When God Closes a Door

Keith posted:

Jesus Christ Is Lord

Romans 14:7-12

Followers of Jesus would agree that whether we live or die, we do so for Christ. But His sovereignty is not limited to those who claim Him as King. The entire world—the whole universe, in fact—is subject to His authority. At the final judgment, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess and praise God.

In the here and now, relatively few people recognize the Lord’s rule and seek to remain in His will. Most refuse to see that all of our human constructs—such as government, culture, and society—thrive or falter in the palm of God’s hand. Moreover, nonbelievers resist Christ’s sovereignty in their own lives. People who won’t surrender their will to the Lord’s great purpose assume control of their own destiny. However, the Lord’s supreme reign cannot be thwarted.

It’s common for men and women today to believe that there are no consequences for rejecting the lordship of Jesus Christ. You may have heard people say things like, “That Christian stuff works for you, but it’s not for me. I’ll live on my own terms.” Yet Jesus’ parable of houses built on either solid rock or sand offers a different perspective (Matt. 7:24-27). Only those who make their abode in the Lord can withstand the upheavals of this world.

Kneeling before Jesus Christ as the Lord of your life is the wisest decision you can make. The sovereign Ruler of the universe loves you and desires to bless all of your days. Make your eternal home in the safety of His kingdom, and forever delight in Him.

Suppose that all of this is just make believe? Suppose that what people say of Jesus and what he actually was are two completely different realities? No doubt believers of Jesus will point to what others wrote of Jesus to support their belief. However, if one realistically take the very limited events, words and actions of Jesus as documented in the New Testament free from blind faith, one will come to a different conclusion.

To begin with, Jesus was no king. He was born to an unmarried woman in a barn and does not even know his father. He grew up in the working class with barely any measurable accomplishments. He hanged out with a bunch of other guys who made him feel important but he was not even acknowledged as a leader of the church and had no meaningful role in the church of his peers.

But that was not all. He was also rude, obnoxious and prejudiced as shown in the manner of how he referred to people who were not Jewish of or his inner circle. Names like dogs, pigs, swine, wicked and adulterous people to name a few. He constantly whined about the comforts that others had while he had nothing of his own. If you weren't Jewish, you were not worthy of his acknowledgement. He was even rude and disrespectful to his own mother who bore him through pregnancy and childbirth regardless of her getting pregnant and not disclosing who got her pregnant.

Now this all may sound harsh but they will make sense once one is willing and able to remove the blinders of faith for no matter how much lipstick one put on a pig, it is still a pig. And if Jesus had no problem calling others pigs, none should be concerned that I use the pig reference here.

Jews have always had tremendous influence in the world. In the world today, that is easily observed in banking, business, politics, science, music, entertainment, fashion, news/print media and pornograhy like in blue movies and main stream cinema. They influence the heathens, gentiles and infidels.

All for the almighty DOLLLAR.

Jewish principles of doing business is similar to Jacob's method-conniving, deciet and outright thiefing of Esau's birthright. A Jew will tell you that all of that is acceptable. As long as they seek Forgiveness at Hanukah. And start a new year again, doing the same things.

Adolph Hitler had a problem with them and that. And again they have resorted to their old ways. Misery for the world masses in all form IN EVERY CONTINENT.

Christ came only to the Jews and the His Disciples took His message to them to the far reaches of the world. 

The way we read the New Testament, is like a person must ONLY ACCEPT. But, the Orthodox Jews have a much more thorough explanation of Elohim and Yesuwah. They waiting for Him to come. He already came, and the things he said about them is all true today.

Now, the Apostle Paul, I percieved tobe like the modern day Orthodox Jewis Rabbi. Listening to them opens up a whole understanding of the scriptures. Paul knew the Torah inside out. And he wrote and spoke of Yahweh and Yesuwah in simplistic terms considering the mulitudes of background of the gentiles.

Christ came  for the Jews for them to change their ways and give harmony to the world. And he knew they will not change. But because, they were the chosen ppl, the effort had to be and must be made. The Apostle Paul, gave us his wriiten thoughts how live in a world full of sufferings. Christ said the same things to the Jews, all from the ancient texts. Paul simple tells us how bear our chafe untill the Lords returns.

Learning From Adversity

Even Christ didn't understand the Lord's sovereignty, priorities, and sufficiency. When the pain of the crucifixion began to hurt him, he exclaimed; "my God, my God, why have you forsaken me".

Looks like Paul's response was better than Christ's was to affliction.

ksazma posted:

Even Christ didn't understand the Lord's sovereignty, priorities, and sufficiency. When the pain of the crucifixion began to hurt him, he exclaimed; "my God, my God, why have you forsaken me".

Looks like Paul's response was better than Christ's was to affliction.

You have not read enough to fully grasp the uttering. And if you did, you will never be enlightened. Because, you are in denial of the Holy Spirit.

There are some things never understood by carnal minds. 

Who We Are in Christ

Our True Identity

Free to Enjoy God

seignet posted:

ksazma posted:

Even Christ didn't understand the Lord's sovereignty, priorities, and sufficiency. When the pain of the crucifixion began to hurt him, he exclaimed; "my God, my God, why have you forsaken me".

Looks like Paul's response was better than Christ's was to affliction.

You have not read enough to fully grasp the uttering. And if you did, you will never be enlightened. Because, you are in denial of the Holy Spirit.

There are some things never understood by carnal minds. 

Seignet, I couldn't say it any better, I was going to reply in length but why bother when one cannot grasp the uttering.

Ksazma, who was responsible for Christ death? Answer me that and we will have an enlighten conversation.

Keith posted:
Ksazma, who was responsible for Christ death? Answer me that and we will have an enlighten conversation.

God. All births and deaths are by God's decree. Jesus is no different. His birth and death were also by God's decree.

btw, you started out as your topic claims that it is not a sermon, just a thought. How did a thought become a two page sermon? Why did you claim that your sermon is not a sermon?

Enoch never experienced death, so did Elijah. Life and death is the power of God. He has dominion over every minute aspects and events. As mortals, we are awed considering many to be miracles.

Yes, Christ died but He is not Dead. Resurrection was not an uncommon phenomenon back then, before and after. I have listened to many interpretations of what the Quran has to to say about Christ and Mary. And resurrection was not uncommon to the writer of the Quran. For the amount of written comments about Jesus in the Quran, the Quran itself establishes the reality of His divinity.  

Mark, the first gospel writer wrote of Christ as His teacher. And his accounts stopped at the scene of an empty tomb. A clear statement that Christ is alive.

seignet posted:

Enoch never experienced death, so did Elijah. Life and death is the power of God. He has dominion over every minute aspects and events. As mortals, we are awed considering many to be miracles.

Yes, Christ died but He is not Dead. Resurrection was not an uncommon phenomenon back then, before and after. I have listened to many interpretations of what the Quran has to to say about Christ and Mary. And resurrection was not uncommon to the writer of the Quran. For the amount of written comments about Jesus in the Quran, the Quran itself establishes the reality of His divinity.  

Mark, the first gospel writer wrote of Christ as His teacher. And his accounts stopped at the scene of an empty tomb. A clear statement that Christ is alive.

Yes, Christ died but He is not Dead - Now this is what I call crazy logic.

For the amount of written comments about Jesus in the Quran, the Quran itself establishes the reality of His divinity.   - Interesting that all the statements in the Qur'an clearly stated that Jesus is NOT divine. You don't have to assume what the statements mean as they are crystal clear. Nothing like how you have to find ways to fully grasp the utterings of the Bible. Jesus is no different from any other prophet. No better nor worse.

A clear statement that Christ is alive - If Jesus is alive, where is he and how you think he must look now given that he would be 2000+ years old.

ksazma posted:

seignet posted:

Enoch never experienced death, so did Elijah. Life and death is the power of God. He has dominion over every minute aspects and events. As mortals, we are awed considering many to be miracles.

Yes, Christ died but He is not Dead. Resurrection was not an uncommon phenomenon back then, before and after. I have listened to many interpretations of what the Quran has to to say about Christ and Mary. And resurrection was not uncommon to the writer of the Quran. For the amount of written comments about Jesus in the Quran, the Quran itself establishes the reality of His divinity.  

Mark, the first gospel writer wrote of Christ as His teacher. And his accounts stopped at the scene of an empty tomb. A clear statement that Christ is alive.

Yes, Christ died but He is not Dead - Now this is what I call crazy logic.

For the amount of written comments about Jesus in the Quran, the Quran itself establishes the reality of His divinity.   - Interesting that all the statements in the Qur'an clearly stated that Jesus is NOT divine. You don't have to assume what the statements mean as they are crystal clear. Nothing like how you have to find ways to fully grasp the utterings of the Bible. Jesus is no different from any other prophet. No better nor worse.

A clear statement that Christ is alive - If Jesus is alive, where is he and how you think he must look now given that he would be 2000+ years old.

 

For the rational minded person who reads the written words about Christ in the Quran they themselves would honor His Divinity. I expect a lot of muslims will see the light when enlightement comes to them. Maybe some has already, but the fear of death keeps Christ quietly, in their hearts. 

Celestial Beings doan age. Angels, Archangels and Ministering Angels are forever the same. 

The Middle-East, before Christ, was no diiferent than India, gods of all descriptions. Many of the nations in that region would adhere to the teachings of Christ through the Apostles and Paul. But there lies the nation state of Arabia, approximately 600 years after Christ, still worship mulitudes of gods.

It has been stated over and over, Mohammad was illiterate in a household with a vast library. And he was taught to read. From the beliefs of Mohammad concerning a monolithic God, one can conclude the library would have had the Gospels, the Torah(The Books of Moses) and most certain the Book of Enoch. He also was a man who had had business dealings with people of all faiths in the region.

Convinced of only one God, he would do what Moses did to the Hittites, the Amorites and all the others who worshipped idols. Declared war and killed the heathens. Which Mohammad did and began teaching Arabians about the One God.

Mohammad had enough written material to teach from.

When Christ came, he reasoned with his listeners about God. He came with a message that was not written anywhere. The Jews knew of their God-according to Moses Laws. There is this man who spoke of freedom for slaves when the world at that time were determined to be 75% slaves. He spoke of a new kingdom. He said a great many things. And He said, that He came from the realm of God and Him and the Father are one.

And the Deciples saw Him on a cross. His pain escruciating, And uttered, the words.  

It must have been devasting for the deciples. Jesus left no wriiten accounts or instructions. They expected a fullfilment of what He said in real time. 

And so, the deciples sought to undersatnd what had taken place. And they started with the utterance,"Father why has thou forsaken Me." They would find the reasoning for those words in the Psalms. From that point onward the Holy Spirit would guide them through the Torah for the prophecies related to His coming.

Some 50 yeras later after the resurrection, The Gospels are written and letters of Paul. All with aim of an explanation of what took place.

seignet posted:

 

Responses highlighted in yellow

For the rational minded person who reads the written words about Christ in the Quran they themselves would honor His Divinity. I expect a lot of muslims will see the light when enlightement comes to them. Maybe some has already, but the fear of death keeps Christ quietly, in their hearts.

Why would anyone who reads where the Qur'an stated crystal clear that Jesus was NOT divine still foolishly "honor his divine"? One would be foolish to use the Qur'an which clearly stated that Jesus was NOT divine to insist that he was.

Celestial Beings doan age. Angels, Archangels and Ministering Angels are forever the same. 

Jesus was no celestial being. He was a human being like all others.

The Middle-East, before Christ, was no diiferent than India, gods of all descriptions. Many of the nations in that region would adhere to the teachings of Christ through the Apostles and Paul. But there lies the nation state of Arabia, approximately 600 years after Christ, still worship mulitudes of gods.

Arabia was not a nation state in 600 C.E.

It has been stated over and over, Mohammad was illiterate in a household with a vast library. And he was taught to read. From the beliefs of Mohammad concerning a monolithic God, one can conclude the library would have had the Gospels, the Torah(The Books of Moses) and most certain the Book of Enoch. He also was a man who had had business dealings with people of all faiths in the region.

I don't know where you get your information from dude. Muhammad's household did not have any vast library. He was not taught to read nor did he ever read any written words throughout his life. The words of the Qur'an are what he claimed he heard from the archangel Gabriel. While the people mentioned in the Qur'an are also mentioned in the Bible, the accounts of their lives are vastly different so clearly Muhammad in dictating the words of the Qur'an chose to disregard the stories of the Bible. And while he did have contact with others as he travels as a merchant, he clearly did not relate their accounts of the Bible in his dictation of the Qur'an.

Convinced of only one God, he would do what Moses did to the Hittites, the Amorites and all the others who worshipped idols. Declared war and killed the heathens. Which Mohammad did and began teaching Arabians about the One God.

Mohammad had enough written material to teach from.

Muhammad did not declare war on the Meccans. They declared war on him. He even left Mecca in the middle of the night and escaped to Madinah because the Meccans were planning to kill him. Yes, he did began teaching the Arabians about the One God after he learned of that One God from the archangel Gabriel.

When Christ came, he reasoned with his listeners about God. He came with a message that was not written anywhere. The Jews knew of their God-according to Moses Laws. There is this man who spoke of freedom for slaves when the world at that time were determined to be 75% slaves. He spoke of a new kingdom. He said a great many things. And He said, that He came from the realm of God and Him and the Father are one.

Jesus did not reason with anyone. He had a tumultuous relationship with anyone he came into contact with except his 12 compadres and even then he had issues with them from time to time. He was very angry and selfish. He called people insulting names like swine, dogs, pigs, etc. He was even disrespectful to his mother who brought him into this world through the pain of childbirth. And he was constantly complaining about all the stuff that others had while he had nothing as not "even a place to rest his head". And all this in only a three year period. The rest of his life is not known to anyone. He never freed a single slave during his life. While he did say that he and God are one, he clearly stated that he is NOT God and rebuked a man for addressing him as good when only God is good.

And the Deciples saw Him on a cross. His pain escruciating, And uttered, the words.

The disciples did not see him on a cross or see his excruciating pain nor hear his uttered words. They all got afraid and fled the scene leaving Jesus alone to bear his chafe.

It must have been devasting for the deciples. Jesus left no wriiten accounts or instructions. They expected a fullfilment of what He said in real time. 

Jesus had no time to leave any instructions. He was too busy those three years enjoying the attention his 12 compadres were giving him.

And so, the deciples sought to undersatnd what had taken place. And they started with the utterance,"Father why has thou forsaken Me." They would find the reasoning for those words in the Psalms. From that point onward the Holy Spirit would guide them through the Torah for the prophecies related to His coming.

Regardless of what the disciples thought, Jesus demonstrated gross lack of faith, patience and devotion when he questioned God's decree. Job showed more devotion to God than Jesus did.

Some 50 yeras later after the resurrection, The Gospels are written and letters of Paul. All with aim of an explanation of what took place.

The Romans found a way to rewrite the story of Mithras replacing Mithras ' name with Jesus' and so began what we know as Christianity today. As Christians celebrate Christmas today, they are actually celebrating Mithras' birthday and not Jesus as Jesus was born in July. Jesus is not even his real name. It is Esau.

 

 

Eternally Secure in Christ

If God is so smart, he would have sent Christ earlier so that all those people who lived and sinned for thousands of years prior to the coming of Christ would have had a similar opportunity to accept salvation too. 

Eternal Security: Can We Be Sure?

1. Whenever I think of a father who love unconditionally, I think of one who will give his life for his children, not one who will ask one of his children to give their live instead.

2. I don't know how someone can be without sin when they display utmost disrespect for the majority of people around them. The bigotry, hatred, calling people names like dogs, pigs, swine. If those are not sinful acts, them what are?

3. Jesus also promised Judas that no one can snatch him from his (Jesus) hand also and he found out that his promise was not good enough to keep Judas from betraying him.

4. Looks like that Holy Spirit was not enough of a seal to keep folks like Jimmy Swaggart, Jimmy Bakker amongst others from falling off the cliff. If that Holy Spirit was able to guide these dudes who proclaimed frequently of speaking directly to God, why would that Holy Spirit have any better result with anyone else. These were dudes who spoke directly to God and still ended up screwing up in many ways than one.

All this Christian promise is pie in the sky. No one can pay for another person's actions. Everyone is responsibility for their own actions. If nothing people do is good enough to help them, that is their problem. If God is so powerful and loving, he doesn't need to send his only son to die so those people have salvation. All he has to do is lower the threshold instead of stubbornly setting unreasonable demands on people. There is nothing perfect about Jesus. If he is part of the Triune Godhead, one would expect him to know about things around him. If I were to ask a local for a certain fruit and that fruit was not in season, that local would know that it is not in season and tell me so. Jesus didn't even know that it was out of season for the fig tree. So he got pissed off when he found out that he was mistaken and how did he respond? He cursed the tree. That is one amazing display of love to curse a tree that did nothing just because he was wrong. Talk about being wrong and strong. One can put as much lipstick as they wish on a pig but it will still be a pig.

Now this is straight talk.

ksazma posted:

If God is so smart, he would have sent Christ earlier so that all those people who lived and sinned for thousands of years prior to the coming of Christ would have had a similar opportunity to accept salvation too. 

Your question is different to "If God knew that Adam and Eve would sin, why did He create them?" but have a similar answer.

The Bible says that God created all things—including us—for Himself. He is glorified in His creation. “From him and through him and for him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen” (Romans 11:36).

God is omniscient (Psalm 139:1–6), and He knows the future (Isaiah 46:10). So He definitely knew that Adam and Eve would sin. But He created them anyway and gave them a free will with which they chose to sin.

Now to answer your Question
Oh before I begin, there was a man asking God some questions and he said "God what is a million years to you"? A million years to you would be 1 second to me! "God what is 1 million dollars to you"? A million dollars to you would be 1 penny to me! "God ",the man said, "can I have a penny"? God said, in a second!....That was a joke but think on it.
------------------------------------------------------------------

I find it helpful to step back a little bit and get the big picture for this question.

The question is not just about why God didn't send Jesus earlier, but about all the seeming delays in the redemptive plan of God. That is, why does God “wait” to do anything?

I mean, if we pray for something, and God knows He is going to give us what we prayed for, why does He sometimes make us wait weeks, months, or even years before granting the request?

There are, of course, a thousand possible answers to this question. Maybe God’s apparent delay had something to do with God’s perfect timing. Maybe God did immediately answer our prayer request, but Satan temporarily stopped us from receiving God’s answer. Maybe God was waiting for us to be an answer to our own prayer, and we were the ones who slowed Him down.

There are other possibilities as well, but these go to show that when it comes to delays in God’s timetable, there is really almost no way to know why God does what He does when He does it.

Here is a basic timetable of God’s major redemptive works in history, counting from the fall of Adam and Eve in the Garden.  Note that in between each major event, there are larger periods of relatively uneventful history. (The number of years listed below is based on the  most conservative estimates. Obviously, there are more liberal estimates which extend these periods of time out to tens of thousands of years.)

• The Fall of Adam and Eve
• Wait 2000 years
• The Call of Abraham
• Wait 500 years
• Giving the Law to Moses at Mt. Sinai
• Wait 1500 Years
• Ministry of Jesus
• Wait 2000+ Years
• The Second Coming of Jesus (in the Future)
• The New Heavens and New Earth

Obviously, God is not silent and is not inactive during these waiting periods, but this outline of events is simply to show that God’s plan of redemption does seem to occur in small steps spread out over long lengths of time.

Rather than that order of events, we often think it would have been nice for the order of events to follow this outline:

• The Fall of Adam and Eve
• Wait 20 minutes
• The Death and Resurrection of Jesus
• Eternal Bliss

Honestly, from a human perspective, this second order of evens would have saved a lot of horrible grief, bloodshed, death, sorrow, and sadness. Nobody would have ended up in hell. There never would have been wars, or famines, or diseases. Adam and Eve would have sinned, Jesus would have immediately shown up to fix it, and that would have been that.

So why indeed was there a delay in God’s redemptive plan? Why did He wait so long to choose Abraham? Why did He wait so long to give His law? Why did God wait so long to send Jesus? Why is He waiting so long to send Jesus back?

It only seems long to us
The first answer some provide is really a non-answer. It is one of those pat answers to difficult theological questions which really does nothing to answer the question. It is a Christian cliché: "God’s timing is not our timing."

2 Peter 3:8: But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.

So in other words, though it seems like God took thousands of years to send Jesus, from His perspective, it only seemed like a couple days.

Peter’s point is valid in the context, but I don’t think we can say that just because God is not restricted by time, this means that God doesn’t comprehend time, or that God doesn’t care that we struggle with how long His plan takes. I know that this is not what people mean when they say this, but to many, that is how it comes across.

Here is how this answer sounds: "Oh, life is hard and you are wondering why God is taking so long to answer your prayers and set things right? Well, God’s timing is not our timing."

This is a Christian way of saying, "Life sucks; then you die. Deal with it." In other words, "Shut up. Nobody cares. Not even God."

God does care. He knows that although our lives are less than mere breaths before His infinite existence, the years of our life are often full of pain, hardship, trials, burdens, sickness, fear, and sorrow.

To teach humanity about the depth of our sin
If Jesus had shown up 20 minutes after Adam and Eve sinned, we never would have understood the depth and breadth of our sinfulness. Nor would we have understood how desperately we need God. It could be argued that one reason Adam and Eve sinned is because they didn’t fully comprehend how horrible it would be to live life disconnected from God.

Due to the long period of time in which we have wallowed in our sin, we now know — do we ever! — how wicked, evil, and brutal people can be.

One great benefit to this way of viewing God’s delay is that it seems to be supported by Scripture. Over and over again in Scripture we see this cycle:

1. Human development (the Law, Land, Judges, Kings, Prophets, etc.)
2. Great expectations for human utopia
3. Greater evil than ever before

I like this explanation, except that it seems like a bit of overkill. Pun intended. Do we really need thousands of years of bloodshed, rape, murder, torture, war, famine, pestilence, and disease to tell us that sin is bad? I don’t know… maybe we do. After all, human history reveals that every so often, people think that humanity has progressed to the point that worldwide peace and prosperity is just around the corner, that human utopia is almost assured. Usually, not long after these rosy predictions of our future are made, humanity enters into one of the most violent and bloody eras of its history.

In fact, you can almost predict future events based on how rosy of a picture is being painted about that future. The rosier the picture, the bloodier the future.

To teach the angels about God’s redemptive purpose
This idea comes from 1 Peter 1:12 and a few other verses which seem to indicate that one reason God created humanity and is carrying out His redemptive plan is to teach something to the angels. Nobody really knows what God might be trying to teach the angels that they don’t already know, but apparently, the angels are learning from watching how God deals with rebellious humanity.

If God is teaching the angels something, then apparently, it takes a long time to teach them.

To wait until the time when the Gospel could spread the quickest
Sometimes, and specifically in connection to why Jesus came when He did, some people say it had something to do with the Roman empire. The Roman empire built roads and had a common tongue which allowed the message of the Gospel to spread more quickly and with greater ease than it could have at other times.

I suppose in theory, this is somewhat true, but if God was waiting until there was a common language and good lines of communication before sending Jesus, He could have picked no better time than right before humans decided to build the Tower of Babel. There was only one language at the time, and it seems their communication was so good, there was nothing they could not accomplish. That is partly why the text says that God scrambled human communication (Genesis 11:6).

Furthermore, if God was really waiting for the quickest and most worldwide method of communication, He should have waited for Twitter/Facebook.

I’m kidding....Kind of …

Look, when we say that God waited to send Jesus until there was a common tongue and a good road system, what we are also saying is that the only part of the world that God really cared about was the part under Roman rule (Most of Europe, Northern Africa, and Western Asia). The rest of the world did not have access to the Roman road system, nor did they speak the common language of the Roman empire. So are we saying then that God didn’t care about most of Africa, most of Asia, and all of North and South America?

That was why I was kind-of only half-joking when I mentioned Twitter/Facebook. If God was waiting until the quickest form of communication was available to all the world, then He could have waited until a worldwide system of instantaneous communication was in place … a system much like Twitter/Facebook.

So anyway, while I do think the Roman road system and common language helped the spread of the Gospel, I don’t think we can say that this was why Jesus came at the time and place that He did.

To fulfill prophecy
Then there is the explanation that Jesus came when He did because He had to fulfill prophecy.

There is some truth to this, especially depending on how you understand the prophecy of Daniel’s 70 Weeks (Daniel 9:24-27). It may be that Jesus had to come when He did to complete the prophecy given 490 years earlier.

Also, in relation to this, Paul writes that Jesus came "at the appointed time" (Galatians 4:4). Other New Testament authors say similar things.

While there is truth with this answer, it really doesn’t answer the question. All it does it move the question back. If Jesus came at that time to fulfill prophesy, then why did God prophecy that Jesus would come at that time? Why didn’t God move prophets to predict that Jesus would come a two thousand years earlier … or later? Why then? Why there?

(My! This post is getting long … Let’s see if I can wrap it up.)

To wait until human theological development had evolved to the point where we could understand Jesus
One final view is that God waited for so long because mankind had  to develop socially and spiritually enough in order to understand and receive the revelation of Jesus Christ.

This idea is based on the concept of progressive revelation, that God has slowly explained Himself and unfolded His plan and purposes for the world over time. The reason is that we could not understand and grasp it all at once, and so He has had to teach us bit by bit, one step at a time.

God had to slowly teach humanity about Himself and His ways, so that over time, we would grow and develop into the people He wanted us to become.

Progressive revelation is a definite fact of Scripture, but I am a bit wary of this idea, for it seems to fall prey to what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery." Lewis often criticized other scholars for thinking that just because they lived in 1960, they knew more about how the world worked and what God was like than people who lived in say, 60 AD. Just because we are further along in years, C. S. Lewis argued, does not mean we necessarily know more. We may, in fact, know less.

But, for the most part, I think this view has some merit, and does help explain what Jesus might have meant in John 16:12 where He said He had much more to teach, but could not do so because they were not ready to hear it. Verses like this are everywhere in Scripture (cf. Matt 13:10-13), which seems to indicate that God only provides further revelation after we have incorporated His previous revelation into our thinking and practice (for the most part).

What is my view about why God waited thousands of years to send Jesus? What is my view on all of this? I hold some strange mixture of all of the above.

Essentially, I believe that whatever we say about God’s timing in sending Jesus is similar to what we should say about God’s timing in doing anything. There are a variety of answers at any given time, and any action of God can have a variety of explanations.

While I believe that faith in God includes faith in God’s timing, I am not always sure we can understand God’s timing …