In this post, I give a short, one web page, summary of what I believe, in language as simple as I can manage. It gives only a quick, "big picture" of my understanding of God, my relationship to him, and my role on Earth. Comments are invited.
Link to video series talking about some of these topics in shorter pieces!
My natural tendency, and all that I have been taught about scholarship over the years, says that I should exhaustively support everything I write, or not write it at all.
But the subject of this blog is huge, my time is limited, and I am not young.
Therefore, lest I leave this world without ever developing the “big picture” this blog will ultimately, God willing, document, I will now post two pages setting forth the outline of this “big picture,” in simple language and without extensive argument or supporting references.
This post will deal with doctrine–a quick outline of what I believe. The second post will give a quick outline of the “big picture” of Church History and Western History that flows from the current post. As it is presently posted, the current post is an almost complete first draft. There likely will be additions to the text and possibly minor revisions made over the next few months. Comments are invited.
Fundamentally, early Christianity was based on the possibility of having a living, personal relationship with God through his Son, Jesus Christ. This is the key, both to faith and to the history of the last 2000 years, much of which is explained by the efforts of “Christian” organizations and their political sponsors to deny the truth of this in practice in order to maintain control of the “faithful.”
God Is
God exists. God exists in himself, without needing anyone or anything else to support his existence. This is actually the most important thing that must be recognized about God. He did not “come” into existence, and nothing created him. He simply exists–with no beginning and no end. Everything that exists exists in him. He has no past and no future, though he understands the flow of time in our human existence–all that has been or will ever be also presently exists in him. God’s name, “I am that I am,” can also be translated “I will be what I will be.” He is not bound.
God Created
God created. God created everything that is, other than himself–both space and time as we know them and all of the things that lie within them. Once–though not in time as we know it–God exists but neither space nor time existed. (I note that even secular “big bang” cosmologies now accept the idea that there was a phase logically or causally “early” in the development of the cosmos when the application of “time” as a progress metric makes no sense, a state of affairs that existed before time; it is no more nonsensical to simply say that God exists even when time did not yet exist). This places God not only outside of space and time but also in authority over them both, as their Creator. He may do with both space and time, and all created things, as he wishes. But it also implies that God remains active in his Creation, and at every place and time within it. He is equally present everywhere and at every time, bringing the whole toward its determined end, though his working may not be equally visible to us at every time and place.
God, his Spirit, his breath, his voice
God is Spirit. But “spirit” is wind, breath or voice. God created everything by speaking. God said, “let there be…” and there was. Genesis 1, repeatedly. By faith we understand that the world has been created by the word of God so that what is seen has not been made out of things that are visible. Hebrews 11:3. God’s breath, his words, are the substance of everything that is in our Creation. All things show his work. His breath and voice are in everything. But, like the wind, God’s spirit can be heard but not seen. What the spirit does can be seen, but spirit itself cannot be seen. Like the wind, God’s spirit is free to act in the world as it wishes; we cannot control it. Again like the wind, we cannot know the origin of God’s spirit or trace its ultimate destination. And, in a sense that is hard for us to fathom, God is one with his breath, voice, and Word, his Spirit by which all things came to exist and now continue to exist.
God is light
God is light. Light defines his activity. The first thing God brought into his creation was light, and light still shows his active presence. Light is the energy which ultimately makes everything in this creation operate. Darkness is nothing in itself–it is only the relative absence of light, relative because light is everywhere. God even created the lesser lights–moon, stars, planets–to “rule” the night of darkness. Light is everywhere: even in the “dark” there is “black body” radiation. We can place ourselves in internal darkness by closing our eyes to God and his working, but this does not make the darkness we perceive a reality. Light’s power is real; the power of the darkness is illusory. All of these statements apply equally to physical darkness and to darkness as a metaphor for evil. To God’s light nothing is hidden. His light is the revealer and the revealed, the ultimate judge, the good against which the evil that tries to hide in the darkness contrasts. Nothing can truly hide from God, his light and his work.
God is Love
God is love. Love defines God’s character. God is eternally love, and everything he has ever done, is now doing, or will ever do, has been done in love, the love which is his character and flows from within him. The essence of God’s love is his desire that we should be one with him, voluntarily living as his children and participating with him in his creation and in all that he is. Everything that is said about love–that it is patient, kind, joyful, good, faithful, acts with self-control, does not act out of self-seeking or self-directed jealousy, is not easily provoked, does not keep an account of wrongs done it, rejoices not in evil but in the truth, covers over wrongs, believes, hopes and endures all things–can also be said in a perfect sense of God’s love for us, and they are the fruit he seeks to develop in the lives of those who will permit him to do so. Even his judgment, bringing the darkness before his light, is an act of love, showing he has love for us by delivering us from the darkness we have chosen for ourselves.
God Can Feel and Respond to Events that Affect Us Without Changing
Because God exists at all times simultaneously, and simultaneously throughout his Creation, his being subsumes all of the changes that occur in his Creation without changing him—the changes are found in him from the beginning, and he has provided for them from the beginning. He is the same God yesterday, today and forever. Hebrews 13:8.. For the same reason, however, God’s thoughts, emotions, and manifestations of himself to his changing Creation and to his transient creatures appear to change with time when viewed by beings like us who are bound to time. God can participate in his Creation, feel emotions as a result of the things that happen in it, and act in response to what we do in it, and not change himself at all, because he is above time. God is frequently described as having emotions. See, e.g., Exodus 34:5-7 (“compassionate” part of God’s name); Hebrews 11:5-6 (God pleased); Hebrews 13:15-16 (God pleased); Genesis 6:5-7 (God grieved); Hebrews 3:7-11, 16-17 (God provoked and angry) . God also frequently makes decisions that appear to have been made in time, basing those decisions on the actions of humans or other events that occur in time, and executes them in time. See, e.g, 2 Kings 20:1-6; Ezekiel 18:21-32; Jonah 3:4-4:4. The whole drama of the Creation which he is perfecting, including us, is simply permanently subsumed within him. We are the ones who are limited to finite, unidirectional time; he is not.
We are created in God’s image, and have corrupted versions of all of the same emotions God feels.
Why and How God created humans
I will start with the “how” question. God created the first human by forming a body from the pre-existing, common materials of the earth he had created–dust or mud–and then breathing his Spirit into the lifeless form. He did this concurrently with–but logically after–telling himself “let us create man in our image.” (I will say more later about God speaking to himself in the plural). So first he spoke, as in his other acts of his creation, then he acted on what he had said by specifically fashioning the first man and breathing his life–himself–into the form he had made.
So without him, we are mud; with him, we can share in his life.
God made the second human by taking a rib of the first human, and fashioning it into another, quite different, human being, who was nevertheless like her husband–taken directly from him. He did not separately breathe his life into her; the breath the woman had was the same breath he had breathed into the man. They shared a body of the same substance, but for a single chromosome, and the same spirit–God’s. God treated them as a single person, one man, male and female. Together, and not separately, they were one man made in the image of God.
This leads naturally to the “why” question. The Scriptures offer several answers, stated in different contexts, none of which is complete in itself. God created humans because an aspect of his own person is to create more beings like himself–a part of his “image” which he also placed in us. God created humans to rule his creation and participate with him in it. God created humans to raise as children to become like himself. God created humans for intimate friendship–both to talk with us, as he did with Adam, and to be his friends he can trust to know and participate in anything he is doing. God created humans to reproduce among themselves the fellowship he has within his own existence. God created us to share in his being. And I’m sure there are others.
God–one yet three–how?
Hear, O Israel, YHWH our God, YHWH is one! Deuteronomy 6:4.
God is one, single in nature and character, unchangeable and eternally only good.
Yet, in this setting, “one” is itself a complicated concept. In the very next verse, God uses a plural construct noun to describe himself, then says his oneness is the reason his people must serve him with their entire, undivided persons. Recall also that, in the Creation, God’s “spirit” (or breath) moved over the face of the unformed cosmos before (logically before, at least) he said anything. Recall also that, when he created the first humans, God spoke to himself as “us,” first person plural. Throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, God repeatedly, hundreds of times, speaks of himself the same plural construct noun (‘elohim) he used in Deuteronomy 6:5. There are several other Old Testament scriptures that appear to speak of God as containing more than one entity in a unified whole. And there are a very large number of scriptures that speak of his attributes–for instance, his power, love, mercy, justice and wrath–as concepts having real content which can be understood as aspects of his being, rather than merely as names which can only be emulated but never really understood because his oneness does not admit of attributes that are separate from his being, even conceptually.
In other words, even the Hebrew Scriptures seem to present a God who is a unified whole, an eternal and indissoluble merging of disparate elements, rather than as a unity that is so radically other as to not admit of any parts or attributes other than simply himself.
Thus it is that, when the New Testament presents God as eternally composed of three persons–the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit, all bound in eternal and perfect unity, always acting together, we should not be surprised. Now, the command that I must serve God with all of my heart, soul, mind and strength, with my unified being, because God is one, makes sense. I am to serve God with my whole self in the same way God himself exists and acts. This is the same thing as being “holy”–separate, set apart–because God is holy. His whole unified being is set apart to doing his will, and I should be also.
This is difficult to grasp, but God has given us some imperfect examples of complex unities, and explicitly told us he was doing so. The fact that we have since corrupted all of these pictures of God’s unity does not lessen their force as intended pictures of God’s nature. I will list these examples here, and discuss them under separate headings later. God created humans, as composite unities, in his “image.” God created humans male and female, two separate beings yet one composite unity (“one” flesh) in marriage to each other, in his “image.” God gave humans, male and female in unity, and only in unity and not separately, the power to create more of their own kind, also bearers of God’s image. This leads naturally to families, both nuclear and extended, and kindreds, as intended, though now corrupted, pictures of the unity in diversity which characterizes God.
Beyond these physical and social pictures, the coming, death and resurrection of Jesus has brought spiritual pictures of God’s complex oneness into the world. God has come into those of us who have believed in Christ through the person of his Holy Spirit, and we are now one with him–though now, for a short time, as we see time, that unity is imperfect and is being actively perfected by him. He is also one with his Church–the body of all believers, past, present and future, as we see time–which also now appears imperfect and is being perfected by Him. The end, which we do not see yet, though God is already there, is that all who are his will join him, become perfectly one with him, in his complex unity.
Human Individuals Created in God’s “Image” and “Likeness”
God created the first humans in his “image.” Past theologians have tended to limit their discussion of this to God’s “moral” image–i.e., God gave Adam (male and female) the power to make “moral” choices, which he abused by sinning. They have then focused on the question whether that choice was truly free or was predetermined, and whether (and how) Adam’s abuse of it left us truly free to choose good or evil. And the ability to choose a course of action, whether or not it has “moral” consequences, is an important aspect of the image of God, who is always free.
But by limiting their focus to the power of “moral” choice, most have missed the point that God’s image in us, which remains in us even though corrupted, in itself exemplifies a “composite unity.”
At the simplest level, even the strictest materialists must admit that a human body is not an undifferentiated blob of tissue. I have two hands, two eyes, two feet, a heart, a liver, a brain, and various other appendages and organs, that are all perfused in some way by my blood. But my finger is not my liver. No sane surgeon would attempt to save the life of a person with a diseased heart by transplanting a foot into their patient’s chest. My body has many, highly differentiated parts, none of which are the same and very few of which can safely be interchanged with others. Yet it is one, unified body, even though removing any one of its parts will leave it either disabled or dead.
Also, even without getting into the issue of whether we have incorporeal parts, it is clear that we are made with various physical and intellectual capacities–capacities to change the objects around us, to create (though on a scale much smaller than God) by changing those objects into new forms which we find beautiful or useful, to communicate with each other, and even to create things like music and art which combine creation of new physical things, beauty and communication. Communication–speaking–and creation are the most essential aspects of God’s expression of his person. Thus, assuming God created us, he must have given us these capacities. But these capacities are not identical or interchangeable, any more than our organs are identical and interchangeable, as is graphically demonstrated by the fact that every person possesses these capacities in differing degrees and mixtures. Being a very good plumber does not necessarily imply the ability to compose a symphony. And I would not necessarily entrust to even a very good lawyer the task of re-wiring a house! Yet our diverse capacities join with our bodies in forming a unified whole.
Besides the creative and communicative capacities, there are also clearly capacities of thought, feeling and volition. Some have limited these to mind, emotions and will, though I would suggest that there are really many more non-physical capacities than these. They are all found in God, as aspects of his unified whole. And they, along with our bodies and physical capacities, are part of our unified whole–and, when one of them attempts to go its own way and act out of unity with the others, mental illness results.
Beyond this, God, who is by nature incorporeal even though he comprehends his entire Creation, has given us an incorporeal part. He breathed the breath of life, his Spirit, into us. Without God’s breath, we have no life. The traditional debate whether we have three parts–spirit, soul and body–or only two–body and soul or body and spirit–is, in fact, irrelevant. Quite clearly, God created human bodies and breathed his spirit into them, and there must be some way in which the incorporeal spirit may interact with the corporeal body, which appears to be the role usually assigned to the soul. Yet the incorporeal part is joined, and must remain joined, with the physical body in the unity called me. Otherwise, it is not me you are looking at, but only my corpse. The body without the spirit is dead.
This last observation–that death happens when the spirit leaves–shows only that the picture God has given us in the unity of our own lives is imperfect. (And its imperfection was our doing, not his). God is perfectly unified forever. We are not, unless we have hope in the resurrection of the dead. But, for the time we have here, the unity of our own persons gives us an imperfect but real picture of God’s eternal unity.
Human Freedom
God has made us able, and leaves us free, to make our own decisions, yet he remains in total control of the ultimate outcome of our choices, and retains the authority to control the details of individual events when necessary to perform his ultimate will. There is no contradiction in this, and both Jesus and the New Testament church sometimes expressed both halves of this tension in the same utterance. See, e.g., John 19:10-11; Acts 2:27-36; Acts 4:24-30; Acts 5:27-32; Acts 7.
Breath and Blood
When God breathed into the dirt model of the first man, he began to breathe. So life is in the breath God gave us, and death occurs when the breath leaves us. But life is also in the blood. The Scriptures say both of these things. There is no contradiction here. The connection between breath as the giver of life and blood as its bearer is actually quite easy to see. At the strictly physical level, the element of the air–oxygen–which sustains our lives, is carried to all of the parts of our bodies by the blood. Figuratively, likewise, the blood represents that which carries the life of God to our bodies. Blood represents the life given us by God.
Body and Blood
Without blood continuously bringing it life, my physical body is nothing but organized mud. But the same thing can be said figuratively of the things of the Spirit. Without the blood, the life Jesus gave for me, I have no life in God. And without his blood giving it life, the Church, the Body of Christ, is similarly lifeless. It is not without reason that the risen Christ warned the church in Sardis that their works gave them a reputation for being alive, when they were really dead. It is only the blood that transmits life. This is the primary meaning of the symbols of the Communion or Eucharist ritual observed since the Lord’s Supper: In his death, Jesus’ body was broken, and in his resurrection we have been brought into his Body. But we must recognize our unity as his Body, which is also the true vine (the use of wine as a symbol of his blood invokes both metaphors), and receive the blood of his life–else we are cut off and wither.
Jesus the Son
God, as an eternal complex unity, the union of three in one, includes Jesus, the Son, who is, among other things, eternally human. Here is a problem beyond our complete comprehension that depends for its solution on God’s role as the Creator of time. The Father and the Son are eternally, indivisibly one, from a state logically before time. This includes the full humanity of Jesus, which was an eternal reality before Adam was created and partially explains both how and why God created Adam in his (that is, Jesus’) “image,” as a human. Yet there was a definite day in our history, as we see time, when Jesus was begotten by God in and from the body of Mary. There is another definite day, as we see time, on which he was born, yet another on which he was crucified, and another yet–three days later–when he was declared the Son of God with power by his resurrection from the dead. Yet, as God sees time, all of these things have always, eternally been true. Revelation 13:8; Revelation 1:8, 13, 16-18; Matthew 22:31-32. They were just made visible to us at the times they occurred in the earthly life of Jesus, the visible human being. In Jesus, the Son, God has always incorporated perfect humanity.
Jesus the Word, and the Word of God
The Scriptures never say “God thought, and it was.” Nor is it said that he imagined or envisioned something and it came to be, or that he desired, planned or willed it and it came to be. No, God created by speaking his will into existence. He created all things, and still holds them together, by his Word. When God created the first humans, he started by speaking to himself to make another being in his image. In the garden, God did not give the first humans beautiful visions, he walked and talked with them every day. God spoke the flood he was about to bring when he talked with Noah about it and gave him directions that would save the few who listened to his words. God told his friend Abraham everything he was about to do, and also spoke to his descendants Isaac, Jacob and Joseph. He spoke to Moses face to face. After Moses led God’s People out of Egypt, God spoke directly to all of his People, but they begged God to keep his distance and give them rules to follow instead. So God spoke his Law to Moses. But, even after that, God continued to speak to his People through judges and then prophets, and, occasionally, through priests, kings and their enemies (and even on one occasion a donkey). He never stopped speaking. He was always seeking those who would come to him and listen to him, not demanding that he keep his distance. Communication is one of the most fundamental aspects of God’s person–as it is also of ours.
But in these last days God has spoken to us in his Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom He also made the world. Hebrews 1:2. But Jesus is himself the Word of God, through whom all things came into being, and in whom is the life and light of mankind. John 1:1-4. Jesus, the eternal Word, is that communicative (as well as creative) aspect of God’s person. Jesus now promises, as we believe in him, to come to us, make his home within us, transform us to conform to his image, and to guide us into all truth through his Spirit within us. And he has given us his Holy Spirit to live within us, to accomplish all of these things.
This manner of speaking to us is not entirely new in one sense–conversing directly with us, with no distance and no obstacles in between, is exactly what God always desired. What is new is that God now speaks to us who believe from within us. No longer are we limited to what other people say or have written about God and what he wants us to do. We now have Jesus, the eternal Word of God, living, acting and speaking within us.
What About the Bible?
The Bible contains the words of God. The words of the Bible, or, more accurately, the ideas of the Bible, its statements read in their proper contexts and for their intended purposes, are god-breathed, true, reliable, sufficient to lead us to salvation, and beneficial for teaching, for rebuke, for correction, for training in righteousness, so that the one who follows God may be fully capable, equipped for every good work. 2 Timothy 3:15-16. Properly understood–and it can only be properly understood through the work of the Holy Spirit within us opening its meaning to us–it contains the most complete statement of God’s work, words and will for us. It is often said that the bulk of the will of God is found in the Bible. This is certainly true, in at least three senses. First, the important things God wants all believers to understand at all times are all found in the Bible. Second, while God may tell us things for the guidance of our lives that are not written in the literal words of the Bible, these things will arise from a life guided by the things he has already told us. And, last, God will never tell us to do anything contrary to the meaning or spirit of his written words, as we understand them. He is always consistent with himself.
On the other hand, the Bible is not, in itself, the eternal “Word of God.” The Word of God is Jesus himself. The Bible reflects Jesus, but is not Jesus. It does not replace him. The Bible gives us the words spoken to people of the past by the Holy Spirit for our guidance today, but it is not the Holy Spirit. It does not replace him. As followers of Christ, our friendship is with God, through Jesus, and is mediated by the indwelling Holy Spirit. We have a personal relationship with God, not with the Bible.
The Bible is a story that invites us to ask questions and converse with God about them. It was not written to answer abstract philosophical questions, so that we can know about God without knowing him, or so that we can predict the “rules” under which he operates so permitting us to manipulate him. It is also not a book of clear rules about how to please God without ever hearing from him directly. God’s most important “rule” for interpretation of his written words is this: in practical matters is “ask and you will receive.” Jesus promises us his presence, leading, and voice. He promises his Spirit within us leading us into all truth. He makes no promise to answer abstract philosophical questions. But he does say he will show us how he is, what he is like, the image we are to let him develop.
In another sense, the Bible is just a book–a very authoritative book spoken by God, but just a book. A Bible sitting on the shelf gathering dust has no magical powers. A Bible used as a prop to administer an oath to a person who has never read it and pays no attention to it adds nothing to the effect of the oath. And the words God has spoken to future events, as recorded in Biblical prophecies, have power just because God spoke them, not because they are recorded in a book. The Bible, as the recorded words of God, in fact, has power in only two situations. Those who do not believe will in the end be judged by what they knew of God–including Scripture God brought to their attention–but ignored. And, for us who believe, it is only as the Holy Spirit makes the Bible a part of our lives that it has power.
Why Jesus came to Earth in a human body
In his little-read and very difficult to find book on the Apocalypse, Jacques Ellul interprets Revelation 11:19-12:12 as showing that the Incarnation–God coming to Earth in a human body–is the central event in all human history. I agree with him.
To understand why Jesus came to Earth in a human body, it is first necessary to remember that what it means to be fully human has been found in God–in Jesus, the Son–from the beginning. This is the “image” God placed in the first two humans, and which they have transmitted–though in a corrupted form–to all of their progeny.
The simplest summary of Jesus’ reason for coming to earth as a visible, and visibly “normal,” human is this: Jesus came to show us what a truly “normal” human is–a human who lives in friendship with God and in reliance on his Holy Spirit–and to enable us to become what he is. In this, he came to fully restore God’s image in those who would follow him. This purpose has many aspects, most of which will be further discussed below. Jesus gave up, for a time, the powers he had that were unique to God, to give us an example of life in reliance on the Holy Spirit that we can follow. He was born as a normal baby, grew up, learned obedience and grew in wisdom, and continued growing and learning obedience through his sufferings throughout his life on earth (though he never disobeyed his Father) to show us that growth and suffering are both parts of life in Him. He died for us to free us from our sin in this life, to reconcile us to God, and to taste death for us so that it would no longer rule over us. He rose from the dead in a glorified but physical human body to give us our hope and power in this life, and the promise of a similar resurrection after this life is over, “that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them and rose again.” 2 Corinthians 5:15. And he sent us the same Holy Spirit by whom he lived among us to make it possible for us to do this.
But all of this required that he first come among us, as one of us.
More on Male and Female in God’s Image
.The first thing we are told about God creating humans is that he spoke to himself about creating a new type of being “in Our image, according to Our likeness.” The second thing is that this new kind of being, in the plural image and likeness of God, was to have dominion over the other living things in God’s Creation. Then the third thing we are told is that God “created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” Genesis 1:26-28. So it is obvious that being “male and female” is a part of the image of God in humanity. Neither male nor female alone is his complete image.
This observation, along with Genesis 2:24, is commonly employed to show the unity God desired to see in marriage. Jesus himself applied it in this way (Matthew 19:4-6), as did Paul (Ephesians 5:31). But this is not its only implication. Male and female are complementary parts of God’s image not only in marriage, but also in every setting in which God designs to show us his image through humans. At the level of his image in me, individually, that same knowledge Adam had that he was not complete by himself shows me a part of God’s image. At the level of the nuclear family, if operating correctly under God’s control (which it never is, precisely, in this corrupted world), the union of the parents and the harmony of siblings though different–and their concern for each other even when sin brings in hurt–shows a part of God’s image, a kind of unity in diversity. Very similar things can be said about extended families, kindreds, and, in a spiritual sense, the Church, as explained below. Everything human involves both male and female, and only works properly if the two, though different, are working together.
Marriage, Family, Families and Kindreds
Modern Christian teaching often, and rightly, speaks in support of families. Families are the fundamental, and natural, units of social organization–more fundamental than churches, corporate institutions, the various economic units, governments and nations. God often speaks of, and to, families.
However, this modern teaching often has a very incomplete focus when dealing with families: we focus almost entirely on the “normal” or “average” nuclear family–one husband, one wife, lawfully married to each other, and their 1.12 children–as an isolated unit against the world, to the complete neglect of all other non-institutional units of which they are a part. This emphasis is in keeping with modern economic expectations, which isolate people to the maximum degree feasible to keep them easily usable and manipulable as fungible resources. The necessity and even the rightness of these institutional expectations of maximal isolation and fungibility are also often tacitly assumed in the administration of the Church as a human institution. It often seems as if the Church believes God commanded “normal” nuclear families to operate in isolation, connected only by other formal institutions that may freely change the arrangements to suit their own current expediency. Many commentators note this emphasis neglects, and thus tends to deny legitimacy to, various other types of voluntary or involuntary nuclear-family-like units, such as extended singleness, single parent families, blended families, other groupings of adults and their children functioning as “nuclear” families, and small extended family clusters. They also note this neglect limits the effectiveness of churches, as institutions, in ministering to the people in these units.
But this almost total focus on “normal,” “legitimate” nuclear families also neglects the larger familial and kindred units to which the Scriptures speak. The Scriptures, for instance, fairly frequently speak of the influence of extended families. Examples of this are Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and the Patriarchs, and, in the New Testament, Timothy and his mother and grandmother, and extended households which also became the nuclei of churches. The Scriptures also speak of kindreds, genetically-related units larger than “extended families” (as commonly understood), and sometimes coterminous with ethnic groups or nations, as units with which God is concerned.
One early example of this is the division of the peoples at the tower of Babel: God did not divide the people into random groups speaking different languages, and neither did he divide them into single “nuclear” families each with its own language. No, he divided the peoples into groups that were of economically and socially viable sizes, the roots of the ancient ethnic groups, according to pre-existing kinship groups, each with its own language. (See, Genesis 10; Acts 17:26). The children of Israel, as they grew beyond being a single extended family, took the form of a set of related kinship groups (the “tribes”), which God recognized in settling them in the land and still recognizes in their diaspora. The Prophets of the Old Testament frequently spoke to ethnic kindreds among the gentiles, predicting that some would disappear while a few would be preserved by God for his own purposes despite defeat and dispersal, similar to what happened to Israel. Jesus sent us, his followers, to make disciples from among all of the world’s ethnic groups (ethnē), Matthew 28:19. At Pentecost, the Holy Spirit caused the hundred and twenty Galilean believers gathered in the upper room to speak in other languages, which were understood by the crowd of Diaspora Jews who gathered as being the ethnic languages of the areas in which they were raised. And the vision of the Revelation is of a people God has purchased “from every tribe, language, people and nation (ethnos),” Revelation 5:9, each group being still recognizable as an example of God’s own unity in diversity . The systematic devaluation of these larger units is likely one of the causes of the growing “rootlessness” of people in our modern world.
These larger kinship units are natural, unlike our modern transient economic and geographical divisions of humankind, and God cares for them. They provide natural channels, established by God as a part of the way he created us, for the demonstration of God’s love. We limit ourselves and our witness to the world when we neglect them.
I should also here emphasize that, in suggesting that larger kinship units remain important, I am not in any way suggesting a return to racism, which I reject.
God Wants to Speak With Us–and Live in Us
The heart of the matter is this: God wants to walk and talk with us individually–as he did with Adam (male and female) in the Garden–and to live through us–as he did through the man Jesus. He is working out both all history and the lives of those who believe and follow him to make this possible. Our historic statements of faith often state that God’s purpose is that we should “glorify” him, leaving that term undefined so that other things we must do and requirements we must keep apart from his immediate direction may be said to “glorify” him. However, the only thing that truly serves God’s “glory” in us is that God himself shows through our lives. What glorifies God is our loving oneness with him.
God’s Will and Other Wills
God’s will will ultimately be done. He sees it as already completed, though we do not. But, in the meantime, as we see time, he allows certain of his creatures–including all humans, made in his own image (which includes freedom)–to have and exercise their own wills. Without this, we would not be able to grow into beings which share his freedom, yet voluntarily yield to his will because we fully trust him and recognize his will is always best, as Jesus does. God’s purpose in giving us freedom is not so much that we should learn to “obey” him (as is commonly taught) as that we should learn from him to be like him, so that we will not only do what he would do in any situation but will understand why, the real meaning of what we are doing. When we have learned this innate understanding of the God who lives within us, he will be able to trust us to fully join him in his being and work.
Sin and Rebellion
There is nothing difficult about the definition of “sin.” Sin is our inward attitude of rebellion against God. We have decided to stop trusting him to know what is right for us, and, in our pride, set ourselves in his place. This attitude becomes a settled way of life, routinely ignoring God, denying his existence or building our own pliable idols to replace him, so that we can go our own way and do our own thing. Thus, it is turning away from the light into the darkness, away from the source of life into death, to have our own way. Its consequences for us personally are walking in darkness, stumbling and injuring ourselves because we cannot see the way in front of us, and experiencing death. But it also shows in our behavior toward others as various degrees of self-centered violations of love, ranging from verbal cruelty to violent murders. And it shows among us collectively as all of the evils we do to each other, individually and collectively. Expressed in all of these ways, its end result is death. But its result is death, not as the judgment of a vindictive God, but because all life is in God, so as long as we turn our backs on him, we must die. The branch cut off from the vine withers.
Angels and Sinning Angels
The Bible really says surprisingly little about angels and even less about the angels that sinned. What little we know is that angels are created, incorporeal spirit beings that sometimes deliver God’s messages. Indeed, the words usually translated “angel,” in both Hebrew and Greek, have “messenger” as their primary meaning. We are also told that the angels were created to serve us humans who “will inherit salvation”–doing things God has sent them to do for our benefit, usually, likely, without us knowing they are there. In the Scriptures, angels only rarely appear visibly, and even more rarely speak to people. God wants to converse with us directly; he wants us to hear and recognize his voice; it is only when human fear of him or resistance to him stands in the way, or in apocalyptic visions, that he has sent angels to speak to people.
Yet we are also told, “do not neglect hospitality to strangers, for by this some have entertained angels without knowing it.” Hebrews 13:2. Angels may visibly minister to us, and us to them, when we are not aware of it!
As for the fallen angels, all we really know is that, at some point, they followed a leader that, in pride, made himself the message, believing he could rival God. We also know that this enemy leader had a role in tempting the first humans to follow his lead, abandoning trust in God for an attempt to become “like” God in his independence (when they were already in God’s image!). We also know that this enemy leader and the angels and people that follow him therefore oppose us, and that this leader is largely in control of the visible “world system” in which we live. However, this enemy and those that follow him are really not in control, even at the present time, and are ultimately doomed to destruction.
We also know that what motivates each of the demons arrayed against us is rebellion. They do not recognize authority, except as it serves their individual purposes. They do not even fully recognize the authority of their leader. They are a kingdom divided against itself, which cannot stand. This is their doom. Mark 3:23-26.
Two Kingdoms
As the last section suggests, there are two competing spiritual kingdoms in the present world.
The devil’s kingdom is visible. It depends entirely on what we, individually and collectively, can “see,” can perceive and fancy that we understand without listening to God speak. At all of its levels, the devil’s kingdom is based on fear, visible shows of power, arbitrary assertions of authority, used to maintain an appearance of control against others. As such, it is characterized by meaningless acts of destruction–both at the hands of nature (which are wrongly termed “acts of God”) and at each other’s hands. In the devil’s kingdom, the way of progress is self-aggrandization; what we have we get by taking it from others. Honor and reward depend on wealth and power. Everyone is subject to the fear of death, and it is used systematically to maintain control. The way “up,” as we see it with our inverted values, is up. The whole visible wealth, authority and power dynamic of world social and political systems is a product of the devil’s kingdom–yet God mysteriously subverts it, using it to ultimately work his will. (Yes, I am calling God a subversive, in our upside-down world).
God’s kingdom is, for the present, mostly invisible. The enemy’s kingdom is a reversed image of God’s Kingdom. In God’s kingdom, the way up is down. The one who would be great must become a great servant. Wealth and power are meaningless. The Kingdom of God is within and among us, hidden, acting on and through us, not out in the world and acting directly on it. Entering the Kingdom requires acknowledgment of weakness and dependence. The true King came as a peasant in an occupied country, spent his life serving, not demanding power, and died by crucifixion as a criminal falsely accused of opposing the reigning human Emperor. Death was defeated by death; death died. He then broke the power of death over those in his Kingdom by rising from the dead. The only true ultimate authority is God’s. The only power we have is God’s.
Even now, God’s kingdom is victorious, even though we do not see it. The enemy’s divided kingdom has an end. God’s Kingdom is forever.
The Beginning of Human Sin
Human sin began when Adam (male and female), faced with cunning temptation by the enemy, decided that they, like the enemy, could rise to equal God. God had given them permission to do anything within their physical power except eat the fruit of one tree. That tree had, or acquired, the name the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil.” The enemy convinced them that God was being stingy, and did not know what was best for them. He had the assistance of their senses, emotions and intellect telling them that the fruit looked good (temptations always do), that it looked like good food (in itself, it was), and that it was desirable to make them “wise.” But “wise” to what? They already knew all good–they walked and talked with him every day. The fruit could not give them knowledge of the good; it could only give them the knowledge of evil, which is something God does not “know.” It was not anything chemical in the fruit, or any spirit mysteriously attached to it, that gave Adam the knowledge of evil. It was only their decision to oppose God by eating it which gave them the knowledge of evil. Evil has been a part of our experience ever since.
The nature of sin and the sin nature.
God’s focus is on his fatherhood and friendship with us, sharing his life with us, the purpose for which he created us. Sin is rebellion against God, the decision that I want my own way, which looks good to me, more than I want the friendship for which I was created. Sin is not the breaking of laws, like the command not to eat from that one tree, it is only demonstrated by the breaking of laws. The sin nature, the continuing dynamic of sin in my personality, is an attitude of the heart and a determined way of life–essentially disbelief of God and rebellion against him.
Who Became Whose Enemy?
“Once you were alienated from God and and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.” Colossians 1:22 (NIV). This does not say God was alienated from us–by a partition erected on his side of the relationship–and he became our enemy because of our evil deeds. No, it says we alienated ourselves from God to keep our evil deeds, and we became his enemies. The partition, and the hostility, are entirely on our side of the relationship. And the context in Colossians makes it clear not once but twice that, through Christ, God reconciled us to himself, not himself to us. God was never our enemy. He has done everything that can be done to bring us back from our state of hostility and restore his life to us.
Guilt, Shame, Hiding from God, and Grace
When Adam (male and female) chose sin, he became Adam and Eve, now suddenly two separate beings (who were intended to be one) hiding from God and each other. The immediate effect of knowing “evil,” this wonderful thing our stingy God had kept from us, was only to make Adam and Eve fearful, guilty, ashamed and painfully alone. Their nakedness, which had not previously been a problem, suddenly became an intolerable burden, as they drew the incorrect inference that the reason they felt fear and shame was located in their physical bodies–a mistake everyone since has also made. They were particularly concerned that the parts of their bodies that could be used to honor the one command of God they could still honor–the command to be fruitful and multiply–were now shameful and would earn them God’s wrath if he saw them. So they sewed loincloths out of fig leaves to cover what they thought was the source of their shame and fear, and hid from God in the bushes when he came looking for them.
Of course, God is everywhere and sees everything, so their attempt to hide from him was unsuccessful. He found them, and offered each of them, individually, the opportunity to agree with him about the thing they had done and the rebellion that was now in their heart, with the implicit promise that he would forgive and cleanse them of their rebellion (as he always does for those who trust him enough to confess the evil that is within them). But, instead, they made excuses. Adam blamed Eve and God–this woman you gave me gave me the fruit and I ate. Eve blamed the snake–the snake deceived me, and I ate. Both of them acknowledged the deed, the bad performance, but neither acknowledged that anything bad inside them had caused the bad performance.
God then told them what the consequences of the unrepented evil inside them would be. However, none of God’s declarations on this occasion were the judgments of a vindictive God. Adam and Eve had both made their own judgments, when they separated themselves from the Source of life and from each other. Hard and futile work, pain throughout the process of creating children, strife between the now very separate sexes vying for domination, and, ultimately, physical death, were all natural consequences of the sin Adam and Eve had unleashed within themselves and their descendants.
In all of this, God made provision for their new defiled and dying, spiritually dead condition. First, he promised Eve the “seed” that would “bruise the serpent’s head,” a prophecy of Christ. Then, because they wrongly believed the problem that separated them from him was their bodies, God gave them coats of skins to cover those bodies. As many have said, this showed them that their own efforts–the fig leaves that wither–were inadequate, and that God had to make provision for them instead. It also showed them, as many have also written, that life (that of the animal whose skin was taken) had to be given to cover their spiritual death, again giving a picture of what Christ would do. But, most importantly, the coats of skins were an invitation to come back to God–God declaring, in effect, if you think the condition of your bodies is what lies between us, I will cover it for you!
Then he drove the first couple out of the Garden, to make their hard living on earth, lest they should “eat from the tree of life” that was in the Garden and physically live forever in spiritual death. But there was always the promise, found in the promise to Eve and symbolized by the coats of skins, that God had already prepared a way for them to return to him as friends. This is grace.
God never gave up on them, or us.
The Systematic Attack on the Pictures God has Given Us of Himself
In order to keep us from recognizing the true God and his desire to live with and within us, the enemy has always done all he can to attack the pictures God has given us of himself. These attacks started with his implicit lie to Adam (male and female) that they were not already fully in God’s image–that he had withheld a part of that image (“knowing good and evil“) from them, something he also tells us all the time in a myriad of ways. When that lie was believed and acted upon, it corrupted (but did not totally destroy) God’s image in their bodies. It also clouded God’s image in the unity of their individual persons, as now they had fears, desires and lusts fighting within them for control against what they still knew of God, and bodies that often opposed or were simply physically incapable of carrying out their desires to do good. It separated the unity between them as one flesh (male and female) that was a picture of God in a way that requires God’s continuing grace and our willingness to repair it under his direction to this day. It introduced selfishness, anger, envy, jealousy and strife into the families and kindreds that would follow. And it introduced death and destructive decay into all of nature.
At least as serious as these facial attacks are the enemy’s sometimes subtle but often compulsory defective substitutes for the pictures God has given us of himself. Parens patriae is a very poor and self-centered parent. “Caring” institutions and agencies, though they do much good, are also poor substitutes for families, extended families and kindreds–and also poor substitutes for local churches and the Body of Christ–in that their first concerns must be their formal “mission,” their rules and their economic survival, in that they corporately are not human, and in that their workers must maintain significant emotional distance from their clients. (See, “Christ the Lord is Not Institutional Food,” written by my friend Jonathan Brickman, for a discussion of this). The household of a slave-master, or the “company family” of an employer, have very little care for anything but their own profits and are no substitute for a family, extended family, kindred or church.
On the other hand, churches are also poor substitutes for families. God established them for different purposes.
Finally, likely the most serious attack on God’s image in us is one that is the most subtle of all, and has been going on as long as sinful societies have existed: the attack on the idea that each human is a valuable individual, a distinct and diverse bearer of God’s image, and, thus potentially a part of God’s unity in diversity. In its simplest form, which modern Western society is ever more approximating, there are only three kinds of people: 1) the very rich, the great leaders, and those who by birth or selection are destined for high leadership (a group that is historically an exception to the rules in every culture); 2) completely fungible “average” people, widgets working within machines, “human resources” that individually may be shaped by group #1 into whatever that group needs them to be; and 3) “defective,” “disabled” resources that are for any reason unable to become fungible “average” people who can be conveniently molded into whatever kind of widget is needed at present.
Other cultures in the present world and past Western culture have, of course, added some rigidly fixed sub-categories within the fungible “average” category which modern Western culture is actively attempting to abandon without giving up the economic supposition that the vast mass of people belong, at least, to some fungible class of resources. For instance, cultures have generally assigned women a different, and inferior, role to that of men. Still, except for the high-born, in most of the cultures that have existed, all women were treated as essentially interchangeable with all other women, just as all men were interchangeable with all other men–women were simply not treated as ever interchangeable with men. And where there are conquered and subjugated nations or ethnicities, or where slavery is practiced, the subjugated and slaves are usually treated in separate classes inferior to the conquerors or masters, but wholly fungible within their own classes. But these practices are merely subversions of differences–not intended at Creation to create rigid or oppressive divisions–into man “male and female” and into kindreds, put into the service of the lie that humans are fungible and by nature given to serve the whims of their leaders, when we are, in fact, created for individual loving oneness with God.
All of these attacks on the pictures God has given us to lead us to himself continue to the present day. They are spiritually caused and powered, by our enemy and by people who presently choose to follow him (but whom God still loves). They cannot be solved by human effort, individually, collectively or politically. All violence only perpetuates them, even when its proponents say it is meant to overcome or eradicate them. The only answer to them is in God, acting in love through people who believe him.
Sin, sins, and our false focus on sins and on performance.
There is a distinction between “sin,” the singular concept, and “sins,” as plural particulars.
“Sin” is our inward attitude of rebellion against God.
“Sins” are bad actions. These actions result from the attitude of rebellion, sin in the singular, but the singular “sin” is much more than, and of a different kind than, the sum of all of our “sins.”
In dealing with us, God has always emphasized “sin,” the singular concept. Jesus came to take away our “sin,” so that we might live with God as his children and friends, in unity with him, no longer expressing inward rebellion against him. Jesus also came to restore God’s life to us, by giving his own life for those who would believe. This was our greatest need–we being dead, he gave us his life.
By contrast, in dealing with God (and with each other), we humans–from Adam and Eve to the present–have always emphasized our “sins.” We don’t want to deal with our inward rebellion–we want to keep our independence!–so we say God is hiding his face from us because of our sins. But the truth is that, just like Adam and Eve, we are hiding from God because of our sins. God is actively seeking us. The good news is that Jesus dealt with our sins, too. He died so that our sins might be forgiven, declared God’s dreaded penalty to be extinguished, so that we can return to God without dread.
But we have always emphasized our “sins,” and, on the flip side, our performance–the things we can do, say or give to earn God’s favor and even, possibly, obtain His help in our projects, all the while maintaining our rebellious independence of him. We also imagine that God is most interested in performance, on achievement and productivity now, because this is our emphasis in our own lives. This insistence is natural for us–future promises, the things you do not give me right now, today, I may never see. Circumstances may change; I may die before you keep your promise! And we imagine this is also the way God sees things. But, unlike us, God literally has all eternity to work out his will. So we naturally think what is demanded of us is perfect performance so that a distant and silent Deity may be pleased and bless our plans. This is the way of all human religion, but it is not what he wants.
God wants me, not my performance. God wants me, not my offerings.
Merit
We earn nothing from God by our own merit. This is an unavoidable consequence of God’s creation of everything, above time. If he made it and has given it to me, I did not earn it. This is true even of physical objects and temporal moral “goods” God has permitted me to participate with him in creating. It was his to give, he gave, and I did not earn it. Even Jesus, when he came as a human, earned nothing by his human merit.
Humans are bound by limited time, limited resources, limited knowledge of each others’ motives and of the future, and, ultimately, by death. Within these limitations, we are collectively forced to apportion nearly everything by some form of real or fictitious merit. That is, in human economy and society, one must nearly always “earn” in some way whatever one gets. This does not mean that human rewards are always, or even usually, given according to one’s own personal hard work or socially meritorious actions. Those most willing to kill and oppress others are often the ones who are the best rewarded. The hardest working people are often the poorest–because of social mechanisms that divert the fruits of their labors, and the social credit for them, to the “elite,” their social “betters,” leaving the ones who do the work to be regarded as “degraded” human “trash” who “deserve” their poverty in perpetuity. Violent seizure, when fully executed and recognized by others in power, has always been treated as an honorable means–and often as the most honorable means–of “earning” the things or people seized. It has ever been so–since the days of King Nimrod the mighty hunter and the tower of Babel, at least, if not before that.
But even the common use of the language of merit to justify the usually unjust distribution of rewards among humans assumes the application of a form of merit–class or group merit, represented by the possession of wealth, social status or power, which is seen as overriding individual merit. The elite “deserve” the power they have over others, either because they personally “earned” or seized it, or because someone in the past “earned” or seized it for them and they inherited it.
Indeed, among human societies, the idea of merit is so deeply ingrained that being given something freely by any but our closest companions, without either earning or stealing it, is viewed with suspicion and usually seen as an insult. The giver of the gift is “patronizing” us, thus putting us in a subordinate position. The giver is presuming to act like God!
We almost instinctively feel the same insult when told that God has given us himself, freely, even though we haven’t earned and don’t merit his life. He is putting us in a subordinate place, patronizing us! We are insulted. How dare he! He is acting like God toward us!
Exactly!
What About Morality?
The Bible adopts neither a legalistic moral code nor any version of Stoic value ethics. It adopts the life of love, lived under God’s personal direction, which is a much more demanding standard!
What About Justice?
Despite all I have previously written, we are nevertheless to give honor where honor is due, and respect where respect is due, according to the world’s rules. Romans 13:1-7. This does not imply that we must always fight to the death to preserve the current order of things against anything that might change it, as Christians have often thought to be their mission, only that we must show proper respect.
Indeed, to the extent God has ordained a part of the current order to continue–and there is much in it which comes from human sin and is not ultimately his will– it does not need our efforts, in our own wisdom and strength, to preserve it. It will continue. But to the extent God has determined that parts of the present order must change, they will change. We cannot preserve them, but will ultimately only be seen to have been fighting against God. (Compare, Acts 5:38-39).
God’s justice is perfect, but it also rests with him above time. It will come, when he is ready, but will likely not be at the time or in the form we want or expect. Habakkuk 1. God gave us our justice by coming to die for us–then asking us to die to ourselves to live in him. He will give the world justice, at the right time. Revelation 14:7.
God has generally not immediately challenged the fact of human ownership of the world and its people in this life, or even the resulting injustices, but he has always challenged its ultimate relevance: “Now it happened that the poor man died and was carried away by the angels to Abraham’s arms; and the rich man also died and was buried. And in Hell he raised his eyes, being in torment, and saw Abraham far away and Lazarus in his arms….”
Episodes of Humans Pulling Away from God, and God’s Responses, Before the Law
Between Adam and Noah, God kept trying to talk to humans, when they would respond. This is demonstrated by Abel and Cain, both of whom heard from God, but only one of whom responded favorably (and was murdered for it). Cain and Lamech, as murderers, both had conversations with God and were given promises of mercy. Enoch walked so closely with God that God simply took him from the earth, apparently without dying. And Noah heard God and had faith to build a boat to save humanity from a coming flood, at a time when no one had ever seen rain.
After the flood, the bulk of humanity quickly abandoned God in favor of idols they believed would permit them to do the things they wanted. But God always kept working with a few who would listen to him. He preserved enough knowledge of himself that, when he called Abram, later renamed Abraham, Abram knew who was speaking and obeyed. From then on, God spoke mostly to and through Abraham and his descendants–although the exclusiveness of this contact can be overemphasized (God also spoke to various people surrounding Abraham and his family who were not members of that family).
Moses, the Law, and the Purposes of the Mosaic Law
Through his chosen people, the children of Jacob (Israel), God gave us a demonstration that simply keeping rules while keeping our lives to ourselves and keeping our distance from him, will never lead to true life. This was true even though the rules were perfect rules God personally spoke along with a promise that any who kept them perfectly would earn life.
The story of the giving of the Law shows this is exactly what the people wanted. God poke to all of the people out of the cloud at Mount Sinai, and to the people’s elders after that, offering to personally lead them to the Promised Land, the place of their rest, to carry them on eagle’s wings. But they were so frightened by the immediate, visible presence of God and the prospect that he might personally lead them (thus infringing on their liberty, or killing them, or so they feared) that they asked God not to speak to them any more, but to Moses only, and to give them laws to keep. “Speak to us yourself and we will listen; but do not have God speak to us, or we will die!” Exodus 20:19. “All the words which the Lord has spoken we will do!” Exodus 24:3. Even God’s chosen people, for the most part, wanted to avoid a direct relationship with God in favor of making a performance that would please him.
But the only human who ever kept God’s Law perfectly was Jesus, the Son of God, who pointedly did not keep any part of his life to himself or keep his distance from his Father, but lived his whole earthly life out of his unity with his Father.
This does not imply that the Law, as given through Moses, is now useless and can safely be ignored. For those outside of Christ, it remains a teacher–given to teach us that it is impossible to “please” God at a distance, by following rules and doing good, and so earn life. It is useful to believers because God does not change–the things God has said are good or evil remain so, because they are a part of his unchanging character, and his guidance for us will conform to them. He will never tell us to commit adultery or to rob a bank; on the other hand, when we are moved with compassion toward those around us in need, we know this is in keeping with God’s character and comes from him. And, at the level of symbolism, nearly all things under the Law were purified by application of blood, and there was no remission without blood. Hebrews 9:18, 22. The life is in the blood. Even to cover the guilt of those living under the Law temporarily and temporally, so that they could come before God without fear, the life of an animal had to be given. For us to come permanently into God’s presence and live in him, God’s life must be applied. “This cup is the new covenant in my blood.” 1 Corinthians 11:25. “The one who eats My flesh and drinks My blood remains in Me, and I in him.” John 6:56.
Being “Holy,” Life Stresses and Mixed Motives
The command “be holy, for I am holy” is repeated in both Testaments. Leviticus 11:45; 1 Peter 1:16. Though it is not everyday, modern English, and has a lot of complicated tradition built up around it, “holy” is actually a simple word. Something that is “holy” is set apart for a purpose. God is “holy” because he pursues only a single purpose–the accomplishment of his good will. He is not distracted by other interests or purposes. He is only himself, with no mixture of anything that detracts.
Although many of the causes of impurity or uncleanness set forth in the Pentateuch are also “sins” (plural sense), most are not, and the state of impurity itself is not sin and is not a sin. Rather, the Law’s pervasive reminder that a state of impurity more often arises from innocent sources in everyday life than from personal sins was intended to serve as a continual reminder of individual dependence on God. Impurity, whether voluntary or involuntary, requires purification and, at some point, sacrifice, both of which are reminders of our need for God’s life and grace.
In this respect, God’s holiness –his total, unmixed devotion to his own good will, to the essence of his own being–is the main point made by Moses’ laws about individual ritual purity. For example, the meat of most animals is safely edible, if properly prepared. Yet for God’s chosen people, trying to find life under the Law, only a short list of animals were “clean.” All of the others, including some very delicious ones, were “unclean,” and so forbidden to those who would come into his presence without an offering to cover their guilt. So also, outside the realm of symbols, there are things that look good to us, but that really are not good–to have them, we would have to divert ourselves from doing only his will.
Under the Law, “leprosy” was unclean and resulted in the exclusion of the unclean person. As defined in the Law, “leprosy” included both Hansen’s Disease–classical “leprosy”–and a whole class of other conditions. Hansen’s Disease is serious, was usually slowly fatal before antibiotics were developed, and is a good picture of the effect of sin in a life. Classical leprosy destroys patches of peripheral sensory nerves, making the leper unaware of injuries and infections in the deadened body areas, which, in turn, allows other infections to set in and eat those parts of the body away. It corresponds to being “hardened” by the “deceitfulness” of “sin,” Hebrews 3:13, becoming unaware of the working of rebellion within us and insensitive to God and to the Body of Christ. But most of the other conditions classified as “leprosy” under the Law are not serious but simply cosmetically resemble leprosy in some way. That the “leprosy” which makes one ritually unclean is so broad as to include any cosmetic similarity to classical leprosy serves as a warning against mixing our devotion to God with other purposes that, while not bad in themselves, make us appear insensitive to God. The appearance may be hiding an equally unclean reality. The only remedy is to return to God’s life–symbolically, the sacrificial application of blood.
Corpses, and even being in the near presence of death, are unclean under the Law. On the one hand, were it not for the Resurrection, Jesus’ crucifixion of death by passing through it and then being raised to life, death would be the ultimate denial of life. But the fear of death is also that by which the enemy holds us in captivity all our lives. Hebrews 2:15. Thus, the enemy, the world and all of its institutions (unfortunately often including the church as an institution), most other people in our individual worlds, and our own desires all concur in demanding the same thing: We must mix the things of God with the things other people and our own desires want us to do, lest we die without finishing them. This is the source of urgency in our lives, the opposite of God’s rest. But, while the presence of death, and the fear and grief it generates, have been unavoidable since the first human sinned, they also divide our attention. Our motives become mixed, and this mixture and confusion increase the more we listen and respond to the pressures of the world around us. The only remedy is the renewal of God’s life in us–again, symbolically, the sacrificial application of blood.
Eating blood, or any use of animal blood other than prescribed ritual uses or pouring it out on the ground, were forbidden and resulted in uncleanness. The reason stated for this is that the life is in the blood, the life was given by God and belongs to him, therefore the blood must be given back to God and not used for our own purposes. In this sense, the proper treatment of the blood of animals we eat is a symbol of our treatment of life–our own and that of others. I should not be consuming the life of a person–myself or anyone else–to serve my own pleasure. My life, and theirs, belong to God. If my motives are mixed, resulting in consuming any person’s life to serve myself, this is unclean.
Under the law, a number of unavoidable or even necessary physical conditions also resulted in “uncleanness.” Various physical deformities were labeled also “unclean.” So were natural functions in which all humanity shares, mostly related in some way to reproduction–menstruation, seminal emissions, childbirth. The point of all of these regulations appears to be that anything about our situation that detracts from our own, or others’, ability to focus solely on God, is a source of uncleanness. This is true even though it is completely unavoidable, not something we chose to do or to be, and thus, neither a “sin” (plural sense) nor a direct result of our own personal rebellion or “sin” (singular sense). The only remedy is the application of God’s grace, which is the outpouring of his life to us and those around us, enabling us to overcome the distraction of “uncleanness” in ourselves and others.
Similarly, bread made from mixed wheat and barley flour is perfectly edible, and clothing made of mixed fibers is functional and durable. Yet they were both forbidden as “unclean” to those living under the Law. Once again, the picture employed is one of mixture–mixing our own efforts outside of God’s will with faith or reliance on God in order to meet our real personal needs–heeding the tempter’s suggestion to tell the rocks to become bread, when we know this is not how God plans to provide. Once again, the occasion for this form of uncleanness is our unavoidable physical condition–but, in this case, our impure (mixed) reaction to it is avoidable. But, as was true of all of the other forms of individual “uncleanness,” the remedy is the application of God’s life and grace–symbolically, sacrificial blood.
Cycles of Abandonment of God and Repentance in the Life of Ancient Israel
The history of the Hebrews between Moses and King Saul consisted of a series of cycles between devotion to God, then the encroachment of mixed motives, then near-complete apostacy leading to divine abandonment to their enemies, followed by the people calling upon God for deliverance. When the people cried out for deliverance, God would send a “judge” to lead the people in repentance and renewal (which was never complete) and provide deliverance from their current enemies, a restoration of God’s protection, and new prosperity, leading again to the encroachment of mixed motives and the repetition of the cycle. This happened repeatedly for centuries, before the people got it in their minds, incorrectly, that what they needed was a human king to lead them, instead of the “judges” God had been sending (and certainly instead of letting God lead them himself, personally).
Establishment of a Human Kingdom in Israel and Division into Two Kingdoms
When the people demanded God give them an earthly king, like all the other nations around them, he obliged them. King Saul was of the tribe of Benjamin, of perfectly pure ancestry (as far as we know), a “Hebrew of the Hebrews,” rather like the Saul from Tarsus a thousand years later who was a great persecutor of the Church. He was tall, young, valiant and popular–the people’s choice. He was also the people’s mistake. As king, he developed a pattern of which he never repented–doing the things God sent him to do his way, doing them the way he thought they should be done, for God and for himself. In other words, he exemplified mixed motives. But Saul’s personal response to God only mirrored that of the people, exactly as the Prophet Samuel, the last judge, said it would.
After God rejected Saul as king, he chose David instead. By a strict reading of the Law, David was not even a clean Israelite permitted in God’s Tabernacle–he was the grandson of a Moabitess and the great-grandson of a Canaanite prostitute from cursed Jericho. He became king in fact only after a prolonged civil war. He committed sins most of us would think were much worse than Saul’s. But he had three things Saul lacked–an ongoing friendship with God, the resolve not to mix God’s business with his own, and complete repentance when reproved for his sins. He was God’s choice, a “man after [God’s] own heart.” David brought Israel to the height of its power. David was also the founder of the dynasty to which Jesus belongs.
For most of the reign of David’s son Solomon, Israel enjoyed regional power, great wealth and peace. At the beginning of his reign, Solomon asked God for wisdom to rule his people, and God gave him wisdom greater than any before or after him. Unfortunately, Solomon excused sins of which his father had repented, and mixed his own will with God’s on a grand scale, profusely accumulating women, wealth, and horses and chariots (military power) for himself. They turned his heart away from God to first veiled, then open idolatry, preferring gods over whom he could have power to the true God who had authority over him. This led to civil war at the end of his reign, and the division of Israel into two kingdoms, Israel and Judah, at the beginning of his son Rehoboam’s reign.
The southern kingdom continued to be governed, for the rest of its existence, by descendants of David. In the southern kingdom there followed a repeating cycle of idolatry and disorder, great hardship, repentance and temporary restoration, much like that during the days of the judges. A few of the kings of Judah were great examples of faith in God. Most, however, were examples of mixed motives, serving God just enough, they thought, to avoid his wrath, while simultaneously serving their idols. And a few kings of Judah were positively evil.
The northern kingdom, Israel, was served by a succession of dynasties, most of them founded by kings God sent a prophet to anoint, but none of which truly followed God. Some of the northern kings gave some lip service to the true God, though they created their own idols to represent him. Others simply ignored him. They were nearly always enemies of the southern kings and of non-idolatrous worship of the true God. All of them preferred gods they could control, and could use to keep control of their subjects.
But after God permitted both kingdoms to be carried away into exile, he preserved the family of Israel. He also preserved the family of David. He restored many of them to their land over several centuries before the true king, Jesus, was born in David’s family. And he even had Jesus proclaimed King of the Jews at his death by the gentile Roman governor of Judea (the charge was absolutely true!), and crowned–with thorns.
Symbols, Traditional Symbolism, Truth and Reality
With those two examples of God’s use of ironic symbolism in history, as a means of teaching us, the time has come to discuss symbolism, both verbal and visual, religious symbols, and their relationship to truth and visible “reality.”
God prefers to speak to us. God created everything by speaking, and put speech–words–into our natures as a part of the image of himself. Conversation–speech both received and given–produces understanding. God commanded us never to make any pictures of him. But he also both commands and encourages us to speak of him often, to ourselves, our families, other believers and the world.
But God also knows our weakness, and sometimes uses symbols to aid our understanding. However, the Bible is a book, and its original manuscripts contained no drawings. Thus, even visual symbolism in Scripture comes as pictures described in words, not as pure visual symbols. As Jacques Ellul has correctly pointed out, except in apocalyptic prophecy, God always accompanies his uses of visual symbolism in scripture with some kind of explanation. Apocalyptic prophecy is a partial exception because it speaks of a time when the truth of God’s words and the visual reality we perceive will merge into one. But, for the present time, visual “reality,” our perceptions of what we can see, is distorted. It is distorted by our physical and mental limitations, which restrict how much we can see and successfully process. It is distorted by our own rebellion. It is distorted by others around us who want us to “see” things the way they do. It is distorted by our leaders in various institutional relationships who often demand conformity in perspective and thought. It is distorted by the media and the economic and political forces behind them who deliberately limit and distort what we are allowed to see in order to manipulate us. But, most of all, it is distorted by our spiritual enemy Therefore, in this world, we live by faith in what God says, by spoken truth, rather than by the deceptive “reality” our eyes can see. 2 Corinthians 5:7. God’s purpose in speaking to us is to provoke rational thought–thought in words–pointing us toward himself, occasionally with the aid of visual symbols, not to evoke a naked emotional response to an unexplained image. That is, he wants to teach us his thoughts, not manipulate our emotions and actions.
Some important examples of valid Christian symbols are the Cross, the empty tomb, the metaphor of the Body of Christ, and the pastoral, agricultural and military metaphors of our relationship to Christ, his Body and our own lives in the world. The Cross is, legitimately, a symbol of Jesus’ sacrifice, of our deliverance from sin by his sacrifice, of his coronation as the final king, and of the sacrificial route to greatness in his kingdom. It should never be–though it often is–applied as a symbol apart from recognition of the empty tomb that followed it. The empty tomb is both its power and its purpose. Death has been defeated. Jesus wears–and is able to exercise the power represented by–the crown he received at his death, because he rose from the dead. So “the Cross” is not the symbol of a human “cause,” nor of self-sacrifice or of political warfare in pursuit of a “cause” (or even of his “kingdom,” separate from its true King). Rather it is the symbol of the sacrifice of the risen Savior and King, and, by implication, of the hard things we must do to follow him –we must “pick up” our cross and “follow” him. Matthew 10:38.
Jesus also used repeatedly agricultural and fishing metaphors for his kingdom, its growth, and his role in it. He also used an extended agricultural metaphor–the vine–as a description of his relationship to us. He is the vine, we are the branches, and we have life and bear fruit only by remaining in him. Jesus’ most frequent metaphor for his relationship with us, however, made us his sheep, totally dependent on him for everything–pasture, water, defense from enemies, correction when we stray. Sheep are stupid and stray into danger easily–the metaphor is not flattering to us, but it is true. Finally, the New Testament does state a few military metaphors of our relationship to Christ. We need to maintain personal discipline–like that of a good soldier or athlete–to stay wholly devoted to God; otherwise we will wander away from our purpose. And we need to use all of the “armor” God has provided to us to stand firm, to hold onto our purpose and our living relationship with Christ against “against the rulers, against the authorities, “against the Devil’s schemes,” “against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” Ephesians 6:11-12.
But even in speaking of warfare, New Testament imagery is not telling us to become involved in military conflict against other people. It is telling us that we already are involved in combat against the spiritual forces of the enemy. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood.” Ephesians 6:12. The intended purpose of all of these symbols is to engage our minds, so that we may rationally understand why we need to remain dependent on God and voluntarily yield to him. Its purpose is not to emotionally manipulate us.
Traditional systems of visual symbolism–religious, national, and even commercial–generally have just the opposite purpose. They are designed to bypass rationality and draw out of the masses strong emotional reactions and conditioned, irrational responses controlled by the people who control the symbols. It really makes little difference whether the people are following the Flag, the Crown, the company logo, the dollar, the “needs” of “humanity,” or the Cross, as long as they willingly volunteer to sacrifice anything needed in pursuit of their leaders’ interests. How many bloody wars have been fought under the (false!!!) standard of the Cross!
Still, the truth remains:
God wants us, not our performance.
The World Lies in the Power of Evil, for Now, but God Has Not Surrendered
On this subject, I offer only a string of quotations. Click on the links for the contexts, which are also important.
The Devil at the time of Jesus’ temptation: “Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. ‘All this I will give you,’ he said, ‘if you will bow down and worship me.'” Matthew 4:8-9.
Jesus, when he was arrested: “ While I was with you daily in the temple, you did not lay hands on Me; but this hour and the power of darkness are yours.” Luke 22:53.
John: “We know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.” 1 John 5:19.
John, again: “The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him.” Revelation 12:9.
Paul: “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 6:12.
Paul, again: “For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.” Colossians 1:13.
John, again: “Who is the one who overcomes the world, but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?… And the testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. The one who has the Son has the life; the one who does not have the Son of God does not have the life.” 1 John 5:5, 11-12.
The writer to the Hebrews: “ Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.” Hebrews 2:14-15.
Jesus, again: ““There will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress among nations, in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and the waves, people fainting from fear and the expectation of the things that are coming upon the world; for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. But when these things begin to take place, straighten up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” Luke 21:25-28.
John, again: “Then the seventh angel sounded; and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, ‘The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ; and He will reign forever and ever.’ And the twenty-four elders, who sit on their thrones before God, fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying, ‘We give You thanks, Lord God, the Almighty, the One who is and who was, because You have taken Your great power and have begun to reign. And the nations were enraged, and Your wrath came, and the time came for the dead to be judged, and the time to reward Your bond-servants the prophets and the saints and those who fear Your name, the small and the great, and to destroy those who destroy the earth.'” Revelation 11:15-18.
Habakkuk: “Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and establishes a town by injustice! Has not the Lord Almighty determined that the people’s labor is only fuel for the fire, that the nations exhaust themselves for nothing? For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.” Habakkuk 2:12-14.
Peter: “But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare… But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness dwells.” 2 Peter 3:8-10, 13.
John, again: “Then I saw ‘a new heaven and a new earth,’ for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.’ He who was seated on the throne said, ‘I am making everything new!’ Then he said, ‘Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.’ He said to me: ‘It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water without cost from the spring of the water of life. Those who are victorious will inherit all this, and I will be their God and they will be my children.'” Revelation 21:1-8.
John, again: “Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.” Revelation 22:1-8.
John, again: “We know that no one who has been born of God sins; but He who was born of God keeps him, and the evil one does not touch him. We know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding so that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.” 1 John 5:18-20.
Finally, Jesus: “These things I have spoken to you so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33.
God’s Law, Human Law and Human Institutions
The Law God gave to Moses was, as we have already seen, an accommodation to humanity’s false focus on our own performance, merit and “sins.” It was given to people who begged for rules to keep, so they would not have to endure God’s presence, and it was given them to show that they could not keep it. It was perfect, and they would have found life by their own merit if they had kept it perfectly, but they could not. It was not God’s ultimate way to live within and among his people. But, for the time it was in force, it restrained sin among his people–they still were in rebellion and sinned, but not as much as they would have without law. And the Law did prepare the way for Jesus.
That is what can be said about God’s perfect Law, and the authorities it established.
God gave his most revealing words about ordinary human laws, rulers and institutions to the bloodthirsty and oppressive gentile King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. Nebuchadnezzar had previously been God’s instrument of vengeance on Judah, destroying the Temple and exiling God’s people. However, when he became overly proud of his own power, an angel spoke about his fate in a dream he had: “Let his heart be changed from man’s, and let a beast’s heart be given unto him; and let seven times pass over him. This matter is by the decree of the watchers, and the demand by the word of the holy ones: to the intent that the living may know that the most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will, and setteth up over it the basest of men.” Daniel 4:16-17 (KJV). Here is God’s judgment: he gives the rule of the world to the basest people, and shows his continuing power by ruling through these base people, despite their rebellion, their evil!
It is to King Nebuchadnezzar’s credit that, after he had served the sentence to seven “times” of insanity, he repented and recognized, “the King of heaven, all whose works are truth, and his ways judgment: and those that walk in pride he is able to abase.” Daniel 4:37. God then restored him to his throne. This made him a humbled and repentant–but still thoroughly base–king.
With that background, it can be said that God permits human rulers to operate–and establishes them within their own spheres of authority–for exactly two purposes: 1) to punish, and, thereby restrain, evildoing, and 2) to praise, and thereby encourage, those who do right. Romans 13:3-4, 1 Peter 2:13-14. People have, of course, found other uses for governmental authorities, after first formally placing them within various types of artificial “bodies corporate,” which they believe both separates the power from the people who exercise it and separates the moral and legal guilt from the individual persons of the rulers onto an artificial entity which cannot be blamed or held responsible for what it does. Such structures have some utility at the individual and social human levels of existence, but wholly fail to dilute individual decision makers’ (and their institutions’ and nations’) moral responsibility before God.
Both restraining evildoing through threat of punishment and promoting doing right through the possibility of praise or reward capriciously bestowed are obviously matters of individual performance and merit. They too, do not represent God’s ultimate way to live within and among his people. But they do restrain evil for the present time–even the very worst, most oppressive governments do this, at least to some degree. And, by analogy to God’s perfect Law, imperfect human rule does prepare the way for faith in Jesus, to the degree that it maintains order and some semblance of justice: “First of all, then, I urge that requests, prayers, intercession, and thanksgiving be made in behalf of all people, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity. This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who wants all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” 1 Timothy 2:1-4.
This is, in fact, all we can ask–and we are to ask God for it, not our rulers. And remember that the Roman emperor for whom Paul was likely telling Timothy to make these prayers was Nero!
God is King, the True Ruler of His Creation, and How that is Seen
God is King. His Kingdom is forever, and he is ultimately sovereign, no matter what we see in the present world. Ultimately he will work out everything–even the consequences of our sin and the evil in the present world–for the good of those who believe, into the visible completion of his kigdom.
But we do not yet see all of this. We know only his word, which is still bringing it to fruition.
For the present, we see the contradictions of the kingdom. God reigns, yet evil visibly continues and appears to be growing at the same time God’s kingdom is growing. The word of God’s kingdom looks like a small, inconsequential thing–a tiny seed. It does not grow in those who will not hear it or will not commit to it, or in those who try to follow it with mixed motives. But where it grows, it produces abundantly. Many who loudly profess faith in it do not commit to it, while many others who appear have loudly rejected it and appear incapable of obedience, later fully commit to it and are productive. Some who will be God’s greatest friends are first his greatest human enemies. For humans in the Kingdom of God, the way up is down–the way to become great is to become small, the way to leadership is service, his power is made perfect in our weakness. God’s way is invisible and untraceable, like the wind, but powerful. The growth of God’s kingdom is never what we expect or plan it should be; instead, it goes in a different direction according to his invisible plan. Still, it includes nothing about which he has not already spoken to his servants, the prophets.
People serve God’s Kingdom, for their own good. God and his Kingdom do not serve people.
Human Religions
People create for themselves gods they think they can manipulate and, to some degree, control. The focus of all human-devised religion is performance–proper ritual performance, moral or ethical performance within the norms of the culture, adequate sacrifices and offerings, willing self-sacrifices in the wars and other causes endorsed by religious leaders, and most important of all, unquestioning obedience. Man-made religions, at least at the beginning, nearly always have leadership that is either identical with or mutually dependent upon the political leadership of the city or kingdom in which they arose. Those cults that survive, grow and spread, usually by right of conquest–in which conceptually the winner’s god(s) defeat those of the loser–are forced to syncretize, to adopt to some degree the ways of the religion(s) and god(s) of subjugated populations, in order to keep the peace by keeping everyone more-or-less happily within the official cult.
As religions survive and spread, they also often achieve some degree of technical independence from the political leadership of their polity. Still, beyond simply supporting their priesthoods, their real, practical purpose almost invariably is to secure the obedience of their followers to their leaders–both religious and political. This obedience is secured with the hope of rewards (either in this life or in the next) from capricious deities for those who do everything just right, the right to petition these deities, in due form, for what we want, and the threat of certain punishment (either in this life or in the next) for any disobedience to any god or person in authority over us.
Thus, man-made religion, the religion we naturally prefer, is all about submission–submission, yes, to deity, but mostly to humans in authority. This can have absurd results when both sides in a conflict claim to be serving the same god(s).
Indeed, this absurdity has often afflicted “Christendom,” the collection of nations that claim to be Christian, when groups of them have gone to war against each other. Jacques Ellul’s example from the Western Front of World War I is particularly pointed. All of the nations represented on the Western Front of that war at that time claimed to be “Christian” nations, ruled by “Christian” kings or mostly “Christian” parliamentary governments. None asserted that any doctrinal differences were involved in the war, which was all about control of territory, revenge for the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, and the defense of the “sovereignty” of Serbia. All of the governments were supported in their war efforts by a majority of the Christian church organizations in their respective realms, which taught that supporting the war and going to fight it, if summoned, were “patriotic” and, therefore, “duties” the people were required to perform for both God and Country. And most of the soldiers on the Western Front called themselves Christians. Indeed, for the most part, the soldiers on both sides were from Christian traditions that were quite similar. Thus, on one Christmas Eve during that war, when a brief, 15 minute, cease-fire for the holiday was observed, it was reported that, as the mostly English soldiers on one part of the front sang “Silent night, holy night…” they could hear the Germans facing them in the trenches singing in response “Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht…”
Ellul explains this as an example of a war in which the troops on both sides believed they were performing their religious duty, doing the will of the same God, in the name of the same Jesus Christ, when the cease fire ended and they began to kill each other again!
But the Allies and the Central Powers could not both have been right about doing the will of God in fighting the other alliance. At least one of the alliances must have been wrong; therefore, the soldiers of at least once alliance must have been committing unjustified murder rather than doing the will of God. Most likely, both were wrong! The all too “easy,” traditional answer to this is that it is obvious that the Allies were clearly morally in the right because they won, and the Central Powers were clearly morally in the wrong because they lost. But I see no indication in Scripture that either right and wrong, or the will of God, is determined by right of conquest. Neither do I see any indication in Scripture that these matters are finally decided by the people who happen to be in power in a nation. That is the way of human-made gods and religions.
People serve in God’s Kingdom, for their own good. God and his Kingdom do not serve people.
Why Jesus died
The standard answer to this is that Jesus died to “forgive” or to “take away” our “sins” (plural). This is true–because of Jesus’ death and resurrection, our “sins” (plural) are forgiven. However, in its emphasis on performance, on our “sins” (plural), it does not accurately express the primary reason Jesus died.
“God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:8.
Jesus died to reconcile us to God, to make it possible for us to put our fear of his wrath aside and return to him as children and friends. As I said before, God never became our enemy. He has always loved us and planned a way for us to return to him. He has always worked all things together for the ultimate good of those who would believe in him. That includes Jesus’ death–at once the worst crime ever committed and the means of our salvation.
And there is another reason Jesus’ death was necessary. When man (male and female), introduced rebellion (sin) against God into our world, God did not become our enemy, we became his enemies. Jesus died to bear our “sin”–not just the guilt, the rebellion itself–to make it possible for us to die with him to ourselves, to our rebellion, and return as his friends no longer in rebellion.
So, while it is certainly true that we no longer need to fear God’s rejection and wrath because of the guilt of our poor performance (“sins”), the larger purpose of Christ’s death was to free us from our “sin” (singular) so that we could be friends again. Beyond this, Jesus’ body was “broken” so that all of God’s children by faith in Jesus could become a part of a single Body, the Church, the Body of Christ.
“The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. ” John 12:23b-24.
The power of Jesus’ resurrection
Jesus died. Everyone does that. But Jesus rose from the grave!
Jesus’ resurrection is the proof that Jesus defeated our “sin,” death and the evil one. It is also the proof of God’s power to defeat death and the promise of our resurrection. Jesus’ resurrection is also the source of our power to defeat “sin,” death and the evil one, even while we remain in this life, and to produce fruit. And we are his resurrected body on Earth.
The Kingdom of the Heavens as the Air We Breathe–All Around, Within and Among Us
As Dallas Willard has pointed out, throughout Matthew, most of the references to the Kingdom speak of the Kingdom of the Heavens (plural, with an article, in the Greek). English translations usually render this as the Kingdom of Heaven (singular, with no article), leading to the common idea that God’s Kingdom exists only way “up there,” out of this world, in “Heaven.” “Way up there” where it is irrelevant to our life on earth.
But “the heavens” describe a broader region than “Heaven,” that infinitely distant and silent presumed location of God’s “throne.” Even in modern English, the “heavens” include the spheres where the clouds are, birds (and, now, people in aircraft) fly and where weather occurs, in addition to “Heaven.” Even in English, the “heavens” also include the astronomical heavens–from the moon (where humans have now stood) to the farthest galaxy of our universe. And in First Century, CE, Greek linguistic usage and cosmogony, the “heavens” also included the “first heaven” (of seven)–the air all around us.
Thus, the “Kingdom of the Heavens,” which is ruled by God, includes everything from the air all around us to the farthest galaxy, in addition to the location of the conventional “Heaven” (singular).
The Kingdom of the Heavens is all around us. It is in the air we breathe. But, as Jesus told us, the Kingdom is also within and among (entos) us. Luke 17:21. It is within us who believe, and also within the Body of Christ we now compose (and, thus, also “among” us). Compare Matthew 18:18-19.
The power and purpose of God’s Spirit within us
God’s Spirit–his breath, his voice–the aspect of God that was (and still is) active in his Creation–God has given to us who believe to live inside us. He is given to us to guide us into the same kind of life Jesus had on earth. He is given to assure us that God has adopted us as his children and desires our friendship. He is given to guide us into all truth–we now have the mind of Christ, and have access to everything hidden in God for us, if we will but listen and yield control. Beyond this, he is given to teach us the emotions of God, so that we may learn to feel compassion for those around us whenever God does and to know how he would act on it, to feel anger only when God does and to know what to do with it, etc. “The love of God is poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.” Romans 5:5.
The Sabbath–Rest of God, Rest in God
On the seventh day, God rested from all his work. So rest is built into the fabric of Creation.
Under the Law, one day in seven–the Sabbath–was set aside for physical rest, in recognition of this.
In Christ, every day, while it is still called “Today,” is set aside as a Sabbath. Hebrews 4:6-8. On this special day, Today, we rest from our own works, and let God work through us. “For anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his.” Hebrews 4:10. We can only enter God’s rest by obeying his voice Today, not tomorrow. “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Matthew 11:27-29.
What faith is
Christians often correctly quote Hebrews 11:1: “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” But the things “hoped for” are not things I naturally want–things “wished for”–and the things “not seen” are not simply things I do not see yet. The emphasis is not on “things” at all, but on the true object of our hope, God, and the life into which he is bringing us. This is the main point of all of the stories of the heroes of faith in Hebrews 11. They could not see what God was doing, where he was taking them, but let God take them there, in hope that what they could not see was better than what they could see.
It is by faith that God’s words are “mixed into” my life, Hebrews 4:2, causing me to listen to his voice, step out on his words and enter into his rest. Hebrews 3:12-4:11.
Expressing God’s Life and Love Within Us
“For we, through the Spirit, by faith, are waiting for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything, but faith working through love.” Galatians 5:5-7.
“You see that faith was working with his works, and as a result of the works, faith was perfected; and the Scripture was fulfilled which says, ‘And Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,’ and he was called a friend of God.” James 2:21-23.
“And not only this, but we also celebrate in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.” Romans 5:3-5.
Christ’s Body, the Church
It is clear to me that the Scriptures speak, in various places, of the church, the Body of Christ, the collection of all who believe throughout all time. We are all united by his broken physical body, his life blood flowing through us, and his Spirit working in each of us. We express God’s unity in diversity, of which we have become a part. Ideally, we show the world God’s unity and the power of God’s Spirit working in and through us.
This Body of Christ is a spiritual thing, of which Christ himself is the only Head, and is not synonymous with any human organization.
Human Church Organizations
In the New Testament, after Pentecost, there were also local churches, human organizations for the support and growth of their members. A few instructions are given regarding the qualifications of their leaders, and regarding keeping their meetings orderly. But most of the instructions given about local churches are given to their members, regarding the purpose of church congregations and the attitudes which should and should not be expressed there.
Very little is said about the form of their organization–how many human leaders they should have, and how these should be selected and organized, for example. It is obvious that there was a variety of organizational forms in the early church, and God does not pick any one of them as the only way it should be done. This is in keeping with the fact that the only true Head is Christ, and whatever other people we make responsible for tasks within the local church should act only as his agents. It is also in keeping with God’s unity in diversity, of which the churches themselves are examples.
The earliest churches appear to have allowed relatively free expression of spiritual gifts during their meetings–and, of course, outside of church meetings, on the street. In the context of church assemblies, the exercise of the open, speaking gifts, was under the supervision of the congregation’s human leaders, of persons exercising the gift of prophecy on the occasion (who were supposed to let others interrupt them!) and, perhaps most importantly, by people expressing gifts of the discernment of spirits. See, generally, 1 Corinthians 12:4-11, 12:27-31 and 14:26-33.
It is also clear that there was a good deal of communication between local churches in the early years, but almost nothing is said about any permanent organizations by which this communication and coordination was maintained. So there likely is a place for organizations which operate between Christians in different places or different congregations, and for organizations of local churches. But no roles for these, and no definitive organizations, are clearly established in Scripture.
The danger here, to which Christianity has consistently fallen prey for centuries, is to build rigid organizations that are corporately substituted for Christ as the Head, or whose merely human leaders are substituted for Christ and treated as the Head. We then have division, which leads to the appearance of a Church with multiple heads at war with each other. Luke 11:17; 1 Corinthians 1:10-17; for an eye-opener, compare Qur’an 5:14 and 2:120 (views from the outside).
The Purpose of the Church
The purpose of the Church–the universal church, the Body of Christ–is to show God to the world, in our words and example. This involves God doing his work within us individually and among us, making us ever more perfectly into his image, with the world watching. The purpose of the universal Church is not to make “converts,” build buildings, create massive organizations or raise money. It is not even to “make disciples”–though we are individually and collectively commanded to do this. It is to show God to the world through what he does within and among us. If he has free rein to do this, finding people to disciple will be no problem–God will bring the right people to us, and they will want to follow our example.
The purpose of local churches–the only really legitimate purpose for them–is to equip their members to show God to the world.
Gifts, Fruit and Rewards
God gives various gifts to his people to serve each other, build each other up, and show him to the world. Some of the gifts he gives are permanent, others for exercise only on particular occasions. See, 1 Corinthians 12 & 14; Romans 12. No gift is ever given to make its vessel powerful or rich, or to make that person look important.
God also gives some people he has chosen as gifts to his Church, both local and universal. He gives these people to “equip” his people “to do” the works of ministry which show him to the world. He does not give these people to rule the church autocratically, nor does he give them to do all of the “ministry” themselves. They are here to equip us.
As humans who have always emphasized performance, we tend to place the emphasis on these “gifts’–the means, or so it appears, of “getting things done” for God. But God’s emphasis has always been on the Spirit’s fruit in us-the attitudes and motivations his Spirit produces within us which show him to the world: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness [and] self-control.” Galatians 5:22-23.
Our reward is based on this fruit–on the things of true value in our lives God has built on the foundation of our faith–not on our visible accomplishments. 1 Corinthians 3:9-15; Matthew 7:21-23.
Death and Life
God warned the first man (male and female) that he would surely “die” if he rebelled by eating the forbidden fruit. And man and woman, now separate, did begin to die as soon as they ate it. They had separated themselves from the source of life. Death became inevitable.
However, that wasn’t the end of God’s plan for them, or for us. Death is only the end of this visible life, on earth, trapped in time. Life actually continues after death, for those who follow Christ. When we leave this body, we will go to be “home with the Lord.” 2 Corinthians 5:8. As it says in another place, we will “depart and be with Christ.” Philippians 1:23.
But where is the risen Christ? The standard, but incorrect, answer is “in Heaven”–a blessed intermediate state infinitely distant from Earth in which we wait to follow Jesus in his Resurrection. The correct answer–given that Christ is fully God–is “everywhere, eternally.” Remember what I said earlier about God’s Kingdom being in “the heavens”–all around us. So those who depart to be with Christ could potentially be with him anywhere he is, which is everywhere. We truly have a “great crowd of witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1) surrounding us as we suffer through this short life on Earth!
Those who have departed this life following Christ are also not, from their perspective, awaiting the resurrection. They have gone from Earth’s time zone to God’s timeless zone. As we see things, they are still awaiting the resurrection, as are we. But they are in fact already, fully with Christ where he is, able to see the end to which all things are headed in God’s good plan for everything he has made. Therefore, they are comforted. They have fully joined him in his Resurrection.
There really is no need for any “intermediate state.”
As for those who leave Earth still in full rebellion against God, their death continues after death. They can no longer hide their rebellion and their shame from the consuming fire of God’s presence. This is horrible, but it is not God’s doing. It was their choice.
But it is also our purpose as Christ’s Body on Earth, our reason for being left here, to show them the alternative–that their death need not be eternal. We do this by permitting him to remake us into his image while the world watches, and by letting him speak through us. This is our whole purpose for being here.
Addendum to “Death and Life”
My friend and partner in the Good News of Jesus, Jonathan Brickman, recently posted an article entitled “Death, Thenceforth, and Thereafter: What God Does With Us” which quotes and summarizes the Scriptures that are traditionally cited in support of an “intermediate state” in which disembodied “souls” of the dead remain between their deaths and the time of the general resurrection of the dead. This article should be carefully read! Jonathan states a valid interpretation of these scriptures–which corresponds roughly with the traditional interpretation.
There is, of course, a sense in which even God is waiting. God came in an ordinary human body in his Son Jesus, in part to show us the true humanity which is eternally a part of his nature. That human body had all of the normal human limitations–including the normal bondage to the tyrant time. On multiple occasions while he was here on Earth Jesus declined to do things he could have done, or was being asked to do, because, he said, their time had not come. And at his ascension, Jesus told his disciples to “wait” in Jerusalem until the Father sent them the promised Holy Spirit. He also told them that he was not now going to “restore the Kingdom to Israel,” but that had to wait until a future time only the Father knows. Acts 1. Even now, “the Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not willing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance.” 2 Peter 3:9 So experiencing time and waiting for the right time is also a part of God’s nature, along with his existence above time.
However, this does not imply that those who have died and gone to be “with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:9)–a phrase which I admit I take very literally– have gone as disembodied souls to some kind of “waiting room” infinitely separated from our world, where Jesus is also passively “waiting” for things to happen. No, Jesus is now everywhere, right here with us, present in our world. He is not “waiting” in an infinitely distant Heaven. In this discussion, it should also be remembered that our resurrected bodies are not exactly the same bodies we have now–they are a qualitatively different kind of body, as explained at some length in 1 Corinthians 15:35-49. Our “heavenly bodies” are identified with our earthly bodies–Jesus’ tomb was empty, he appeared physically, ate, and could be recognized by his disciples when he wanted to be recognized by them, and the wounds of his crucifixion were still visible. But it was also quite obviously of a different kind than his earthly body, in that he could, for instance, appear and disappear at will, and show up in locked rooms without using the door. And then he ascended, something his unresurrected earthly body could not do.
On the other hand, there is also a sense in which neither God nor his Son Jesus is waiting for anything, as they are already present at the end of time. And those who have gone to be “with the Lord” are present with him there, too. I believe the answer to the apparent tension between the dead in Christ being immediately “with the Lord” where he is, above time, and the Scriptures that seem to suggest an intermediate state is this: Jesus, and those who are now with him, are above time. We are still waiting for the final resurrection of the dead, at a time which is future to us. There will be a day, future to us, when we will see the graves opened, and we will then join those we see being raised in the air, to be with the Lord forever. As finite beings presently trapped in the tyranny of time, it is probably unavoidable that we should think of those who have died as now “waiting,” just as we do, for the time when we will be released from time constraints. There is nothing in our present experience that gives us any clue of what being “above time” would be like. But Paul also wrote that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. Jesus has already realized the Resurrection, as have all who are with him. What looks like the future to us, is the eternal present to them.
Whoever is wise, let him understand these things;
Hosea 14:9
Whoever is discerning, let him know them.
For the ways of the Lord are right,
And the righteous will walk in them,
But wrongdoers will stumble in them.
NEXT: You are Not the One to Build, video series with accompanying linked texts.
A Simple Summary of Church and Western History–Introduction
LINKS:
Heresy is Division in the Church
The Earliest Christianity–Stating many of these same things, and some others, in a numbered, propositional form.
The (Wizard of Oz) Scarecrow Fallacy, about formal qualifications
God Rejected King Saul, But Declared King David a Man After His Own Heart. Didn’t God Get this Backwards? About formal disqualifications.
The Implications of Jesus’ Humanity, Revisited
The Distinction Between “Sin” (Singular) and “Sins” (Plural)–Part 1 of a short series.
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