April 27, 2008

Background Scripture: Daniel 9

Devotional Reading: Psalms 130

When I was a child, the God presented in my church experience was an angry, vengeful God. Perhaps this was because the God of whom I thought and to whom I talked was really so different from the God presented in lessons and sermons on Sundays.

As I came to read more and more of the New Testament and the Jesus who came to reveal God to us, I wondered why the picture of God was so one-sided, so founded upon a God of judgment instead of the God of love and mercy revealed in the life and teachings of Jesus Christ.

Sometime during the past decades, however, has been a change in that perception of God. The most persistent concept today is a God of love and mercy, so that now in most mainline churches it appears the God of judgment has been largely forgotten. Is it possible that we have swung from one extreme to another? Must we choose between these two perceptions, or do we need to incorporate both images into our understanding of God?

In Daniel 9 we see Daniel praying, “O Lord, the great and terrible God, who keepest covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments” (9:4).

In one sentence of prayer, Daniel acknowledges that God is both “great and terrible” and “steadfast love.” Both of these elements are evident in the God of Jesus, who began his ministry proclaiming, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (MT. 4:17). The way out of sin and selfishness is repentance, the result of which is the love and salvation of God.

Repentance is unpatriotic

The people of Israel to whom Daniel was appealing needed the message coming from Daniel, even if they didn’t like it. Over the centuries, they had drifted further from God, acknowledging Him as their tribal god, but ignoring both His commandments and His prophets. When the prophets had come to them imploring them to return to God and uphold the covenant, they couldn’t conceive of a need to repent.

People, then and now, don’t like prophets because they always focus on what is wrong with our societies. We do not like to be told there is something wrong, nor do we want to be told to repent. Repentance is unpatriotic (but sometimes, so is God!).

Daniel has been reading the prophecies of Jeremiah and, perceiving that Jeremiah’s prophecies are just as authoritative for the Jews of his day as in the day they were written, he responds with an anguished prayer: “… we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from thy commandments and ordinances; we have not listened to thy servants the prophets, who spoke in our name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land” (Daniel 9:5,6).

Repentance required

Today, more than 20 centuries since they were written, we can read those words with detached indifference, because we cannot see that we or our nation need to repent.

Of course not: That’s what the people in Jeremiah’s day thought, and the people in Daniel’s day. And the people in our day? Surely, our God of love and grace doesn’t want that kind of prayer from us. Surely, He does!

I believe we live in the greatest country in the world. But it is not the kingdom of God. In fact, it has not yet fulfilled its own purpose and destiny. We’ve come a long way, but the ideals with which we began constrain us to keep moving upward and onward. Our United States were neither won nor founded by those who were satisfied with the way things were.

As Christians, we have a responsibility under God to join in working to fulfill the greatest experiment in government that the world has known. And that will require repentance from time to time to a God who demands of us justice, righteousness and compassion and offers us mercy and salvation.

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Readers with questions or comments for Rev. Althouse may write to him in care of this publication.

This farm news was published in the April 23, 2008 issue of the Farm World, serving Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan and Tennessee.