Monday Thought -- September 3, 2012

Good Morning Friends,

“The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’  They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; there is no one who does good.  The Lord looks down from heaven on the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God.  All have turned aside, they have together become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one.” (Psalm 14:1-3)

Only a fool denies that there is a God.

It takes a fool to declare himself an atheist because the evidence for God is so clear to any who will look with an open mind.  As Paul told the Romans, “What may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.  For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.” (Romans 1:19-20)

There is another reason why only a fool would declare himself an atheist – because all of us need God so desperately!  The atheist must declare that he can make it on his own and that’s an impossibility!  It’s impossible because all of us are failures.  Even if we set our own moral code, we don’t keep it!  We don’t keep the world’s moral code, either.  And certainly we don’t keep the moral code established by a perfectly righteous God.  Try as hard as we can, none of us can go through life without failure after failure.  We desperately need someone to help us – and if there is no God, then there is no one who can help.

Thank God there is a God!  And thank God that He offered His help for us despite our failures.  In fact, He has offered His help for our failures.  That’s why Jesus died for us – to make up for our failures and reconcile us to God through the forgiveness that He offers for our sins.

Paul reminded us of that great truth when he quoted from Psalm 14 in Romans 3.  After announcing the failure of all men in sin, he concluded with this marvelous statement, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” (Romans 3:23-24)

His, by Grace,

Steve