Authority Figures and Our View of God

We continue to look at our perspective of God and explore areas where it is not accurate and also why. It should come as no surprise that the author of lies has had a hand in the formation of any inaccurate view of God. This passage gives a quick reminder of what we all know. It is important to become aware and alert, because the enemy still tries the same stunt with us.

Genesis 3: 1-5 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”  “You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.

Satan has been accusing God’s character since the beginning. By saying, “Did he really say that?”, he was already saying God is not trustworthy. Satan does not want you to believe God, he doesn’t want you to be like Him. He is using every mistake of every authority figure in your life to back up his claim that God doesn’t care about you, that He is angry with you, that He is unreliable, etc. He challenges God’s intentions, creates a twisted case that God doesn’t love you, that you can’t trust Him, that He isn’t a good God, that He is holding back from you, that He is deceptive. Often he does this by twisting the truth a little bit, so we doubt God’s love and stop trusting Him. He says God is lying, and by so doing puts up a barrier, of mistrust between us and our unconditionally loving God.

As you have probably seen in your own life, the God we perceive often looks a lot like our mom or dad or other authority figure in our lives. That fact feels a little insulting to our intellect, at least it used to for me, because in my head I never believed that. But we are talking again about the subconscious, which is where we relegate beliefs to, that are formed before our ability to reason has had a chance to fully develop and function. As a result, we subconsciously project what our authority figures were like to us, often especially any relationships with key men, onto the image of God. How we come to view our dad for instance becomes a filter through which we see God. God may say something to us and we filter it through how our dad used to say such a thing, which is likely not how God would be saying it. Or when we find ourselves being mad at God for something, it is probably something God isn’t like but our dad or authority figure is. For instance, I used to be upset many times that God would not speak to me, that trying to hear his voice always felt like guess work while others could hear him just fine. That is until I realized that because my earthly dad was very sparse with words, I must have subconsciously come to believe that God doesn’t want to speak to me. Because my prover seeks to prove what I believe to be true, I was struggling to hear God for myself.

As long as we don’t challenge these subconscious wrong beliefs, we will find ourselves in a lot of pain. I loved Abi and Justin’s term of embarking on the journey of wiping the face of our father off the face of God.

A couple more examples that were given to illustrate this point. One person was convinced God doesn’t love her, because she is still single. Abi happened to know that this person had a very abusive father and also understood, based on her counseling background, that had this person found a spouse before going through a healing journey, she would probably have found someone very similar to the abusive dad. (To make clear, Abi stated that this was not a sweeping statement but she thought in this case, the absence of a spouse might actually have been God’s goodness protecting her). 

In Abi’s own case, because her dad didn’t plan for her future, Abi assumed God doesn’t care about her future. In her first step to break that, she had to come to see that she wasn’t actually looking at God but at her dad and imagining God to be like him. It is important to find where the Bible contradicts my view. Apparently most of our hurts and pains with God are directly related to family hurts and pains.

As part of our misconception of God, we also often have a false understanding of why we were created, or what we were created for. Many Christians grow up believing that they were made because God has a specific task for them. In my own case, the basic idea I came away with was that I was made to stay firm against all the things of the world. I didn’t come away believing he had a specific job for me to do. If it was taught me, I sure missed it. While it is true that God has prepared work for us to do, it is not the most important thing to him. Abi and Justin likened God to be this completely pure, full love circle of the Trinity and that they created us so they could pour some of that love on the created ones. In other words, God made us so he could love us.

Following are some verses showing the perfect love between Father, Son and Holy Spirit, beginning with how the Trinity loves to show each other off and honor each other.

Luke 3:21-22

When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

Matthew 17:1-5

After six days Jesus took with him Peter, James and John the brother of James, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. There he was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light. Just then there appeared before them Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus. Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, I will put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.” While he was still speaking, a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!”

John 8:16-18

I am one who testifies for myself; my other witness is the Father, who sent me.”

Matthew 16:16-17

Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven.

Ephesians 1:22-23

And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.

Philippians 2:5-8

In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;

Many people have this understanding that God is the mean, angry, disapproving  one, Jesus is the kind, nice one, and the Holy Spirit is this impersonal ‘it’ that we don’t know how to understand. But Jesus came to reveal the Father, so when we see Jesus, we see the Father. They are both equally loving and kind.

John 6:38

For I have come down from heaven not to do my will, but to do the will of him who sent me.

Colossians 1:15-20

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the Cross.

Colossians 2:9

For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form

Acts 10:38

“You know of Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.”

2 Corinthians 1:13

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort,

Finally, here are some verses to show how they three, Father, Son and Holy Spirit interact with each other, how they are one, and together.

2 Cor 13:14

May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

John 15:26

“But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.”

John 14:16-17

And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth.

Romans 5:5-6

And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.

Ephesians 3:17

And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

All these verses show varying aspects of the Trinity, their relationship with each other and who they are. Part of the reason why all these verses are here, is because it is important for us to see that the Trinity, God, is fully one, never fight for prominence, trust each other, honor each other, love each other, work together in unity and respect. Their relationship circuits are always on. They don’t need us to do anything to make them happy. I can do the worst thing, and their unity is not impacted. Even if I don’t please God, he can still be in a good mood. My purpose and goal is not to make an unhappy God happy. 

That still messes with me, because I have a hard time distinguishing between making him happy and doing things that please him. When growing up in a Christian environment, where doing what was right was the priority and being loved wasn’t the motivator for it, I can see how that would skew my discernment. My purpose is to be loved by God and to love him. We were all birthed for that abundant, overflowing, never ending love that is found in God. He didn’t make us because he was bored and needed entertainment, or because he was discontent and needed a slave. Quite the opposite, God loves us because he loves us. It’s as simple as that. This is quite contrasting to the world. I hear that before the industrial age, people had kids because they needed hands to help on the farm (it’s a little cut and dry, I don’t think that was the only reason for most), or often people have kids because they think it will fulfill them. But God made us so he could pour out his love on us.

This kind of God can be terrifying for many because they can’t control him. They have to live in radical trust that he will be kind and gentle etc. with them, without them having a way to guarantee by their actions that he will. They have to let go of the ability to perform completely and trust that he is as good as he says he is. While that is terrifying, it is also beautiful.

In contrast, the God many grow up believing in, is either happy or sad, and his happiness depends on us and whether we do or don’t do the right things. The reason many people see God this way is because that is how things were at home with their parents. They did stuff that made their parents angry, which was followed by having to figure out what they had to do to get back into their good graces. This picture of God may be present in different people to varying levels. I know some of that feels true for me.

With this kind of God, we think when we make him unhappy, that his relational circuits are shut off just like they would be if we triggered our parents. As we have learned, based on the validation lesson, we try to find what we have to do to turn those circuits back on again. With people validation will certainly help, but we don’t understand that God doesn’t need validation because we don’t have the power to turn off his relational circuits. We think if we pray an hour a day and read this many books of the Bible and go to all the church meetings and volunteer, then we will feel like God is happy with us again. This is of course in our perception. But because we think this is what it takes to make God happy, we are stuck with that and want everyone else to do the same thing, because we want them to make God happy as well, replicating the same formula over and over, which is how we get into religious ruts. This God we can control. If we just find out what the rules are to make him happy, and we do them, then he has to love us. We can make him love us by our works. As long as we want to control God, we have a very small God. Once any of us think about it, why would we want a God we can control? What kind of God would we have if we could control him?

As explained above there are at least two versions of viewing God. One is working really hard to stay somewhat in God’s good graces. The other is to be so fully loved by God, that we lay down our lives to follow him. The difference is that with one God, we work for love, with the other we work from love. The difference is monumentally big. The way the enemy manages to twist this, is by monopolizing on the fact that there is work to be done. It’s true. There is work to be done. It’s just not more important to God than our heart’s condition and our relationship with him. We do have a destiny to be world changers, but it is a joy and a beautiful expression from being loved fully by God, not a scary, huge task that, if we don’t get it right, will result in us being disinherited. Our job isn’t to perform for him. That hits so close to home, having grown up in a highly performance-oriented home. God isn’t a taskmaster holding a clipboard in his hand and comes after us every hour to see if we are on target. The reason many Christians don’t have good boundaries is because of the belief that caring for everyone else is more important that what is going on in themselves.

It is true that serving God is very fulfilling, but we just need to be self-aware to know we are doing it because we share his heart, not because we are trying to win his approval.

If you feel hopeless in your relationship with God, it is likely because you are believing a lie about God. Here is a list to get you started, but you will likely have to add some of your own to it until you feel you have gotten to the root of your hopelessness.

• There is the lie that we can never actually please God. The lie that he will always want more than we are able to give. That what we give isn’t even close to enough.
• The lie that if I don’t do at least a certain percentage of things right, he won’t help me.
• That there is only one destiny for our lives. That it is our job to figure it out and our job to make it happen.
• We may believe that God expects us to know things even if he doesn’t spell it out for us.
• We believe he gets frustrated with how long it takes for us to process and grow
• We may worry that he is just annoyed at how human we are.
• Then there is the lie that we are not meeting his expectations, that we are way far behind on meeting his goals.
• We also sometimes believe that the weight of the whole world (or of the whole church or family or marriage…) is on our shoulders and if we don’t handle everything right we will be punished.
• A statement that has often been mistakenly thought to be from the Bible but is not: God only helps those who help themselves.
• We may have been so conditioned in this world that we have come to believe God’s ultimate goal is perfection, not connection. (God does want perfection, it’s just that he is the one who does the perfecting, not us)
• And a rather painful one for many is the lie that if you believed God more, you would be healed.

How many of those could you relate to? What other ones would you add? I am busy just trying to come to an understanding of how some of these beliefs have been able to fly under the radar so long. The verse about being alert and sober minded – it is so critical to be aware!

Finally Abi and Justin shared a list of statements Paul Young assembled to help us know what the enemy may be hurling at us through thoughts or others, trying to pass them off as God statements that definitely would not come out of God’s mouth.

• The depth of my affection for you is dependent on you. – Truth: He cannot be manipulated, controlled or swayed. His love for us is set. There is nothing we can do to make it grow more or less.
• I expected you to do better. – Truth: God actually is the only one who has realistic expectations of us. He has an accurate sense of reality – we frequently don’t.
• If you don’t say the magic words, my hands are tied… sorry about that.  – Truth: God is not looking for formulas, else he would have given us some.
• I don’t like being with you when things get messy. – Truth: He came into our mess to clean us up and get us well.
• I allow evil because it will make you a better person. – Truth: God does not need junk to create something good. He can and definitely does make good out of bad things, but he does not make the junk or need it.
• You aren’t allowed to participate until you are perfect. – Truth: In his eyes, we are already covered in the righteousness of Christ and we are co-heirs, priests, a royal priesthood, saints in his kingdom.
• I would rather you attempt to appear holy than to be honest. – Truth: God made it very clear how distasteful he found whitewashed tombs. He looks at the heart.
• You are deafer than my ability to communicate. – Truth: He pursues us and sent Jesus to reveal the Father and his will to us. Additionally, he has given us his Spirit to lead us and guide us.
• I only love you today because I know your potential. – Truth: Doing something great for him so he can love us, is in direct contradiction to him loving us with a fixed love from the beginning.
• Shaming is sometimes a good thing. – Truth: God came to bring intimacy and restore safety and trust.
• I find your questions offensive. – Truth: God invites us to reason with him. He is not afraid of our questions and understands our need to understand.
• I put up with you only because Jesus loves you. – Truth: Jesus came to reveal the Father, he only did what he saw the Father do.