Questioning Dark Views

Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, "Behold, you have become well; do not sin anymore, so that nothing worse happens to you." (John 5:14)

This verse strikes very close to a whole knot of lies that can be found deep in the heart of nearly every person on this planet about how God relates to sinners. It is such a deeply entrenched set of beliefs that in every religion on earth many elements of these lies can be seen quite clearly. Thus, whenever a person begins to openly question too many of these assumptions they find themselves at serious odds with most people around them, especially those who feel it their duty to keep everyone else in line when it comes to what we should believe about God.

One of the fundamental beliefs that skews our concept of how God relates to us can be seen in the mistake that the Jews of Christ's day had fallen into rather deeply. They believed and taught that whenever someone came down with some sickness, especially a very debilitating condition, that this was clear evidence that they were suffering under God's wrath for some terrible sin that they, or maybe even their parents, had committed. Thus they were viewed with great suspicion and as a result did not necessarily deserve any compassion from those who were more 'righteous' and healthy.

Part of this belief system is rooted firmly in the logic that God treats sinners with a 'carrot and stick' approach. It is believed that God depends quite heavily on threats and fear and intimidation to control the lives and choices of His children and that love is something only to be enjoyed by those who are more in line with His demands. A loving relationship with God may be something to be attracted to in some way by those who are starving for affection and a need to feel valuable, but in this common belief it is viewed as something that in some way needs to be earned by obedience to God's commands.

A counterpart to this rigid view of God is a reactionary belief system that insists that God is so 'loving and good' that He couldn't possibly allow terrible things to happen to people who are disobedient to His commands and that His goodness actually means that somehow He will bend the rules or ignore them altogether and simply sweep nominal believers into heaven and arbitrarily change their lives after they get there to be able to get along with each other better than they do here on earth. This stems both from an abhorrence of the dark views of God promoted by the first group and a serious misunderstanding of the real meaning of the words used to describe God's character.

The Jews, along with many people today, believed that God was a stern judge or an arbitrary dictator of sorts who was looking for strict obedience simply because He demanded it and not for any deeper reasons involving our own good or welfare. It is commonly accepted that whenever people get too far out of line in their behavior with the rules laid down by religion that God is waiting not far away to inflict harsh punishments and pain and misfortunes on those who do not comply enough with His demands.

As a result of this kind of thinking that permeates every one of our hearts, we have been deceived and confused about many of the passages of Scripture that indicate something rather different than this view of God. Added to this confusion is the fact that Bible translators weave into their choice of words the same sentiments described above which adds even more layers of darkness and confusion to the false ideas about God that blanket the whole world. This is not to say that the real truth about God cannot be seen in various translations of the Bible, but it is a wake-up call to be aware that it is not necessarily safe to take any one translation at face value or put too much stock on a key word or phrase that may seem to reinforce our negative assumptions about God.

I have noticed over the years that many people seem to enjoy bashing all modern versions of the Bible, sometimes claiming that they are somehow inspired by demonic influences and that only the King James version can be trusted. They have assembled many arguments to 'prove' their case and have surrounded themselves with thick walls of prejudice and animosity toward anyone who chooses to disagree with their dogmatic conclusions. However, I have noticed that the spirit that emanates from such people has often been so negative and bigoted that I sense a strong warning within my own heart that something is seriously wrong.

It reminds me a great deal of the same sort of attitudes promoted during the dark ages where religious authorities refused to allow the Bible to be translated into any language other than Latin with the assertion that it would become corrupted if that were to take place. From their perspective the King James translation itself was a serious mistake and was a corruption of the purity and authenticity of the true Word of God. We can now see that this was a thin veneer to justify their desire to keep the public from thinking for themselves and listening more directly to the Word of God and then learning that God was not like what the religious authorities portrayed Him to be. The authorities feared they would begin to lose their grip over the masses and they were keen to not allow that to happen.

They asked him, "Who is the man who said to you, 'Pick up your pallet and walk'?" (John 5:12)

In this story of the sick man finding himself at serious odds with the religious authorities of his day when he obeyed the direct words of Jesus, I see a parallel to many situations today. The whole book of John has this issue of authentic authority woven through many of its stories. Back in chapter two it came into sharp clarity when Jesus expelled the chaos of counterfeit religion from the temple precincts and was immediately challenged as to why He thought He had any authority to disrupt the status quo.

Now, likely some of those very same authorities who felt so threatened not long before this came across a man who was violating some of their rules and regulations designed to 'protect' the keeping of the Sabbath day, and they likely had little doubt as to the source of this man's information. They only were challenging him about his authority not because they actually had no idea who had told him to break their laws but because they wanted to compile a stronger case to indict this out of control teacher who was threatening their control over the masses.

But these religious teachers shared the same dark views of God that caused a similar condition of deep darkness hundreds of years later that we now call the 'dark ages'. Those ages were dark precisely because of the counterfeit ideas about God imposed onto the masses as well as the deprivation of the Word of God in their lives. The established religions refused to allow the common people to make their own choices about what to believe about God and kept from them as much as possible any information that might lead them to have a personal, accountable relationship with Him. The religion of the dark ages presented the same sort of dark views of God that the Jews had degenerated into largely, but the later church made it even much darker yet.

It is often argued that if we do not present God as at least partly harsh and ready to arbitrarily punish evildoers then we will lose one of the main deterrents to rampant evil in the world. It is widely believed that love itself is simply too weak and wimpy to accomplish the restoration of sinners into a proper relationship with God. Therefore, because of our own settled assumptions about what must take place in order to get people's attention and compel them to repent, it is believed that we must use a mixture of terror and allurements to manipulate people into conformity to what we believe is the right preparation to be taken to heaven.

Given the pervasiveness of this sort of thinking, it is very easy to assume that the words of Jesus to this healed man in the temple simply reinforce this dark view of God. If one comes to this passage with these assumptions unquestioned they will see little reason to challenge them based on what they read here. But just because some piece of a puzzle might seem to fit into a slot without too much pressure does not mean that the colors are going to line up properly to represent the correct overall picture that it is designed to display. It is not enough to simply say that because these words seem to reinforce our dark ideas about God's punishments against someone relating to their diseased condition that our assumptions about God's dealings with us are necessarily justified.

This is a subject that is far too vast to address adequately in this writing. I have tried to address it more fully on another web site, but even there it is not fully developed sufficiently. However, those who know me very well know that I have become rather passionate about this at times because of the pervasiveness of the lies about God that actually serve to keep us at a distance from Him instead of serving to draw us closer to knowing and obeying Him from our hearts. My own encounter with truths about this issue over the past few years have made me more sensitive to facts and doctrines that have been abused far too long in order to prop up false pictures of God that push people away from Him rather than draw them closer to Him.

Next time I hope to spend some time exploring the other side of this issue – the real truth that Jesus was actually seeking to convey to this man and to all who are willing to look past their prejudices and false assumptions about how God feels towards us as sinners. There certainly are great dangers that we need to fear, but it comes as a surprise to most that those dangers are radically different than what we have been taught to believe by most religions.