A Benevolent God?

Last fall, a USA Today Survey showed that one's view of God influences their political leanings and ideology more than any other factor, including party affiliation or even denominational one.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2006-09-11-religion-survey_x.htm?csp=34

The views are titled A, B, C and D, standing for Authoritarian, Benevolent, Critical and Distant. The third one is a little confusing. It's not actively critical, as in identifying and intervening into unacceptable behhavior, but more like an art or literary or drama or music critic - observing human behavior (and having known opinions), just passively. But it makes for a nice C-word to continue the labeling scheme. :)

I remember having discussions with people about this article when it came out, including one person whose view of God was "some of both of the first two" - Authoritarian and Benevolent. That person happened to be Catholic, and since then I've talked to other Catholics who seem to see things the same way. Not coming from that background, I don't follow how this comes about, but it seems to be even within the Trinity itself that this dichotomy exists.

This week, at seminary, there was a guest speaker who came in to talk with "the kids" (read the students - most of whom are north of 35...) on the occasion of a new quarter starting. She spent some time talking about her Catholic upbringing, and put it this way: "I was scared of God The Father, always feeling He was angry with me. He never seemed either loving or approachable. Jesus on the other hand was always approachable, loving and merciful. I had no problem praying to Him, meditating on His words. The Holy Spirit? He was just smoke and mirrors to me. Mostly smoke. You know, all that incense and so forth. He was in there somewhere, in that smoke, that much I knew." It was kind of humorous to listen to her, but I knew hers wasn't an isolated experience. Others have said similar things. Hm.

Me, I'm squarely in the B camp. I get my idea of an essentially benevolent God the Father, one characterized by lovingkindness and mercy (yet not without concern for satisfying the needs of justice), from both Old Testament AND the New. Even in the Torah, in the books of the law, it's clear how God describes himself to Moses, here in Exodus 34:6-7, from the NKJV:

And the LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.”

This Sunday the key verse for the day in church was Titus 3:4-7, which is, interestingly, also one of the few passages in Scripture that explicitly gives us a look at the concept of the Trinity, here from the NIV:

But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.

The kindness and love of God (the Father) is poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ (the Son), by the Holy Spirit (who facilitates the rebirth and renewal that happens with that forgiveness). Even the demands of justice were also satisfied through the death of Jesus, which God the Father ordained - for our benefit. Sure sounds benevolent to me (benevolent toward mankind, anyway). And I didn't have to do a darned thing to merit that benevolence; couldn't, even if I wanted to. It's all by His grace.

Reminds me of a little song I sang for years at Bible camp. (Not the Jesus Camp of the recent film with the same title, by the way - nothing nearly that militant). It went like this:



He paid a debt he did not owe.
I owed a debt I could not pay.
I needed someone to wash my sins away.

doo bee doo bee doo
(yes, we really sang that part)

And now I sing a brand new song:
"Amazing Grace", the whole day long.
Christ Jesus paid the debt that I could never pay.


So...

what?

Well, a lot, that's what! It's the main reason I go through life making mistakes and failing routinely, but don't get crippled by guilt. God knows I'm not worthy of forgiveness, not even close. But I don't have to be, either. He's merciful and gracious. He forgives, not because of who I am, but because of who He is.