JESUS IS GOD AND THE EXPRESSION OF OUR FATHER
13/08/24 09:09
A pastor’s wife asked in staff worship, ‘But what is God like.’ I was puzzled because I thought everyone had read, ‘If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.’ Nevertheless, there is a strand of thought in some communities in which Jesus is believed to be less than God and of a lower level than the Father. But this is not so. If it were, the salvation offered in Jesus would be nullified.
SIGNS
Signs and miracles demonstrated the authenticity of Jesus Christ as the Messiah. The ultimate sign was His resurrection from the dead. Jesus declared Himself the Way to God, the truth of God and the life of God because He is God. As part of the trinity, He was/is the human face of God among us, bringing the communion of the trinity, the oneness of God in perichoresis to us and making us part of this oneness. The at-one-ment and the incarnation end adamic separation and make us one with God in similar fashion to God’s oneness with Himself. ‘Participating in the divine nature’ is of similar quality to the trinity’s participation in each other. In this we are one with God and most truly ourselves. Our holiness begins in our living in what we have been given: Union with God.
OUR FOUNDATION
Jesus Christ is really God and we are truly sons of God in Jesus Christ. We are made one with God in Christ.
Jesus prayed, ‘I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity’ John 17.2-22 NIV. Note that oneness for us is derived from the oneness of the trinity.
NON-DUALISTIC UNION WITH GOD
Jesus urged, ‘On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you’ John 14.20 NIV. This is the day we are born from Adam’s separation from God into Jesus’ union with God. Christ becomes our life and we as sons become a manifestation of our Father.
God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. What we have written above is this reconciliation. That which Jesus prayed for is achieved in Him. Enjoyment of the oneness with God depends on our agreement with Jesus that we are now one with His life.
COMES FROM CHRIST
Oneness with God does not come to us from the gifts or from signs. Nor is oneness ours from the anointing. Oneness is ours from the atonement of the cross and the incarnation of the fullness of God in our being. With the end of separation in Jesus Christ, God is both in us and with us. Oneness is ours on account of the successful enterprise of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
JESUS OUR GRACE AND SANCTIFICATION
Jesus sanctified His person and His life by accomplishing all that Father gave Him to do, so that we may be sanctified with Him as our life. ‘For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified’ (John 17.19) Because Jesus is our life, we are graced/sanctified in His person by allowing ourselves to be drawn into the oneness that is His in His trinitarian communion.
WE LIVE AS A MANIFESTATION OF CHRIST
The fruits of the Spirit are the result of Christ our life. Who we are in Christ becomes who we are in everyday living. We are crucified with Christ, nevertheless we live because Christ lives in us to be expressed as us.
We need to understand that our status in Christ is the result of the finished work of Christ. Separation is finished. Our oneness is forever unless we are obtuse enough to deny it. Even then our erratic attempts at holiness and our many failed resolves to do better are not what our union with God depends on. Our oneness with God is found in the objective fact of Christs oneness with God and His oneness with you.
Thomas Torrance observes that, “So far as our belief in the Holy Spirit is concerned, it is also clear that unless there is an unbroken continuity of presence and activity between the Holy Spirit and God, then in the last analysis the Holy Spirit and all his manifold operations can have no saving significance for us.” (1)
This is who the Spirit is for us in Jesus Christ and Father God. Jesus is fully God. He is the absolute expression of Himself as the I AM OF GOD and as the human being, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus is neither a representation of the law or a clothesline on which to hang all the possibilities of virtue in the universe. He is simply love, light and light as the Son of God who lives in you and imparts Himself to you. The unbroken continuity between Jesus and the God-head is your unbroken continuity as a person and a son/daughter. This is how Christ is our life.
SIGNS
Signs and miracles demonstrated the authenticity of Jesus Christ as the Messiah. The ultimate sign was His resurrection from the dead. Jesus declared Himself the Way to God, the truth of God and the life of God because He is God. As part of the trinity, He was/is the human face of God among us, bringing the communion of the trinity, the oneness of God in perichoresis to us and making us part of this oneness. The at-one-ment and the incarnation end adamic separation and make us one with God in similar fashion to God’s oneness with Himself. ‘Participating in the divine nature’ is of similar quality to the trinity’s participation in each other. In this we are one with God and most truly ourselves. Our holiness begins in our living in what we have been given: Union with God.
OUR FOUNDATION
Jesus Christ is really God and we are truly sons of God in Jesus Christ. We are made one with God in Christ.
Jesus prayed, ‘I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity’ John 17.2-22 NIV. Note that oneness for us is derived from the oneness of the trinity.
NON-DUALISTIC UNION WITH GOD
Jesus urged, ‘On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you’ John 14.20 NIV. This is the day we are born from Adam’s separation from God into Jesus’ union with God. Christ becomes our life and we as sons become a manifestation of our Father.
God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. What we have written above is this reconciliation. That which Jesus prayed for is achieved in Him. Enjoyment of the oneness with God depends on our agreement with Jesus that we are now one with His life.
COMES FROM CHRIST
Oneness with God does not come to us from the gifts or from signs. Nor is oneness ours from the anointing. Oneness is ours from the atonement of the cross and the incarnation of the fullness of God in our being. With the end of separation in Jesus Christ, God is both in us and with us. Oneness is ours on account of the successful enterprise of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
JESUS OUR GRACE AND SANCTIFICATION
Jesus sanctified His person and His life by accomplishing all that Father gave Him to do, so that we may be sanctified with Him as our life. ‘For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified’ (John 17.19) Because Jesus is our life, we are graced/sanctified in His person by allowing ourselves to be drawn into the oneness that is His in His trinitarian communion.
WE LIVE AS A MANIFESTATION OF CHRIST
The fruits of the Spirit are the result of Christ our life. Who we are in Christ becomes who we are in everyday living. We are crucified with Christ, nevertheless we live because Christ lives in us to be expressed as us.
We need to understand that our status in Christ is the result of the finished work of Christ. Separation is finished. Our oneness is forever unless we are obtuse enough to deny it. Even then our erratic attempts at holiness and our many failed resolves to do better are not what our union with God depends on. Our oneness with God is found in the objective fact of Christs oneness with God and His oneness with you.
Thomas Torrance observes that, “So far as our belief in the Holy Spirit is concerned, it is also clear that unless there is an unbroken continuity of presence and activity between the Holy Spirit and God, then in the last analysis the Holy Spirit and all his manifold operations can have no saving significance for us.” (1)
This is who the Spirit is for us in Jesus Christ and Father God. Jesus is fully God. He is the absolute expression of Himself as the I AM OF GOD and as the human being, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus is neither a representation of the law or a clothesline on which to hang all the possibilities of virtue in the universe. He is simply love, light and light as the Son of God who lives in you and imparts Himself to you. The unbroken continuity between Jesus and the God-head is your unbroken continuity as a person and a son/daughter. This is how Christ is our life.
