You know that God is Love, right? But did you also know that God is Jealous? “Do not worship any other god, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.” (Ex. 34:14) Everyone nowadays always talks about how God is love, God loves the whole world, God loves you, etc, etc, etc. ( I was going to say blah blah blah, but I didn’t want to sound cynical. (Even though I am)) But like everything else in the Bible, God is balanced. It’s not just that God is a jealous God, like He’s sometimes jealous and sometimes not. No, in the Bible verse above, He personifies Jealousy. Read it again, look at the conditional clause, “whose name is Jealous”. As much as He is Love, likewise He is Jealous. So obviously, jealousy is not an “evil” emotion, because in God, nothing is evil.
But that’s not the point of this essay. I know, you’re probably wondering to yourself, “Do any of his essays have a point?”, but in this case, yes, I do have a point. And I’ll share it with you… in a minute. So do you remember how I described our mortal feelings of jealousy? How angry we are when we get jealous of someone? How we just want to kick, claw the other person for even looking at your honey, your sweetheart? Well, guess what? God feels exactly the same way. “I will say to those called 'Not my people,' 'You are my people'; and they will say, 'You are my God.'” (Hos. 2:23) Well, that verse was given primarily to the Jews during the time of the Occupation. Hrm…. Here’s a more NTy verse from Paul. “For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.” (1 Cor 6:20)
Jesus, who is God, bought us with his blood. We are His Church, which is the Bride. And since each individual member is part of the Church, each one of us is to be married to God. So, just as how we would feel if our SO were to dally with someone else, Jesus will be just as jealous when we stray. And who is it that we stray to? Another handsome devil named, well, Devil, or Satan. Can you imagine how Jesus is feeling, every time we make googly eyes at Satan? It’s like, not only is your SO flirting with someone else, your SO is flirting with your mortal enemy, your arch-nemesis. It’s like Lois Lane kissing Lex Luthor in front of Superman! It’s not like we can hide from God, meet the devil in the back alley, and while Jesus is glued to the football, have a quick one! God sees all (for better or worse) and he can’t close his eyes, and stick his fingers in his ears and pretend that he didn’t see you with Satan. That would drive me just insane.
“When did I ever kiss the Devil?” you may ask, innocently. I’m sure God’s got the stack of DVDs all set up for you to see. I’ll give you the short answer, “Every time you sin”. Yup, that little white lie you told your co-worker about how you don’t feel well, that’s like French-Kissing Satan, right there. And don’t even go into how you lustfully looked at the Victoria Secret commercial, that’s like rubbing the Devil’s thigh. Every little thing we do, as small and harmless a sin may seem to us, is like a huge alarm sign to God that you aren’t thinking about him and are thinking about the enemy.
But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin. No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him. (1 Jn.3:5-6)
This he is referring to Jesus. He had no sin in himself, because he’s totally in with God. God completely cannot abide sin at all, it’s anathema to him.
And hopefully, you can see why God is a jealous God. He loves you so much, and yet it hurts him every time He sees you consorting with the Devil. I know you can’t help it, I can’t help it either. This entire world, the mortal world is Sin, much like God is Love and Jealousy. The only way we’ll truly be sinless is when we die and go up to Heaven. There, we’ll be in the full presence of His Glory, and we’ll have no problems resisting the Devil then. But for now, while we’re on earth, we have to rely on Jesus’ sacrifice, His blood, and the Holy Spirit. We’re going to sin, it’s a given. But thank Goodness that he will always forgive us, if we believe in Jesus, believe in his sacrifice, believe in his resurrection, and of course, we repent and confess the sins.
Peace out.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Hmm... good post. It's something that we often forget but need to be reminded every so often about Jesus' sacrifice.
thanks for your comment! I'm trying my best to answer all the comments,so as to encourage more! Thanks everyday reader ;)
good post on God's jealousy. though a husband can get sinfully jealous of wandering wife as though he made her and owned her, how much more should God be righteously jealous of the wandering people that He had created and chosen and owned through the precious blood of His sinless only Son. we don't even have to flirt with the devil to sin. God is extremely jealous every time we act as if He is not God, like when we're comlaining in our heart every morning about how slow the traffic is or how long we have to wait in line at the store...
as you said, thanfully God sees us through the lenses of the Cross, or else his jealousy should turn into holy wrath. what mercy the Cross brings!
Post a Comment