Job CCCXXIX

 Job 39:5-12, “Who set the wild donkey free? Who loosed the bonds of the onager, whose home I have made in the wilderness, and the barren land his dwelling? He scorns the tumult of the city; he does not heed the shouts of the driver. The range of the mountains is his pasture, and he searches after every green thing. Will the wild ox be willing to serve you? Will he bed by your manger? Can you bind the wild ox in the furrow with ropes? Or will he plow the valleys behind you? Will you trust him because his strength is great? Or will you leave your labor to him? Will you trust him to bring home your grain, and gather it to your threshing floor?”

There is one God. There is one King on the throne, and all the rest are pretenders to it. Men might aspire to the title of little gods, but once we get a glimpse into what God can do, what He has done, who He is, the detail that went into the creation of something as insignificant as the wild donkey, or the wild ox, we soon realize that though they might claim to be deities, they fall short of the definition, and vastly so.

Even so, self-delusion is a powerful aphrodisiac, and there have been those throughout history who insisted that they could readily replace the God of the universe, and in their hubris insisted they could do a better job of it. When pressed on the issue and asked what they would have done differently, it’s always some vague, opaque thing about healing the world, or making men live in brotherhood, not understanding the underlying implications of either.

As far as the world goes, God created a perfect world, harmonious and wondrous. It’s not God who systematically went on a rampage to destroy His wondrous creation; it was man. It’s akin to my wife baking a cake, perfect in every way, then having one of the neighbor kids come by and crush it into an oddly shaped amalgam of frosting, unrecognizable in its current form from what it was intended to be, then blaming my wife for making such an unappetizing dessert. What she made was glorious, and she is not to blame for its destruction because it wasn’t her hands that crushed it and mangled it, but the hands of another.

As far as the brotherhood of man is concerned, if free will does not exist, then all we would end up being are automatons, robots in flesh suits going about doing the bidding of another without agency or choice. Compulsion isn’t love. Love is not compulsory. We choose to love. We choose to submit. We choose to worship. We choose to honor. We choose to obey. God’s desire is that we choose Him and reciprocate the love He has shown, rather than force us into fealty like some medieval overlord who sacked a neighboring village and now rules over the peasants with an iron fist.

Yes, God reveals Himself; God entreats; God beckons; God calls, but we must heed the call, answer His entreaties, and choose to humble ourselves at the foot of the cross and follow after Him.

When Joshua stood before the people and declared, “Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve”, it means they had a choice! As for him and his house, the choice had already been made. They would serve the Lord in sincerity and truth.

You can’t serve two masters; you must choose one. The choice is yours, as are the consequences. I can’t drag you into heaven; I can’t browbeat you into serving God in sincerity and truth; I can’t force you to take your walk seriously and circumspectly, putting away the things you know are hindering your spiritual growth. All I can do is tell you what the Book says, and reaffirm the truth that there are no exemptions or carveouts for anyone. I’m not special, and neither are you. What God demands of the least He demands of the greatest.

Whosoever means whosoever. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him would not perish but have everlasting life. Belief isn’t something that can be projected onto another, nor is it something that can be forced upon someone. It is inherent and inborn to the individual and something they must come to discover and acquire.

You can tell me you were teleported to heaven and played hopscotch with the Almighty until you’re blue in the face; you may even believe it, but I don’t. See how that works? I believe that Jesus is the only begotten Son of God, the only means by which man might be reconciled to the Father, that He lived, died, and rose again and ascended into heaven, not because someone told me I should believe it, but because to the deepest recesses of my soul, to the marrow of my bones, I do.

The reality of Jesus must be experienced on a personal and intimate level. It can’t be a second- or third-hand retelling of how another was saved and born again, but something you must experience for yourself. What good does it do a blind man if someone tells them they’ve seen a Monet in person? They have no frame of reference; they don’t know what a Monet is, and the most vivid description of one won’t come close to the reality of seeing it.

I once was blind, but now I see. I once was lost, but now am found. I once had no hope, but now He is my hope. I once had no purpose, but now He is my purpose. All these are true, but fall short of describing what it is to be born again, to be transformed, to be made new, and to be reconciled to God.

Another aspect that stood out in God’s description of His attributes is that none of them have anything to do with destruction or chaos. Every one is about order, creation, and the painstaking detail that went into speaking the world we take for granted into being. There is a reason Jesus said He is the light of the world, and not the darkness thereof.

John 8:12, “Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, ‘I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.’”

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.