Love vs. The Punisher

When I was a young boy, perhaps 9 or 10 years old, if someone had asked me to draw a picture of what I thought God looked like, I probably would have drawn something completely different than I would now. The picture I had in my mind as a child was that of a stern, menacing looking old man waiting for me to disobey. Punishment was surely awaiting me. God was the Great Punisher. That was my concept of what He was like.

That idea would shape my thinking and consequently my behavior for many years after that. When God is The Punisher, you live your life in fear of punishment. So why am I giving you this personal glimpse into my past? It’s an example of how satan will deceive us concerning the nature of God.

How different our world would be if we were all taught from birth the true nature of God and saw it demonstrated before us. It would be impossible to completely cover the topic of God’s nature in this one blog article, so I won’t attempt it. However, what I will do is share with you how God enabled me to tear down the “punisher” concept and replace it with the correct one.

As a direct result of this false concept of God, I had developed a toxic thought. That thought became an established way of thinking for me. To sum it up in one sentence, that thought was: I and others who fail should be punished. The Apostle Paul tells us as believers that we are to be casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. (2 Cor. 10:5)

There were two character traits of God that I was missing revelation on –  God is Love, and God is Good. I’ll cover these two more in depth in future blog posts. I knew I couldn’t go on allowing this toxic thinking to have its way any longer. It influenced so many decisions I had made, not to mention the impact it had on relationships.

When a toxic thought is destroyed, it must be replaced with a healthy thought. For me, the new healthy thought was – “I see myself and others as the objects of His love.”

            1 John 4:10-11 (The Message) says “This is the kind of love we are talking about – not that we once upon a time loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as a sacrifice to clear away our sins and the damage they’ve done to our relationship with God.

            My dear, dear friends, if God loved us like this, we certainly ought to love each other.”

We’re talking about unconditional love here. Love that is not earned or deserved. You can’t adequately love others if you don’t know that you’re unconditionally loved.

So, through the direction of the Holy Spirit, I was able to identify this toxic thought and replace it with “I see myself and others as the objects of His love.”

I did this for 21 days (said it to myself multiple times each day). I was blown away at the change that started happening in my mind. I began to see myself and others in a different light. There were regular (and still are) times alone in His presence when I would feel like I was literally being immersed in the love of God. A baptism of love, if you will!

1 John 4:18 (NKJV) says “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear has torment (punishment). But he who fears has not been made perfect in love.”

In my journey I’ve been discovering what this perfect love looks like. Jesus! I’ve found myself more and more being drawn back to the gospels and studying the life of Jesus when he lived as a man on this earth. All of the libraries in the world couldn’t hold everything that could be said about this man and I sure won’t attempt to in this blog. Do you want to know what love looks like? Look at Jesus. Do you want to know what good looks like? Look at Jesus. Do you want to know what God looks like? Look at Jesus.

I’ll end with a quote taken from C. S. Lewis’ “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (Chronicles of Narnia, #1):

“Aslan is a lion – the Lion, the great Lion.” “Ooh” said Susan. “I’d thought he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion”…”Safe?” said Mr. Beaver…”Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.”

He’s good.

Kevin