I'll Be Back -- the Terminator

The old joke says "The good news is Jesus is coming back.  The bad news is that He's really angry."  Why is it that we are so comfortable with the Jesus who will return being a stranger to the Jesus promised of old and laid in a manger?  I cannot figure it out.  Though God has moved time and eternity to speak love to us, we seem determined to make Him into an angry and vengeful God.  This does not diminish the judgment or deny the fact that there will be those who have refused God's mercy and must face His justice.  But Jesus does this with all the regret of a mother hen who would have gathered her chicks under her wing, but they would not...  There is no joy in Mudville nor in Heaven about those who elected to stand outside of mercy's reach and are allowed to stand there by the God who will not compel us but who woos us like a lover woos and wins his beloved.

It is as if we could say that the Terminator was based upon Jesus and folks in the pew might believe us.  Such is the tragedy of grace that calls and invites but is rejected.  The Giver of that grace takes no joy in the loss of those who refuse His overture of hope -- only great sadness.

Plus, the line about "you drew first blood" has the atonement so screwed up that it ain't even funny.... oh, well, another post to deal with that one...  Suffice it to say that such a sentiment is sad and unfaithful to the Gospel that moves and wins with love and perfect love, well, casts out all fear... I read it somewhere....