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Whenever I ask people the question: Where does God lives? I get one of two answers. Depending on the religious leaning of the individual, some answer with; God lives in our heart. While others answer that God lives in Heaven. Both answers are correct, as verified by the Bible text in Ecclesiastes 3:11; He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.

God is eternal, from everlasting to everlasting, from eternity to eternity. Before time to after time. Before the creation of the universe of time and space in which we physical beings that are part of nature that exists in time, to when our physical beings no longer exists in time and space.

This brings us to the title of this piece, whenever religious people are confronted with the statement that they are fooling God, they immediately back off and go into denial, proffering the generic statement that nobody can fool God, while non-believers do not bother to address or proffer such statement. In the past, I myself, have approach the matter in a different manner. I used to say to people” You can fool me, you can fool yourself, but you can not fool God”, something that we as ‘believers’ sort of understand.

However, this universally agreed statement ‘you can fool me, you can fool yourself, but you can not fool God’ lands us squarely in the arena of “Fooling God by proxy”. By now, you are shocked with this assertation. Well do not be shocked, since you as a believer probably answered the opening question of, where does God lives, with one of the two above stated answers, in conformity with the Scripture text in Ecclesiastes 3:11. Logical deduction tells us that since we stated that God lives in us, any time we deceive ourselves or others, then we are deceiving God, since God lives in us.

We all have secrets that we do not share with another living soul, some of us who are parents do not tell our offspring the truth with ‘good intentions’, some of us do not share certain information with our spouses with ‘good intentions’, some of us do not share our opinions of others with them because of decorum or civilization, modernity, politeness, not wanting to offend or in order to avoid hostility. Whatever our justification is, as long as it is not rooted in Christ, since Jesus Christ is our Justification, our Justifier, then we are literarily Fooling God by Proxy. Stupendous, that we are literarily fooling God our Creator, the All-knowing God, the All-seeing God, the God of Wisdom, the Omnipresent, Omniscient, Omnipotent God. We are indeed ignorant! May the Lord forgive us, for we do not know what we do. Amen.

When the Lord our God in the form of Jesus Christ was giving us final instruction before the completion of the greatest act that surpasses even the Creation itself, He left us some warnings, especially those He had chosen, such as in Mathew 23:2-4; “The teachers of the law and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. So you must be careful to do everything they tell you. But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach. They tie up heavy, cumbersome loads and put them on other people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them. He went on further with description of these folks who know the Laws in their head but not in their hearts, and specific instructions for the chosen ones in Mathew 23:6-10; they love the place of honour at banquets and the most important seats in the synagogues; they love to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces and to be called ‘Rabbi’ by others. “But you are not to be called ‘Rabbi,’ for you have one Teacher, and you are all brothers. And do not call anyone on earth ‘father,’ for you have one Father, and he is in heaven. Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one Instructor, the Messiah.

So, the chosen ones were not instructed in the art of manifestation of spiritual gifts for self-promotion purposes, or entertainment, or self-aggrandization. Neither were they chosen to promote local or special group interests with recognizable physical group attributes, such as colour of hair or presence of hair in certain body regions, clothes, and skin colour. The chosen had one purpose, besides loving one another and being united as one, in spite of colour, race and background, that is praise Jehovah, as stated in 1 Peter 2:9; But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.

God is not fair to us. However, He wants us to be fair in our dealings with each other. Which is why He told us to do unto others as we want others to do unto us. Since we love ourselves, therefore the love we demonstrate towards ourselves and our immediate family members, we should also demonstrate towards others. This is known as fairness. Fairness can also be defined as impartial and just treatment or behaviour without favouritism or discrimination. Furthermore, fairness is the quality of treating people equally or in a way that is reasonable.

Psalm 103:6-10; The Lord works righteousness and justice for all the oppressed. He made known his ways to Moses, his deeds to the people of Israel: The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbour his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.

Mathew 5:38-48; “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you. “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Mathew 7:9-12; “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.

People who want to mistreat others whom they perceive as ‘Christians’ are fond of quoting the Scripture ‘If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn the other cheek also’. But not the other Scripture that says, ‘Do unto others what you would have them do unto you’. Which simply translate into ‘Love others as you want others to love you’. The above Scriptures lays it bare that God is not fair towards us, because if God were to be fair towards us, then we would all be doomed and reap the consequences of our sins which is death. But because God loves us, He Redeemed us of our sins. To eternal life with Him. Which means Love trumps fairness. The impartiality of God is not contestable, in that we are all the same before Him, rich or poor, wise, or foolish, white, or black, pope or congregation member, believer or non-believer. Salvation, the knowledge thereof and its dispensation is in God’s Hands. It does not come from any man, neither is it brought about by any man. The winning, and nourishment of a soul is by Him, God alone.

Grace – Unmerited Favour

Grace is by some, described as unmerited favour. This raises the question: Is there any favour from God, that is merited. If you answer yes to this question, then probably you do not know yourself or the God that made the universe. Or you have misconception about yourself and your place in the universe.

As for those who believe that they do something for God or work for Him, then I have two texts from the Scriptures for them to expose their misconception:

1. First text  is from Job 38; 4-7; “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me, if you understand. Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who stretched a measuring line across it? On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone— while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy?
2. Second text is from Acts 17; 24-28; “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’

Living life involves coming across good and evil, good times and not so good times. It is not about deserving good or deserving not so good. Nobody deserves good, and neither does anybody deserves bad, it is not a case of meriting good or evil. God is in control of everything, according to the Scriptures in the Book of Job, chapter 2 verse 10, Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble? This is further verified in the Book of Isaiah 45 verse 7; I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the Lord, do all these things.

Therefore, if God is not served by human hands and does not live in temples built by human hands, how come, human beings say that they work or serve in His house? In addition to this, when God was creating the universe, and His designated Messengers [Angels] were looking on, where do human beings get the guts to say that they are winning or have won souls for God? When Jesus Christ stated categorically that human souls are very precious to God, in Mathew 10:29-31; Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows. Since God did not use or need the help of His designated Messengers in creating or caring for Sparrows, why would He need the help of human beings to care for or save or win human souls. Study the Scriptures, do not fool yourself, thank God and lastly, there is no merited favour from God.

It takes God to please God. This can be found in 1 Timothy 2:5; For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus.

How to please God, even when you do not attend a religious assembly, be it a mosque or a church or a synagogue, and do not belong to any religious denomination. A person cannot please God by him- or her- self.

The Scriptures tells us about how to please God. the reality is that the process of pleasing God requires God’s help. By ourselves, we cannot please Him. Take the case of a medical doctor who goes to work, and promised his wife to be home by six o’clock in the evening, the trip from his workplace to his house is thirty minutes. As he was about to leave work at 5:30 pm, there was an influx of Ambulances bringing accident victims requiring major surgery. What does he do? Keep his word to his wife or stay to attend to the accident victims. Obviously, this is a no-brainer example. The Bible tells us in 1 Chronicles 29:17; I know, my God, that you test the heart and are pleased with integrity. How do you maintain integrity? It takes God to help us to maintain integrity. It takes God to please God.

Dieting by fasting is not really God’s first choice of communication. Fasting and praying is approved by God, for communicating between Himself and His children. But He categorically stated the kind of fasting that pleases Him in Isaiah 58:6-7; “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? Clearly, in order to share your food, you must first have food, which is of course provided by God. To provide shelter for the poor wanderer, you must first have shelter yourself, which is once again provided by God. To clothe those who are naked, you must first have clothes yourself. Unless, you believe that you created yourself, conceive yourself, gave birth to yourself and that everything you have is by your own effort. There is of course freedom of expression of opinion.

Having the opinion of self-existence, or generally the philosophy of SELF, has one flaw, that is mortality. Even if you believe that you created yourself or that you evolved from apes and that the origin of the universe is the Big Bang theory, some 13 and half billion years ago, you are not going to live past one hundred and fifty years at the most. We will all die, just like a flea with a couple of weeks’ lifespan dies. It might be a good idea to live life in a manner that pleases our Maker and not ourselves. Whether the universe is 13 and a half billion years old or not, apparently somebody is responsible for it, and that Person is still controlling things, thousands of years since it was created or if you subscribe to the Big Bang theory, billions of years since it was created. The fact that, we have not been able to find signs of intelligent life elsewhere in our star (our Sun and the 8 or 9 planets that orbit it with accompanying moons.) says something about Intelligent Design. It is probably a good idea not to piss off the Designer, rather pleasing Him seems the better option. Peace out.