August 25, 2017
Because I was working on the contemplation How We Experience God (beginning with Adam and Eve), I was just systematically reading the book of Genesis. I read that immediately after the flood God had compassion upon mankind, knowing that “the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth” (8:21).He again gave man dominion over all the rest of creation and even gave him permission to eat meat (9:2-3).
I continued to read until I reached chapter 11 which is the story of the tower of Babel which the descendants of Noah planned to build to “reach unto heaven,” making a name for themselves “lest [they] be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth” (v 4). These words jumped off the page:
6 And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.
Having just written the contemplation Perfect in One, this really caught my attention. If people whose hearts are “evil” have this much power to commit evil because they are aware that they are “one” in language only, how much more do we who have a “new heart” and the awareness that we are one in Spirit not only with one another but also with God—how much more power do we have to do that which is good, to do the works that Jesus did (John 14:12) and “turn the world upside down” as did the disciples of Jesus (Acts 17:6).
Jesus prayed in John 17 that we would understand that we are one with our Father and with one another just as He understood it. This is what enabled Him in His descended state of humanity to do the works that He did. Both Jesus and Paul told us repeatedly what we could experience if we had this revelation:
John 17:21 That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. . . . 23 I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.
Isn’t that the “good” that we want most to do—to convince the “world” to believe the gospel? It is only through walking in the revelation of our being one with God and with one another that this is going to happen.
Ephesians 3:20 Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,
That “power” works in us when we are “one,” a power so great that “nothing will be restrained from us, which we have imagined to do” (Genesis 11:6).
The ONLY reason the world has not believed is that believers are not “one,” even to the extent that the descendants of Noah were. The followers of Christ have spent the past 2,000 years arguing over interpretations of scripture and doctrinal issues rather than loving God and one another, causing division amongst themselves rather than allowing Jesus’ prayer to be fulfilled in their individual lives.
We judge, criticize and condemn others for not seeing things as we do, completely ignoring all the admonitions to bless, pray for, forgive and live in peace with one another. We have thought that we could frighten people into believing, not realizing that they must be presented with a God who is loving, not judging, them with a perfect love that will cast out all their fears (1John 4:18) and cause them to be eager to believe.
In Romans 1 Paul talks about all the people we are attempting to reach with the “gospel of Christ” (v 16), those whose “foolish hearts” are “darkened” (v 21), those with “reprobate minds” (v 28), those homosexuals who “against nature” “burn in their lust toward one another” (v 27), those who are
V 29 . . . filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, 30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, 31 Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful: 32 Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.
We go about judging and condemning them, pronouncing upon them the “judgment of God,” telling them that they are going to spend an eternity in hell if they don’t repent of their sins and receive Jesus as their personal savior.
And we wonder why so few respond to our message. Yes, there are multiplied millions of people who call themselves “Christians” because they have done whatever the particular group who “evangelized” them said was necessary to insure their place in heaven when they die. But when we observe people’s lives, it is oftentimes not easy to distinguish between the Christians and the non-Christians. Christians have as many relational problems, have as much debt, take as many anti-depressants, get divorced as often, have as many illnesses (both mental and physical) as do non-Christians—and are definitely more self-righteous and judgmental than they.
Paul tells us why this is so. We are condemning others for what we are guilty of ourselves (Romans 2:1-3). We think that we are doing “good,” but the truth is that “there is none that doeth good, no, not one” (Romans 3:12). What we are doing may look better than what another is doing, but Jesus said:
Luke 18:19 . . . Why callest thou me good? none is good, save one, that is, God.
No humanity is “good,” not even the humanity of Jesus which was “made of a woman, made under the law” (Galatians 4:4). We’ve tried desperately to be “good” by keeping whatever set of laws we ascribe to, but just find ourselves “cursed” in the attempt. Paul spends the entire letter to the Romans (as well as many of his other letters) showing us that God has freely given to every man HIS “goodness” or righteousness. More to the point, we already had God’s “goodness” before the law. We were made in His “image and likeness” (Genesis 1:26) and declared by God to be “very good” (v 31).
Romans 7:9 For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.
Romans 5:13 (For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law.
Romans 7:5 (NIV) For when we were in the realm of the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in us, so that we bore fruit for death.
Romans 4:15 Because the law worketh wrath: for where no law is, there is no transgression.
Rom. 3:20 Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.
In Genesis 1 God told us that “every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food” (v 29 NIV).
There was no law. I was alive. But then in Genesis 2 “the commandment came” and “I died” (Romans 7:9). The commandment came from the “law god” Yahweh (see Elohim or Yahweh) that I conceived God to be:
Genesis 2:16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: 17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
Yes, as Paul says, that “law” aroused the “sinful passions” which “bore fruit for death” (Romans 7:5). I did eat of that “tree of the knowledge of good and evil” and “surely” died.
But the good news of the “gospel of Christ” (Romans 1:16) is
1 Corinthians 15:22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
Romans 11:32 For God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all.
The emphasis is on the word “all.” It is we, not God, who make the distinctions. God is no respecter of persons; he lets his rain fall on all—the “just” and the “unjust”—or those who classify themselves thusly. It is the law that forces us to make the distinctions between “good” and “evil,” “saved” and “unsaved.” David said it well:
Psalm 139:7 Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? 8 If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. 9 If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; 10 Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. 11 If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. 12 Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.
No wonder he was called the man “after God’s own heart”! We can’t get away from God—no one can:
Acts 17:28 For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.
And Paul was speaking to unbelievers worshiping “the unknown God” (v 23) when he made this statement! For, as Paul says on another occasion, there is but
Ephesians 4:6 One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.
That is the “true God” that Jesus so earnestly prayed in John 17 that we would know. He prayed that we would know that we are one with Him and with one another. (John 17:21 That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. . . . 23. . . .and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.)
Knowing that is the only means by which we will be able to fulfill all Scripture—by loving God and one another. It’s not difficult to love my brother when I know I am one with him. I will understand that when I judge and condemn him I am judging and condemning myself—just as Paul said:
Romans 2:1 Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things.
It is the sense of separation from God and my brother that gives rise to the law which we place upon ourselves and upon one another, the law which causes us to think ourselves better than our brother because we think we keep that law better than he does. We think we are “a guide to the blind, a light of them which are in darkness” (Romans 2:19), but we are “the blind” attempting to lead the blind (Matthew 15:14). Jesus said that our “sin remaineth” until we recognize our own blindness (John 9:41). We cannot love our brothers as we (and they) have been loved by God until we know that we are one with them (no matter what their “sin”):
Hebrews 2:11 For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren,
Our walking in this revelation (of our being one with God and with one another) is the ONLY way the world is going to believe the gospel of Christ (see Perfect in One), the gospel that says that they can never be separated from God’s love. We have tried evangelizing by using the law (with all its distinctions) and have only succeeded in making our “proselytes” “twofold more the child of hell than ourselves” (Matthew 23:15).
Now if we come with the message of “the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations” “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:26-27), the message that Christ is the life of every man, that we are all one in Him, there will be no “restraining” us:
Genesis 1:6 And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, . . . and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.
It won’t be the “imaginations of our evil hearts” (Genesis 8:21) as it was with the descendants of Noah who were building the tower of Babel. It will be “immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us” (Ephesians 3:20), His power that will be released without restraint that this “hope of glory” can be realized in every man as
Habakkuk 2:14 . . .the earth [is] filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.