Mesaba,
There is no conflict between the Epistles of Paul and the Gospels.
The Epistles of Paul are revelations from Jesus explaining the meaning of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. The Epistle's of Paul clarify the meaning of the New Covenant that Jesus had established on His Blood. The Gospels simply reveal God in human flesh unfolding His nature before men's eyes. His nature is love, mercy, and longsuffering. The word longsuffering also indicates that His patience is long but not eternal.
During Jesus' soujourn among men he also left us glimpses of His righteous wrath and jealous nature when he drove the moneychangers from the Temple, when He told the Jews who scournfully rejected Him, 'ye are of your father the devil, and the lust of your father ye will do'. John 8:44, and when He said 'I am the way, the truth and the life; no man comes to the father except through me'. In other words, you shall have no other gods before me.
Since many of the Pharisees and Scribes concentrated solely on religious show and the wrath of God, they could not recognize the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as He walked in their midst.
Today, we have many Christian religious auithorities who also miss Christ because they concentrate on wrath rather than on the dominate characteristics of His nature, which is love. God is love; not the syrupy and mythical love of the liberals who talk of love, but a love couched in the midst of the reality of the New Covenant.
Emile |
