A quick Google search reveals the following top ten desirable character traits: honesty, optimism, courage, confidence, creativity, compassion, integrity, patience, discipline, flexibility.
Does that sound like someone you would like to be?
Does that sound like someone you would like to be with?
Of course these aren't chosen in a vacuum but are situated in our culture. These are the traits deemed necessary by the algorithm gods for success in the modern world based on a fast moving life within a zero-sum game where the winner takes all.
The loser, well ... loses.
What if our mission was bigger than our cultural maxim of getting rich, finding a mate, pursuing pleasure, and leaving a legacy?
What if, say, the mission was to recreate the world - a new heavens and a new earth, populate it with a regenerated new humanity (that fulfil their original mission of stewarding and ruling over it) and living with them forever?
This is, incidentally, God's mission according to the Bible!
What kind of God would be needed to pull that off?
What would God's top ten traits be?
Well I don't think courage and confidence and discipline would cut it - as cool as those traits are.
I once took my children to a youth event where the preacher shared with them how wrathful and violent God is. After a gory sensory description of a Roman scourging and crucifixion he reached his final climax in a fervent frenzy: if they didn't accept Jesus they would all burn in hell. As the altar call came and a few shaky hands went up around the hall, my youngest - only seven years old at the time - turned to me and whispered, "Daddy, I don't think he knows the same God we do! We should tell him about our God!"
I had to agree with her. Not about telling him. I suspect he was quite happy with his angry god thank-you-very-much. But I did scoop my children up and high-tail it out of there pretty quickly.
The thing is, the Bible makes no effort to hide who God is.
John, one of Jesus' disciples simply writes: "God is love" (1 John 4:16).
Not has love, feels love, or shows love. (Although all of those are true).
God IS love.
It's who he is.In Paul's letter to the Ephesians we read:
'But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ - by grace you have been saved - and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus' (Eph 2:4-6).
Read that again.
Because of his GREAT LOVE (for us), he is rich in mercy.
Because of his RICH MERCY, he opens his arms to all who spurn him (all of us).
Because of his GRACE (the immeasurable riches of it), he saves us.
And he doesn't stop there.
He makes us alive, truly for the first time, by filling us with his Spirit, and birthing a new creation within us: a life that surpasses natural death.
Then he raises us up, elevating us to kingly status as he draws us out of the depths of our earthly existence and places us into the heights to dwell also in the heavenly plane.
Then he seats us with him, by his side, relaxed, assured, bathing in his eternal presence.
But Paul writes on, telling us why he does all this: "so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus' (Eph 2:7).
He does this all because he is KIND.
Is it just me, or do we not hear much about the KINDNESS of God.
For that matter, it's not something we value very highly in anybody.
In all the character traits lists I researched earlier, kindness was not in any of them.
My guess is that is because kindness doesn't get you very far in the world.
Kindness is considered quant at best, weak at worst.
But back to God's mission - to save and shape a people for stewarding and sharing in his new creation - apparently kindness is a crucial, paramount, and effective way to convey his grace.
But this verse situates God's grace in kindness, not wrath.
What if we started talking about God, not as angry, but as kind?
God is kind. It sounds weird, given its connotations of weakness and quaintness.
Yet according to this verse, kindness is the chosen tool God uses to convey his grace to us, so that we then show it to others (so that in the coming ages he might show...).
What if we spoke more about his kindness in regards to the cross?
I wonder how many more of those young souls would have responded to a kind God that night out of intrigue and love (as opposed to fear), and not only responded, but enjoyed, grew with, and stayed with that God? I know many, many people who grew up with the idea of an angry god and become lost, as it inoculates them to the true, kind God later on.
What if Jesus died for you, not to check God's wrath, but to convey God's kindness.
To save you, make you alive, to raise you up, to exalt you - so that you can show God's kindness to others?
He died because of the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward you.
So much grace you can't measure it, and it overflows in kindness.
It seems then, that God's grace is instinctive and natural to his character; it simply flows out. It is not then, a secondary response to his wrath.
What if we described God as Paul does in Ephesians 2?
Merciful (being rich in mercy), loving (because of the great love with which he loved us), forgiving (even when we were dead in our trespasses), creative & powerful (made us alive together with Christ), a generous (by grace you have been saved), hospitable (raises us up and seats us with him), visionary (so that in the coming ages he might show), graceful (the immeasurable riches of his grace) and ... kind (in kindness toward us).
Now here's a list to aspire to:
Merciful, loving, forgiving, creative, powerful, generous, hospitable, visionary, graceful, and kind.
Here's the God my daughter was talking about.
Here's the God I know.
Here's the God who is love.
What kind of God? A kind kind of God.
But hey, just my two-bob’s worth as usual.
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