An unsafe God.

I mean nothing more from the title of my post, than just a play on the words from my last post quoting "Of course He isn't safe, but He's good."

I went to church tonight.

It shouldn't seem like such a big thing, but I've been estranged from church for quite some time now - I only attend the services that I feel I absolutely have to. Sunday mornings are a given, and Sunday nights have become a struggle that sometimes I wonder if I only attend for fear that my parents might choose to visit my service the one Sunday night I happen to skip.

I don't know that it's true - but it's awfully close.

Something just feels wrong with me being at church. It's where I don't fit anymore. Which is ironically strange since it's the world I grew up in.
But sitting there tonight, so obviously outside of everyones general beliefs we discussed the book of Revelation. The small group sat content with the idea that they would never have to see the horrible events discussed - while I took a breath and prayed that God would help us all endure when the time came.

Cause I happen to think we're going to go through it.

Besides the fact that I think scripture on the end times backs up the idea - I believe the entire bible backs up the idea. It's the safe God that gets He kids in out of the rain. It's the unsafe, wild God that allows His children in the rain. It's the unsafe God that allowed the 3 Hebrew children thrown in the fire -protected in the fire - not prevented from the fire.

It's the wild God that shuts His children into an ark with every kind of animal He had created while the earth is destroyed. Floating in the middle of the worlds destruction, listening to the sound of torrents of rain upon rain upon rain upon rain.

It's the unsafe - but Good God that looked upon His servant Job, and according to the scriptures not even long after the time of testing had begun Job was already saying "For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me."

He's the God that turns people into pillars of salt (pillars of salt for cryin' out loud!), gives them brief moments of leprosy, He's a God that dropped two people dead, right where they stood, for lying to Him, He's a God that is planning on turning the waters on the earth to blood.

It might sound all unrelated I suppose, but my Good God doesn't do things the easy way. His word is full of violence, and love, and every last word and action in it is for the glory of Himself. When we go through great tribulation - The Great Tribulation, that's going to be when we can bring glory and honor to Him. Those will be the years when those who truly love Christ, will no longer be "people who go to church". But instead, they'll be people helping their neighbor, banding together in prayer and holding tightly to their Father and Friend as they build Gods Kingdom and refuse things like the mark of the beast while they're being martyred.

The mark of a good parent isn't that they keep their child from the hard problems of life. It's that they have prepared their child and are willing to do the hard task of letting their child be challenged, scared, tested. But, while you'd expect that to bring glory to the child - the true glory belongs to the parent who did the real work to get the child through the test.

My Father - is He safe? No.
Is He good? Yes.
Do I trust Him? Yes.