Message Balls Blog

A better understanding of where Adam and Eve went wrong had me not wanting to make the same mistake they did and more determined than ever to believe God’s Word over anyone or anything. The problem was that there was an entire section of the Bible I was afraid to accept. With lessons from Tree Circle still fresh in my mind, I came to Paul Boulevard where I discovered a profound way of sorting out what I believed.

Seeing so clearly that Adam and Eve’s actions revealed who they believed made me take a closer look at my own beliefs. I believed God–because He’s God. I also believed Jesus–so much that I’d tried to do what He said as hard as it was sometimes. But the apostle Paul–not so much just because he wasn’t God. It’s embarrassing now to admit, but there was a time I wondered if he could be the big deceiver the Bible talks about who in the end times will deceive even the elect. It sounds crazy, but since Paul wrote most of the New Testament, I couldn’t think of anyone alive at that time in a better position to also deceive the elect in the end times. For whatever reason, I thought it was just safer to stick with what Jesus taught and stay away from what Paul had to say. When announced at Bible Study that our next study would be on Paul’s epistles, I was less than thrilled. But the Lord had been showing me that unless I believe what I’m learning it’s not going to change my life. So, I agreed to go to Paul Boulevard where about halfway through the study I saw a compelling reason to believe Paul’s teaching too.

Week by week as the study of Paul’s letters progressed something began to stand out to me–Paul’s suffering. Paul kept saying the same stuff over and over. And over and over he was beaten and thrown in prison. Still, he didn’t stop. He just kept saying the same things. That’s when my experience on Tree Circle came back around, and I began to relate to Paul in a way I could believe him.

When the question: “What if God did not create the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?” first popped into my mind, I thought it was a new revelation from God. It had come much like other things God had spoken to me–as a thought in my mind. I felt I’d come to the point where I was able to distinguish my own ordinary thoughts from the ones through which God spoke to me. And the question about the tree was no ordinary thought! It was one I wouldn’t have thought in a million years!

Learning that most of what Paul was so desperate to share was given to him by revelation, caught my attention. I found myself relating to how he must have felt when those he was so eager to share the message with didn’t believe him. Those who I had told about the tree hadn’t believed me either. I understood how hard it must have been for the people in Paul’s day to accept information so contrary to what they were taught all their lives. I also saw the gravity of their choice to continue to believe keeping the law would save them, or believe what Paul was saying–that a connection to God the Father comes through faith in Jesus Christ. The only thing I had trouble relating to was the abuse Paul was so willing to endure to continue sharing his message. It made me ask myself, “How much would I be willing to suffer to tell the world that God did not create the tree that caused the fall of mankind?”

Paul’s revelations were confirmed in scripture by old testament prophets. The only thing I had to go on was a parable Jesus told about wheat and tares. Some strange looks I’d gotten can no way compare with reactions Paul received, but it showed me just how much Paul must have believed the words he was saying for him to continue sharing them knowing when he did he would be beaten and imprisoned. I think it’s what the prison guards saw too that caused them to come to believe in Christ.

Although I still believe the question about the tree came to me from God, I’m not so sure it had come to reveal anything different about the tree. It did after all come as a “what if” question, not an actual statement of fact. If its purpose was to get me to think about what’s true and what isn’t, it more than fulfilled its purpose! Knowing I wouldn’t be willing to suffer very much if at all, to say for sure that God did not create the tree of the knowledge of good and evil told me that people aren’t willing to suffer for what they don’t believe. Not even for what they aren’t quite sure they believe to be true. That realization helped me to accept Paul’s teaching. It also caused me to sort out what I do and don’t believe. I just ask myself one simple question: “How much would I be willing to suffer for that”?

Once I decided to believe Paul’s teaching, my eyes opened to learning more about what Jesus accomplished on the cross, to His gospel of grace, and to the powerful truth of who I am in Christ. I’m excited to see how my life will change.

To be continued . . . see Trudy Avenue

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This entry was posted on Thursday, June 28th, 2018 at 7:50 pm and is filed under The road to the greater life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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