God and Man

“...if religion consists merely in feeling the presence of God, it is devoid of any

moral quality whatever. Pure feeling, if there be such a thing, is non-moral.”

- J. Gresham Machen

The foundation of all religions lies in the answer of two questions: “Who is man?”

and “Who is God?” These questions show an individual’s worldview.

Let’s begin with discussing the first question. Who is man?

The liberal worldview suggests maybe humans are not entirely bad and are able

to overcome evil. Essentially, liberalism has lost sight of sin. If we forget our own

sins we can become fixated on the large sins of others. We can be tempted then

to ignore ‘small’ sins and focus our attention on more serious sins. This is a

dangerous temptation, however, because Satan uses both ‘big’ and ‘small’ sins to

draw us away from Christ.

Christianity begins with the realization that man is sinful and unable to save himself.

Beginning with Adam, every human to live has been born imperfect and lost. The

problem is that our sin keeps us from realizing that we need help. There is no part of

human nature that is good enough to solve the evil in the world.

This brings us to the second question. Who is God?

Christianity believes in the real existence of a personal God. He is the creator of and

completely separate from the world. He is holy and relational. Because he is holy he

cannot be in the presence of sin but because he is relational he desires to know us.

How then can a holy God had a relationship with sinful men? Until the problem of our

sin is atoned for, he can’t.

We will return to this point in a moment. First let’s look at the liberal view of God.

In the liberal view, the distinction between God and the world breaks down. We are a

piece of the life happening all around us and therefore “God...is not a person distinct

from ourselves; on the contrary our life is a part of His” (Machen 54). Modern liberalism

says we do not need to know God but only feel his presence. Essentially we must

become part of the goodness around us. This view of religion completely negates its

moral value and bases it in emotion.

There is no relationship in liberalism, but Christianity begs to be part of something bigger.

However, if we believe that God is relational and holy but man is sinful, how can we

have a relationship with God?

The answer is simple: Jesus. The second member of the Trinity, born of the Virgin Mary.

He was “God from God, light from light, true God from true God” (Nicene Creed). He

lived the perfect life, was crucified, buried, and rose again on the third day. He became

sin so that we might have a relationship with God the Father.

As I said in the beginning of this post, answering the questions “Who is God?” and

Who is man?” shows the pillars of the religion. In this case we see“Paganism is

optimistic with regard to unaided human nature, whereas Christianity is the religion

of the broken heart” (Machen 56). Broken heart does not mean it is without hope,

but rather that we must acknowledge our brokenness and ask for help. When we

realize our sin and need of a savior we can be reconciled to relationship with God.