I think it's important to ask ourselves here if we are ignoring the actual character of God because we just don't enjoy the paradox of His personality. If this is true, it would mean that we would be a more harmful witness than the SP's.
Excellent point Christine, as the Bible teaches we are Ambassadors of Christ. Imagine if you will, that our ambassador said to a few nations, "if you do not give America everything we want according to our president we will nuke you in 24 hours." Suppose we had a Broken Arrow ambassador, that only spoke what he felt, what he wanted, what he thought? This person would be nothing more than a fraud, right?. To be an ambassador we must understand what our leader/president/king/emperor wants and speak those words, wanted or not. This same standard applies to speaking for God, with the Bible as our standard and guide to noise out to mankind. One must understand the character of God as you pointed out and this does not happen with feelings but scripture and with the Bible as the authority we speak.
I think some people go to the extreme when judging us, thinking that all we do is preach a dark, gray, gloomy message to everyone. One might be very surprise to find how we communicate to people that have ears to hear.
If you read the Book of Acts we do not find one..1...uno..message of God loves you or Jesus loves you anywhere. However we find this message in the Epistles. Why? Because these were saints, the Church, those that have eyes to see and ears to hear. I rarely quote something in the Epistles to unbelievers, because those letters were addressed to saints of particular cities and not to whosoever. Context can help with this truth. We find words like "forgiveness, mercy, love", in all the Epistles and "repentance" in the book of Acts.
Connect the dots.
So if we speak on issues from our own feelings, stamping a little dove to it, then we a phony ambassadors. The book of Jeremiah can give insight to speaking nice kind words from the heart (Jer 23) rather than what God our King wants said to a people, city, event, campus, individual. If we speak the words of our King no matter what people think, indeed you are a true Ambassador doing your duty.
When the Bible says, thou shalt not take the Lords Name in vain, this is what I believe that text is trying to communicate to us. Do not take His name and apply your words, with your feelings, with your dreams, with your own heart (Jer.23:31). Speaking on behalf of Almighty God is big league and should not be taken lightly.
Good observation Christine
Ruben Israel
---------- "Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer every man." (Colossians 4:6) http://www.InnGlory.org
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