , strapped in traction, fed intra–
venously-only his left eyeball was
visible! The doctor carne in, checked
the chart at the bottom of the bed of
pain, hmmmed knowingly, but not
too encouragingly, carne around the
side of the bed, looked closely at
George and said, "I don't like the
looks of that eye!"
Hopeless!
Somehow we. forget that God in
His perfection devised a plan to bring
us out of our natural depravity and
into the divine perfection of His own
family!
Severa! years ago there was a pop–
ular country-western song that pic–
tured God as many see Him, called
"God's Gonna Getcha Fer That!"
The lyrics told about the common
foibles of human nature and each
refrain ended with "God's gonna get–
cha fer that!"
It
showed God as only
concerned with being divine Judge,
Jury, Policeman 'and Jailer. Forgot–
ten were His !ove, merey, forgiveness
and concern- and no mention was
even made of His plan for man–
kind.
Did God really make a mistake
when He created man? Did Satan
upset God's applecart when he de–
ceived our first parents in the Garden
of Eden? Does the dismal history of
man prove that whatever God may
have planned for him must have been
a failure?
17