What God demands from people: faith, recognition

Faith

In the first place faith means that humans view themselves and everything that exists as made by a creator who has definite ends in mind with everything He has made.

Faith also implies that people believe that the Bible is God’s perfect message to humans, which reflects absolute truth and is the absolute and perfect standard in all human affairs.

The best example of perfect faith that we know from the Bible is the faith of Abraham. When he and Sarah were almost 100 years old and God promised them a son, the couple needed a perfect faith to take God’s words seriously. When God had promised Abraham a numerous offspring and then commanded him to kill his only son Isaac and sacrifice Isaac to Him, he needed a perfect faith to remain convinced that, also after Isaac’s death, God could still keep His promise regarding his huge number of descendants.

No wonder that the Bible calls Abraham the father of all people who have faith. And in one of his letters Paul writes that people who have a faith like Abraham’s, will be justified purely on the basis of this faith.

In addition to all this Christians must not only have an absolute faith in their creator and in His Bible, but also in the Son of the creator: Jesus Christ. They acknowledge Jesus as God’s only-begotten Son and as the seed that was promised in the Hebrew Scriptures. They also believe that Jesus has offered His perfect human life to His Father as a ransom sacrifice and a peace offering for the benefit of all people of good will. They believe that Jesus was killed, but has been resurrected by His Father and now lives in heaven. Finally: they also believe that at the end of our human history Jesus will destroy God’s enemies, clear God’s name from all blame and proceed to establish God’s eternal Kingdom.

In this eternal kingdom the earth will fulfill the function for which the earth was created: the eternal dwelling place for perfect people who will lead perfect lives in perfect circumstances. Without suffering and without death.

All the inhabitants of this paradise earth will be people who have voluntarily and from their own conviction chosen to appreciate as being perfect their Creator and everything He has created, including the laws, rules and limitations that are in force for humans.

God desires an earth inhabited by people who serve Him because they love Him and His perfect qualities and actions. They feel sincere love for their God and their fellow humans. It stands to reason that these people subject themselves to God’s sovereignty and acknowledge that no one is better capable of ruling the universe than its creator. They also know that God’s wisdom and God’s righteousness far exceed those of angels and humans and are absolutely perfect.

An attitude to life which is based on faith.

People who believe must behave in such a way that their belief becomes visible through each of their actions. They must refrain from anything that hurts God and their fellow humans. Moreover, the Greek Scriptures strongly emphasize the fact that the believers may not practice idolatry, that they must be faithful to their spouse and that they must consider blood as holy and something they may not consume.

In addition a Christian must be a good human being: friendly, mild, tolerant, self-controlled. The famous saying: love your neighbor as you love yourself.

The Greek Scriptures also emphasize the fact that all Christians must propagate their faith and make new disciples. In this attempt they must call upon all people to accept the true faith and live the way JHWH and Christ want them to live. This missionary duty of all Christians will not make them popular: the rejection and the aggression with which Jesus Christ was confronted during His preaching activities will also befall the modern day preachers of the faith. This is a result of the fact that believers choose to behave very differently from non-believers and do not wish to be involved in any way in activities and ideas which are often approved of by the masses, but are unacceptable in the eyes of JHWH.

Recognizing God as your law-giver.

God demands from people that they acknowledge Him as the absolute and perfect law-giver. Within this context people should be aware of the fact that God gave the first man, Adam, only one single commandment: he had to obey only one single law and by doing that he could demonstrate whether he acknowledged or rejected God as law-giver.

All the laws which govern God’s material creation, the laws which apply in the sciences, were made by God. These laws are unchangeable, completely reliable and unbreakable.

For human behavior God has made moral laws. These are just as perfect, reliable and unchangeable as the laws which apply in chemistry, physics and all other sciences. During the first thousands of the years of the existence of humans there was no God-ordained system of laws that people had to obey. Such a system of laws only came into being at the law-covenant which was concluded between God and the people of Israel in 1513 B.C.

This does not mean to say that the people who lived before the establishing of the law covenant did not know God’s laws and did not have to obey them. Neither does this mean that before the law covenant there was no good and evil. God has laid His moral laws inside the minds and hearts of all people who have ever lived, with the result that all humans have a conscience and a mind and a heart that tells them what is good and what is evil.

Humans can also get to know God’s moral standards by looking well and listening well to God’s material creation and the fact that everywhere in this creation there is order and not chaos. Like Paul writes: God’s invisible qualities are clearly discernable in His creation, they can be known through the things He has made. This also includes His moral laws which dictate how people must behave.

Viewed in the light of all this, it was also during the centuries preceding the law covenant a terrible sin against God when people committed idolatry. For instance by worshipping animals or celestial bodies and giving these animals and celestial bodies the honor which is due to God. Honoring the creation as God instead of honoring the creator as God goes against our human intelligence, our human sense of perception and our human reasoning power.

It is impossible that there have ever been people who used their God-given power of perception, reasoning power and intelligence and then looked at the sun and sincerely thought that the sun created the earth, the plants, the animals and the humans. Nevertheless, the sun was worshipped as a god by the Babylonians, by the Canaanites and at times even by the Israelites. And by many other peoples.

It is impossible that there have ever been people who used their God-given power of perception, reasoning power and intelligence and then looked at a bull or a calf and sincerely thought that the bull or the calf created the earth, the plants, the animals and the humans. Nevertheless, there have been many peoples in the course of human history, among them the people of Israel, who worshipped images of bulls and calves as gods.

Of course this kind of idolatry has always been completely unacceptable in God’s eyes. He has always considered idolatry as a form of mockery of Him and He has always said that He does not allow this kind of mockery of Himself as creator and as God. Idolaters will harvest what they sow!

In the Bible God is most visible as law-giver in the law covenant which He concluded with the Israelites in 1513 B.C. At the centre of this law covenant there is a code of behavior for the Israelites which regulates all aspects of life down to the minutest detail and embeds all forms of behavior in commandments, laws, prescriptions and prohibitions.

The Greek Scriptures tell us that in those days the law covenant served two purposes: it demonstrated how imperfect and sinful all people are and also in how many hundreds of ways people can harm God and their fellow humans