There are two ideas I have been mulling over the last couple years which are central to understanding the heart of God, and which most Christians do not seem to understand. These two keys are based on God’s omniscience, that fact the He is all-knowing. While it is amazing to think that God knows everything, I think we have not grasped what this means when it comes to heart of God.
These keys are summarized by some quotes I heard from somewhere … (I cannot recall where or from whom … sorry).
There is no person you would not love if you only knew their story.
I think this quote might be from Darin Hufford, though I am not certain.
It is often easy to judge and condemn other people when all we see is their outward actions or behavior.
We all tend to hate people who treat us with spite or anger.
We even get frustrated at loved ones when they do not do what we think they should in the way we want them to.
But God, who is the only being in the universe who knows everything about everyone, loves each and every person unconditionally.
When a person is rude to you, you get angry in return. But if, like God, we saw the fight they had with their spouse that morning, or the way they had been treated by their boss when they showed up late, or how the person they had encountered right before you had cussed them out, we would be able to love that person in spite of their rudeness, because we would know their story. We would know what led up to them being rude.
You do this with yourself all the time. If you are rude to someone, you might feel bad about it afterwards, and you might even apologize. But you probably also know everything that is going on in your life which caused you to react rudely toward someone else. Since you know your own story, you are often able to keep loving yourself despite the things you do.
Since God knows everything about us, He is able to understand what led up to our bad behavior, and He loves us anyway. He loves us in the midst of our bad behavior, because He knows what led up to it.
This is the first key to knowing the heart of God. The second key is like it:
To know all, is to forgive all.
I think I might have heard this from Greg Boyd, but again, I cannot be certain.
This second idea is almost exactly the same as the first. God is willing and able to forgive us for everything, in part because He knows all the events and circumstances which led up to whatever sin we committed.
It is not that we get to blame others for what we do, or even that God lets us off the hook for our sin, but that God forgives us for what we do, partly because He knows what led up to it.
Since God is omniscient, He alone knows everything that happened to the rapist which caused that man to become a rapist. He is still at fault for what he did, and made some terrible choices en route to such a terrible crime, but God is able to forgive the rapist because He knows what led up to the man committing such a terrible sin.
So How Then Should We Live?
You and I do not know everything about everyone. So does this mean that we do not have to love them or forgive them?
No, it means that we do need to love and forgive them, for we know that God, the one being who does know everything, loves and forgives.
Our job is to unconditionally love and freely forgive others, despite not knowing everything about them.
If we leave omniscience up to God, we can love all and forgive all, just as God loves and forgives us.
So we’re called to love our enemies (enemies defined as how they treat us, not how we feel), and if we don’t have love in us then we’re not of God. That aside, I would see it more as we’re called to love people regardless of their stories.
I know I would find it a personal challenge to shake the hand of a bloodthirsty tyrant who had tortured then killed family or friends (e.g. Hitler and Jews, Nero and Christians, Stalin and Ukranians, Pol Pot and half the population, Kim Jung Ill and any dissenters, especially Christians), or someone who had deeply hurt family or friend, and genuinely love and forgive the enemy. It would have to be God’s love expressed through me to love an enemy like that, but people do it.
The stories these people have don’t encourage us to love and forgive, but God does.
Like Paul the apostle, to him he was a righteous man because he believed he was in service to God by crucifying Gods people. Until God made him see it was the other way round. Many of these tyrants have their own Unique way of viewing their actions. Some just wants to play God. But God knows their past well enough to know their Trigger points to love them unconditionally, that’s why we beg Christians to be strong in the Lord because if you let a witch to destroy you and waste you away. That same witch becomes born again tomorrow, brethren Old things are past away. So watch and pray and put on the whole Amor of God and know that you are the head of all principalities and power. You are great.. God loves you.
God doesn’t forgive our sins because He knows what led up to it. He forgives our sins when we trust in Jesus. Jesus paid the price of the penalty of sin (death). He took our sins upon Himself and atoned for them. When we trust in Him, He forgives our sins, imputes (credits) His righteousness to us and gives us the Holy Spirit. It is by the power of the Holy Spirit we are able to forgive others, not because we “understand what led up to” their actions.
Greg Boyd is an Open Theist and that is not a biblical understanding of God’s omniscience (all knowing), omnipotence (all power) and omnipresence. Open Theism is man’s attempt to make God more like us and it is not a biblical doctrine.
God forgives us because of His grace. It is an unmerited gift, available to those who trust in Jesus because of Jesus’ finished work to redeem man. Yes, God does know why we sin (“what led up to”) but that is not an excuse of any merit and plays no part in God’s forgiveness of our sins. We are justified (forgiven) by grace alone through faith in Jesus.
I just started a quest to know the heart of God better. My method I’m trying now is to put myself in the place of people we read about in the bible. The first story I’m using is the woman caught in adultery. Jesus was there teaching. What was going through his mind? His heart? Then the Pharisees and Scribes showed up and quote law. Jesus knelt and wrote in the dirt. What was he thinking? When the accusers all left, what did he think then? I believe praying about these questions and letting the Holy Spirit show me answers will increase my understanding of God’s heart.
Luke 7:41-42 (NLT) 41 Then Jesus told him this story: “A man loaned money to two people—500 pieces of silver[a] to one and 50 pieces to the other. 42 But neither of them could repay him, so he kindly forgave them both, canceling their debts. Who do you suppose loved him more after that?”
Like the apostle Paul once said, I myself am also a “chief of sinners” so for me, the well of love runs deep. The gratitude of my heart so overwhelming God is able to use me as a vessel of honor.
1 Cor 13: 4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged
I can look at the worst of sinners and think, “But for the grace of God, there go I.”
Thank you for what you have shared with us..
Thank you God…
There’s nothing to add or dispute! I Love your message and now know why the Holy Spirit gave me this assignment: to share the heart of God. I am going to use your post to open and will direct to redeeminggod.com.
Thank you for your faithfulness.
In His Great Love,
Wanda