Insights from 'Gospel According to Moses' (I)

I've had the chance to begin reading a book called "The Gospel According To Moses - What my Jewish friends taught me about Jesus" written by Athol Dickson , who has taken time out to understand the gospel through the eyes of our Jewish brothers. It has been an incredibly insightful read though i'm only at the first 3 chapters and a great journey in understanding who GOD is and who He says He is to His people.

Wanted to jot down a few insights from the book here so far:

1) God has unfulfilled desires

"Oh, that their hearts would be inclined to fear me and keep all my commands always, so that it might go well with them and their children forever! " Deu 5:29

Believe it or not, God has unfulfilled desires, and this desire is directed towards the people He has chosen and created. Made me think about unfufilled desires that i have and many others may have and how that longing feels.. but yet now knowing that it cannot be close in comparison to God's longing to have our hearts inclined towards Him so that all may be well with us. Imagine, the Creator and Ruler of the universe expressing unfulfilled longing! God’s self-limitation costs him dearly. what has He chosen to limit Himself with? to provide his creation with free will, to freely choose good or evil and hence to love. He could have created a world that was could only do good, and save Him all the heartache, but hence unable to know true love - a love that does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth, a love that keeps no record of wrong where wrong does exist.

If we have any longing.. an unfufilled hope e.g. a desire to be loved, a hope of better life, a reconciliation of relationship, a dream to be fulfilled, you could but catch a glimpse of the longing God has for us, to have our hearts directed towards Him.

In fact some of us may have many times, even in worship songs, cry for more of God. Our sin separates us from Him but the distance between the Lord and I does not change my desire to be close to Him. Dickson writes in his book,

"The bible teaches that that God shares my desire to rebuild our relationship. In fact, “relationship” is too weak a word for what God wants. The Lord inspired Hosea and other prophets to present the bond between Israel and him as similar to marriage in order to teach that he wants to experience that kind of intermingling with our essence, that sense of oneness of losing overselves in each other."

There is no starker contrast of relational-imbalance than this:

I want MORE of God ( and not even all the time!?) but

God wants ALLof me.

 

2) Soil of Miracles

 

"Tragedy is the fertile soil of miracles. Barren wombs lead to miraculous births. Joseph is sold into slavery and the result is the greatest examples of forgiveness in human history. Cruel bondage in Egypt culminates with miracles of Exodus and the Promised Land. In the same way, Jesus’ gruesome death on a cross led to his resurrection and eventually to (our) miraculous love affair with God here and now, in the midst of our suffering. It seems the way to deal with the evil with the world is not to pretend to go around it, but to plunge right through.

 

Sometimes bad things happen to good people so we can watch God turn the greatest tragedies into the purest love. "

 

Have you witnessed God turned your tragedy into the purest form of love? I hope that we all have and would. Though sometimes when we are walking in the middle of the valley of the shadow of death, it feels like the end rather than a journey. Sometimes it feels that time comes to a stand still and no other alternate future seems possible. But as we keep walking with God at your side, you come through with a greater understanding of love and greater love itself than you ever thought possible. Plunge right through clinging to Him alone, don't avoid or deny the pain, but take heart, at the end of it and through it all, you will experience joy unsurpassable and a love distilled, ever pure. There is no short cut to true love, no 3-step solution.

 

Help us, GOD, that we may be willing to walk through the pain of tragedies in our lives, that we may live and love truly.