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God's Love...

             But from everlasting to everlasting the Lord’s love is with those who fear him, and his righteousness with their children’s children—  with those who keep his covenant and remember to obey his precepts. (Psalm 103:17-18)

 

           One of the themes that recurs in my stories is that there is more than one kind of magic. I know some Christians who would object to the word “magic,” saying that all magic is demonic, but they might see nothing wrong with looking at a verse like this and thinking of the Lord’s love and His righteousness as being something that God adds to the lives of those who are faithful, and their descendants. Its whole purpose is to produce the happiness and security of all those involved, so that nothing bad will ever happen. And if the children or children’s children happen to turn out other than as expected, they assume someone did something bad. In other words, while they hold up a cross against anyone who mentions the word “magic,”  they treat God’s love as if it were magical.

            I’m not suggesting that this passage isn’t true. I am suggesting that how it is true is not necessarily how some people think. The idea of magic is that if you do X, Y, and W but not Z, the results will be whatever you sought. If you are praying every day, going to church on Sunday, and giving 10% of your income, and not doing the sex, drugs, and rock & roll bit, that does not guarantee that you’ll earn $250,000/year or that your children and grandchildren will never give you  a moment’s anxiety. Those are examples of magical thinking.

            So, what good does having God’s love and righteousness do? It gives  us access to Him, so that when things don’t go how we want, we can turn to Him with assurance that He will act on our behalf, according to His purposes. It means that we have, or have access to, the wisdom we need to handle the situation we find ourselves in. It means that God will walk with us through the bad times and the good. It’s God’s love and righteousness that get us through the hard times. It’s what He has taught us that helps us make good decisions and teach our children and grandchildren to make good decisions, even when those decisions are hard. 

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