Why Indeed?

My brother sent me the following comic a while back that I have been thinking about for quite a while and this morning my thoughts finally came together enough for me to respond to it. Here is the comic:

The comic depicts God asking the question: “Why would I need to sacrifice Myself to Myself to allow Me to change a rule I made Myself.” It brings up a very good question. Why indeed? If I am to deepen my relationship with Him, such questions are great to surface and explore with Him. Why does God condemn us with His Law that is created by Him?

I think one answer lies in who God is – His character. The statement of the comic and even my question suggests that Law is something that God creates. But I do not believe this is so. The Law is a reflection of Who God is. He is the Word, He is the truth, He is the Alpha and Omega (the letters). When God makes statements of command, He does so out from Himself. When He says, “Thou shalt not lie,” it is not that He just created a new idea, concept, or fact. The statement is a reflection of Him. God is true and thus anything that is not true is not of Him. It is not “new” from God’s point of view because He has always been. It seems new to us because we see it from our point of view, being quite limited by time and location.

God’s Law is a revelation of Himself, and because of His eternality, it is not a new thing, because it does not reflect a new thing, but an eternal Being. This is why right and wrong existed before the written Law delivered through Moses. God existed before Moses, before Abraham (“before Abraham was, I AM”), before creation. He held Cain responsible for the murder of his brother before “thou shalt not kill” was ever written because it is part of Who He is. He is the creator of life, infinite love, and the one who numbered our days. Life is given and taken by Him. Cain knew his guilt without hearing any specific command because as an image-bearer of God, that imprint and knowledge was stamped on his heart. He never questioned God’s sentence for His sin, but rather asked Him for protection. He never made an excuse to God about “never being told that murder was wrong,” because he knew it was wrong!

So, in reference to this comic, God did not “make” the Law as He “makes” other things such as the earth or even you or me. The words of God are revelations of His character and for Him to “create” the Law, he would have to “create” Himself.

We are so accustomed to saying things after we arrive at a conclusion, “I have made up my mind now,” “I realized the other day,” “I no longer think this is true.” These are not words that God speaks unless He is relating to us on our level. “I have made up my mind” means that God has forever had this purpose and plan and has chosen to communicate it to us at the present moment. His “change of heart” we read is precisely planned and carried out by Him. He is not ever changing Himself, but acting in accordance with His character. If I pray and ask God for something and He gives it to me, it is not that He changed Himself – He acted from Himself. He sees my wants and needs, knows the appropriate timing, knows my design, where I am at in life, and gives gifts according to grace and love.

We are condemned by our sin against God. God is and when we choose to go against that reality, we are breaking ourselves by going against something immoveable. You’ve seen auto crash tests – when you drive the test car into the wall, the car is shattered; the wall is quite fine. If you drive into a brick wall, you will damage your car. The comic is simply angry that we jumped off a building and gravity took its course. There is no sense in trying to ridicule the wall for being hard or gravity for its pull downward. The ridicule lies on the driver and jumper.

We are forever blessed that He is gracious enough to give us Christ as the way of salvation. Praise His name!