A Gift??

I recently had the opportunity to watch a VeggieTales video. The particular video in question, or at least the story on it which I saw, was entitled A Snoodle's Tale. It was a rather cute story narrated in Dr. Suess like rhyme. The story focused on one young snoodle in particular who comes into being (snoodle's aren't born, they are created and a new one pops out of a tower every Tuesday or something like that) with three gifts, a set of paints, a “snoodle kazoo” and a pair of wings. Yet, when he attempts to use each of these gifts the other snoodles simply make fun of him for his lack of ability. After making fun of him, one of the older snoodles paints, with considerable skill, a picture to remind him of his failure.

After three pictures of him are painted and placed in his back back, the young snoodle decides he has had enough, and climbs a mountain hoping that when he gets to the summit, he will be left alone. However, when he arrives at the top, he is not left alone, but a nice old man invites him in for tea. The young snoodle eventually tells the old man his story, and the old man reveals himself to be the creator of the snoodles, that he in fact is God. He tells the young snoodle not to listen to the older snoodles, because the three gifts are in fact the three things which God specifically chose for that young snoodle to be blessed with. God then paints a picture of the young snoodle as an older snoodle soaring through the air. He removes the negative pictures and places his own in the back pack. This picture does not weigh the young snoodle down as the other ones did, but makes him feel lighter. The young snoodle flies back to the snoodle village to tell of his encounter with God.

I have seen a few VeggieTales videos and as I watched this one, I really had high hopes. I saw the young snoodle doing wrong (In this case the wrong would simply be not using your gifts to their full potential. He was trying to use them, and since he did try to use his gifts I do not really see this as being a good representation of sin. Unless he was able to use his Gifts and yet despised them and refused to use them to God's glory, this is not a sin, although it is caused by one's sinful condition. Yet to many evangelicals, not using ones gifts as well as possible is a chief mortal sin, and I wonder if that was meant to be expressed here), and the law was applied in the form of the pictures painted for him by the other snoodles (no matter that they painted mean spiritedly. It could still be seen as an application of the law). As the law drug him down he could only be comforted by God. Yet when he met God, the “Gospel” was simply not to listen to the mean spirited accusers. To remember that God made you special, and no one can take that away. Yes, the sins were taken away (the negative pictures removed from the young snoodle's bag) but they were removed because he was simply to forget about them, they were not forgiven. Additionally, when God painted his picture of the older stronger snoodle, it would have been much better if he would have painted a picture of someone representative of Christ because when God looks at us and is please, he is only really seeing Christ.

Anyway, a review was not really the purpose of this post. There was a particular line in the movie which struck me as very true and important, even though the context in which it was used made it tragic. At one point in the conversation between God and the young snoodle, God laments that all the snoodle's he created use their gifts to make other feel bad. The young snoodle asks God if he can't make the snoodles love him and one another, if he can't make the snoodles all obey his wishes. God responds with the phrase “A gift that's demanded is no gift at all.” Now, I am nearly certain that this was put in to defend some Arminian notion of free will. (It is terribly sad that the creators would find a need to put in a re-enforcement of their notion of free will, but do not see the need to emphasize the need for a savior).

Now, I do agree with the statement that a gift that's demanded is no gift at all, but the statement simply proves that when we love and obey God, it is certainly not a gift we are giving him, as if he needs gifts from us anyway. Loving and Obeying God cannot be a gift, because it is something which God demands of us. God's ten commandments are an explicit command to obey. The first commandment tells us that He is the only God and that we are to “fear, love, and trust in God above all things.” Doing these things is not a gift, it is the law, to ignore the law is to sin, and to sin brings us the punishment of death. We are explicitly told this in Romans 6:23 where Paul writes “the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Not only are we shown that a love and loyalty towards God cannot be a gift from us, but we are show a true gift indeed, eternal life in Christ Jesus.

Now, if we truly believe that a gift demanded is no gift at all, and we are explicitly told that salvation through Christ is a gift, it should go without saying that salvation is not something which can be demanded. This completely abolishes the very idea of free will in conversion, because the typical Arminian idea of conversion is for the human to make a demand on God for salvation. One simply says the sinner's prayer if they truly meant it they are saved. It may not sound like a demand, but it is. A demand is simply asking with authority and intent to receive. The sinner's prayer (or any way in which one asks for salvation) meets this definition: the person who is “converting” is certainly asking, and certainly has the intent to receive. The sinner's prayer also connotes authority because it puts the person above God in as much as the person is making the step towards God of his own “free will” but God is passive and as far as they are concerned, God does not have the Authority to deny the request. For all practical purposes, this constitutes a demand. People demand salvation from God on the authority of their own free will. As far as they are concerned, free will is freedom from God's will, giving the authority to themselves. The only way for the idea of free will to have anything to do with salvation would be if God's will is equally free to say “no” to their decision. Of course in their minds he cannot say no, if he could it would be called a “request for Christ” instead of a “Decision For Christ.” In their minds their decision is final, giving themselves the authority and effectively robbing it from God.

What they do not see is that for all their defenses of Free Will, they are trying to rob God of the ability to give a simple gift. They insist on their own authority, or free will, at the expense of God's supreme authority. They seek to overturn the idea of a gift, and make it into an exchange. It becomes a matter of getting salvation from God in return for dedicating my life to Him. But this is not how it works, we are passive, God is the initiator. He gave me the gift of salvation, which I received through Baptism when I was just a helpless baby, and in response to that I dedicate my life to Him. But my dedication does not get me anything. My salvation is not dependent on my dedication (darn good thing too). But my dedication, and my love for God and my Obeying God are all simple responses to God's love shown to me in Christ Crucified. “We love because he first loved us.”

God has given us a very precious gift, one which we do not have the right to ask for, much less to demand. But this is what makes it a true gift. It is something which he gives to us out of pure, holy love. On our own, we cannot even begin to desire this gift. We cannot understand the love shown to us. We cannot ask for it or demand it. Yet, God is gracious enough to give it too us anyway. We respond with love and obedience, but ultimately, the gift is from God alone through Christ alone.

SOLI DEO GLORIA