Made Up God

There's a music video from a musician who I used to enjoy quite a bit. I enjoyed their new single and I was making a play list of music for a party I was having. I grabbed that music video which happens to take place at a gay pride festival. In it, this artist lets these people know that Jesus loves them, but what's more is this artist lets the festival goers know that the "Jesus they know" would never judge them for being gay. Perhaps you know the video and artist, perhaps not. I have no interest calling this person out by name nor do I plan to rally against homosexuality in this article. But there is something I want to draw your attention to that I think is a more serious and pressing concern from the story above. "The Jesus I know."

"The Jesus I know," have you ever heard that before? What about "the God I know?" Perhaps a better thing to say would be, "The God/Jesus I believe in," or even more close to the mark, "The God/Jesus I made up." In this godless world in which non-belief is becoming more and more prevalent, it seems like the believers who are still hanging in are starting to get it wrong also.

I was thinking about this situation the other day when trying to find how to best breach the subject with some people I was concerned for. I thought a while about it and my question thought would be, "Why do you think this? Can you point me to some scripture that backs up your argument?" The idea is to get them back to scripture, Holy Spirit spoken truth. That should always be the goal, but I also thought, what if it's that they just don't like what scripture has to say? Well what then?

I'm going to tell you the truth, I came out of this a little unsure what to think by the time I was done considering all these things but I'd like to share the conclusions I came to and ultimately how I would end up arguing this situation. To the people I was concerned for I would ask them if they actually even believed in Jesus any more. In this example, let's say they still consider themselves believers. "Of course I still believe in Jesus, how could you say that," they ask. Next I would ask, "you believe in Jesus and the God of the Bible, the Triune God," to which they should say yes. So I have to then remind them what scripture said in regards to the sinful lifestyles they were trying to defend. One time this happened to me and what's interesting was we kind of ended at a standstill with them agreeing, perhaps they weren't willing or ready to hear what God has to say. I warned them to turn their back on those sins, because I worried what a disregard for Jesus' Word could mean for their soul.

You see, I don't believe they have completely committed the sin in which they know what God has to say but turn God away, if I had to guess, I think that person honestly believes that if they took the time they'd find some verse that backs up what they believe, or maybe are waiting on some new doctrine or a change in theology announced in the church that would help support their argument. Or perhaps they believe that I am wrong, that maybe I don't know what I'm talking about, or I'm holding onto one out of context verse or twisting the meaning of something to suit my agenda. I really believe if the church opened up to some of these sins in this new tolerant world(and I pray they don't) that this person might even go back every Sunday and be singing the praises of this new Gospel. All I could do was ask this person to study God's Word further. To know His Word is Truth and that His Word has been fully revealed.

Here's a different example, there's also another person going through a similar situation. You see this person believes in God, but the difference from the last person is they don't like what He has to say. And it seems that everything God says makes them angry, down to the littlest things. I thought about this situation, and I thought about the last example, and I thought about that musician's music video and everyone else who's trying to redefine God and Jesus and I came to a scary conclusion.

If I may diverge for a second. This is not officially backed by my church or synod, these are my personal thoughts on it. But here's what came to mind when I thought about these people. They say they believe in Jesus, this is very different from being agnostic where one says, "I believe in a god." Jesus is a name, they don't believe in "a" god, or Buddha, or Shiva. They believe in Jesus. However, this Jesus accepts homosexuality, this God doesn't send unbelief or unrepentance to Hell, our souls come into existence once we breath open air in a hospital room and not at conception or even at 8 months and 20 days inside the womb, this God didn't create the Earth in 6-24 hour days.

I thought up this example. Right now the President is Barrack Obama. Regardless of how you or I feel about his politics, let's say I'm talking to some one about my love for the president's policies. I say I love how he is pro-marriage, anti-abortion and keeps the best practices of capitalism in mind in every decision he makes regarding the economy. I hope whomever I'm talking to would stop me in my tracks and say, "No, our president is for gay marriage, and he supports abortion clinics and he usually enacts social programs over big business." This is not a criticism of his politics, just the facts. What if I said, "Oh no, my president would never have such liberal ideals, my president is very conservative." Apart from the opposing party being very much in favor of my ignorant content, what I said just isn't true. I know the president's policy and agenda, he makes it known through platforms and laws and press conferences. People can point to things he has said and done and prove me very easily wrong. At the end of the day, I might not like it, but I'd be very much wrong believing otherwise. It would also be very dangerous to make something up like, "abortion is illegal in this country." Depending on who I'm talking to, my ignorance could end up hurting someone.

The president I believe in from my example is a made up man, I have no evidence of this man existing. So getting back on point, my fear is this. These people believe in a god named Jesus who doesn't exist. If I say I believe in Jesus, but make things up about Him that have no factual base, but otherwise just sound nice, I'm not sure these people haven't created an idol. I'm not so sure I want to accuse them of worshipping a false idol, but it does remind me of how Muslims would have us believe that Allah is the same as the Biblical God. At first it makes sense until you see how those doctrines are incompatible with each other.

So what do I tell the people in my personal life who I am concerned for? Do I tell them they are worshipping a false god? To be honest, I don't think it'd be a good idea. I can't point to a verse from scripture that says, when you change God's Word, you make a brand new god. But here's what I can tell someone. There are verses that warn the dangers of changing scripture(Revelations 22:18-19). There are verses condemning false teachers and those who twist God's Word(2 Timothy 4:3-4). What they are doing is absolutely a sin, a sin that needs to be stopped immediately as this is a sin that's very dangerous to people around them who learn about Christianity through their outward actions.

So let's get back to what we need to ask them. Something that Christians need to remember is to not play defense. Remember God is good, God is truth, there is no other way to Heaven so there is no need to defend, defending is in need of proving innocence and we have already been declared righteous through Jesus, however, a sinner does need to prove their innocence when they believe they are doing right against their and your better judgment. Ask them to explain themselves, ask them to present scripture that backs up their points. Be prepared to share verses that will help put them back onto the path to righteousness.

The Jesus I know is the only Jesus there is because the only reason I know about Jesus is that He has written His name on my heart. He has given me His Word and sent His teachers out into the world so that every ear can hear it, even if it does get ignored. Jesus is not a mystery, Jesus has not left anything unanswered, we can find everything we need to about Him and His Law right in the Bible.