The Logic of God

The scriptures referred to are Colossians 1:15-28.

Logic is not, as many people think, a way to determine the truth of something but rather a method of staying self-consistent. If the assumptions you begin with are faulty, like you think the world is flat, you can logically build an argument that is very consistent with that premise but also very much at odds with reality. One huge crisis for the flat earthers was when our astronauts landed on the moon and sent back pictures of the earth that showed it was indeed a globe. That is why they usually say that we never landed on the moon, that it was faked and that NASA and the government are part of a vast conspiracy to keep the truth from us. They have concocted very clever and elaborate explanations for this. And those explanations might work if you discard Occam's razor, the principle that the simplest explanation, the one that requires the least number of elements, is the one that is most likely true.

If a magician makes an elephant seem to disappear before you eyes, you might posit a whole new set of quantum physics to account for it. But the simplest explanation is that it is an illusion. The elephant hasn't gone anywhere. The magician has used the way the stage is set up and possibly a very large mirror to make it look like the elephant has vanished. We don't have to unnecessarily multiply the number of elements involved.

Still logic is useful, provided the basic premises you start with are true. We use logic all the time, such as in math. 2 plus 2 equals 4. In fact, one of the big questions in philosophy is whether we have invented mathematics or whether we have simply discovered it to be part of the universe. Reality testing shows that math does reveal how the world works. Some of Einstein's descriptions of the universe were not testable in his lifetime. But ever so often the technology and conditions come together to make one of his propositions testable, such as the existence of gravitational waves, proven in 2015, or that gravity can distort the flow of time, proven in 2022. Einstein predicted these things accurately because he did the math correctly. From that we can argue that we didn't invent math; it was built into reality. The question is by what or by whom?

However, one of the problems for very logical persons is that reality seems to make sense but not quite. Reality contains paradoxes, instances where two seemingly opposite things are true. Like the fact that light behaves both like a wave and like a particle, depending on how you approach it. But in everyday life the paradoxes we run into most often are people. Hitler, responsible for the deaths of millions of people, nevertheless liked dogs and children. Charles Dickens wrote movingly about the plight of the poor and even wrote a book about Jesus for his children and yet at age 45 he fell in love with an 18 year old actress and not only tried to have his wife put in an institution but took all but one of their 10 children to live with him and his mistress.

And we see this writ large in the story of humanity as a whole. It's obvious that we did not rise to the top of the food chain because we were stronger or faster than other predators. People often say it was because humans were more intelligent. But scientists are saying that was not the most important feature of our species that allowed us to survive. Instead it was our ability to cooperate on a scale not seen in other primates. A clever human is still not a match for a wooly mammoth or a buffalo. But a group of humans working together can bring down a bigger, stronger animal. Our worldwide civilization is an amazing achievement brought about by literally millions of humans working together.

But at the same time the story of humanity is one of almost continuous wars. Human intelligence has invented ingenious devices to make life better as well as gruesome instruments of torture. We have developed medicines that cure and biological weapons that kill. Numerous contributions to civilization have been made by women and people of color and immigrants yet they still suffer from inequality and discrimination and xenophobia. How do we reconcile these things?

2 millennia ago a small group of people called Christians offered a way of understanding the paradox of humanity. And we see an overview of this viewpoint in today's passage from Colossians.

It begins with the assertion that Christ Jesus “is the image of the invisible God.” This immediately points us to Genesis 1:27, where it says that humans were created in the image of God. That's where our gifts and potential for goodness comes from. So where does evil come from? Genesis chapters 3 through 6 shows how we have decided that we know better than our Creator and how we have used our God-given gifts of intelligence, skill and cooperation to harm one another. We are told, “But the Lord saw that the wickedness of humankind had become great on the earth. Every inclination of the thoughts of their minds was only evil all the time...The earth was ruined in the sight of God; the earth was filled with violence.” (Genesis 6:5,11) Because we tried to replace God's will with our own contradictory wills, his image in us has become distorted into a diabolical parody of what God is like.

In Jesus we see what God is really like: loving, just, forgiving, healing, life-giving. And this is how loving God we see in Christ is: “in him all things hold together,” as our passage says. God did not turn his back on us. He is still keeping things from falling apart. For instance, there is a broad consensus among physicists and cosmologists that the universe is fine-tuned for the existence of life. If gravity, electromagnetism, and several universal constants were only slightly different, it would make life impossible. Christian philosopher Alvin Plantinga has said, “It's as if there are a large number of dials that have to be tuned to within extremely narrow limits for life to be possible in our universe. It is extremely unlikely that this should happen by chance, but much more likely that this should happen if there is such a person as God.” The alternative is to believe that we are the beneficiaries of a wildly improbable series of happy accidents, akin to winning the lottery trillions of times in a row.

We know what we do about the mind-bogglingly large universe by means of imaging. We use extremely sophisticated telescopes to see things we can't with our unaided eyes. We use lenses to focus what is out there into images we can examine. And as J.B. Phillips put it, Jesus is the unimaginably vast God behind everything focused in terms we can grasp: time and space and human personality.

And how does the incarnate God see himself? As a healer. Jesus said, “Those who are healthy don't need a physician, but those who are sick do. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Mark 2:17)

He sees himself as a beacon in this dark world. Jesus said, “I am the light of the world. The one who follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12)

He sees himself as a servant and as the means of freedom for others. Jesus said, “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:45; cf. Matthew 20:28) The Greek word for “ransom” means the redemption price required to free a slave. Jesus gave his life to free those enslaved to sin.

How do you stop the harm we humans do to each other, ourselves and to our relationship with God? We humans are convinced that the only way to stop harm is with violence. The result is that violence begets violence and the wheel of suffering never stops. God in Christ decided instead to absorb the harm. He essentially took on a suicide mission, entering enemy-occupied territory, spreading the good news that he could free those who followed him and taking on the brunt of the evil we have unleashed upon the world. He let himself be betrayed by a follower, abandoned by his friends, whipped and beaten by his enemies, stripped naked on a public road, and nailed to a cross while people mocked him. The people who did not want to hear his good news thought they could silence him through death. But the incarnate Word of God could not be shut up for long. He triumphed over death and offers eternal life to all who disown themselves, take up their crosses and follow him. (Mark 8;34-35: cf. Matthew 10:38; Luke 9:23)

Our passage tells us “For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.” The Greek word for “reconcile” used here means to reconcile completely, to bring things back to a former state of harmony. God wants to restore that image of God we have lost. He does that through Jesus.

So Jesus not only shows us what God is like but he also shows us the image of God in humanity as it was meant to be. He shows us what we can become. As our passage says, “And you who were once estranged and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his fleshly body through death, so as to present you holy and blameless and irreproachable before him...”

The word “holy” has become disparaged today because people mistake it for being sanctimonious. But “holy” means “different” as in “sacred” or “set apart.” I don't use my communion chalice to drink soda or beer or even water out of. I don't keep snacks in the pix or container I used for the communion bread. They are different from other cups and containers because I have set them apart for God's purposes. To be “holy” is to be set apart for God's purposes.

Similarly the Greek word translated as “blameless” literally means “unblemished.” The Passover lamb was to be unblemished as was any sacrifice to God. (Exodus 12:5; Deuteronomy 17:1) In Romans, Paul tells us, “Therefore I exhort you, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a sacrifice—alive, holy, and pleasing to God—which is your reasonable service.” (Romans 12:1) By giving our lives to God they become sacred. We use them for his purposes. And by the way, the Greek word translated “reasonable” is logikos, from which we get the word “logical.” Since Jesus gave his life for us, it is logical and self-consistent that we give our lives to him.

I think it is in this sense of living a self-sacrificial life that Paul talks of “completing what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church.” What Paul gave up and underwent in his mission to spread the gospel throughout the Roman empire was his sacrifice to God. His Christ-like suffering that was necessary to plant and grow churches was his contribution to the body of Christ.

And then Paul gets to the ultimate answer to the paradox of humanity, which he calls “the mystery that has been hidden throughout the ages and generations.” He calls this mystery “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” The “you” in Greek is plural, so it is not Christ in the individual but Christ in “y'all,” the whole body of believers, both gentile and Jewish. And because of the Spirit of Christ, living and working through the community of believers, we can look forward to the glory of being completely in the image of God in Christ.

Because in Jesus we not only see what God is like but we see what we can become. The original temptation in Genesis 3 is to be like God by disobeying God and taking a shortcut to gain his wisdom. (Genesis 3:4-5) It's not that God didn't want us finite creatures to grow into the image of his infinite love but what we were tempted to do was to achieve it in our own way. And that has led to misery. People want to be like God in his power. God wants us to be like him in his moral character. As it says in 1 John, “Dear friends, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet been revealed. We know that whenever it is revealed we will be like him, because we will see him just as he is.” (1 John 3:2) We will reflect his love and fairness and mercy.

In Jesus we can become like God—if we join our lives to him and let him live in us. God says he will recreate the heavens and the earth and make them a paradise once more. But the only way it can be paradise is if we are people who love and help one another rather than hate and harm one another.

Look at it this way: you can't put a Hitler in heaven. He wouldn't like it: there would be too many Jews and people would be worshipping God and not him. It wouldn't be heaven for him. And that would cause him to act up all over again and it would cease to be heaven for others

Only if a Hitler totally changed his nature would it be possible for him and everyone else to be happy there. But he can't change his nature. None of us can—not by our efforts alone. Only God can change us. But he will not force us. God is love and love requires consent. If we consent to let him into our lives, if we consent to let him reign in our hearts and minds, then we will be able to change. Then we will be able to shed this horrible parody of the person God created and become the person he intended us to be.

The final paradox is that only when we become like him will we truly be ourselves. As finite beings we cannot reflect all that God is. But we can reflect the various aspects of God through the different gifts he has given us. Biologists, astronomers, physicists, neurologists, chemists, and other scientists can reflect his knowledge of the workings of creation. Poets, painters, singers, dancers, musicians, and other artists can reflect the beauty of his creativity. Runners, mountain climbers, gymnasts, swimmers and other athletes can reflect the glory of the body in motion. Storytellers, philosophers, comedians, writers and other thinkers can reflect his nuanced and deep wisdom. While none of us can reflect the entire image of God, by coming together, like pieces of a mosaic, we can reflect our large and complex and marvelous God. But to make this work we must all reflect his love. God loves us. We must love him back. God loves all people. We must love them too. That is the logic of God's love.