THE DEIST AND JESUS

Jesus came to take away all preconceived ideas about God. He took away all concepts about nature, about tradition, and about all things sentimental toward religion and history. He removed the idea of being ‘chosen,’ or ‘in the family,’ or being part of ‘a select nation.’ He asked His followers ‘to leave your family, your father and mother, your national status, your sentimental traditions, your Hallmark card clichés, your children, your in-laws, your deist concepts and ‘Come follow Me’ (see Matthew 10:34ff, Mark 8:34-38; Luke 14:25ff). He presented a God of love, poverty, weakness, humility, sweetness, suffering, compassion, friendship, tenderness and faithfulness. He presented Himself. He demonstrated these characteristics and said, “I only do what the Father does.” He then left us the Holy Spirit part of God to indwell us and manifest these same attitudes.

To only explain God, as is common and apparently acceptable to evangelicals, as a God who is immutable, infinite, omnipotent, and omniscient, etc., is a metaphysical way of saying we are deists and perhaps not followers of Jesus. This does not define the loving Father we call God, one who cares for us, that knows we lost our job, or knows we have a disease, that knows we are going through a divorce, that knows we are lonely. This God is full of love and compassion for our every issue. The first explanation speaks of a deist god, the second, a loving father God. Choose the Father. All people on the street ‘believe in God’ and especially during terrorist attacks, hurricanes, tornadoes, wars, pandemics, drought, loss of jobs, loss of mates, and in winning the lottery. That is a deist. We need the God of Jesus, who was God Himself, living among us. He “bore our grief and carried our sorrows.” He even loves deists as much as He loves those who are not deists. Deist religion is the heart’s sensuality, i.e., the eyes and ears, smell, touch, taste and the sensuality of the body. The religion of Jesus is to use all these senses to be human while separating our soul from our spirit in matters of faith while imploring and exploring the Father.

“If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.” Jesus