Years ago I came across a verse in Psalms that peaked my interest and troubled me at the same time. It was Psalm 50:21, where the Lord God says through King David the psalmist and prophet: “When you did these things and I kept silent, you thought I was exactly like you.”

I thought of situations in my youth where I did questionable things that felt right at the time, but which over the years as I grew as a Christian, I understood were wrong. Yet, at the time I believed that I was pleasing God (cf. John 16:2.) If, during those times, I did not receive a message from God to the contrary, I assumed that He was good with it–that He was exactly like me. What I was doing was in some small sense redefining God to fit my personal desires. I was attempting to turn the true God into something God was not.

Years ago, it was popular among some members of the feminist movement to refer to God as “She,” but I wonder whether that wasn’t just something more like a protest. I can’t imagine anyone making a reasoned argument based on Scripture that God’s gender is in question. But in spite of whatever gender pronouns are used in the Bible–and they must respected and acknowledged–we must believe that somehow God transcends our relatively narrow notions of sex.

There are actually different ways that Christians and others try to make God in their image. I’d like to share some of the more common ways in this post.

The erosion of sound doctrine in our concept of God

I think Christians can deliberately or inadvertently alter the nature of God in their minds though poor or absent teaching. As Hosea says in 4:6: “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.” I’m seeing more and more of this. Consider I Timothy 4:6: “In pointing out these things to the brethren, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, constantly nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound doctrine which you have been following.” This thought comes with a warning: “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires (II Timothy 4:3.). Anybody with a Facebook or Twitter account can spread false doctrine to hundreds of people from the comfort of their home. And most people believe it if it’s on the ‘net.

Selectively choosing what divine attributes we support

Most of us prefer a God that is predictable, forgiving and warm-hearted. God is much more than that. He shakes continents, destroys empires. People can get hurt–or even killed! Babies die before they can see the light of day, children and their grandmas succumb to cancer. We as people are often embracing of others (sins and all) but God hates sin. All too often, we do not. Pastors seek not to offend, so they fail to mention or teach important passages in the Bible that we all need to hear.

Brian Cosby writing for the Gospel Reformation Network points out Noah and the Great Flood. We don’t like to talk about God killing almost all of the people and wildlife on the Earth back then. But there were reasons God believed were valid, and the flood is also a story of redemption and mercy, because God spared Noah and his family. Rather than focus on one narrative to the exclusion of the other, we need to bravely admit to both.

“You can safely assume that you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.”

– Anne Lamott

The role of culture in our concept of God

I’ve always wondered whether our culture hasn’t prejudiced (contaminated) how we see God, influenced what our favorite verses in Scripture are, etc. I just read an article called “Turning from God to God.” It was written by Jaci Maraschin, a faculty member at the Methodist University of Sao Paulo in Brazil. Brazil in the past two or three decades became perhaps the most prosperous country in this hemisphere south of the U.S. In many ways, Brazil tracks with events in the U.S. Maraschin says that Brazilians see God as a Brazilian.

“He (this God is always a masculine being) acts as a king in the skies trying to protect the faithful and showing satisfaction when we do good works. He is “Brazilian”, as many would believe and say in this country: that is, God is still able to look after us even if things are not so good all the time. In this way Brazil is an extensively religious country. There are churches and shrines all over the place. In an upside-down contextualization, we have succeeded in creating God after our image. Our Brazilian God reigns over the people in the great festivals of Candomble in Bahia, mixing his powerful wits with the Catholic processions and Pentecostal frenzies. And he explodes in rhythm and many fantasies during Carnival.

“Our God also serves the political power. In our Houses of Deputies and in the Congress he is present in the form of a crucifix. He is there, laying upon the cross, dying or already dead. This is good for the politicians. They know that images do not criticize. They are mute and blind. The politicians claim to be at his service. They talk about morality and reason. Since they belong to the age of Enlightenment, their God is moral and rational, a God of “principles”. He is just like they are. Their image. Our Constitution, like many others in the Western world, speaks “in the name of God.” 

Maraschin, Jaci “The Ecumenical Review (Vol 50, Issue 2) April 1998

If the people in Brazil think of God as being Brazilian, is it any suprize that many Americans see God as an American?

The role of projection in our concept of God

Writing in the Huffpost, author Neal Wooten brings out the radical teachings of Jesus. According to Jesus, the sin of murder can occur even if there is no corpus delicti–just by planning a murder, reveling in the thought of someone dead. Adultery no longer requires an act, but a simply a thought stream. Five minutes watching a raunchy movie on Netflix, for example. These verses are quite severe, enough so that some Christians make excuses about not following them, or they just ignore them. Says Wooten:

“Always beware when someone tells you what Scripture doesn’t mean. That quite often means they don’t like what it does mean. Again, it’s not easy to follow the rules. If a person wants to be seen as a Christian, however, there are two ways to handle these directives. One way is to truly strive to handle them and ask for forgiveness for coming up short, or the most frequently used practice: simply find means to get around them.”

It is also clear to Wooten that some verses in the New Testament resonate more with liberals in our society than with conservatives. He notes: “Like most issues in the United States today, a person’s beliefs tend to mirror their political preference. A conservative Christian is more likely to follow the teachings of Paul whereas a liberal Christian is more likely to follow the teachings of Jesus and the original apostles.”

“Like most issues in the United States today, a person’s beliefs tend to mirror their political preference. A conservative Christian is more likely to follow the teachings of Paul whereas a liberal Christian is more likely to follow the teachings of Jesus and the original apostles.”

Neal Wooten, “Making god in your own image,” huffpost

Writing in Christian Week, Rob Grayson takes a different tack: “To put it simply, if you’re often angry, you tend to expect others to be angry too; if you’re often fearful, you tend to see others as potential sources of fear; and so on.” This in psychology is called projection. For example, if I hate the democrats and see them as bad people, it might not be unusual for me to conclude that God hates democrats as well. This is what Anne Lamott is getting at. And, if this in fact is what is occurring in my life, I need not have to worry about it because this is God’s problem, not mine. I’m just faithfully following Him. Grayson agrees:

“It seems obvious to me that if we do this with other people, there’s every reason to suppose that we do it with God too. Thus we imagine God to be angry, distant, hard to please, capricious, implacable, judgemental and so forth, not because we have any objective reason to believe that this is how he is, but because we’re projecting our inner neuroses onto him.”

Grayson, Rob Christian Week, November 17, 2016

Wooten encourages us to “step back” if we’re subconsciously making God in our image. In that case, how would we know? Well, perhaps we’re church shopping because we no longer feel “fed” in our current church. We might say God is “leading us” to a more politically involved life. Maybe we’ve drifted away from people who we’ve had lifelong friendships with. Perhaps we’ve become fearful at the direction the country seems to be moving in, or we’re angry at some political party, or we’ve left our first love (Jesus) and we’re preoccupied with some populist, partisan leader of the day instead?

Today, I am personally concerned about the increasing number of false prophets in the Church. By “false prophet,” I mean someone who says “God told me this will happen on such and such a date” and it does not. Or, prophets who give advice contrary to Scripture. One such person recently wrote on how to discern what is true in God’s eyes, and as a test or standard, the person said to compare or contrast what is said to “His written Word or His spoken word.” Huh?! At first, I was confused. Isn’t God’s spoken word also His written word? Else, how would we know what He spoke to Adam, or Moses, or Nathan, or John if it wasn’t written down in Scripture? But then it dawned on me. The last part of that clause refers to what is proported to be God’s genuine word as spoken by his contemporary “prophets” (presumably, including the author of the essay in question.) That should give us pause. If I decide I’m a prophet, and I say test what I say against the Bible or against what I say, myself…Well, you can see the problem. I become my own standard for truth. I’m begging the question.

I believe that God occasionally speaks today, that He is not completely silent as dispensationalists insist. He has on two or three occasions in my life spoken to me. So, I know that this happens. But what I believe God has said to me (called special revelation) is certainly not the same as Scripture. This is because there is always the chance of consensus bias, where I am convinced that God believes exactly what I believe, even–and especially when–I am in error. This takes us back to the first paragraph of this post with the verse from Psalms.

So, I regularly search out prophetic word websites, or sites of people who call themselves apostles, prophets, etc. to see what they are saying. I’m noticing as this year progresses, there are more and more militant utterances in terms of word choices. For example, that God wants us to be “Holy Snipers” who will “pick off the enemy before he gets close to the camp.” Another “prophet” urges us to become “warriors of justice.” Words like “battle,” “shake,” “fight,” “call to war,” “attack,” “rise up,” and “sword” are used with more and more frequency, seemingly careless of the consequences. What is a new believer to think of this? Incidentially, those who use these terms are almost always loyalists to former president Donald Trump. They believe he is God’s man of the hour and, if we don’t want to go to Hell, we should agree with them. Based on Scripture alone, I can make a much, much stronger case that Christians are called to be servants, not warriors or street fighters. But then, I’d be using the words of Jesus.

Christians had no business breaking into the Capitol building on January 6th, assuming any did (there was a Christian flag sighted in a Capitol hallway.) Paul says in Romans 13:1 “Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.” Just as God has allowed Donald Trump to be elected as our 45th president, he has allowed Joseph Biden to be elected as our 46th president. Many of these self-proclaimed “prophets” are not promoting peace, reconciliation, mercy, love and humility. Some even mention how God has “promoted” them or “chosen” them in some sense because of their fealty to him, exhaulted birth, whatever.

Neal Wooten’s advice here to “step back” is worth repeating. Let someone else carry the banner while you run a self-diagnostic on whatever voice you are hearing. God is not the author of confusion, or chaos. Why would you want to ferment it?

God is God, let the chips fly as they may.

The broader context of the key verse is:

“What right have you to recite my laws
    or take my covenant on your lips?
You hate my instruction
    and cast my words behind you.
When you see a thief, you join with him;
    you throw in your lot with adulterers.
You use your mouth for evil
    and harness your tongue to deceit.
You sit and testify against your brother
    and slander your own mother’s son.
When you did these things and I kept silent,
    you thought I was exactly like you.
But I now arraign you
    and set my accusations before you.“