"When God Has Things Backwards"

“When God Has Things Backwards”

 

When I was in seminary all of us Master of Divinity students had to take a year of Hebrew. The two things I found most difficult to get used to were the different alphabet (22 letters but no vowels) and reading right to left. We sure wished those Jewish scholars of old hadn’t gotten things backwards! The same can be said of the British who think driving on the left side of the road is the way to do it. We know we’re right on this one!

Undoubtedly the people who read Hebrew and those who drive on English roads think we’re the ones who have turned things around. So we need to realize (even if we hate to admit it) that whether or not something is backwards is primarily a matter of our own perspective rather than an issue of right and wrong.

There’s an interesting phrase in Acts 17:6 (KJV) in which unbelievers identified Paul and Silas as “These that have turned the world upside down….” (Quite a compliment on the impact of their ministry!) But the accusers were looking at things from their own vantage point—we’d say the world was being turned right-side up, wouldn’t we?

The Greek word used in Acts 17:6 means literally “to stand in reverse”. Each of its three usages in the New Testament deals with opposing some accepted practice. Could this then be a first century example of fighting political correctness?

Sometimes we think (or at least act as though) God has things backwards when they aren’t the way we believe they should be. Is this possible? No, because He’s not out to confuse or upset us (“…God is not a God of disorder….”—1 Corinthians 14:33) and He “(…makes) known the end from the beginning….” (Isaiah 46:10). So if it looks like things are out of sync God doesn’t have things backwards or upside down—we do! And if things are to be straightened out we must do the changing to conform to His standard as revealed in His Word (“Your word, O Lord, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens.”—Psalm 119:89).

Will we let God turn us right-side up when we need it?

 

Grace and Blessings!

Jim McMillan