Many believers think of money as irrevocably belonging to God. And if you are one of such Christians, you immediately think this post is about money. Wrong, wrong, wrong. He gave us money and other blessings to fully enjoy. It therefore only indirectly matters to God what you do with your money. Why indirectly? He is not going to be spending your currency anytime soon, but you?
You need money and if you ignore your source, you soon dry up, like the river that forgets its source. Or like Queen Vashti who forgot that King Ahasuerus was her source of royalty. She perished. So, in the sense that God delights in your prosperity, your attitude toward money matters to Him but only indirectly. We therefore do not consider money as irrevocably belonging to God.
Nevertheless, the bible speaks of two attributes of God that He cautions us against trying to acquire or mess with. Those are the two we consider as irrevocably belonging to God. Therefore today, our focus is on two attributes of God that God says specifically that we must not touch. Each belongs to God and God alone.
Bible scholars will know the first one as vengeance. Emphatically, God declares that vengeance is His, indicating that we should steer clear of it. We should view vengeance as irrevocably belonging to God. And if we don’t, we can incur the wrath of God. When we take or share each of those attributes, we are stealing from God, and that matters to God. Greatly.
View Vengeance As Irrevocably Belonging To God
It is not by accident that we start with God’s vengeance. Most of us may never preach or minister in large crowds. Consequently, the risk of us messing with the other divine attribute that belongs to God and God alone is minimal. But vengeance? We constantly run afoul of that particular declaration. Hence, we start with vengeance in this post because it is where most of us are.
We try to wrest vengeance out of God’s hands instead of accepting it as irrevocably belonging to God. Am I blaming you for doing that? Not at all. I do it, although less frequently now. It is our default anytime we experience hurt, the natural thing that comes to our minds. But you know that the spiritual man does not live in the default state. We should be intentional.
Let’s just say that once I saw the danger in sharing God’s vengeance, God has been helping me to refrain. It is in that light we should view this post. We want to learn so we can seek the help of God to refrain from taking vengeance. We want Him to help us see vengeance as irrevocably belonging to God. That way, when we suffer some form of injustice, we know to take our case to the silent Judge.
He is the Judge of the whole earth and we can depend on Him to do right all the time. That is the attitude that gave birth to all those imprecatory psalms such as psalms 69 and 109 in the bible. There are many others in which the psalmist asks God to judge or curse his enemy. The good people back then must have experienced a lot of injustice, perhaps like now.
Look To God To Vindicate You
The consciousness of vengeance as irrevocably belonging to God also informs the petitions for vindication in the bible. You do not ask God to vindicate you if you are already doing it yourself through vengeance on your enemy. The psalms contain at least five instances of such a petition, an example of which we see in Psalm 43.
Not mincing words, that psalm starts off with “Vindicate me, O God. And plead my cause against an ungodly nation; Oh, deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man!” Wow! This writer is in real pain and no doubt, we can identify with him. At least, I can.
However, he is only seeking vengeance through God. He is fully aware of vengeance as irrevocably belonging to God. Therefore, he is depending on God to work the vengeance on his behalf. It is important to note that he is not trying to take vengeance by himself. If he had done that, God would not have taken up his fight.
Whenever we try to take vengeance away from God, He stands aloof from our case. I pray that that will not happen to us. But better than praying, let us refrain from trying to take vengeance into our own hands. God does not like it. Now, it should be obvious that only suffering people seek vengeance, the second attribute of God is different.
Consider Glory As Irrevocably Belonging to God
This second divine attribute is God’s glory. And although stealing it is not a problem for the regular believer, it is even more serious than vengeance. God states this in even more emphatic terms, starting with an introduction of Himself. That is because many times, we forget who God is, that He is the LORD, aka Yahweh.
Before too long we start to think of Him as Lord or even lord. And then we may start to compare him with idols. So, He starts by introducing Himself as Yahweh, the God of heaven and of earth. “I am the Lord, that is My name. And My glory I will not give to another. Nor My praise to carved images.” Stern words but He wants to be sure we understand not to confuse Him with the gods of this earth.
God will not share His glory with another and trust me, there are many who want to share God’s glory. The first examples that come to mind are leaders, particularly religious leaders. God heals somebody in their ministry. They immediately take to the airwaves to brag about it. Or they preach like an angel and they instantly snatch to glory.
And then there are idols which we make for ourselves competing with the LORD for glory and credit. It could be your great education or your huge bank account. Your wonderful body may cause you to steal God’s glory. But we must resist the temptation of giving God’s glory to another.
What we need is to constantly live in the consciousness of glory irrevocably belonging to God. If we can leave God’s glory and vengeance to God, we would do well. And now that we know, God will help us so to do
Maranatha!
