I frequently tell students that they are more than welcomed to quote me out of class. I am fine with that, even if what I say isn’t something they like, as in “Can you believe Professor Huxford said . . .?” But I always remind them , “If you’re quoting me, make sure you are saying what I said, not what you think I said.” I hate it when I’m misquoted!
All of that has me wondering about how God might feel about us humans when we are so casual about telling the world what God thinks about all sorts of issues. Sometimes our guilt in this area may be that we are simply speaking to an issue about which we have no Spirit-inspired word from God. Other times, our guilt here is that even though we do have such a Word from God, we have either misunderstood it or deliberately chosen to make it fit our preconceived theological systems about what the Bible can and cannot say.
The beginning of a new calendar year marks the beginning of a new semester for me, and that means that sometime this week, in four different classes I’m teaching, I will say something like, “My goal is two-fold when it comes to commenting on Scripture: first, I want to try to never say more than Scripture says; and second, I want to try to never say less than Scripture says.” Quite frankly, that falls under the category of “easier said than done!”
My goal is two-fold when it comes to commenting on Scripture: first, I want to try to never say more than Scripture says; and second, I want to try to never say less than Scripture says.
If I take that goal seriously, I need to be able to cite sources. In the case of “speaking on behalf of God,” that means something like “book, chapter, verse,” as one of my early Bible professors insisted, and “rightly dividing the word of truth,” as Paul encouraged young Timothy (2 Timothy 2:15). Of course, if I take this goal seriously, I will need to have the courage to say “I don’t know” sometimes, maybe more times than I wish. But I’d much rather you be frustrated that I can’t answer your question than God frustrated that I misrepresented Him.
There is a side of me that thinks (maybe knows?) that if I could fully understand and speak on behalf of God, I would have little need for Him. The very fact of mystery – in the best sense of that word – is a vitally important part of my attraction to a God described by Paul with these words: “How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways.” (Romans 11:33)
In mid-December, an article in the Atlanta Journal Constitution was titled “Clayton 11-year-old shot to death by best friend, 12, authorities say” (17 December 2021). The article pointed out that at that time, “more than two dozen children and teens have been killed by gunfire this year in metro Atlanta.” I don’t know what the total number is as of now, but I know of at least two more entries on this horrific list.
In an interview with this child’s mother, she is quoted as saying, “God designed it the way he wanted to design it. If it was time for (name of child) to go, it was time for (name of child) to go.” (I can’t bear to mention the child’s name or his mother’s name. I can’t imagine her suffering at the moment.) To add to the awful nature of this story, this child’s five-year-old cousin was shot and killed by a three-year-old sibling just two weeks earlier. If I were the parent of either of these children (and numerous others in metro Atlanta and across the country) and someone told me “God designed it the way he wanted to design it,” I would be done with God.
Before you quit reading, this is not about gun control – though it should at least make us think about how in the world we can prevent three-year old and twelve-year old children from having access to guns and killing other children! Rather, this is about “speaking on behalf of God.” Is it really God’s design that this kind of horrific violence ever happen, much less happen with some degree of frequency all around us?
I can remember sitting at a funeral for an infant who died suddenly at about six months of age. Her grandparents were members of the church where I was the preacher. The preacher conducting the service said, “God wanted a pretty flower in heaven, and picked your baby.” It seems like I constantly hear something like, “When it’s your time to go, it’s your time to go.” A little twist on what the mother said about her son. I always wonder, if that is true, why do people who say that go to doctors? But that’s a question for another day.
When we say those sorts of things, and lots more like them, we are, I think, saying “more than Scripture says” on behalf of God. It is a kind of hyperbolic view of the sovereignty of God on steroids. I deeply believe that the Bible teaches me that God is sovereign – in ways that will forever remain a mystery. But what I can’t find in Scripture is a kind of capricious view of that sovereignty that makes Him seem uncaring about the life of a twelve-year-old kid living on the southside of metro Atlanta with his grandparents.
In the spirit of “God so loved the world” (John 3:16), we have been commissioned to be to the world around us what Jesus was to the world into which He came (John 20:21). And “as we are going,” we are to make disciples and baptize them and teach them (Matthew 28:19, 20) until “the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20) and “the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8) cross paths at His glorious reappearing.
But how will we ever be fruitful (John 15:1-11) if the image our culture has of God is based on a picture we have painted of a capricious God who thrills at snatching life from among us? Or a while bunch of other awful things that happen all around us, and somehow the word that goes out seems to say, “God did it. Deal with it.”
The only explanation I can give for such things – that I think reflects the spirit of Scripture – is that our world has been dreadfully impacted by sin and death. But that never was and still isn’t how God “designed” it to be. In fact, creation itself “waits eagerly for the revealing of the children of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.” (Romans 8:18-25)
Our message to the world can’t continue to be “God designed it this way” if we want to speak “no more” or “no less” than God has said.
It must be “In Christ, it doesn’t have to be this way.”
My new year’s resolution? Maybe just to take more seriously than ever my commitment to be a “no more/no less” kind of guy when it comes to citing sources when I speak on behalf of God.
Wye Huxford 