President Abraham Lincoln is well remembered for his famous Gettysburg Address. He is also remembered for a very famous observation: “You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.” Hmmm. . . very interesting. If we wished, we could add a biblical principle to that—“You can't fool God any of the time.”

That does not require really deep thinking, does it? But it is very profound! It is life-changing if we really get hold of the concept. Why do we not live in light of the fact that we can't put anything over on God? Maybe it's because we think God is just like people, and if we are really clever, we can actually fool Him when we think it helpful to our own personal cause or comfort like we do sometimes with other people. I know, I know! In our theological understanding, we glibly say that God knows everything, including our thoughts and motives. We quote Proverbs 21:2, “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but the LORD pondereth the hearts.” Now, do we live out that verse? Well, maybe God sees and ponders our hearts (we tell ourselves), but He knows I GOTTA BE ME as a popular entertainer used to sing.

Who are we fooling? The writer of Hebrews assures us that “. . . all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.” (Hebrews 4:13) The apostle Paul categorically states that God has destined His children to be conformed to the image of Christ (Romans 8:29). That takes care of the I-GOTTA-BE-ME thinking, because God knows our hearts, and is not impressed with our feeble attempts to just look or sound good. You see, people don't know our motives, so we can fool them—some of the time or maybe all of the time. But as far back as Adam, no human being has ever fooled God. Adam tried to blame his wife and God for his disobedience: “The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat.” (Genesis 3:12) God completely ignored Adam's lame attempt to pass off the responsibility and excuse himself. Instead, the Lord informed him of the consequences (Genesis 3:17-19), and in essence said, “You don't fool me for one minute.”

So, what is the point? God is not a respecter or an excuser of persons. He is not interested in what we want to be (or what we want people to think we are), but He is vitally concerned with making us into what His design is for us. “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:30-31) I think these words of Jesus say it as clearly as it can be stated. So much for the I GOTTA BE ME! It clearly is what He wants me to be—no fooling!

Jim Sproul, B.A., B.D.
Senior Adults Pastor