The Discipline of God and What Our Sins Deserve
Below is an email that awaited me in my box when I returned to my office today. Along with it is a brief response. What do you all think?
Hey Pastor Tim,
I have some scripture that I'm a little confused on, and I'm not sure if I will be able to express my confusion correctly but here it goes; Act 5:1-11 tells the story of a married couple who die because they witheld the truth (from God) on the amount of money they received when selling their property. They kept some for themselves while giving the rest to the apostles. Now I understand the deception and greed they had. What I don't understand is why they had to die. This type of scripture seems to be very common in the Old Testament, when man tests God they lose, and sometimes in very disturbing ways. What makes this disturbing to me is that this happened in the New Testament, after Jesus paid for our sins on the cross. Could they not have repented and asked for forgiveness? To me, Peter comes off as arrogant or that he himself killed the wife after telling her to look at the feet of the men who just carried her dead husband out. I don't know I might be totally missing the message on this one. Could you help to clarify this for me.
Thanks,
______
My response:
Hey _____________,
To give a short answer to your good question let me say this:
1. First, Peter was simply relaying God's perspective on this situation; he wasn't killing them or being arrogant. He was telling them what God thought about their sin, and simply carrying out God's sentence against them for it.
2. The truth is that what happens here reveals how God views all sin. Remember that all the way back to Genesis 2 we're told that if we sin any sin, death is the natural and divinely ordained judgment for it. All sin deserves death (Romans 6:23; James 1:14, 15) because no matter how small it seems or trivial it might appear, it is an offence against a holy God.
3. Since God is unchangingly holy and just, God's view of sin is no different in the New Testament than in the Old. In fact some of the most frightening descriptions of God's attitudes toward all sin (including lying, see Rev. 21:8; 22:14, 15) are found in the teachings of Jesus and the New Testament. Few seem to realize that no one in the Bible spoke more about hell the consequences of sin more scarily than did Jesus!
4. In the Bible we have instances like these in both Testaments to remind us of just how bad sin is, and of what all sin deserves. For example in 1 Corinthians 11:28-30 we see that God actually put some to death because they partook of the Lord's Supper without careful preparation of heart! And there’s no reason to think (as far as I know) that He doesn’t still do this today.
You are right in saying that "when man tests God, he loses, and some times in very disturbing ways." I think that is exactly the point of these occasions in Scripture: God is reminding us of what our every sin deserves and of what He could justly do to us every time we test Him by doing things we know to be wrong.
The real mystery here is why people aren't dying for these types of things more often, since God could kill us fairly for them. The fact that these things are rare speaks of the amazing patience of God toward us.
5. Regarding the question of God's forgiveness, I'd say that it may well be that Ananias and Sapphira were forgiven of their sins (if in fact they were true believers which I think they were) but still had to face certain earthly consequences for those sins.
Forgiveness does not erase certain consequences on earth. It erases the eternal consequence of hell but not all earthly consequences in this life. (Think of the murderer who later comes to faith in Christ. He is forgiven of his sin but he still has to be punished on earth for it.
There's a lot more to your questions bro, than what can be unfolded in a short email reply. For this reason I'm going to post your letter and my reply (without your name of course) on my blog, so others can speak into the question and a conversation can begin. I’d encourage you to follow up there!
Thanks so much for your very thoughtful and humble questions brother. It speaks well of God's grace at work in you that you are thinking carefully about the reading of the Word of God!
Yours in Him,
Tim
Hey Pastor Tim,
I have some scripture that I'm a little confused on, and I'm not sure if I will be able to express my confusion correctly but here it goes; Act 5:1-11 tells the story of a married couple who die because they witheld the truth (from God) on the amount of money they received when selling their property. They kept some for themselves while giving the rest to the apostles. Now I understand the deception and greed they had. What I don't understand is why they had to die. This type of scripture seems to be very common in the Old Testament, when man tests God they lose, and sometimes in very disturbing ways. What makes this disturbing to me is that this happened in the New Testament, after Jesus paid for our sins on the cross. Could they not have repented and asked for forgiveness? To me, Peter comes off as arrogant or that he himself killed the wife after telling her to look at the feet of the men who just carried her dead husband out. I don't know I might be totally missing the message on this one. Could you help to clarify this for me.
Thanks,
______
My response:
Hey _____________,
To give a short answer to your good question let me say this:
1. First, Peter was simply relaying God's perspective on this situation; he wasn't killing them or being arrogant. He was telling them what God thought about their sin, and simply carrying out God's sentence against them for it.
2. The truth is that what happens here reveals how God views all sin. Remember that all the way back to Genesis 2 we're told that if we sin any sin, death is the natural and divinely ordained judgment for it. All sin deserves death (Romans 6:23; James 1:14, 15) because no matter how small it seems or trivial it might appear, it is an offence against a holy God.
3. Since God is unchangingly holy and just, God's view of sin is no different in the New Testament than in the Old. In fact some of the most frightening descriptions of God's attitudes toward all sin (including lying, see Rev. 21:8; 22:14, 15) are found in the teachings of Jesus and the New Testament. Few seem to realize that no one in the Bible spoke more about hell the consequences of sin more scarily than did Jesus!
4. In the Bible we have instances like these in both Testaments to remind us of just how bad sin is, and of what all sin deserves. For example in 1 Corinthians 11:28-30 we see that God actually put some to death because they partook of the Lord's Supper without careful preparation of heart! And there’s no reason to think (as far as I know) that He doesn’t still do this today.
You are right in saying that "when man tests God, he loses, and some times in very disturbing ways." I think that is exactly the point of these occasions in Scripture: God is reminding us of what our every sin deserves and of what He could justly do to us every time we test Him by doing things we know to be wrong.
The real mystery here is why people aren't dying for these types of things more often, since God could kill us fairly for them. The fact that these things are rare speaks of the amazing patience of God toward us.
5. Regarding the question of God's forgiveness, I'd say that it may well be that Ananias and Sapphira were forgiven of their sins (if in fact they were true believers which I think they were) but still had to face certain earthly consequences for those sins.
Forgiveness does not erase certain consequences on earth. It erases the eternal consequence of hell but not all earthly consequences in this life. (Think of the murderer who later comes to faith in Christ. He is forgiven of his sin but he still has to be punished on earth for it.
There's a lot more to your questions bro, than what can be unfolded in a short email reply. For this reason I'm going to post your letter and my reply (without your name of course) on my blog, so others can speak into the question and a conversation can begin. I’d encourage you to follow up there!
Thanks so much for your very thoughtful and humble questions brother. It speaks well of God's grace at work in you that you are thinking carefully about the reading of the Word of God!
Yours in Him,
Tim
Labels: Chastisement, God's Discipline
posted by Tim Shorey at
9:37 AM
5 Comments:
Very sobering thoughts indeed Tim. Remember the comments regarding those on whom the Tower of Saloam fell. They were no more guilty than the rest. The message was that unless we repent, we shall all "likewise perish". That is to say, when we least expect it. There is a day that God may say enough, and no more. Thus the exhortation to work out our salvation with "phobos kai tropos", fear & trembling, is relevant here. God is a consuming fire. His wrath is held back only so that he may show the goodness of his longsuffering toward those whom he plans to save.
What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering vessels of wrath fitted unto destruction:
and that he might make known the riches of his glory upon vessels of mercy, which he afore prepared unto glory,
I agree that the amazing event is his longsuffering not his wrath. Rom. 1 vividly describes two divine and constant activities in the events and lives of men. One is the revelation of his wrath against all ungodliness. The other is the revelation of the righteousness of God from faith to faith.
Remember the two types of wrath spoken of in Romans 1, Thumos and orgay. One is a slow boil, if you will, the other is an outburst.
We see this again with the fellow who tried to steady the ark of the covenant when the ox cart was unstable. God killed him on the spot. This even angered David.
When we meditate on what we truly deserve, our amazement is not that God judges men, but that he shows mercy and goodness to men.
"There is forgiveness with Thee, that Thou mayest be feared."
My thoughts.....
JR
(PS Tim, so much for confidentiality, you left the email adress in your blog.)
Well.....my short answer is----I think you're right.
My question is not why God struck down Ananias and Sapphira, but why He hasn't struck me down.
Thank you Tim for putting that in perspective for me. I was thinking that their death for their sin had automatically sent them to hell. I wasn't seperating the punishment on earth to the punishment in the eternal. So what you are saying is that if they were true believers in Jesus they still went to heaven, even though they were punished by god for their sin on earth.
Thanks and I look forward to reading your blog.
brian
PS...no worries on posting my name in error. lol
Thanks for your grace Brian! I've deleted your name--but o just a little too late!
BTW- I tried to keep it anonymous, not because there was anything wrong with your questions. They were good questions needing to be answered because most people have no category nowadays for God as He really is. They are not even open to a God who takes sins seriously--Old or New testement--it doesn't seem to matter to them.
I thank God that He has opened your heart to accept and love God as He is; not as people pretend Him to be.
Is it Brian Solik? Or another Brian. Name names... since I was not astute enough to catch it when I first read the post!
And, I remain anonymous.... as I must, for asking such a question!
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