The fool says in his heart, “There is no God”…
Psalm 14:1a
According to the Bible there is only one trait which makes you a fool in this world: denying God. It is a fruitless and futile enterprise, or as Derek Kidner puts it, “intellectual and moral suicide.” 1
Now, my fear today is not so much that you do not believe in the God of the Bible—indeed, you likely know of the Father, Son & Holy Spirit; you believe Jesus died and rose again for your sins; you believe the Holy Spirit lives within you; and you believe Christ will come back again to redeem you—I am not concerned about you knowing the facts of Christianity. Instead, I am concerned about something much more insidious—namely, the temptation which you and I are faced with every day to functionally live as if God does not exist. We may not be explicit atheists who declare outright unbelief in God, but we frequently live as functional atheists who claim to know Christ yet live as if nothing is different. What exactly do I mean by this?
Perhaps the best way I can get this across to you is to ask you the question: if the truths you find in the Bible really are true, how should it change how you live? In other words, if the God of the entire cosmos is perfectly and terrifyingly holy—and we are utterly and treacherously sinful—then do you really believe it is good news that the Son of God has come in the flesh as Jesus Christ to reunite you with God? If you have tasted and seen that the Lord is good (Ps 34:8)—good in his forgiveness of all your sin, good in his grace to renew you every day, good in his constant provision over your life, and good in his faithfulness to keep you secure forever—then again I ask, how should that change how you live?
You see, if you really believed, grasped, comprehended, and mined the riches of the good news of Jesus Christ for you, you would live as a different type of person. You would view your circumstances differently. You would view your relationships differently. You would view the purpose of your life differently. You would be changed.
No, I am not saying that the mere conjuring up of more faith will make your life better—please don’t misunderstand me. Instead, I’m saying that if you truly abide in the never-ending, super-abounding, ever-faithful love of Jesus poured into your heart through the Holy Spirit, then your life will be changed. You see, the work has already been done: Jesus has given you all you need to enjoy the privileges and favor of God as one of his children. This is called grace. Therefore, the question is not “how do I become closer to God?”, as if you doing anything could merit that honor. Instead, the question is, “am I truly living today as if God’s grace for me is a present reality, able to help me in my time of need, change me in the middle of my failures, and strengthen me in the time of my weakness?” The shift in perspective makes all the difference.
I assure you today: God’s grace is real, Christ has given you a new life, and the Lord your God is with you wherever you may go through the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit. So don’t live your life so far away from the realities of the Bible; don’t say in your heart “there is no God.” Live it instead to the fullest—the fullest of a faith-filled life, the assurance that God in Christ Jesus has indeed given us “everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him” through “his very great and precious promises” (2 Pt 1:3-4, NIV). Do you really believe that today?
I assure you if you do, your life won’t be the same.
- Derek Kidner, Psalms 1-72, Kidner Classic Commentaries (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2014), 96.
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