God's Little Problem
If We Only Believed And Obeyed.
God's Little Problem
God was having trouble with his children on Earth. He had promised never to flood the whole Earth again, so he had to think of something different that would affect the entire Earth. He didn't want to destroy them but to get their attention. He reasoned that they would begin to be obedient when he had their attention.
The Bible was the most published and sought-after book on Earth, but that did not mean his children were reading it, taking advantage of its promises, or obeying it. On the contrary, they loved all the securities in the Bible but had misapplied the promises. They were claiming the promises without understanding the contracts came only when the conditions were met.
This is where obedience came in or, in this case, where compliance had gone out of style. People just believed that He, God, had so loved the world that He had given His Son, Jesus, to be a sacrifice for the sins of the whole Earth. The trending thought had been that believing in the fact of Jesus's death was sufficient for anyone to be saved and ready for heaven when they died. They were not told forgiveness of a person’s sin resulted from obedience to God.
People were pressuring everyone they could to believe that Jesus was God's Son. He had died on the cross, and after three days in the tomb, he arose from the dead. People worldwide believed these facts, but then nothing happened in their lives. All they had done was confess their belief in Jesus. And this was their problem. They had believed in facts, but they had no idea that knowing these facts should result in obedience to what the Bible had taught. The trending teaching was a faith-only form of being pleasing to God. Teaching that there was more than merely believing in Jesus to be saved was not trendy. So, their belief did not result in obedience.
They were ignorantly taught that belief was enough to gain God's grace. So, out of His love, he started thinking. "What can I do to get these stiff-necked creatures to obey what I have commanded in my Word"?
In a flash, He had it. He would get their attention by causing gravity on Earth to be slightly different. On the first day, God kept everything as He had made it. People enjoyed this carefree lifestyle. They believed in God but didn't obey what he taught. After all, the thinking was all a person had to do to be saved was believe.
The next day, God caused gravity to be a little stronger. Things were different. Leaves fell from the trees faster. When people tripped, they fell harder. The plants had different shapes. Airplanes had to take off differently. The landings were terrible, with blown tires from hitting the ground. These were a few of the news items in the evening news.
The problem with most news networks was that they did not mention that this drastic change in gravity had to be caused by God. Instead, they reasoned that it had to be a human-caused result of something that had to be further studied by the government.
Remember, God is still in control of things, so the next day, God reversed the strength of Earth's gravity. It was lighter. It took forever for a leaf to fall from a tree. If a person stubbed his toe and caused him to fall, he could call his doctor on his cell phone and make an appointment before he hit the ground. As far as this effect on the airplanes, they took off quicker, flying faster and farther than the next airport. Most had to turn around and come in for a landing from the other direction because they had traveled so far. Their flight schedules and sharing of the airport runways could have been better.
Again, guess what? The news networks had a field day, blaming the masses of people for the change in gravity.
The next day, God sat in heaven, waiting to see if he got the people's attention. He hadn't. Most people lived the same as they always had – without obeying God.
“Well," God said to Himself, "It looks like I will have to wait until Judgment Day when people will finally see that each promise I made came with the condition I gave.
10/22/2004 This was a tongue-in-cheek writing. A few parts are true. Some people still believe, partly. God is still in control. God wants people’s attention. God wants people to believe in and obey Jesus’ teaching. God is still having trouble with his children on earth.
By Larry E. Whittington
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I enjoyed your creativity on a topic where the issues seem to be visible for some and yet hard to see for others. We must be careful and also vigilant regarding what we choose to believe. Thank you for sharing!
Great story. I wasn't sure where you were going with it but when you got to the part about gravity you really got me laughing. I read it to good wife Bev and she got a kick out of it too.
My take on salvation is the same, except I would add this: faith is essential, and it has to be sincere, and yes, God wants our complete commitment and obedience, but he knows we'll still fall short, and without his loving grace to bridge the gap, we would be lost. I'm very thankful for the wonderful grace of Jesus.