Just before He was crucified, Jesus prayed the words we now know as John chapter
seventeen. He did not pray for Himself, but for all that would come after Him in
pursuit of the kingdom of God. He prayed,
"Now I am no
longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father,
keep through Your name those whom You have given Me,
that they may be one as We are.
What did He mean when He said, "that they may be one
as (in the same manner and by the
same means as) we are"? Just how are Jesus and the Father one? We know that they
are and always have been one in agreement. Even when it meant the loss of His
life, Jesus prayed, "O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I
drink it, Your will be done." (Matthew 26:42, NKJV).
Elsewhere Jesus said, "I and My Father are one." (John 10:30, NKJV).
But is it possible that they are
one in a more singular way? Is it possible that first, in and of
themselves they are each one? We often
speak of ourselves as being body, soul and spirit. We speak of being
in the spirit or
in the flesh. We speak of our secular lives and our religious lives
as two separate things. We seem to be all compartmentalized into many different
categories. If so, are we truly ONE?
Was this the life that Jesus lived, fragmented and deluded?
Now consider this verse,
The light of the
body is the eye: if therefore thine eye
be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. (Matthew 6:22, KJV).
Jesus is the Light of the world. He has a
single eye. What does it mean to have a
single eye? We don't think that Jesus is talking about us being a
glowing Cyclops here. No, to have a single
eye is to have a single vision, a single motivation and purpose, a single
life source and that is the kingdom of heaven and the Spirit of the Father.
Those that have such singleness of sight are often accused of "being so heavenly
minded that they are no earthly good."
Do we have a single eye? If so, what is our sole purpose in life?
We have known many people who are singular in their pursuit of wealth. Some even
call themselves "Christian." They spend their time christianizing their ambition
for wealth, twisting the scriptures to justify their inordinate love of money.
How could this be when Jesus said so plainly that a man cannot serve both God
and mammon? In fact He said that we will love the one and hate the other.
People who worship many gods can never be united. If all Christians truly had
the same object of worship, there would be a much stronger bond of unity among
them. In fact, there is little unity at all. People who have different pursuits
and different objects of supreme affection, such as Mammon and various other
idols, can be expected to have no unity, for they are not single of vision
within themselves. They are wall-eyed Christians.
Permit us to take this a step further. You cannot be a "carnal
Christian." You are either carnal or you are a Christian.
Sorry, but the phrase "carnal Christian"
is not in the Bible. To be a true Christian is to have a single eye. The word
carnal is in the scriptures, but it is
not found in association with those who are securely in Christ and of His
kingdom.
As soon as we put our mind's eye on the things of this world, or
even on those who minister in the things of Christ instead of on Jesus, our
light becomes darkness. We are yet carnal. Can you see why we say that there are
so many walleyed "Christians"? These are carnal and not following Christ.
Are we being too harsh on the lukewarm? No. Please don't mistake
our frankness for cruelty. We contend zealously that we might all be ONE even as
Jesus and the Father are ONE, knowing that until our focus is single we will
remain divided. Such division is proof that the eye is not single and
accordingly the "light" is actually darkness. Jesus said,
"But if your eye
is bad (double), your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the
light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
I (Michael) knew a kid in high school we called Dickey, who was
walleyed. I could never tell if he was talking to me or somebody else near me.
He had an eye on us both. I never knew what to think. Like a walleyed person,
our vision is double when we are carnal. We can-not rightly make out what we are
looking at. We are like a drunk with double vision and our walk is a stagger at
best. Men look at us and say, "That guy is drunk!" They don't know what to make
of us. Is this the witness that best portrays Jesus and the kingdom of God? No,
this is the witness of somebody in darkness who has to hang onto everything,
groping and feeling his way, not knowing what dangers the next step might have
in store. These are carried about by every wind of doctrine.
I (Michael) was in a Bible study more than twenty years ago where a
brother was teaching from the book of John. As he read from John chapter five, I
came under deep conviction. He was reading about the lame man at the pool of
Bethesda. You know the story. This lame man had been lying there by that pool,
waiting for somebody to put him in the water when the angel came down and
stirred it up, believing that if he could just be the first one in the water, he
would be healed. He had been lying there lame for thirty-eight years! Now that
is faith! It is amazing what great faith people can have in outward signs, but
having true faith in what comes without outward observation is a rare thing.
So along came Jesus and he said to this guy, "Would you be made
whole?" Whoa! Did He say whole?
He could have said, "Do you want to
walk?" Was Jesus offering this man a chance to be truly
whole? When I heard this, my mind
raced! Could you truly be made whole? I mean free of all sin and its stumbling
consequences? The very thought was a challenge like a glove slapped in my face
by an opponent. Jesus was saying to me, "Would you be made whole? My grace is
sufficient for you." My mind was answering, "But Jesus, you know I am but dust
and prone to sin." I was making
excuses like our lame man did 2000 years ago, "Sir, I have no man!"
As the passage went on, I heard Him say, "Rise, take up your bed,
and walk!" Take up my bed? You have to be kidding! I have spent the last 38
years working my way down through this sea of humanity, trying to get to the
edge of this pool so I could be the first one in and now you want me to rise,
take up my bed, loose my place and identity as the lame man by the pool and walk
away? What if I should suddenly go lame again? I would have to start all over.
Jesus was saying to me in that moment, "You can keep your lame
excuses and your place as a lame sinner or you can choose to walk in my light
with singleness of eye. It is up to you. My grace is sufficient for you, for
when you are weak I am strong." Then I read further where He said to the man
that was now walking, "Behold, you
are made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing come to you."
Well, I am sorry to say that I had more faith that day in my
ability to sin than I had in the power of His grace to keep me. I went on to
fall into sin and to cop to my lameness and weaknesses as I kept my place with
my bed by the pool of fallen humanity. It was always easy for me to point and
say, "I have no man." I could always find a way to blame others' lack of support
or the shallowness of the church for my sin. Or worse, I would blame my parents
for the way I am. Now God is saying to me once again, "Would you be made whole?"
Would you have a single eye? Would you have a body filled with light? And now I
answer, "YES LORD, YES, I WOULD!"
Elijah once challenged the nation of Israel who were a walleyed mixture to walk
with a single eye,
And Elijah came to
all the people, and said, "How long will you falter between two opinions? If the
LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him." But the people answered him
not a word. (1 Kings 18:21, NKJV).
Jesus challenged His already fallen church in Laodicea with these
words,
15 "I know your
works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot.
16 "So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit
you out of My mouth.
17 "Because you say, `I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing'
--and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked."
(Revelation 3:15-17, NKJV).
God is still speaking this same message in the spirit of Elijah today. God has
always desired a people who were one.
First, one in themselves and then one corporately. Did you see here in these
passages that God wants us to be totally cold toward Him or totally hot after
Him? He desires unity of purpose in us. He knows that if we are completely cold
toward Him we have a better chance of repenting than if we are clinging to our
false spiritual riches and our lukewarm religion. We have found that the most
real Christians Jesus has saved are those who were flat out for the kingdom of
Satan, fully in his kosmos system
before they came to Christ. They know where that road goes. So many who come to
Christ today seem to have taken the advice of one of our modern American heroes,
Casey Stengel, "If you see a fork in the road, take it."
Jesus prayed, "Father, I desire
that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they
may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the
foundation of the world." (John 17:24, NKJV).
That they "may be where I am." Just where
was Jesus, the Father's Beloved? Above
we read where He said, "Now, I am no longer in the world (kosmos)." Yet He was
there, standing before them on this earth! No, He was
in the world but not
of the world, that fallen system of
demons and rebellious man. He had come to His own and His own received Him not.
When He stood before Pilate a few short hours later, Pilate asked him, "What
have you done?" Jesus replied, "My kingdom is not of this world. . ." That was
His crime! This is what the Jewish leaders and Rome wanted to kill him for. He
had a single eye on the Father's kingdom, "My Father has been working until now,
and I have been working." (John 5:17, NKJV). His works were always the Father's
works. His words were the Father's words. His every act and thought went toward
THAT kingdom.
Philip said to
Him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us."
Jesus said to him,
"Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has
seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, `Show us the Father'? "Do you
not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I
speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me
does the works." (John 14:8-10, NKJV).
So how can we BE where Jesus IS? By having a single eye and a body
filled with His light, by being totally focused on Him as He does the works the
Father does. Did we hear you say, "Well, sure! That was Jesus, the Son of God,
but we are mere men." Think again. Paul was also a
mere man and called himself
the chief of sinners. Consider His
words,
". . .according to
my earnest expectation and hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all
boldness, as always, so now also Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by
life or by death. For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain."
(Philippians 1:20-21, NKJV).
"I have been
crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and
the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in (of) the Son of God,
who loved me and gave Himself for me."(Galatians 2:20, NKJV).
What? Did we hear you say, "Well that was Paul, you know the great
anointed apostle, but I am me. I am weak and despised of men." To that Paul
answers,
"For you see your
calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty,
not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world
to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put
to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the
things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring
to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence. But
of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God--and
righteousness and sanctification and redemption-- that, as it is written, "He
who glories, let him glory in the LORD."
All we need to be holy and filled with light has been made
available in Jesus Christ. We have available to us the fullness of Jesus, His
faith, His holiness, His life, His boldness, His calling, His choosing, His
wisdom, His righteousness, His sanctification and His redemption that we might
glorify His name forever.
One time Charles Simpson told a story about being at a meeting with
Bob Mumford. Bob had been the guest speaker and at the end of his discourse he
told people with different prayer needs to go off to different meeting rooms off
of the main auditorium. Well, finally he got around to those needing healing and
said, "All you in need of prayer for healing go over there with brother Charles
Simpson." Simpson said that he about freaked out. He would have rather had the
group that needed prayer for financial help or had marriage problems, anything
but healing! People who get prayer for healing expect to see results right then
and there.
Then he thought to himself, "Maybe most of the people will go to
the other rooms for prayer and I can skate through this after all." No! He said
that 90% of those needing prayer went to HIS room. So what was he to do? He
started walking back and forth praying that God would send a Spirit of healing
to these people, etc. He prayed and he prayed as he paced back in forth in front
of them.
Finally, He heard the Lord say to him, "Charles, what are you doing?"
He said, "I am healing these people, Lord!"
The Lord answered, "Do you mind if I do it?" At that Simpson shut up and opened
his eyes and looked over the people in the room and saw a lady light up like a
neon lamp. He went over and laid his hands on her and said, "Mam, I do not know
what your sickness is, but God is all over you and is healing you right now!"
Bam! She was healed. He then looked up and saw another one light up, went over
and laid hands on him and Bam! He was healed! Simpson went around the room this
way, watching for the works that he saw the Father doing and doing only those
works. He said it was one of the most important lessons he ever learned.
Jesus prayed that we would be
where He is, doing only the works we see the Father doing and speaking only
the words we hear the Father saying. You want to have success in ministry? You
must be where Jesus is. If you are,
you WILL behold the glory that the Father has given Him.
Paul wrote to the Colossians,
"If then you were
raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting
at the right hand of God. Set your mind
on things above, not on things on the earth.
For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ who is our life appears, then
you also will appear with Him in glory."
(Colossians 3:1-4, NKJV).
Back to Jesus' high priestly prayer, "Father, I desire
that they also whom You gave Me
may be with Me where I am, that they may
behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the
foundation of the world."
He was not talking about pie in the sky by and by. His appearing in us is for
the NOW as we set our minds on the things above.
"When Christ who IS or life appears, you will appear with Him in glory."
If Christ IS our life, it is He who fills our bodies with light, shining forth
His glory. God is the great I AM, not the I WILL BE! He is our ever-present help
in a time of need. If the world has ever needed His light shining forth from His
people, it is now.
We all long for fellowship. We go to fellowship meetings. Our church buildings
have fellowship halls. We have organizations with
fellowship in the titles, but are we getting true fellowship? Is our
eye single? Is our whole body filled with light? If not, we are not going to
find true fellowship no matter what room we meet in, what meeting we go to or
what group we belong to. How do we know this? We know it because God told us so.
John wrote,
"That which we
have seen and heard we declare to you,
that you also may have fellowship with us; and
truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.
And these things we write to you that your joy may be full. This is the
message which we have heard from Him and declare to you,
that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we
have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the
truth. But if we walk in the light as
He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of
Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin." (1 John 1:3-7, NKJV).
Here again we see that choice between being filled with His light
and our own darkness. How did John find fellowship? He found it in fellowship
with the Father and the Son, just as Jesus found fellowship with the Father. He
did the works He saw the Father doing and spoke the words He heard the Father
saying. John found great joy in hearing and seeing God in action and He wanted
us to know it, too. Only as each of us has this fellowship with the Father and
the Son can we have fellowship with each other. The vertical must come before
the horizontal. Only those who are one individually with the Father and His Son
can be one body.
Do you want to be free of walking in darkness? You must walk in the
Father, because in Him there is no darkness or shadow of turning. If any two or
more of us are walking in His light, we will have fellowship. We must be first
found in HIS light individually before we can be ONE in each other. It gets back
to the fact that we must be ONE just as Jesus and the Father are ONE, not double
minded, not walleyed, but singular in Him. So you might say that fellowship is
not out there somewhere in the church, but rather it is first an inward thing.
We must be one in ourselves, one with Jesus and the Father, abiding inwardly in
unity with them.
Notice how many times that the word one
or unity shows up in the following
passage from Ephesians chapter four…
" . . .
endeavoring to keep the unity of the
Spirit in the bond of peace. There is
one body and one Spirit, just as
you were called in one hope of your
calling; one Lord, one faith, one
baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and
in you all. But to each one of us
grace was given according to the measure
of Christ's gift. Therefore He says: "When He ascended on high, He led
captivity captive, And gave gifts to men." (Now this, "He ascended" --what does
it mean but that He also first descended into the lower parts of the earth? He
who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He
might fill all things.) And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets,
some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints
for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ,
till we all come to the unity of the
faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the
measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; (Ephesians 4:3-13, NKJV).
Note here that Paul refers to the unity of the spirit first (Verse
3). Without the unity of the Spirit we will never realize the
unity of the faith (Verse 13).
Historically there have been many attempts at the unity of the faith that have
further fractured God's family. We have put the emphasis on the "five fold
ministries," on buildings, denominations and having the right church structure,
but not on the need of each first being one in the Spirit. Evidence of this is
clearly seen throughout our cities in the form of cathedrals, temples, and
church buildings, all built on some unifying doctrine or creed. The primary
focus of these institutions is on the unity of the faith, arriving at some
unified doctrinal statement of what they believe.
We are to be ONE in Spirit and thus bound together in peace. It is in the Spirit
that the Father and the Son are one. "The Spirit IS truth." In the mind of God,
our lives are a lie if we are not in His Spirit. Likewise we are to be one body
in that one Spirit. We all have a common hope, one hope in our callings. We are
to only have ONE Lord, one object of affection, and abide in ONE faith together.
The next one mentioned
above might stumble some of you. There is only ONE baptism. What?
Paul, are you nuts? There is the baptism of the spirit, there is baptism
by sprinkling, baptism by immersion, baptism in the name of Jesus only, baptism
in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, just to name a few.
Nope! There is only ONE baptism.
If we knew what baptism meant we would not have all this disunity over ONE
baptism. Baptism is an outward sign that we are dead to the world (kosmos system
of the devil), coming up out of the water alive only in Christ and His kingdom.
We are crucified to the world and the world is crucified unto us. We are ONE in
His kingdom alone. We are one in His death, burial and resurrection. We are
singly focused on that one domain and that one Lord in our lives. Where do all
these other "baptisms" come from that men boast in? They come from not having a
single vision, they come from the darkness within. Believe me, THIS
one baptism covers and includes all
the rest. Paul said it so well,
But God forbid
that I should boast except in the cross
of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to
the world. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision
avails anything, but a new creation. (Galatians 6:14-15, NKJV).
For as
the body is one and has many members, but
all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is
Christ. For by one Spirit we were all
baptized into one body--whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free--and
have all been made to drink into one Spirit. (1 Corinthians 12:12-13, NKJV).
You cannot get away from this theme of being ONE in Christ even as
He is ONE. The cross severs us from the world and the things of the world and
baptism is an outward sign of that. Our old man goes down into that watery grave
and a new man separated unto Jesus and His kingdom is raised up. Only in Christ
by His ONE Spirit can there be one body and true fellowship.
Insistence upon doctrine
or unity of creed is the primary reason that the family of God is so divided.
The belief that unity can and must be reached through human consensus is
responsible for the savagery of the inquisition. It creates an underlying sense
of self-righteousness that causes believers to bite and devour one another. Why
do we feel we must contend for "truth" even to the expense of truth, insatiably
driven by an inordinate desire to bring others into our viewpoint? This results
in a myriad of congregations, all gathered around their own unique versions of
"the truth." God has not appointed us to be anyone's inquisitor. All sheep
belong to the One Shepherd. We are all members of one body and Jesus is its
Head.
Years ago I (George) heard Campbell McAlpine tell his story of how
God dealt with this matter in his life. The Lord spoke to Campbell and told him
to fellowship with another brother who had a totally different doctrinal
perspective. He argued with God, even using the scriptures to make his point.
"You see Lord, it says right here in Amos 3:3,
Can two walk together, except they be agreed?"
Waiting for the Lord's response, and feeling certain that he had
convincingly made his point, Campbell rested his case. The Lord's response to
Campbell's overwhelming defense was, "I
disagree with you on a lot of things."
How can God walk
with us when we fall so short of his glory? How can God walk with us when we
refuse to meet each other on the grounds of Spirit unity, insisting upon man's
unity of faith? If we were to take an accounting today we would find, like
Campbell, that God disagrees with us on a good many things. So why do we
withhold from others the acceptance that God has so graciously extended to us?
Though we individually fall short of God's glory, we still expect perfection
from each other. We are not afraid of the truth. Forcing our opinions of "truth"
on each other as a condition of fellowship is what concerns us.
Most denominations have an elitist attitude, thinking that, "We
could all be in perfect agreement, if everyone in the world would just agree
with us. If everyone would just accept our creeds and doctrines, then we could
all be one."
Now let us look at God's means of unity from a slightly different angle.
Gathering or Scattering?
Another
important key to unity is the way we are gathered. What might appear to be
gathering from a human perspective may, in truth, be scattering in the eye of
God.
The Pharisees accused Jesus of casting out demons by the
power Beelzebul, the ruler of demons. Christ's response reveals a foundational
truth about unity in the family of God. Knowing their thoughts, Jesus said to
them, "Every kingdom that is divided against itself will be destroyed. And any
city or family that is divided against itself will not continue. And if Satan
forces himself out, then Satan is divided against himself, and his kingdom will
not continue." (Matthew 12:24-26, NCV)
In verse 30 of this same passage, Jesus applies this principle to
the kingdom of God and our participation in it. Revealing the ground of unity or
division in the Ekklesia, His Church.
"He who is not with me is against me, and
he who doesn't gather WITH ME, scatters."
Note that Jesus said, "He who doesn't gather WITH ME, scatters."
We might be gathering, but if we are not gathering WITH Christ, we are
not gathering at all but dividing, disjoining and scattering. The development of
denominationalism in the world today is viewed by many as gathering, but is it
really? Denominationalism is sectarianism, dividing the family of God into
isolated sects. This is not gathering. It is scattering! The proof of this is
the many denominations scattered throughout Christendom today, each holding
different "unifying" doctrines that are used like wedges to divide each from the
other. The real question is, are we gathering WITH Christ? If we are gathering
without Him, we are scattering. If we are gathering with Him, we can no longer
recognize many flocks of sheep with many shepherds but ONE fold with One
Shepherd. In Him we are of one Spirit.
What if all the denominations became one big denomination, wouldn't
that be wonderful? No matter how you add it up, 1 plus 1 plus 1 plus 1 plus 1
will never equal 1. It will always equal five! This kind of ecumenical math
simply does not add up. In this ecumenical unity you have many people trying to
be united by the very thing that separates them, human organization.
If a group did manage to unite on these terms it, would not be long
before someone would once again come out of the larger "one" to start a more
perfect "one" of their own, "The Reformed
Ecumenical Church." This new church uses the very same means of
unification-- drafting creeds, special doctrines and bylaws to maintain their
oneness and their own charismatic leaders for men to follow. The coming out is
not the problem, but their means of unity
is, because it is not true unity, but scattering. The way they try to unite
themselves is the very thing that separates them from the rest of the believers
and the disunity continues. Like the mythical Hydra, every time you cut off one
head, two take its place. The math of God is 1+0+0+0+0=1. Only in the death of
our old natures and taking on the nature and Person of Jesus Christ will there
ever be any unity.
36 For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen. (Romans 11:36, NKJV).
There is as desperate cry in the heart of man to be
like God, yet to remain autonomous and separate from Him. This is
the very nature of the sin that precipitated man's fall. The serpent told Eve,
"If you eat of this tree you will be like God knowing both good and evil." This
also carries over into the visible church.
Jesus told Peter that as He who would build His church. Yet well meaning men and
women set out daily to do just that by their own strength.
Behind all these efforts to build Jesus' church are
what men think of as good works. Men and women encourage
good men to be their leaders.
They pool their best efforts to build a
good thing. Again, our ways are not God's ways and our thoughts are
not His thoughts.
Now behold, one
came and said to Him, "Good Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have
eternal life?" So He said to him, "Why do you call Me good? No one is good but
One, that is, God. But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments."
(Matthew 19:16-17, NKJV).
Many in this world want desperately to be "good" or at least
thought of as a "good" person. In and of ourselves, we cannot be
good. Jesus went so far as to say, "No
one is good but One, that is God." Yet man seeks to prove Him a liar with his
own goodness. Quoting the Old
Testament Paul wrote, "There is none righteous, no, not one; There is none who
understands; There is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; They
have together become unprofitable; There is none who does good, no, not one."
(Romans 3:10-12, NKJV).
We can never know goodness of and in ourselves. True goodness comes
not from within us and any goodness that comes through us is from God Himself.
All other goodness is from the wrong tree, the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil. Jesus tried to make
this plain to this Jewish ruler when He said, "Why do you call Me good? No one
is good but One, that is, God."
There's that word ONE again. All goodness comes from being
one in the Father. If we try to do
good works on our own, they are only dead works and a stench in God's nose. The
old man wants to be good, to be accepted and thought of as righteous and
upright. This is the source of empty religion which chokes out true faith in the
righteousness of Jesus Christ alone, the One source of our unity. All that is
done from this false idea of our own goodness stems from idolatry. We have
become our own idols and in so doing have rejected the atonement of Jesus as
well as the goodness of God. This is the spirit of antichrist at work within us.
Jesus did not claim to be good. How can we
dare to do so? How often we use that word
good in association with a mere man? He is a good man. She is a good mother.
He is a good brother. We have a good pastor. He is a good Bible teacher. Did you
know that this very word good comes
from the word God? None are gods, but
One. If we are not one with the Father, there is no goodness in us. It is a
spiritual law. If we look to
ourselves for the source of goodness, we are no longer ONE in Christ and the in
the end we will bite and devour one another for failing our expectations of
goodness.
My (Michael's) wife, Dorothy, grew up in a holiness church where everyone was
held to a legalistic standard of goodness. The women were not allowed to wear
makeup, and were encouraged to wear high-necked dresses. Movies and dances were
forbidden and never would one be found in a bar. Every time the church doors
were open, the faithful were expected to attend. These and many more observances
were expected of the people to make them "holy." Instead of unifying the
congregation, it made the ones who were not so successful in keeping the
standards afraid of the ones who were. It also caused many of the young people
like Dorothy to grow up with distorted ideas of God
For many years, even after getting free of this legalism, she saw God as
a huge man with a fly swatter, just waiting for us little flies to sit down
somewhere so He could squash us.
Andrew Murray wrote in his book, "Be Perfect,".
"The chief hindrance in the
way to obedience to this command ( "Be ye
perfect.") lies in our misapprehension of what religion is. Man was
created simply to live for God, to show forth His glory, by allowing God to show
how completely He could reveal His likeness and blessedness in man. God lives
for man; longing in the greatness of His love to communicate His goodness and
His love.
"It was to this life, lost by
sin, Christ came to redeem us back. The selfishness of the human heart looks
upon salvation as simply the escape from hell, with so much of holiness as is
needful to make our happiness secure. Christ meant us to be restored to the
state from which we had fallen--the whole heart, the whole will, the whole life
given up to the glory and service of God. To be wholly given up to God, to be
perfect with the Lord our God, lies at the very root, is the very essence of
true religion. The enthusiastic devotion of the whole heart to God is what is
asked of us."
Again it is not in our doing the works, but in our yielding to His Spirit as He
conforms us into the image of Christ and it is from there that all good works
come. Jesus said, "Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of
itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me."
The Root of All Temptation
What is the root of all temptation? What was the nature of Jesus' temptation in
the wilderness? Was it not to act in some way on His own, to commit an act that
He did not see the Father doing? Was He not tempted to do some work that would
be solely self-gratifying? Yes. That is where the enemy always focuses his
attack. All sin is summed up in these three motives, the lust of the flesh, the
lust of the eyes and the pride of life. If we are One in the Father as Jesus is
ONE in the Father, the Prince of this world can come, but he will find NOTHING
in us… no handles he can use to throw us.
If Jesus had been concerned with temporal things, as carnal man is, He would
have seen the temptation in the wilderness as an opportunity to "get a piece of
the rock." He was offered a chance at free food for His starving belly, and an
opportunity to prove to Jerusalem's religious community that He was the Messiah
by doing a miracle in front of them (jumping from the pentacle of the temple).
Finally that serpent offered Him the nations of the world if He would just bow
down and worship him.
Jesus saw Himself in the Father, not in Himself. All that He could have or had
or ever will have was in the Father, not in the enemy of our souls. Of Him John
wrote:
In the beginning
was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the
beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing
was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
(John 1:1-4, NKJV).
Again we see that single eye of Christ, unity with the Father in
all things past, present and future. Because of His single eye, the whole Body
of Christ can now be filled with Light. "In Him was life and the LIFE was the
light of men." It is His Life in unity with the Father that gives men LIGHT.
God allowed Jesus to be tempted by the serpent because He had to be
tempted in every way just like us, yet be without sin to be that true
propitiation for our sins. Satan is just a tool. He tests and refines us for
God's good pleasure. The Spirit of God, not Satan, led Jesus into the wilderness
to be tempted. In turn, Jesus led the way for us to become sons of God.
The opposite of good is evil, and the opposite of life is death. The forbidden
tree in the Genesis account gave Adam and Eve a choice, but the tree of life did
not. It was the tree of Life, not the tree of Life and Death. Everything in the
created universe has an opposite, light --darkness, male--female, in--out,
black--white, wet--dry, good--evil. But here we have a tree that stands alone,
the tree of Life. God was saying, "Choose Life!" The devil was saying, "Use your
free will, choose death."
Our learned teachers tell us that we have a
free will to choose what is good and what is evil, but that is the
state of fallen man. Jesus walked a different life before us. He lived as if
there was only one choice before Him. He always chose the will of the Father of
life. Jesus shows us the way to
true unity. We can never be one as long as we see ourselves as righteous.
"There is but one
that is good, and that is God." This was true when God had as yet created
nothing; and this truth has not changed after He has created innumerable hosts
of blessed and holy heavenly beings. Therefore, any goodness in the creature can
be nothing but the one goodness of
God manifesting a birth and discovery of itself as the created nature is fitted
to receive it. No creature could produce of itself that which is good and
blessed any more than it could create itself. "The heavens," said David,
"declare the glory of God"; and no creature, any more than the heavens can
declare any other glory. As well might it be said that the firmament shows forth
its own handiwork, as that any man shows forth his own goodness.
The Spirit of the
triune God, breathed into Adam at his creation, was that alone which made him a
holy creature in the image and likeness of God. A new birth of this Spirit of
God in man is as necessary to make fallen man alive again
unto God as it was to make Adam at the first in the image and likeness of
God. And a constant flow of this divine life y the Spirit is as necessary to
man's continuance in his redeemed state as light and moister are to the
continued life of a plant. A
religion that is not wholly build upon the supernatural ground, but which stands
to any degree upon human powers, reasonings, and conclusions, has not so much as
the shadow of truth in it. Such religion leaves man with mere empty forms and
images that can no more restore divine life to his soul than an idol of clay or
wood could create another Adam.
The scribes and Pharisees dragged a woman before Jesus whom they
said was caught in the act of adultery. They were trying to force Jesus to make
a choice between good and evil, between life and death, condemning her for her
sin. They said, "Now Moses, in the law, commanded us that such should be stoned.
But what do You say?"
Did Jesus answer like a self-righteous Jew? "By all means then, we
must stone her!" They could have killed Him if He spoke out against the law to
save her. No, He did not condemn her to save His own neck. In fact he did not
say anything. He just wrote in the dirt while the life of this woman and His own
life hung in the balance.
When Jesus finally spoke, His answer was from the Father. He did
not answer them according to good or evil, but according to life. When He
finally spoke He said, "He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone
at her first." Now He had THEM over the barrel. If just one of them threw a
stone at her, he would have been making the law of Moses a lie and would have
become subject to being stoned himself by saying that he was sinless. The law
condemns all men under sin as sinners and the Jews knew it.
Jesus answered them according to the principle of life . . .
Then those who
heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning
with the oldest even to the last. And Jesus was left alone, and the woman
standing in the midst. When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the
woman, He said to her, "Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one
condemned you?" She said, "No one, Lord." And Jesus said to her, "Neither do I
condemn you; go and sin no more." (John 8:9-11, NKJV).
He did not condemn her, but offered her a chance at a new life free
of sin. Just as Jesus once said thousands of years earlier, "Let there be
light," and there was light, When He said, "Go and sin no more," He gave her new
life and grace to not sin and to never again fall prey to adultery. He gave her
a new life and a new heart. The Pharisees and scribes could only offer her
death, but Jesus, the Tree of Life, gave her life more abundantly.
There is a rich lesson to be learned here in John chapter eight by
us all. Will we choose life or will we choose the tree of death with one
another? Daily, in the way we treat one another, we are showing just who is our
father. Jesus told these self-righteous Jewish leaders that they were of their
father the devil, who was a liar and a murder from the beginning. We live a lie
as we hide behind the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in our
self-righteous robes and fig leaves of religion. We are guilty of murder in our
hearts as we hate those who do not live up to our religious standards of good
and evil and refuse to live by our rules. Because of our clinging to this tree
instead of the tree of life we are constantly either excusing ourselves, "I am a
good Christian," or accusing others, "They are evil sinners." If we are ever to
be free of sin and be one with the Father and with each other, we must instead
choose life and walk in His grace. The letter of the law kills, but the Spirit
gives life. A serpent hangs out in the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,
but Jesus is the Tree of Life.
We encourage each of you to have a single eye, keeping it fixed on
Jesus alone. As long as we continue to compare ourselves among each other,
whether saint or sinner, we are in the enemy's trap and we will never be one.
Jesus Christ is our one true measure and standard of life. Look only to Him.
". . . let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." (Hebrews 12:1-2, NKJV).
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