JESUS THE CHRISTMAS GIFT
22/12/24 09:49
Adam and Eve were seduced out of union with God on the lie of self - improvement. Esau Denied himself the birth-right in exchange for a pot of soup. The unprofitable servant buried his inheritance in the ground because he clung to the law and defined his portion in the incarnation as something and nothing. The paddock of rich, red volcanic soil became a weed patch of stones and rocks because the owner would not sow into the deep soil of oneness with Christ. The result is weeds and rocks where there could have been the Kingdom of God.
GOSPEL OF THE KINDOM
There is a gospel that is good news and excellent in effect, because it is extravagant life as Christ our life. It causes us to flourish as sons because it roots us in the being of our Father on account of our belief in His Son. Our treasure that is Christ is not a god-way of doing religion. It’s the God Way of being the expression of Christ as Dave and Sue.
NOT YOUR EVERYDAY RELIGION
This Gospel of the Kingdom is so radical and exquisite that it defies rationalism and religiosity. “So new, so unheard of, so unexpected in this world is the power of God unto salvation, that it can appear among us, be received and understood by us, only as contradiction. The Gospel does not expound or recommend itself. It does not negotiate or plead, threaten, or make promises, it withdraws itself always when it is not listened to for its own sake. 'Faith directs itself towards the things that are invisible. Indeed, only when that which is believed on is hidden, can it provide an opportunity for faith. And moreover, those things are most deeply hidden which most clearly contradict the obvious experience of the senses.” (1)
ANTI-KNOWLEDGE TREE
The gospel of the Kingdom and teaching of the apostles is all that the knowledge of good and evil is not. It is spirit although it comes in our flesh. It is holistic because it is Christ in us and as us. It is the effect of union with God whereas law-based holiness is the attempt to achieve union with God in separation from God. The Gospel of the Kingdom as Christ our life is the undoing of the lie that we can be as God in separation from God. It’s the truth that we are one with God in the person of Jesus Christ. We can live incarnated or we can leave it in the ground.
Christ our life is the antidote to a variety of Christianity deformed into a version of the knowledge of good and evil. Eating Christ by living the incarnation is the living way of being alive in Christ instead of dead in Adam.
(1) Karl Barth, The Epistle to the Romans, p. 39.