(013) – VIOLENCE!!!

 

The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, looking from eternity and from the inaccessible light, saw men condemned to inexorable death; widows unable to feed withered orphans, innocent victims of the evil which reigned rampant in this deep pit: the oppression, the bondage, the vice, the corruption, the crime, the exploitation, the diseases, etc. God desired that men knew that He is a Father, and a Father of love, who suffered with the disgraces that were upon them, because love suffers with all these things (1 Cor. 13:4-7). God is love! (1 John 4:8). Because God was suffering with the sight of men ravaged by all kinds of evils, He wished to participate in the human suffering to prove His great love. So, the Son, who is One with the Father, went down into the abyss (Rom. 10:7 and John 1:14). Christ suffered our miseries. “For Christ also dies for sins once and for all, the just for the unjust, in order that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit” (1 Pet. 3:18). Love was so great, that it allowed the death of the Son of His love in the cross. “But God demonstrates His own love towards us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom 5:8). “What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?” (Rom. 8:31-32).

There was a time when God was different. A just and righteous man was delivered to Satan to be tortured. “Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them, and the Lord said to Satan, ‘From where do you come?’ Then Satan answered the Lord and said, ‘From roaming about on the earth and walking around on it. And the Lord said to Satan, ‘Have you considered My servant Job? For there is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, fearing God and turning away from evil. Then Satan answered the Lord, ‘Does Job fear God for nothing? Hast Thou not made a hedge about him and his house and all that he has, on every side? Thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But put forth Thy hand now and touch all that he has; he will surely curse Thee to Thy face. Then the Lord said to Satan, ‘Behold, all that he has is in your power, only do not put forth your hand on him.’  So Satan departed from the presence of the Lord” (Job 1:6-12). Satan took everything away from him and killed his sons. “Now it happened on the day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house, that a messenger came to Job and said, ‘The oxen were plowing and the donkeys feeding beside them, and the Sabeans attacked and took them. They also slew the servants with the edge of the sword, and I alone have escaped to tell you’ ” (Job 1:13-15). Again God delivered Job to Satan, who smote him with leprosy. And Satan answered the Lord and said, ‘Skin for skin! Yes, all that a man has he will give for his life. However, put forth Thy hand, now,  and touch his bone and his flesh; he will curse Thee to Thy face.’ So the Lord said to Satan, ‘Behold, he is in your power, only spare his life.’ Then Satan went out from the presence of the Lord, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head” (Job 2:4-7). The God who did this is called Jehovah. Job, then, began to cry out, “Know then that God has wronged me, and has closed His net around me. Behold, I cry, ‘Violence!’ but I get no answer; shout for help, but there is no justice. He has walled my way so that I cannot pass; And He has put darkness on my paths. He has stripped my honor from me, and removed the crown of my head” (Job 19:6-9). Job accused Jehovah of using violence, depriving him of his honor, surrounding him with darkness. The One forming light and creating darkness, causing well-being and creating calamity; I am the Lord who does all these” (Is.45:7). Through the evil weapon of violence, he delivered his people from Egypt. He then took them to the wilderness, and intended to make them believe by violence. “Now consider this, you who forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to believe” (Ps. 50:22). “Give glory to the Lord your God, before He brings darkness and before your feet stumble on the dusky mountains, and while you are hoping for light He makes it into deep darkness and turns it into gloom” (Jer. 13:16). “God is a righteous judge, and a God who has indignation every day. If a man does not repent, He will sharpen His sword; He has bent His bow and made it ready. He has also prepared for Himself deadly weapons; He makes His arrows fiery shafts” (Ps.7:11-13). IT IS FAITH BY VIOLENCE. You either get converted to me, or I will put you into hell. “The wicked will return to Sheol, even all the nations who forget God” (Ps. 9:17).

This method of violence does not spare anyone. Moses served Jehovah faithfully for 40 years, carrying on his back about two million fellow countrymen. He suffered offences and insults, but Jehovah arranged a way in which to hurt him: “Now Jehovah was angry with me on your account, and swore that I should not cross the Jordan, and I should not enter the good land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance” (Deut. 4:21).

David was another victim of Jehovah’s violence. He committed one adultery and one murder, and Jehovah killed his son, which he had had with Bathsheba, a child that didn’t have anything to do with his parent’s sin. After that, he killed Amnon, his first-born, by the hands of Absalom, and finally killed Absalom also, by Joab’s hands. All of this had already been promised by Jehovah: “Now, therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hitite to be your wife. Thus says Jehovah, ‘Behold, I will raise up evil against you from your own household; I will even take your wives before your eyes, and give them to your companion, and he shall lie with your wives in broad daylight” (2 Sam. 12:10-11). Jehovah did it all. He was also violent with Tamar, a dear daughter of David, raped by Amnon, her half-brother. What did poor Tamar have to do with all this? She had the anger, violent and blind, of Jehovah against her, who, meaning to abuse the soul of a person, abuses this person’s children. As we have said above, he made use of violence against Egypt, in order to deliver Israel; he, then, made use of violence against Israel in the wilderness, killing them. ‘As I live,’ says Jehovah, ‘just as you have spoken in My hearing, so I will surely do to you; your corpses shall fall in this wilderness, even all your numbered men, according to your complete number from twenty years old and upward, who have grumbled against Me’ ” (Num. 14:28-29).

Whoever uses of violence does not have compassion. “And though they go into captivity before their enemies, from there I will command the sword that it slay them, and I will set My eyes against them for evil and not for good.” (Amos 9:4).  “‘And I will dash them against each other, both the fathers and the sons together,’ declares Jehovah. ‘I will not show pity nor be sorry nor have compassion that I should not destroy them’ ” (Jer. 13:14).

Jehovah’s violence does not fit in with the Father’s kindness. Jehovah slaves his worshippers by violence and fear—better saying: DREAD. The Father frees slaves from fear, by love.

Jehovah’s servants were violent, and continued to be so. He told Elijah to anoint three servants: “And Jehovah said to him, ‘Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus, and when you have arrived, you shall anoint Hazael king over Syria; and Jehu the son of Nimshi you shall anoint king over Israel; and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah you shall anoint as prophet in your place” (1 Kings 19:15-17). Three killers anointed by Jehovah. One was a heathen, and two were Israelites; all of them, though, were anointed for violence.

The sword of Jehovah is drunk with the blood of his creatures: “I will make My arrows drunk with blood, and My sword shall devour flesh, with the blood of the slain and the captives” (Dt. 32:42).

God the Father, in the person of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, poured his own blood, for Jesus and the Father are One (John 10:30). And men are drunk by the blood of the Lamb, drunk with forgiveness, drunk with the grace obtained in the cross, drunk by the blood of the Lord’s Supper (John 6:54).

Jehovah and Jesus’ behaviors are different from each other because they are not the same person. Glory be to Jesus Christ through all centuries; for His meekness, for His love, for His grace and for His true salvation.

By Pastor Olavo Silveira Pereira

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