HOW AND WHY GOD HAS DISAPPEARED.
“I shall hide my face from them. I shall see what their end will be, for they are a perverse generation, children who are unfaithful” Deuteronomy 32: 20.
Trump and religion.
Of course, God is always there, somewhere, everywhere, if we believe what the Bible says. Because He has been barred from playing a role in business, politics , in society in general, and, yes, even in religion, prayer is needed more than ever.
Jesus alludes to God’s absence when, as recorded in John 17, just before going to his Father, he asks, “My prayer is that you protect them (us) from the evil one (verse 15) now that I am leaving,” indicating that the great enemy, the evil one, is in charge in the world. 1 John 5: 19 unambiguously confirms this when it says that ‘the evil one rules our world.’ If you don’t believe it, look it up if you have a Bible.
Over time the influence of the ‘evil one’ has gradually increased and now has become all pervasive.
No doubt some sort of god plays a large role in America, where he is a front-seat actor, especially in the Republican Party, which, by and large, has endorsed Donald Trump, who, in my opinion, embodies evil. He blatantly lied when he stated that the Bible is his favorite book.
What especially galls me is that when Trump met with hundreds of evangelical Christians, Dr. James Dobson, perhaps the most influential leader in the evangelical world, said that “Trump appears to be tender to things of the Spirit.”
I happen to know my Bible, and in Colossians 3: 12 “the things of the Spirit” are listed as ‘compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience”. Anyone who is following USA politics knows that not one of these attributes applies to this presidential contender: his taunts, his boastings, his uncharitable remarks on opponents, minorities, veterans, disabled, are well-known.
And then there is Jerry Falwell Jr., president of that ultra right-wing “Christian” Liberty University who expresses as his belief that “Donald Trump is God’s man to lead the nation.”
These are just two examples of “Christian” leaders endorsing a man who is the opposite of all that stands for Jesus and his teaching. Just one more quote from another influential church man, the pastor of the First Baptist Church in Dallas, Robert Jeffries who told his large flock that “any Christian who would sit at home and not vote for Donald Trump is motivated by pride rather than principle.”
These “men of God” as they call themselves, have totally lost touch with the God who has revealed himself in Jesus. Just imagine: these people want to do away with all environmental protection, scrap laws that protect the poor and introduce measures to make the rich richer.
It reminds me of an episode that ties in with this. I noticed it in THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV, Dostoevsky’s last book. It’s called “The Grand Inquisitor”. It’s a story that Ivan, the atheist Karamazov brother, has composed and recounts to his younger brother Alyosha, the aspiring priest. In it Jesus returns to the earth during the Spanish Inquisition. Ivan says: “It is fifteen centuries since signs from heaven were seen. And now the deity appears once more among the people.” Everyone recognizes him, because a blind man sees and a dead child rises. But the old cardinal, in charge of the Inquisition, takes Jesus to prison and tells him that: “You have no right to add anything to what you have said…. Why have you come to hinder us?” Ivan explains that this is a fundamental feature of the Church that God cannot ‘meddle’ now because “all has been given by you to the Pope. The Church is the authority now.”
The Grand Inquisitor then tells Jesus that he erred when he resisted the devil’s three temptations in the wilderness, where the devil offered him miracle, mystery and might, which the Church has accepted. Jesus, however, wanted them to have freedom of choice. But, says the clergyman, freedom is too difficult and frightful for the masses and so the Church has taken the three awesome gifts for them. The Inquisitor concludes: “We are not working with you, but with the devil– that is our mystery.” Jesus, still not speaking, kisses him on the lips. “That was all his answer.” The Grand Inquisitor opens the cell door and says, “Go, and come no more, never, never.” And the divine visitor leaves.
“Freedom is too difficult for the masses” says the cardinal, but that is an important part of Jesus’ teaching: “The Truth shall set you free”. The church of his day and of today rather not gives the people a free hand.
Is the result of this the following?
“Whenever God erects a house of prayer
The Devil builds a chapel there;
And ‘twill be found upon examination,
The latter has the largest congregation.”
Daniel Defoe in The True-born Englishman
By and large (of course there are exceptions that confirm the rule) the devil has taken over much of the instituted church. I greatly admire Pope Francis, but he is stuck in a system that is beyond reforming.
In many ways the Christian religion, as practiCed in North America, differs very little from Islam where the existence of the one and only god forms the cornerstone of this entire belief system. There Allah alone is the all-powerful authority. “We are not working with you, but with the devil– that is our mystery” is true of Islam and equally true of the American evangelical movement, which is owned by the Republican Party, abhors any environmental regulation, wants food stamps abolished and fully endorses the Rapture heresy.
No wonder these two “religions” hate each other: they are two sides of the same coin.
Jesus gave us two important rules for life.
Jesus gave a few directives in his brief sojourn on earth. One of them was “Love God above anything else”. Tell me: how possibly can say that we love great artists if we despise their works of art? When we say we love God and treat creation as totally expendable, then our attachment to God is completely phony.
The other direct rule Jesus gave us is in the Sermon on the Mount: “Seek first the Kingdom of God and its righteousness”. The Kingdom of God is his creation, this simply means that we always and everywhere must strive to improve creation and obey the laws that govern it. Show me a church where this is the case. Show me a person who does that. Our collective failure to pursue the aims of the Kingdom indicates our total lack to implement God’s intentions, which shows up in our willful neglect to preach and practise love for creation (John 3: 16), and is proof that we has not grasped the essence of the gospel.
This essentially means that we have eliminated God from society. God’s disappearance is our doing.
It all started long ago.
Of course Christianity has immensely influenced the Western world, witness the Roman Catholic Church and its long history. There the first Pope emerged 1700 years ago in the year 312 when the Emperor Constantin exchanged the Roman Eagle for the Christian cross. Ever since then the Roman Catholic Church has been fashioned along Roman Imperial lines, with the Pope resembling the Emperor, the Cardinals acting as consuls, while all the way down the line the priests have taken the place of the centurions.
All this has been a far cry from the simple instructions of Jesus when he wandered the earth, teaching his small group of followers of the kingdom to come.
Jacques Ellul. Ever heard of him?
Jacques Ellul is another of my favorite authors. He was a professor of law at the University of Bordeaux, France, and a member of the Resistance during the war. In his book – one of many I have – HOPE IN TIME OF ABANDONMENT, in its preface, he writes “The decisive importance of the promise, the approach of the Second Coming, the Eschaton, which is at our doorsteps, is the only hope we have. It is the only hope now that God has abandoned us.”
Why was Ellul so convinced that God has abandoned us?
Here are a few quotes from his book: “The glory of God cannot be made present by means of words (preaching alone, I might add, is totally inadequate)…..Paul tells us that the whole creation witnesses to his glory (Rom. 11: 38).. It is of the utmost importance to maintain this creation to the glory of God…..It is not only we humans who must live to God’s glory: it is the whole of creation! That’s why God has disappeared: it is no longer his creation.
“We no longer live in a natural universe. The things surrounding us are no longer the things of creation…..Where the things of creation are destined to manifest the glory of God, technological products express the glory of the human race…..
“When the light of the world becomes a darkened light, when the rainbow is reduced to the physical phenomenon, when the Ark of the Covenant is eaten by termites, the empty tomb is filled with our hermeneutics, when the kingdom of God is a political product, when the life in Christ is a mere symbol, when the dethroned King takes refuge in speeches, then the dead of night has won the heart and darkened the eyes. The dead of night is now”.
Enough of Ellul.
So what really set off God’s disappearance today?
God’s disappearance vastly accelerated with the universal use of fossil fuels, with the mass production of goods, setting the stage for the consumer society. Geert Mak, a Dutch writer, depicted this quite accurately in his HOW GOD DISAPPEARED FROM JORWERD.
In that book he described how a small town in the Frisian province of the Netherlands changed from a tightknit community to a bedroom town for city dwellers. He traced how the impact of the automobile and the rise of supermarkets in the larger cities killed off the small-town merchants, and emptied the churches, while cheap fuel and large farm machinery eliminated the need for farm laborers.
That phenomenon happened everywhere in the Western world. My own father, catering to small bakeshops in the North of Holland, became a victim of this development. It also fueled the Dutch large-scale emigration to Canada, where I was among those seeking new opportunities.
We now experience the great falling apart, of which Brexit is just a beginning.
All this reminds me of that children’s nursery rhyme: Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t put Humpty together again.
A Brutal choice.
Now the fuel revolution which started some 70 years ago has run its course. We are faced with the brutal choice: either quit fossil fuels or perish, an impossible dilemma because we have built our entire existence on cheap fuels. If we quit the carbon addiction, society must go back to the era before 1830, before the Industrial Revolution, when the world had some 1.5 billion people, when present day Germany consisted of 372 different regions, ruled by kings and dukes and princes, when Small was Beautiful. If we don’t quit, and that will happen, given the vested interests, everything will fall apart.
I started out with a Bible text.
“I shall hide my face from them. I shall see what their end will be, for they are a perverse generation, children who are unfaithful” Deuteronomy 32: 20.
That is God speaking, giving us power to rule his world, perfectly well knowing what the result will be.
It reminds me of Psalm 14 which has as its heading: THE FOOLS.
Here it is:
The fools have said in their hearts: There is no God above.
Their deeds are corrupt, depraved; not a good one is left.
From heaven the Lord looks down on the children of men
To see if any are wise, if any seek God.
All have left the right path, depraved every one;
There is not a good one left, no not even one.
See how they tremble with fear without cause for fear.
For God is with the just, whose refuge is in the Lord.
The fools in this Psalm are not stupid: they are agnostics who have their values all wrong.
So, why has God disappeared?
With 200 energy slaves at our disposal 24/7, with heat/cool at our fingertips, with 200 horsepower to transport us everywhere in total comfort, we have become little gods, no longer
needing the God Creator.
Of course this will not end well. The first stages of un-creation are becoming visible: signalling sickness, death, destruction: hell on earth.
P.S.
Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, has published three books I have translated from the Dutch: THE ECONOMICS OF HONOR, by Dr. Roelf Haan, BETWEEN THE BEGINNING AND THE END, A RADICAL KINGDOM VISION, by Dr. J. H. Bavinck, and just of the press THE RIDDLE OF LIFE, also by Bavinck.
A fourth book on REVELATION, again by Bavinck, will be published next year.
The RIDDLE OF LIFE is highly recommended by John Bolt of Calvin Seminary, calling it “A perfect gift for college-age students or others wrestling with the deepest questions of life.”
Order them at your bookstore or buy them online.