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Refreshment in Refuge
by Gina Burgess
Paul said, God's objective truth has become subjective truth for all of us, and none of us has excuses to deny His Truth (Romans 1, loose paraphrase).
I see this at work everywhere I look. God has set down the Truth that is solid and indisputable. Because a person believes there is no God does not dispense with God. He remains Truth. Just as no amount of denial can remove gravity from existence, no amount of denial can dispense with God, or the eternal consequences of such denial.
He is the one that made us complex beings in His image. Scientifically, Jesus was. He walked, He died, and He rose from the dead. But interpretively, God had to explain to us why, not necessarily how Jesus willingly gave Himself in sacrifice for us. We do not interpret it for ourselves. God interpreted it for us through His Word.
Why do bad things happen to good people? Why must the blood of our sons and daughters bleed into the ground of foreign soil? Why is our nation so blessed and other nations which were once great so low? Why might our nation fall to those same depths in which other nations wallow?
O thus be it ever, when free men shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desolation;
Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Pow'r that hath made and preserved us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just;
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust!"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall
Wave o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
Francis Scott Key wrote the words; and they are the second verse to our national anthem. Those words come from scripture, Psalm 20:7 "Some trust in chariots and ... horses, be we trust in God."
God gave us reason so that we could make sense of things. He slowly, through time, revealed physics, mathematics, science which He had created so we could then understand His creation. It is emotions and feelings, filtered through human behavior, all falling short of His perfectness that need interpreting. We are created in His image – having a sense of justice, and righteousness, but the human frailty and the finite mind cannot fathom God’s emotions and feelings, nor understand God’s restraint toward blatant wickedness.
Reasoning is good, but cannot stand alone when faith is part of God's plan.
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Gina Burgess has taught Sunday School and Discipleship Training for almost three decades. (Don't tell her that makes her old.) She earned her Master's in Communication in 2013.
She is the author of several books including: When Christians Hurt Christians, The Crowns of the Believers and others available in online bookstores. She authors several columns, using her God-given talent to shine a light in a dark world. You can browse her blog at Refreshment In Refuge.
If you'd like to take a look at some Christian fiction and Christian non-fiction book reviews check out Gina's book reviews at Upon
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