Watch Aaron in the film Holy Wars

Thursday, July 06, 2006

Gut-wrenching honesty

Okay readers. It's time for a little gut-wrenching honesty. I know my blog is called "Bible Answers for Seekers", but when it comes down to it, I am no "Bible Answer Man." I think a more appropriate title for me should be "Aaron the Bible I don't know man." Here is a short list of my "I don't knows." How can God know all things and yet man have free will at the same time? I don't know. Or, better yet, does God have to know all things whether He wants to or not? Once again, I don't know. Is the earth thousands of years old or millions? You guessed it. I don't know. Are the flames of hell literal or figurative? That's a good question, I'm glad you asked. The answer is I don't know. Although I have a hunch on this one, that is for another post at another time.

If you want to know what it is like to have the heart of an evangelist and the mind of a philosopher, here it is. It's not very pretty, but here it is. Sometimes I have goofy questions like "I wonder if my blue is the same as every one else's blue?" Or "how can an infinite past ever arrive to the present?" (Believe it or not, I thought about these things in the first grade) And then I think to myself "Why does any of this matter when millions are dying and going to hell?" Speaking of hell, the moral philosopher in me says "How is that just? An infinite punishment for a finite crime? How can love for God be genuine when infinite suffering is the only alternative?"

And then I remember the cross. I remember the nails, the crown of thorns, the whips, the spitting, the plucking of the beard, the hunger, the thirst, the nakedness, and I remember that God suffered on the cross for me. I remember that God is love and that is all that really matters. I remember that, somehow, the answers to all of my questions are found on an instrument of wood used by the Romans 2,000 years ago to execute the worst of criminals. I remember that love is the foundation for everything. And when I think about it even more, I think to myself that maybe that is all I really need to know.

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