Reasonable God

"Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord."  Isaiah 1:18

Reasonable to the Last

THE MARVELOUS MIRACLE OF THE ATONEMENT FOR SIN was given to mankind at Calvary for their benefit and use, yet Christ is received with less and less enthusiasm as each day passes.  A merchant may advertise in a local newspaper the durability of a tire, battery or a spark plug of some well known brand and the response by the buying public may be very enthusiastic, yet these products wear out in due time and are discarded in the junk yard.

Nothing has ever been tried that can advertise or boast more of its lasting durability than real salvation can, yet the public acceptance is small and the buyers few.  Real salvation has stood the test in the lion's den and in the belly of a whale; it has stood the test in the fiery furnace, the swelling of Jordan and on a sinking ship; it has stood the test in the thick of the battle, in the darkest of dungeons and in a pot of oil.  It has refilled the barrel when the last grain of meal was gone and given safe passage across the valley of death.  Its durability is everlasting and its guarantee never runs out.

For all this its salesmen get scoffed at, ridiculed, spit upon, tortured and falsely accused, yet God is so reasonable that He still pleads for sinners to reconsider their ways.  This is the lovable loving the unlovable.  It is no other than the reasonable trying to reason with the unreasonable.

The Son of God was mocked, spit upon, crowned with thorns and crucified in the place of a murderer and yet he said: "Forgive them for they know not what they do."  At that very moment he could have called twelve legions of angels to his rescue and yet in agony he found time to reason with two lost thieves.

The depth of His reasonableness will never be comprehended by mankind for He could have stood on the Mount of Olives in the distance and called for the two angels that destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, and in a few minutes' time Jerusalem would have been like a sea of melted glass from the intense heat.  God could have taken this world in the palm of his hand, ground it into powder, blown the dust of it out into space along the Milky Way and forgot that it ever existed.  Instead, this reasonable God looked out over the lost that were in the city and wept.  What the Lord did at Calvary cannot be described by the word "great"; neither can what He kept from doing to this world be described by this word.  It was the creation mocking the Creator and yet He was reasonable.

A few weeks before this the Pharisees confronted Jesus with a woman caught in the act of adultery.  With the woman's head bowed with guilt and embarrassment, they challenged the Lord to stone her as the Law declared.  This marvelous and reasonable God stooped to the ground and slowly began to write in the sand.  As He began to write the hidden sins of each of her accusers, they one by one disappeared and she was left alone.  This reasonable God then spoke softly and clearly: "He that is without sin, let him cast the first stone."  With no stones being thrown, her accusers left being indicted of sinful acts.  He then told the woman: "Neither do I condemn thee; go and sin no more." 

This shows how reasonable God is to a sinner, for though he knew the hidden sins of the accusers, he would not stoop to such low tactics as they in exposing them in public.  Instead, he wrote their sins in the sand one by one where only they could see.  He then erased them forever from public view with a stroke of the sole of his sandal.

Is God unreasonable?  He spoke this world into existence.  He hung the sun in place and told it to give forth light.  He spun the solar system out into space and tacked the heavens back with the stars and gave them all a name.  He can shake empires, remove kings and banish nations into oblivion and yet your will can turn him away.  May I ask again - is He unreasonable?  To think of a man, who came from dust and shall return to dust, being asked by the Creator for only a few moments of his time and being refused.  He most certainly is a reasonable God when He does not retaliate with anger.

The Lord was not obligated to Nineveh nor did He owe anything to Jonah and yet He was so reasonable.  The inhabitants of Nineveh humbled themselves by putting on sackcloth and ashes and fell on the mercies of God, thus turning away the anger of the Lord.  It is your privilege to have access to salvation, not His. Sackcloth and ashes mean faith, repentance, and works all in one package when applied in meekness.

There is a difference in "Churchianity" and Christianity.  He doesn't want you to just turn over a new leaf but he wants all things to become new.  Salvation is not one of the seven wonders of the world but the only wonder.  Many people laugh and shake their heads because there are altars placed in churches for sinners to kneel at and repent, but to scoff is an insult to the cross and to the blood of Christ.  Jesus washing the blind man's eyes in spittle looked foolish and many shook their heads; so does an altar look foolish to the self-righteous.

When your air castles tumble and your little world of make-believe crumbles under you, you will suddenly be awakened to the fact that you are a helpless sinner and that God was so reasonable.

Reasonable to Lukewarm Christians

Many Christians can endure a depression but cannot endure material gain.  The rich young ruler who kept all the commandments might have become an apostle if his wealth had not possessed him.  If only he had possessed it and it became his slave, then he would not have gone away in sorrow.  Though man was made of the earth, there is something in him far more important than dust.  God picks up the lowest dust and allows it to become a joint heir with Jesus Christ.

I find church members who claim they are interested in the progress of their church and also say they have a desire to spread the Gospel to the heathen in distant lands.  Yet they can never obligate themselves to a church pledge nor is there ever a convenient time to send a donation to a struggling missionary abroad.  These same people do not hesitate to go into debt for twenty years and obligate themselves for a large mortgage to buy a home, yet should they falter on their payments, a foreclosure may be made and they may find themselves out in the cold.  Little do they realize how reasonable the Lord is, for He weighs their actions with the knowledge of their past. These same members came into this world with a mortgage on their souls to Satan.  Many times Satan would have foreclosed on them before they were saved, but His mercy held up the forclosing until such time as He could redeem them by due process of Salvation.

For any person to miss heaven after they lhave heard the Gospel is to disregard all reasoning and  pleading of conviction. He must disregard all sermons, prayers and  religious songs. His creation proclaims and makes manifest of him in these words:

"For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and  Godhead; so that they are without excuse."
Romans 1:20

We can question the Lord's will on many things but never His will to save. The Lord could make man wallow in agony until he sought Him, but He never intrudes where not invited. The Book of Revelation reveals six churches that had grown cold or lukewarm in spirit. He complimented them for their good and called attention to their bad.  Then He warned them of what He would do but yet He tempered His threat with this reminder, "I gave Jezebel space to repent of her forrnications."  This implied that if He was merciful to such a wicked woman as Jezebel, that He most certainly would be merciful and reasonable to lukewarm saints.  The reasonableness of God is found in the book of James to all that have erred from the truth and by doing so have become sinners.

" Bretheren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him; Let him know, that he which converted the sinner from  the error of His way, shall save a soul from death and shall hide a multitude of sins."
James 5:19-20

The only hope for this wayward Christian is for him to return to the truth.

I see many sitting in church on the "bench of do-nothing" who once had great experiences in the truths of God but now have erred and become lukewarm.  A great experience with the Lord yesterday is no assurance you are still in fellowship today. The Lord expects you to be reasonable.  This modern world can leave the horse and buggy day it must never err in forgetting that which they had in those days-the experience of "old time salvation."  Israel had great experiences of victory and then erred.

For you to offer any thing at hand to God as a consecration to holiness is to play the game of folly as Cain. Even then the Lord was so reasonable. Cain and his brother Abel made a sacrifice offering to God. The Lord had respect for Abel and his offering but for Cain and his offerings he had no respect. Cain became angry, as most lukewarm Christians do when told the truth, and his countenance fell. The Lord said: "If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door."  This was agreeable reasoning but Cain chose such a reasonable God, and when he chose to reason it was too late, for God would not allow Cain to come back into his presence, Cain then said: "My Puni8shment is greater than I can bear."  It was Cain who was unreasonable.

Many today are making the same mistake. Right or wrong, they have no intention of reasoning with God until it is too late.  Any way will not do.  Any religious belief will not do.  No one can escape the truths of Salvation in reasoning with God.

No one is so reasonable as God, for when David sinned against the Lord by numbering Israel and had to accept punishment by either famine, pestilence of falling into the hands of his enemies, he chose to fall into the hands of a reasonable God.  Many church members would not dare fall into His hands as they might become "emotional ."  To love God with all  thy soul, mind and strength means "emotional."  You cannot mold iron while it is cold.  Neither can a cold church member be molded into a saint until he gets on fire with the spirit.  The radiant glow of the spirit in Stephen's face was more noticeable in comparison to the cold countenances of the religious Pharisees.

The Lord told the Laodicean church that he knew their works.  They were neither hot nor cold, but He wished they were one or the other.  In the lukewarm condition they were in, He would "spew them out of his mouth."  His reasoning in this was: if cold, they were in a lost condition and he would deal accordingly to get them back into the fold; if hot, then he had no worry for they were on fire with the spirit. But just to be lukewarm and be in the middle ground of no man's land was a state of being He would not tolerate.

The Lord has always tried to warn his children they cannot escape His wrath if they neglect Him. The Lord's warnings are heard in these words: "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great a salvation?" There is no escape route known by God: "For if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?"

Reasonable in Judgement

The Lord was more reasonable in His judgement proclaimed on Nineveh than was His servant Jonah.  After proclaiming the judgements of God on the city, Jonah retired to a hillside and became angry because the Lord had reasoned with its inhabitants and they had repented so that they were spared from His wrath. Of all men Jonah was the most foolish. The Lord had spared him from being fish food which he rightly deserved. The Book of Jonah must impress all who read it with hoe reasonable then Lord is in judgement. He could not destroy Nineveh without first warning it. Judgements and promises are conditional. What will be, will be, unless that individual or group does something to change the mind of God.

The Lord would not destroy Sodom and Gomorrah until he talked to Abraham and dispatched two angels into its streets.  Abraham reasoned with God to spare the city on his terms. The Lord was so reasonable that Abraham felt ashamed to bargain any further when it was learned not even ten righteous men were to be found. If were possible for Lot to come forth and testify today, thee would surely be tears in the eyes of all who heard him telling of the mercy and reasonableness of God in judgement. The Lord would not destroy the righteous and unrighteous together.

Lot could tell us the importance of knowing someone on speaking terms with God. Many do not comprehend or assess the value of having the friendship of one who could intercede in prayer on their behalf. The Shunammite woman had her only son restored to life because of Elisha, the Prophet of God, befriended her. It was Joseph who Pharoah owed so much for sparing Egypt from salvation. In the New Testament, all those with Apostle Paul in shipwreak would verify that his presence on th ship was a great asset. After all hope was gone, then came the assuring words from Paul that an angel had stood by him and said there would be no loss of life.  Peter owed much to those spirit-filled saints who prayed the jail gates open.

All too often Christians that are inclined to be emotional in worship and who earnestly pray and have faith in prayer are called "squares."  Until the Lord calls them "squares," the least anyone should do is be reaonable for they may be more valuable to a community than anyone knows.

Reasonable to Israel in the Wilderness and Unto This Day

God did marvelous things in the sight of all Israel when they were yet slaves in Egypt.  The night they left not even a dog showed his teeth as they traveled all night in their escape. This was a feat only the Lord could perform as the company as the company of people moving were numbered over a million. Besides this great multitude were carts carying their belongings plus their livestock on foot.  He divided the sea and caused them to pass through as the waters stood as a heap.  In the daytime he led them with a cloud and in the night with a pillar of fire.  In the desert when they would have perished by thirst, He struck the rocks and they drank of the cold water from the springs of the deep.  Streams of water gushed from the rocks and ran down through the desert like rivers.  When they were hungry the Lord rained down manna upon them to eat and mankind did eat angel's food.  In the morning as east wind blew this food from heaven into their camp and as quickly as each one gathered up their portion for one day, a wind from the south blew it out of their presence. He opened the doors and windows of heaven and rained flesh also upon them as dust and feathered fowls like as the sand of the sea.

Because the Lord had protected them so well and furnished them the purest of water and finest of food, they took it for granted it was the Lord's priveledge to serve them.  Though he had sent them angel's food into their midst with instructions to gather just enough every morning to last all day, they had the audacity to question God as to why He did not set it on the table for them in their tents. So they did eat and were well fed, for he gave them their own desire.  But while their meat was yet in thier mouths, the wrath of God came upon them and smote down the chosen men of Israel.

This is as true today as it was then.  Though God has furnished the greatest and the best plan of Salvation ever offered to mankind, there are those who question why God does not make Salvation easier for them.

For all this the children of Israel still sinned and believed not his wondrous works.  Therefore their days were consumed in vanity and their years in trouble.  When He slew them, they inquired early after him and remembered that God was their rock of refuge in time of trouble and their redeemer.  Nevertheless, they did flatter him with their mouths, and they lied unto him with their tongues; for their heart was not right with him, neither were they steadfast in His covenant.

But the Lord, being full of compassion, forgave them their iniquity and destroyed them not.  He was so reasonable that many times He turned away His anger and would not let His wrath come upon them, for He remembered that they were like flowers, here today and gone tomorrow.  Many times they provoked Him in the wilderness and grieved Him in the desert.  Though they forgot all the miracles He performed in delivering them out of bondage, yet He was reasonable when tempted to destroy them in the wilderness.

Nearly two thousand years ago He came as the Messiah to all Israel.  There was no sin found in Him nor guile found in His mouth.  He came to be their Savior and went about doing only good to them, yet He was wounded in house of His friends.  He came unto His own and His own received Him not but as many as did receive Him He granted to them the power to become the children of God.  Though He was dishonored by them and ridiculed for claiming to be their king, He yet reasoned with them and offered to them the first chance to be born of the water and of the spirit.  Though betrayed and crucified with Israel's approval, we find Him still reasonable with the statement of Apostle Peter on the Day of Pentecost: "For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call."

His mercy and forgiveness cannot be fathomed or estimated.  No matter what depths of sin a human soul may reach, there is no God as reasonable as He to come to for forgiveness.  Close friends and kinfolk will disappoint you, but God cannot and will not ever be a disappointment.  Run unto him while he is yet so reasonable.