Sabbath Musing

nothing but against is hell

Photo by Arthur A on Unsplash

For and against

Though we don’t always believe that it’s true, the future belongs to the for.

For life, for love, for light, for right.

Beauty rises from ashes, truth will always triumph, courage will turn the tide. Because the Creator is for his creation.

Are you?

Against

To be against instead of for is to linger at hell’s door. From this pertinacious perch you’ll hear only bitterness below. “Hell is where no one has anything in common with anybody else except the fact that they all hate one another and cannot get away from one another and from themselves,” Thomas Merton.

Against sounds like this : “Blame them, hate them, damn them, shoot them, fear them, avoid them, get rid of them if possible.”

It’s the story of Cain, envy gnawing in his guts, who decides his jealousy is not the problem. Instead, he eliminates his God-approved brother, and faces the terror of a whole planet now set against him. The ground soaked in Abel’s blood will no longer yield to him, strangers will seek to kill him, the home he loved will be lost to him, the face of God will fade from his view.

When Cain cries out in horrified dread, God graciously grants him protection. Unbelievably, undeservedly, God is still for him. Later, Cain’s son Enoch faithfully “walked with God,” and became known as one of God’s favorites (See Genesis 4, 5:24). Doesn’t that make you wonder?

The power of for

breezes in on a quiet whisper, “ Forgive, and forbear the foolish, and forlorn. For I will never forget nor forsake you.”

If God is for us, who can be against us? (Romans 8:31). Great question.

The momentum of history is always forward, not in returning to a sentimentalized, safer past. God brings us through the frightening present to a future even now unfolding.

“Behold, I am making all things new,” (Revelation 21:5) is not wishful thinking, but a daily dose of goodness and strength—even now, in even this, even for you.

For without fear

“Don’t be bluffed into silence by the threats of bullies. 
There’s nothing they can do to your soul, your core being.
Save your fear for God, who holds your entire life—body and soul—in his hands.”

Jesus, in Matthew 10:28 The Message

In other words, the One with ultimate power over you is the God who sent his Son to die for you, to rescue you from the only thing he has set himself against—the hell-raising devil we resemble when we refuse God’s “compassion for all he has made” (Psalm 145:9).

So, which will it be—the transforming, upending for of Jesus, or that ancient against-everything-deceiver? Will you allow God to reshape, remold your life into what and whom you are for, or will you, in fear, shape yourself into a droning hiss of against?