Thursday 14 May 2009

Is God incomplete?

Is it heresy to say that God is incomplete? Reading from the first letter of John again on Sunday we were reminded that 'if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.' Can it be possible that God needs us in order to be fully complete? That he needs us to love another in order for his love to be complete? What sort of God is it that needs people in this way? Some might say, "He can't be much of a god if he is so needy." But John seems to be saying that he is SO loving he is even prepared to risk his own omnipotence in order to show and share his love.

One thing that a powerful person cannot do is to make you love them. No matter how powerful - even if they have the power of life and death. The opposite of love is not hate, but fear. Love encourages growth and more love, but power - with the possibility of punishment - will only lead to fear. Fear makes people wither and turn in on themselves.

So here is the paradox: God, the all-powerful, the almighty, the all-loving needs people to take the love that is at his heart and express in 'actions and truth', as John says, in order to make it complete.

What an amazing God!

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