As I grapple with metaphors to explain the unexplainable (can you say God, Creator, Being?) I wonder just how futile the effort is. How can finite man even approach the elementary aspects of God let alone the deeper mysterious ones that evade us. But one that helps me see that God is love more than not is the potter vs. blacksmith metapor.
I grew up in a denomination that demonstrated the BLACKSMITH approach to God:
1-God was angry with my sin and demanded that Jesus be killed so I could live
2-God was a harsh task master, school master who kept all my sins accounted.
3-God only loved a few people who obeyed all His (God was a man) laws.
4-God would send everyone to hell who didn’t live right and repented of all sins.
5-God only loved Christians- everyone else He banned to an eternal punishment.
It was the role of God and the church to hammer us into conformity, shape us in His image, keep the heat on and make sure we didn’t get off the anvil until we’d been properly beaten into submission. It was a tough life to live but I was up to it, until I discovered I really couldn’t do it and neither was God requiring it of me. Doctrinal intolerance made life oh so impossible!
I have now adopted the POTTER approach to God and life is good.
1-God sent Jesus to demonstrate His love not to appease His anger.
2-God is my exhorter and encourager who covers my sins as East is from West.
3-God loves ALL of His creations of which I’m one.
4-God will bring correction to all in the end and polish us up before joinging Him forever.
5-He keeps my on the wheel gently shaping and molding me into His image.
It all sounds too good to be true- almost like GOOD NEWS!
I can see why Marcion had such a difficult time with the Old Testament God and the New Testament God. If I lived in His day, I’d probably have the same concerns. He was told to accept the Bible literally! But I live in the twenty first century and we know so much more about God because of the progressive revelation and unfolding of His nature through time. Are you up with the times or stuck back in 2-3,000 year old theology?
I agree with you Ernie…the Potters’ wheel is the better place to reside, wouldn’t you agree even a place of FREEDOM? I like NOT having to know everything, not having to perform to earn my Father God’s love as I once thought I did.
It is more like a prison having to be the “doer”, but always failing, of all the man made laws and traditions in the blacksmith’s anvil, talk about a people in chains of bondage, in a place of hell of which I once was a part of.