Insightful Musings on the Scriptures
by
Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67
Good evening, folks.
At this late hour, it’s kind of silly to wish you Happy Mother’s Day. But I hope you had one anyway. We did. It was a full day for us…as evidenced by this late release. Whew.
It’s past my bedtime. So that’s where I’m heading…after I feed Bimbo and the cat.
A little rain is falling. That’s a good thing.
Blessings.
Love, Dad/Ray.
There is no axiom of life more obvious from the Biblical record, and for that matter, from the entire scope of human history, than the one that connects how one thinks with how one lives—and how one ends. Thinking leads to choices; choices lead to results; results lead to outcomes; and outcomes lead to eternal destinies. Simply put, THINK RIGHT, LIVE RIGHT, END RIGHT. THINK WRONG, LIVE WRONG, END WRONG. It’s as simple and obvious as that. The need for objectively critiquing personal thinking was well stated in a message we recently read on a church reader-board sign—“Don’t believe everything you think.” The standard we select for directing our thinking should be selected with as much care as we would use in selecting a surgeon or an airplane pilot.
Why in the world would Ahaz choose the course he did? Why would he deliberately abandon the exclusivity of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob Who in the beginning “created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1)? How in the world could things possibly go well for him with such blattant rebellion? To be sure, his lines of thinking and reasoning were terribly goofed up. Beyond that, is it possible that this was part of the problem he faced—one of exclusivity? Is it possible that a liberal “politically correct” movement had emerged in Judah that made a capstone out of toleration? Is it possible that this movement despised the exclusivity of conservative thinking?—of those who wanted to hold to Israel’s original CONSTITUTION and laws of God to a “T” (—perhaps labeled as “T-partiers.”)?
Most likely you are familiar with the capsule of thought that indicates the inherent danger of too much or mis-directed toleration—“Stand for everything and you stand for nothing.” I think that statement bears valid thinking. If every viewpoint about God and His standards for life are given equal standing, then TRUTH is lost absolutely—because there is no basis for absolute TRUTH.
At the risk of social rejection or being part of a despised minority, I have no alternative but to take a stand upon basic Biblical TRUTH. The Biblical God is the one and only true exclusive God. And the very first commandment as prescribed by this exclusive God is a command to exclusivity—“You shall have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:3. See also Deuteronomy 4:39). All ideas about God do not lead to this God—as though they were different roads to the same destination (John 14:6; Acts 4:12). I am forced to reject that notion as very wrong thinking. I judge that if I truly came to think otherwise, the Biblical Gospel would be neutralized—and the value of this Bible would be reduced to little more than a packet of paper for starting fires.