I came to a realization
today. I was walking across a wooden bridge, nestled in the rainforest,
surrounded by moss and vine maple, when I realized that God doesn’t love me
because of Jesus. He doesn’t love me because of the cross. In fact, the cross
had no part of Him loving me.
I don’t know if that’s a
radical thought for you; it was for me. It caught me off guard, and I stood
still on the bridge thinking about it.
Is it true? God doesn’t
love me because of the cross? It messes with some of my religious thinking,
certainly, to think that God does not love me because of Jesus and what He has
done. But is it a biblical thought? Is it true?
As I was standing on the
bridge, the thought occurred to me that the cross was not what I thought it
was. I had been working from the assumption that the cross was a rescue
mission: that it had allowed God to love me because it put me in Christ (or put
Christ in me) and certainly Christ is quite lovable, and I had been caught up
in that love-fest between the Father and the Son. I understood that in Christ,
I was loved; apart from Christ, I was not so lovely, not so lovable.
Without the cross, I’m
just a sinner heading for hell. God didn’t plan hell for me, of course, but
when I rebelled (when I chose a way that wasn’t his way – when I sinned) hell
was my choice. I discovered that, fundamentally, I saw myself as the sinful
man, separated from God, thankful for the rescue that the cross provided. I was really
quite grateful for the rescue!
And there’s truth in that.
But standing among the mosses on the bridge, I realized that the cross did not
somehow manipulate God into doing something that wasn’t in His mind already.
There in the woods, He took me back to before creation, before He declared “Let us make man in our image.” By the
time He made that declaration, He would have already been committed to the process: to the creation of a
species in His own image, and the creation of a universe in which to place that
man. Standing on that bridge, I was caught off guard by a vision.
In the vision, I saw the
omniscient God considering the process of creating man before He took the step
of creation. In that instant, I saw that because He is omniscient, when He
considered creation, He also saw all that comes with it; He knew that if He
created a species in His image, they would be loving, because He is love. They would be creative,
because He is creative.
But in order to create us
– you and me – as a loving, creative people, for it is us He is contemplating, He must create
free will, for love that comes from a will that is not free is not love at all.
And free will – truly free will – will lead to someone among the billions of
individuals choosing to sin. In point of fact, it has led to every single one of us sinning, and so our omniscient
Father knew that as He considered creation, it required a cross; if He created us, then He
must die for us, and He knew that before He made up His mind to create a race
of men in His image.
But because He is
omniscient, He saw more than just the concept of a species of beings: He saw the
members of that species. Standing there obscured by the vine maple, I looked up
and it was as if I saw God looking down at me from that moment, as He was
thinking about the creation He would make. And I knew that He saw me. Before He
made me, He knew me, yes, that’s true. But before He
had even made up His omniscient mind about whether to make a creation or not,
He grasped that once He said “Let us make man,” that He would make me.
And in this vision, as He
saw me from before His decision to create, He fell in love with me. (It’s OK:
He saw you from that vantage point too, and He fell in love with you, too, but
this is my story!) From before He ever decided to create a universe with space and
time, and a race of people to inhabit and explore that universe, He had already
fallen irrevocably in love with me.
And now, before He had
committed Himself to creation, He was already committed to me in love; He was
hooked. He had fallen in love with me. Even though I didn’t exist yet, and I would
never exist unless He chose to create me, yet He had fallen in love with me,
and now He must follow through with creation, with the
cross, in order that He might know me, that He might share his heart with me,
because His heart had been ravished.
He was smitten. With me!
And suddenly, I saw the
cross differently. He didn’t send His Son to the cross as a rescue mission, to
deliver me from all the crap and slavery I’d gotten myself into. And He didn’t
love me because finally I had come Christ and He certainly loves His own Son,
so I get included in that love too.
No! The cross was
conceived, all of creation was conceived, planned and carried out, because He
loved me! God had fallen
in love with me, and He was going to do everything He could do to get to me, to
find me and wrap His arms around me. He would climb any mountain to get back to
me, so to speak; and that’s what He was doing.
That’s what the cross was:
It wasn’t the goal. It was the means to an end, and the end was me. Standing
there in the woods, leaning on the railing of an old wooden bridge, I looked up
into eyes that were seeing me from before “Let there be light,” from before
“Let us make man.” And those eyes were falling in love with me – had already
fallen in love with me. And He would do anything,
absolutely anything, in order that He could be with me.
I love walking in the
woods. Would you care to join me?
1 comment:
Such a good insight! I love it!
Isn't it breathtaking to consider that His love came first? Wow!
Thanks.
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