by Aaron Davis
In my own experience, on the day I was attacked and almost killed, on three different occasions I felt God tell me to call it a day and take the men I was transporting back to the office because something wasn’t right. In my arrogance, I literally told God three different times, “I can handle it. If things get out of hand, I have the strength and ability to diffuse the situation,” but what I didn’t know (though God did) is that they had a weapon that changed the overall scenario.
Had I died on that day, I know without a doubt that there are people who would have blamed God. “I know Aaron. He loved God. He dedicated his entire life to helping people . . . and God failed him! Where was God!?”
But what they would never have known is that God didn’t fail me. God tried to help me avoid the entire situation three times. Because of my pride, I failed to listen, even when I knew God was speaking.
I arrogantly argued with God that day. The year of physical therapy, the year on a shrink’s couch, the hundreds of thousands of dollars in years of lost wages, all could have been avoided if I had listened. And the kicker is that I know His voice. I heard it. But how many don’t have the benefit of knowing that voice or even begin to know how to recognize God in His attempt to rescue them, because they have not been taught or even believed it is possible?
I wonder how many other scenarios parallel my own. I wonder how many times lives were hanging in the balance, and God was speaking, but His people were distracted or just simply didn’t listen.
What if man is not an optional variable to the will and kingdom of God’s establishment on the earth, but a constant and absolute variable? What if, at this point in time and history, the establishment of God’s will and kingdom on the earth is completely contingent upon man’s involvement?
SON OF MAN VERSUS SON OF GOD
In light of our God-given authority and the possibility of man being an essential variable in the exercise of authority and establishment of the kingdom of God here on earth, I think there are some things to consider in these two scriptures from Matthew, chapter 8.
Matthew 8:28–29 (AMP)
And when He arrived at the other side in the country of the Gadarenes, two men under the control of demons went to meet Him, coming out of the tombs, so fierce and savage that no one was able to pass that way.
And behold, they shrieked and screamed, What have You to do with us, Jesus, Son of God? Have You come to torment us before the appointed time?
In years past, I have read this passage and thought, Man, the devils knew they were in trouble and freaked out. But now I wonder if something else was happening here. I wonder if perhaps they were not declaring Jesus’ authority when referring to him as the “Son of God” but rather defiantly questioning it.
First, I find it odd that these demon-possessed men sought out Jesus. Verse 28 says that they “went to meet him.” Then they screamed at Jesus, questioning Him. I wonder if my previous interpretation of them screaming in terror may have been misinterpreted, considering the totality of the circumstances.
They called him Son of God, not Son of Man. If man were given complete authority on this earth and man surrendered his authority to the kingdom of sin, then I wonder if it is possible that the demons were actually questioning Jesus’ authority to be there and exercise His authority (as the Son of God) before an appointed time that both He and the demons were aware had been established, but man as a whole was not privy to.
As we discussed in earlier chapters:
God placed all created things on the earth under the authority of Adam, giving him dominion over them, but He also intended that Adam learn from God how to rule effectively. Dominion over the earth was man’s gift from God. Dominion over the earth lawfully became man’s right, and how he used it became his responsibility.
When Adam chose to follow after the temptation of sin rather than submit to the authority of God, he became a slave to sin and lost his legal rights, not only to his person but to his domain. Adam had unwillingly handed over the gift of dominion to Satan. Satan became the ruler of this world with legal authority.
In order to restore to man what he relinquished to the kingdom of darkness, God had to institute a strategy that would not transgress His own principles. Since Satan had become the authentic authority in this world, the Lord would not arbitrarily revoke His claim. God would not violate His own character and ethics, not even to redeem mankind from Satan. Since the rulership of the earth had been delegated to man and consequently lost by man, it had to be lawfully restored by a man. However, every descendent from Adam was born in Adam’s likeness and thus was born under the dominion of sin. Hence, only an authentic human being, who was not a part of Adam’s rebellion and therefore not sin’s slave, must be found for this purpose.
God’s solution was Jesus. When the Holy Spirit of God overshadowed and impregnated Mary with God’s seed, a man was born into the world without the predisposition to the kingdom of sin that would have been produced from the seed of Adam (man). He had a divine, sinless nature. Yet as the son of Mary, He was qualified as part of the human race to enter the legal contest to restore Adam’s forfeited inheritance.
The first Adam was created without a mother, and the second Adam (Jesus) was created without an earthly father. If Jesus had been Adam’s descendant, he would have been born under the authority of sin. But He was born the Son of God, and sin had no legal right to Him.88
If Jesus were only the Son of God, as the demons declared when confronting Him, and not also the Son of Man (a man who had not surrendered his authority to the kingdom of sin), I wonder if it is possible that He would have been transgressing His own law and the demons were attempting to distract or divert the exercise of His authority over them as a man by calling him the Son of God.
Instead, He was both the Son of Man and the Son of God.
It seems logical to me that if the demons were afraid, as I previously assumed was the case, then they would have hid from Jesus and He would have had to go to them where they were hiding. But they didn’t run and hide and make Jesus come to them; they went to meet him yelling, spewing accusations, and questioning what they perceived to possibly be His lack of authority to be there, and even bringing to His attention what they perceived was His breaking a law surrounding their authority and an appointed time when that authority would be relinquished.
If man is the conduit for the establishment of the kingdom of God on the earth and Jesus came to restore our relationship with God and our authority as men to its original intent by God, then I wonder if it’s our responsibility and not God’s to place a demand on that authority and establish His will here on earth.
If this is the case, then I wonder if my vision of God crying in the corner of the elementary school classroom is played out daily around the world in places where the kingdom of sin has been established and is reigning in the lives of men. I wonder if it is possible that God is not complacently watching on and doing nothing (as many assume) because it’s just a difficult part of His will, but if, in fact, with each brutality that occurs because of the kingdom of sin’s reign in the lives of men, God weeps! He is broken, observing those He loves being tortured and tormented and left only to observe the results of an unopposed kingdom of sin reigning in the earth.
Pastor Jurgen Matthesius states it this way: “Some believe that God does whatever he wants, whenever he wants because he’s God. They speak these things ignorantly, not knowing that God has bound himself to both His word and His laws, which He will not violate.”89
BREAKING THE HEART OF GOD
As a father myself, I can’t imagine the pain of restrictedly watching my son hurt in ways that devastated me. That would be torture enough. But it would be unbearable for me to think that he believed that I not only watched on and did nothing, but that it was part of his daddy’s plan for his life. Furthermore, no enemy could more devastate my heart and do me emotional harm than to hurt my child while I watched on, unable to help, and then convince him that it was me who
chose that for him. Even as I type this, I’m finding myself emotionally choked up just at the idea of it.
Yet, I wonder if this is exactly what has happened between God and man. What if the greatest, most dividing satanic deception in the history of man has been to convince man that God is watching on in agreement and compliance with our tragedy?
I wonder if the heart of God is torn apart with every injustice and untimely death and brutality that is committed. I wonder if He is constantly speaking, begging His creation to hear His voice and just hoping that some of His children—even one of His children— will hear Him and make a difference by rising up and joining their authority with His omnipotence, and as a result, changing their world for His glory.
How could we imagine that God the Father, God the Creator, God who loves us . . . hurts any less than we do?
WHAT IF WE ARE THE ONE PERCENT?
Recognizing that this may be the first time you may have ever considered the possibility that God’s will is not the only contributing factor to your experiences in this world, let’s disarm the unacceptable exceptions in your mind.
I’m not necessarily saying our authority is the only contributing factor in every circumstance, or that God’s will is never a factor in what we experience, but what if, in a certain percentage of instances, God and His will had nothing to do with our tragedy?
What if that percentage is actually 90 percent or 50 percent or 10 percent? What if even one percent of the time we experienced something negative that we assumed was just a part of God’s will, when perhaps it was in actuality a direct result (fruit produced) from the establishment of the kingdom of sin on the earth through the will and lives of other people in the earth. How would that change your opinion of God if you found out that He actually had no part in your tragedy?
What difference might be made in the world if even one percent of the time when God was blamed for something, He was actually vindicated? What if the truth was that what we perceived to be His involvement in the tragedy was actually our misinterpretation of the circumstances? What if God was not complicit in the event but rather the one who grieved more than anyone for you?
If your perception changed even slightly, what could that mean for your faith being restored?
Would you still be angry at God for not intervening?
Would you be confused, still needing to express your frustration toward someone?
Or would you be able to believe in and receive the love of God and the relationship with Him that you assumed was damaged or nonexistent, based upon your feelings of abandonment in the scenario?
If you’ve never even had a relationship with God, would this knowledge make you reconsider?
We can’t possibly know the percentages, but the more I think about it and the more scenarios I process through these lenses, the higher that percentage gets in my own life. I wonder if this possibility might present the same response in the hearts and minds of others like myself when considering that what we accepted and believed to be God’s fault (or at least existing by His omnipotent and omniscient permission) might actually have more variables associated with it than previously understood.
At this point, the natural question arises: “If it’s not God’s fault, then whose fault is it?” My question in response is, “To whom did He give authority to establish His kingdom (or whichever kingdom they choose) on the earth?”
INFINITY UNDIVIDED
According to Matthew 19, when it’s just man apart from God, infinite possibilities (all things) are still divided.
Matthew 19:26 (AMP)
But Jesus looked at them and said, With men this is impossible, but all things are possible with God.
But how does infinity become possible and undivided while completely coinciding with the physical-spiritual relativity equation that I saw?
When I saw this initial equation with infinity divided by man, the answer to having undivided infinity (∞) was actually very apparent to me through very basic algebra. In order to get the numerator in a fraction separated from the denominator and made whole, you have to multiply both sides of the equation by the reciprocal of the denominator and the end result is “Man (m) times God (AΩ) equals infinity (∞) undivided.”
And all things become possible . . .
Matthew 19:26 (AMP)
But Jesus looked at them and said, With men this is impossible, but all things are possible with God.
After working through the simple algebra of the equation that I believe God showed me, right now, man can serve as either the divider or the multiplier of His kingdom. In order for man to experience the infinite (∞) possibilities that God intended for man in His kingdom (and which Jesus both spoke of and exemplified in his own life), man must serve as the multiplier to the infinite possibilities of experiencing the kingdom of God on the earth, and not the divider. After all, earth was given to man by God, so wouldn’t it make sense that we could stand in opposition to the will of God or agreement with the will of God to see it established?
MAN x GOD = INFINITY!
I wonder if it is possible that apart from God on the earth, man divides all things (infinite possibilities) available to him through God in the exercise of his authority, but when man couples his divinely given authority and will in this physical realm with the will and direction of God and the omnipotent power available to him through Him, I wonder if a physical-spiritual/God-man continuum is formed that transcends boundaries between realms and literally makes that infinite scenario tangible and experiential! All things are possible with God on earth as it is in heaven. At the very least, seeking God’s voice or will in each situation would be essential.
I asked this question at the beginning of the chapter: If a great majority of people believe and rationalize that everything that happens (good and bad, but especially in the case of the bad) is some form of God’s will and they do not believe that they have any direct involvement in the overall experience or process, what would need to happen for the perceptions to turn and for man to experience active agreement with the infinite possibilities that they are currently dividing?
If there is any legitimacy to this physical-spiritual relativity equation and it does have a direct relation to us experiencing the “all things are possible” promise in Matthew 19:26, then I think the answer is obvious—man and God are going to have to be on the same side and the same page in order for the “all things are possible with God” combination that Jesus referred to in both Matthew 19:26 and the Lord’s Prayer as it pertains to establishing the kingdom, will, and subsequent promises of God to be established in this physical realm.
And furthermore, considering the reestablishment of man’s authority through Christ in the New Covenant, if man is a necessary factor in the establishment of God’s kingdom and will on the earth, then when we face the tough questions about why there are starving children in Africa and why things are happening that seem so contrary to what the Bible describes as the will and promises of God, we may have to reevaluate where the guilt or blame really resides.
I wonder if this may actually be a case that is less about God’s will, omnipotence, and authority, and more about man, his agreement with the will of God, and the exercise of his authority in establishing kingdom principles on the earth (evil or godly).
If this is the case, then maybe Einstein was treading on a Quantum Christianity principle that he didn’t even realize when he said, “The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
RevoLution
“God’s not mad at you.”
—Pastor David Crank, Faith Church, St. Louis
“I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing.”
—Astronomer Allan Sandage, winner of the Crafoord Prize in astronomy (w
hich is equivalent to the Nobel Prize)*
The question I have encountered more than any other is, “How does God feel about me?” It often initially comes in much less direct forms like, “If God is a loving God, then why did this happen?” But what I have found as I have more deeply explored is that people are most often asking the indirect, impersonal, hypothetical question in hopes of answering the more direct and personal root question: “Does God love me?” or “Can God love me?” Depending upon what you have been told about God, judgment, sin, hell, and consequences for your actions, the answer to that question can be terrifying, particularly if you have a foundational belief in God but are unclear on how to process through what you do not understand.
Through the previous chapters, I’ve attempted to be very intentional in sharing with you how I have processed through some of the perceived inconsistencies surrounding what I have experienced, in comparison to my expectations. Perhaps through some of this processing, you have come to the same conclusions that I have, that maybe not everything we have been told about God has been completely accurate.
If perception determines reception and our reception ultimately influences our response, then it’s no wonder that so many who have been raised in Christian homes have significantly questioned their faith to the point of being terrified of God, wondering if He really loves them, and conclusively reach a place of spiritual resolve bordering on agnosticism or atheism.
Many people sincerely believe that God is mad at them, hates them, and is just waiting for the opportunity to give them a good judging by throwing them in hell for not tipping the scales with more good deeds than sinful deeds in their life. And in their defense, they didn’t come to these conclusions without the ample input of the Christ-followers that they know.