You've got to get out of the car, take the keys around, open up the trunk lid, hand the keys to the Lord Jesus, get inside the trunk, slam the lid down, whisper through the keyhole, 'Lord look, fill'r up with anything you want and you drive, it's up to you from now on.'

Do you realize this? That if you were to somehow purpose to, from this day on, perfectly please God and succeed in doing it, that that perfect obedience, from this moment, would not acquire in the remainder of your life, enough merit to atone for one past sin, because God exacts and God demands perfect obedience and there's no merit for giving him the minimal requirement.

Why should a person come to the cross? Why should a person embrace death? With Christ? Because it's the only way that God can get glory out of a human being!

Does the Lord intend to make man happy? Sure... but it's a byproduct, not a prime product.

Is God an end or is He a means?

The liberal says the end of religion is to make man happy while he's alive. And the fundamentalist says the end of religion is to make man happy when he dies.

This philosophical postulate that the end of all being is the happiness of man has been sort-of covered over with evangelical terms and biblical doctrine - until God reigns in heaven for the happiness of man, Jesus Christ was incarnate for the happiness of man, all the angels exist and ... everything is for the happiness of man - and I submit to you that this is unchristian.