Do you remember the scene from Star Wars, near to the end of The Return Of The Jedi? The Millenium Falcon has just destroyed the main power reactor of the Death Star, and as the entire base starts to blow up, the Millenium Falcon starts to make it's desperate attempt at escaping the base along with another comrade and an enemy TIE fighter, lest they blow up along with the entire death star. In the course of escaping, the flames engulf and destroy the hapless TIE fighter and the allied fighter(was it an X-Wing?), and just as the flames start to engulf the Millenium Falcon itself and they look as if they're all about to be matyred, the ship shoots out of the Death Star, and the crew heaves a great sigh of relief. (Of course, the Death Star blows up, and the Rebel Alliance celebrates the end of the enemy along with their new found furry Ewok friends.)
Exactly the impression I got when I heard today's sermon on Romans 5:12-21. Having seen the bad news of God's anger on ALL men because of their unrighteousness(Rom 1:18-3:20), and the perfect solution solution given by God at the right time(Rom 3:21-26), and now one of aspects of this salvation, I can't help but heave a sigh of relief looking at the doom that we've left(Rom 5:12) and be thankful to the 'rescuer' that plucked us out from this doom into the promise(Rom 5:15-21).
All this, available to anyone who receives it simply by believing in what has been said in the bible, sometimes seems far too good to be true...but that's what grace is about, right? (God never owed us anything, let alone our salvation, but yet He gave his only son to do so.)
2 comments:
Hehe... yeah, i remember that scene... and yes, it was an X-Wing ;)
I know exactly how you feel and think too. And ultimately, it isn't bad news that God's wrath is on all man. If God's righteouness and justice toward sin were to be held captive by soft sentimentalism toward man, God won't really be GOD right? He HAS to address sin, for sin defames his glory. If his wrath wasn't on us, it implies that he's partial toward sin and that partiality would mean that he's denying the value of his own glory and is being untrue to his nature... and that would make him unworthy of anyone's worship.
Therefore, its GOOD NEWS that God's wrath is on all man. For (I quote from John Piper) "If God were not committed first to vinidicate the worth of his won glory, there would be no gospel and no hope, for there would be no glorious God. The God-centeredness of God is the foundation of his grace to the ungodly".
:)
oops... typo errors :p
"vinidicate" should be vindicate &
"won" should be "own"
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