God-Centeredness & Decadent View 4

“It is my opinion that the Christian conception of God current in these middle years of the twentieth century is so decadent as to be utterly beneath the dignity of the Most High God and actually to constitute for professed believers something amounting to a moral calamity” (A. W. Tozer).

“Learn then this basic truth, that the Creator is absolute Sovereign, executing His own will, performing His own pleasure, and considering nought but His own glory. “The Lord hath made all things FOR HIMSELF” (Prov 16:4). And had He not a perfect right to? Since God is God, who dare challenge His prerogative? To murmur against Him is rank rebellion. To question His ways is to impugn His wisdom. To criticize Him is sin of the deepest dye. Have we forgotten who He is? Behold, “All nations before Him are as nothing; and they are counted to Him less than nothing and vanity. To whom then will ye liken God?” (Isaiah 40:17,18.)” (Pink, The Sovereignty of God)

The deep and absolute truth that God is absolute Sovereign should sink deeply into our hearts. We must learn that He executes His will, not ours. When we pray, we should not be trying to change God’s will but discover His will and be changed ourselves. Perhaps I should have said that true prayer has those things as its goal. Humanistic prayer is to pray wanting God to change and to do my will. God-centered prayer is to pray asking God to show us His will and change us in accordance with that. Prayer should never be an attempt to change the will of God or it is blasphemous in reality. Who does man think that he is in trying to change the will of a sovereign, eternal, perfectly wise God? God does all for His own pleasure. This should inform the prayers and the lives of human beings. We are to seek God and all other things for the pleasure of God, not God for our pleasure. God does not consider anything but His own glory, not even what I may want that is not for His own glory. If the above two paragraphs hit you in the pit of your stomach, then it may be that your conception of God has led you to the brink of a moral calamity if it has not already cast you over the edge of that brink.

Does mankind really understand that he has been made for God since God made all things for Himself? Does it change man’s conception of God and of himself? Does it change the way that man lives? If God made man for Himself, then man has the right to live for the glory of God and nothing else. God has the right to create man for His own glory and a right over man for man to live for that same glory. If all the nations are as nothing and even less than nothing before God, then how great and glorious our God really is. If all the nations are indeed less than nothing, then what does that say about one puny human being? No, not another human being, but me. What does it say about me? Who do I think I am before such a supreme majesty that declares all the nations together as less than nothing and complete vanity? If all the nations are less than nothing before Him, then what am I in reality?

Man wants to judge himself by animals and inanimate objects. But that only makes man think of himself as great. Man should judge himself by God. Then he will be able to see himself more accurately, but in truth man needs to see the glory of God in order to even begin to see himself as he really is. But what is it when a speck of dust on the earth which is a speck of dust in the universe lifts itself up against the Creator and Potter of it all and challenges His prerogatives? What does it mean when human beings murmur against God? What does it mean when human beings impugn His wisdom and question His ways? What can it be but utter blasphemy to criticize the living God? However, within the churches today all of these things are being done. Within Reformed churches these things are being done. How dare we do this?

But, one might say, “I don’t see these being done.” These things are being done by the way the churches practice what they practice. Instead of following Scripture in what is important in how the practice of the church is to be carried out, men have left the Word of God and have gone to their own devices. The churches are inundated with programs and ideas that are new. But aren’t these things simply ways of impugning the wisdom of God? Isn’t it the case that people are choosing their own ways and wisdom over the clear teachings of Scripture? Isn’t it true that the churches are doing what they are doing in an effort to gain more human members rather than seek the living God for His presence? Do the Reformed people of today really believe in the sovereignty of God any more than others in the way they try to find people to attend church and they way they practice evangelism? Do we really believe in the sovereignty of God if our evangelism is the same as those who do not believe in the sovereignty of God? Do we really believe in the sovereignty of God if our churches practice the same things as all the other churches do? Do we really believe in a sovereign God in our day or not? Is our conception of God decadent?

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