God in the Dock

We return today to C S Lewis, this time from his essay, "God in the Dock."

Human beings often struggle with their place in the world. Even Christians, who know that God is the Creator and Sustainer of all that is struggle to submit to him as their Lord. All of us have had moments in which we pull God down to our level, actually below it, then evaluate his actions in order to determine whether or not he is truly acting like God should. The stakes are high. If he is judged worthy, we follow him. If not, doubt arises, and our spiritual life suffers immensely.

This is, in a word, sin, as Lewis is quick to point out,

“The greatest barrier I have met is the almost total absence from the minds of my audience of any sense of sin... The early Christian preachers could assume in their hearers, whether Jews, Metuentes, or Pagans, a sense of guilt. (That this was common among Pagans is shown by the fact that both Epicureanism and the mystery religions both claimed, though in different ways, to assuage it.) Thus the Christian message was in those days unmistakably the Evangelium, the Good News. It promised healing to those who knew they were sick. We have to convince our hearers of the unwelcome diagnosis before we can expect them to welcome the news of the remedy.

The ancient man approached God (or even the gods) as the accused person approaches his judge. For the modern man, the roles are quite reversed. He is the judge: God is in the dock. He is quite a kindly judge; if God should have a reasonable defense for being the god who permits war, poverty, and disease, he is ready to listen to it. The trial may even end in God’s acquittal. But the important thing is that man is on the bench and God is in the dock.”

This reversal of roles is rarely overt. It is often subtle as questions about what is going on in our lives and the world turn into accusations that assume that we would do better were we running the show. It forgets the foundational distinction in Scripture between creator and Creator.

We need a reorientation of our thinking. We need to remember that,

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth,

so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts." (Isaiah 55:8-9)

And in remembering that, we also remember this,

“For who has known the mind of the Lord,

or who has been his counselor?”

“Or who has given a gift to him

that he might be repaid?” (Romans 8:34-35)

And in remembering that, we are now capable of submission and worship, the proper attitude of the Christian. Which leads us to the proper response to anything we may have to face in this life,

"For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen." (Romans 8:36)

Soli Deo Gloria