The Cross - Our Way of Life (7)

 

 

“Jesus, crying out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.” Having said this, He breathed His last” (Luke 23:46).

 

We see fellowship restored, our High Priest has offered Himself (Hebrews 9:11 – 10:14), He is both Priest and Sacrifice. We cannot see what transpired when darkness covered the land, but we can see fellowship restored, for the Father has accepted the offering of the Son. Let us always be clear, that on the Cross Jesus was the perfect and complete sacrifice and reconciler, that “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them” (2 Cor. 5:19).

 

“He [God] made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, so that we might be the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Cor. 5:21). O dear friends, there has never been anything written as precious as this, never anything that so communicates the mystery of the Cross and those dreadful hours when holy darkness covered the land, never anything that comes so close to communicating, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”

 

To think that “while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son” (Rom. 5:10). To think that “having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life”! (Rom. 5:10).

 

O dear, dear friends, the love of God is overwhelming in its depth, its vastness, its Nature…no wonder Paul writes that he desires us to “know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God” (Eph. 3:19).

 

One day you and I will breathe our last. We do not know where we will be, we don’t know the day, we cannot discern the circumstance, we don’t know if the experience will be sudden or prolonged. We don’t know if we will be with friends and family.

 

But we do know two things. We will not be alone, for our Father and Lord Jesus will be with us, as will the blessed Holy Spirit. We also know that we can say, “Father, into Your hands I commit my spirit.”

 

We know this because of God’s Nature, His character (if we can use such a word), His Essence. We know this because Jesus is our perfect and eternal High Priest. We know this because God is love (1 John 4:16).

 

When Jesus says, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit,” He says this not just on His own behalf, but He speaks for us all; He speaks with assurance of His Father’s love so that you and I may speak with assurance of our Father’s love. Does Jesus not teach us to pray, “Our Father”?

 

Paul writes that “We groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven…so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life…Now He who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the Spirit as a pledge” (2 Cor. 5:1 – 5). In other words, we long for that moment when we too will say, “Father, into Your hands I commit my spirit.”

 

As our lives move deeper and deeper into intimacy with God, we sense what Paul was feeling when he wrote, “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain…having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for that is very much better” (Phil. 1:21 – 24).

 

Let us not think that we can be so heavenly minded that we are of no earthly good, this is foolishness. It is only as we are heavenly minded that we can be of true earthly good, for this world desperately needs to see heaven, to taste heaven, to sense heaven – which is all to experience Jesus. We are citizens of heaven (Phil. 3:20), and as citizens of heaven we are called to live. We are children of another world, and as the children of our Father we are to live and we are to die, and dying is but a portal into our eternal home and glorious destiny.

 

One day the Spirit of our Father will call us home; whenever that day is, wherever we may be, whatever the circumstance, it will be a glorious call from the One who loves us beyond measure, from the One who desires us to be with Him and with our brothers and sisters, from the One who has prepared both individual and collective destinies for us – and we will see the Lamb and be enveloped in His glory and love and peace and joy, and every tear will be wiped from our eyes, and there will no longer be any pain…NO PAIN! O hallelujah!

 

And the Name of our God will be written on us, and the Name of the Lamb, and the Name of the Holy City…and O dear friends…O dear dear friends…and we will see His Face! O my, O my, O my…we…you and I…we will see His Face.

 

Now I ask you, how can we not look forward to that day? How can we not long for that glorious day?

 

When Jesus said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit,” He said it for Himself, He said it for you, He said it for me, He said it for us.

 

Let this be our daily prayer of consecration, and our daily prayer of expectation…yes?

 

“Father, into Your hands I commit my spirit.”

 

AMEN.

The Cross - Our Way of Life (6)

 

“It is finished!”

 

“And He bowed His head and gave up His spirit.” (John 19:30).

 

This is, my friends, the watershed of the cosmos, of the ages, of our lives. Before these holy words, before this eternal declaration, this triumphal cry, was proclaimed on earth and in the heavens, you and I had no hope, no ray of sunshine, no possibility of returning to our Father, no remedy for sin and death and wickedness, no expectation that the Sun would arise over the horizon of eternity’s ocean and bring light and life and warmth to our cold dead souls.

 

But now we have the assurance that Jesus Christ has accomplished all on the Cross for us, for His Father; that a holy offering and transaction and healing and redemption has occurred that is beyond our comprehension, but not beyond our experience. Indeed, we are all invited into the experience, into knowing the love of God, the life of God, the mercy and grace of God, the joy of God, the peace of God in Jesus Christ. A Table has been spread and we are invited to live by the Bread of God, the Blood (Life) of God, the essence of God in God the Son, Jesus Christ (John 6:26 – 69).

 

“By this will, we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all time. Every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins; but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time onward until His enemies are made a footstool for His feet. For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified” (Hebrews 10:10 – 14, NASB).

 

“And the Holy Spirit also testifies to us; for after saying, “This is the covenant which I will make with them after those days, declares the Lord: I will put My laws upon their hearts, and write them on their mind,” He then says, “And their sins and their lawless deeds I will no longer remember.”

 

“Now where there is forgiveness of these things, an offering for sin is no longer required. (Hebrews 10:15 – 18).

 

Do we believe these words, dear friends? Do we believe that Jesus has done all that can be done? Do we believe that Jesus IS all that can be done? Do we believe that we can add nothing to Jesus Christ, nothing to His Person, nothing to His work?

 

Do we realize that “the one who has entered His [God’s} rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His” (Heb. 4:10)?

 

Did not Jesus constantly violate religious notions of the Sabbath in order to demonstrate that He is the true Sabbath? Jesus is our true and lasting rest.

 

Perhaps He challenges us in our own sabbaths? Might it be that most of us have practices or beliefs that we think make us more righteous than those who don’t have those beliefs or engage in those practices? Is it not possible that our distinctive beliefs and practices are sources from which we derive self-righteousness, thinking that God has bestowed a special righteousness on us because of our distinctives?

 

Naturally we would teach against any such notion (or maybe we wouldn’t), which would make the notion all the more dangerous, much like the person who rejoices in his humility.

 

O how I love Paul’s statement that “while we were without strength [while we were helpless!], at the right time Christ died for the ungodly” (Rom. 5:6). We could not help ourselves dear friends; we could not help ourselves then and we cannot help ourselves now – we must trust Jesus Christ for everything. Our righteousness, sanctification, redemption, and wisdom are all found in Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 1:30; Col. 2:1 – 3).

 

We look to the Christ of the Cross and the Cross of Christ for our source of life, our assurance, the ground of our being. Life flows from the Cross, forgiveness streams from the Cross, our old identity is killed on the Cross and we are clothed with the New Person of Jesus Christ (Romans 6; 2 Cor. 5:14 – 21; Gal. 2:20).

 

Our merciful and faithful High Priest is both our priest and sacrifice and His self-offering is completed and perfect – perfecting us in Himself – accepted by the Father, ushering in the “new and living way” into the Holy of Holies, into the koinonia of the Trinity (Heb. 10:19 – 25; John 17).

 

“Come to Me, all 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. For My yoke is comfortable, and My burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28 – 30).

 

O dear friends, Jesus says to us, “I have done it all. I have paid the price for your sins. I have taken your sinful self into my holy Self and bestowed Myself on yourself to give you a new self, a new identity in Me. I have completed all for you because My Father and I love you and we are bringing you Home to where you belong – in relationship with Us; come Home My daughter, come Home My son, come Home my child.”

 

Is this not a good Day to come Home to Jesus?

 

Is it not a good Day to bring others along with us?

 

 

 

 

The Cross - Our Way of Life (5)

 

 

“One of the criminals who were hanged there was hurling abuse at Him, saying, “Are You not the Christ? Save Yourself and us!” But the other responded, and rebuking him, said, “Do you not even fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed are suffering justly, for we are receiving what we deserve for our crimes; but this Man has done nothing wrong.” And he was saying, “Jesus, remember me when You come into Your kingdom!” And He said to him, “Truly I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.”” (Luke 23:39 – 43, NASB).

 

“The robbers who had been crucified with Him were also insulting Him with the same words” (Matthew 27:44).

 

Consider the plea, “Jesus, remember me!”

 

Matthew tells us how this robber began, Luke tells us the rest of the story.

 

How can a person have the presence of mind, the clarity of heart and soul, in the midst of crucifixion, while spewing vitriol at Jesus, to realize that Jesus is more than a man, and yet a man – for He is being crucified? As life is ebbing and breath is ceasing and the end is near and the heart is approaching its last beat, how does this man, this robber, this person who has practiced evil, how is it possible for him to “see” Jesus the Christ and call out, “Jesus, remember me”?

 

Perhaps there was no presence of mind or clarity of heart and soul, perhaps there was only a recognition in the core of this man’s being that His Creator was dying alongside him…or at the very least, a recognition that Something or Someone other than humanity as he had known it was suffering as he, the robber was suffering. But not exactly as he, the robber was suffering, for the robber “saw” someway, somehow, that Jesus “had done nothing wrong.”

 

This man, the robber, who made the plea “Remember me!” also said to the other robber, “Do you not even fear God?”

 

God had arrived on Golgotha, God was suffering and God was convicting and God was continuing to save others even as He chose to not save Himself. Yes, and God was showing mercy, “Today you shall be with Me in Paradise.”

 

The Roman soldiers will not be with Him. The crowds will not be with Him. The religious leaders who are preparing to celebrate Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread will not be with Him; but this thief suffering a shameful and horrendous death will indeed be with Him. This thief crucified in shame will soon know the holy clothing of the white linen of the very righteousness of the Son of God.

 

Since we know that Jesus died before the two thieves died (John 19:31 – 33), we can imagine Jesus welcoming the repentant man on the other side of death, and what a welcome it must have been! There must have been quite the hug, close and tight…and not a few kisses!

 

Christ meets us in our extremities, He speaks to us in the depths of our beings, He calls us to Himself in myriad ways in infinite circumstances. We may be in the midst of our daily occupations, such as the four fishermen; we may be at our accounting ledgers, such as Matthew the tax collector; we may be immersed in a political movement, such as Simon the Zealot…or we may be, we just may be, experiencing our own and upfront and personal crucifixion…but Jesus is there and He is there for us.

 

And here we see that, as with ancient Israel, we need only look to Jesus and be saved (John 3:14 – 15; Numbers 21:6 – 9).

 

But now my friends, let us look to Jesus and His calling in our own lives, for His Resurrection message is that “Even as the Father sent Me, so I send you” (John 20:21; 17:18).

 

If we are called to know Him in the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His suffering (Phil. 3:10), then we can anticipate the glorious opportunity not only to say with Jesus, “Father forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing,” but we can also look forward to serving those opposing us, persecuting us, taking pleasure in our sufferings (Matthew 5:43 – 48), and bringing them into the Kingdom of God in Christ so that they too  may be clothed in the white linen of the righteousness of Jesus Christ.

 

All of us are on one of the crosses of Golgotha, some of us know what it is to be on two of the crosses.

 

Some begin on the cross of mocking God and remain on it, dying on it. Those who are not on the cross of mocking and unrepentance are on the cross which cries, “Jesus, remember me!”

 

Do we recognize that our cry is a gift which God has given us through Jesus? Do we acknowledge that our cry is not of ourselves? Not of our intellect, our will, our imagination, but rather of God? (John 1:12 – 13). This raw cry is God’s gift of salvation, akin to the cry of the father pleading for his son, “Lord, I believe, help my unbelief!” (Mk. 9:24).

 

O dear friends, there is an eternal transaction in the gut, in the depths of the soul, an indefinable and unexplainable bursting forth of life from the tomb within us, a coming forth of the image of God in Christ, that confesses, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God!” (Matt. 16:16).

 

“Lo, now You are speaking plainly” (John 16:29).

 

But here is the thing dear friends, the plain cannot be explained. We cannot explain love. We cannot explain joy. We cannot explain peace. We cannot explain this “thing” that happens within a woman, a man, a child when that person cries, “You are the Christ!” “Jesus, remember me!”

 

O dear pastors, remember this when Easter arrives – evidence may have a supporting role, but evidence without the appearance of Christ is evidence presented in a moot court.

 

Then there are those who know what it is to hang on two crosses on Golgotha. They begin on the cross of repentance, then in Christ they move to the Cross of the Intercessory Life, Life lived for Christ and others. As Paul writes, “Death works in us, but life in you.”

 

We learn to participate with Christ in His sufferings for the reconciliation of others (Col. 1:24; 2 Cor. 5:16 – 21). We learn to pray, “Father forgive them, for they don’t realize what they are doing.” We learn to say, “Today, you will be with Jesus in Paradise.”

 

“I have been crucified with Christ; and 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 the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me” (Galatians 2:20).

 

As St. Augustine taught, as with the Head, so with the Body.

 

Shall we live as His Body today?

 

The Cross – Our Way of Life (4)

 

“Jesus, knowing that all things had already been accomplished, to fulfill Scripture, said, “I am thirsty.” A jar full of sour wine vinegar was standing there; so they put a sponge full of the sour wine vinegar upon a branch of hyssop and brought it up to His mouth” (John 19:28 – 29).

 

In Matthew (27:48) and Mark (15:36) the sour wine vinegar is associated with Jesus’ cry of “My God! My God! Why have You forsaken Me?”

 

It was only the night before that Jesus was sharing the cup of the wine of the New Covenant with His disciples. He has gone from the intimacy of the Upper Room to the open shame of the Cross. The hands with which He broke the bread at the Table are now nailed to the Cross. Instead of lifting a cup of wine to His mouth at the Table, a sponge with vinegar is forced upward onto His lips.

 

Jesus inaugurates His ministry with the sign of turning water into fine wine. Jesus concludes His ministry with wine vinegar. Jesus gives fine wine to others; He receives sharp wine vinegar for Himself.

 

Jesus gives the woman at the well living water so that she will never thirst again. Jesus suffers thirst on the Cross.

 

Jesus clothes us with God’s righteousness, while His own body is stripped bear. Jesus is wounded so that our wounds might be healed. Jesus wears the crown of thorns that Adam and his race have woven, so that we might be crowned with God’s glory.

 

Jesus drinks the bitter, that we might drink the sweet.

 

This, dear friends, is the Way of the Cross, the Way of Jesus.

 

When Jesus says, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me” (John 14:6), He is speaking of us entering into Him and living by His Life. He is our source of life, our breath, our heartbeat; the way He lives is the Way we live. We learn to drink the bitter so that others may drink the sweet.

 

We learn to turn water into wine, we learn to give others the water that becomes a fountain of life within them so that they will never draw water from wells again, we learn to share the Body and  Blood of Jesus in holy Communion at the Lord’s Table, we learn to prepare that Table for others in the presence of their enemies, and we learn to have outstretched hands to the world in the Name of Jesus, and the drink the bitter and sharp wine vinegar that the world offers to us in order that others may live.

 

We learn to live in Jesus the Vine, as Christ toward others, as Jesus Christ lives within us; knowing that we “have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves” (2 Cor. 4:7). Let us make no mistake, we are speaking of a “treasure”! While we acknowledge the frailty of the earthen vessels, let us exalt and magnify the treasure, our Lord Jesus Christ. “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col. 1:27).

 

With Paul we are called to confess, “Death works in us, but life in you” (2 Cor. 4:12).

 

The Way of the Cross is the Way of drinking the bitter so that others may drink the sweet. It is bearing the sorrows and burdens and sufferings of the world, as we live in Christ and as Christ lives in us, so that others may live.

 

The Way of the Cross is living with our arms and hands outstretched.

 

When we appear before Jesus will He ask, “Show Me your hands”?  

 

 

The Cross - Our Way of Life (3)

 

 

“Jesus was saying, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing”” (Luke 23:34).

 

Betrayed by one who has been near Him for three years. Abandoned by those with whom He has shared the intimacies of love, friendship, truth, kindness; whom He has invited into the depths of the love of the Father and the Son. Mocked, slandered, delivered for crucifixion by the religious leaders – the leaders who are supposed to be the guardians and transmitters of the covenant which He and His Father gave to Moses. Tortured and crucified by Rome, embodying the governments and powers of this world.

 

“The rulers were sneering at Him, saying, “He saved others; let Him save Himself if this is the Christ of God, His Chosen One.” The soldiers also mocked Him, coming up to Him, offering Him sour wine, and saying, “If you are the King of the Jews, save Yourself!”” (Luke 23:35 – 37).

 

Can we hear the voices?

 

“If You are the Christ of God!”

 

“If You are His Chosen One!”

 

“If You are the King of the Jews!”

 

Can we hear the criminals in their suffering saying, “Save Yourself and us!” (Luke 23:39).

 

Now my friends, let me ask you, what proof would you have that Jesus is the Son of God as He hangs on the Cross, suffering, bearing our sins, bearing the iniquity of mankind in realms that we cannot comprehend? As God of very God hangs there in the suffering of His soul, what proof would you have?

 

Would you like Him to come down from the Cross?

 

Would you have Him call his angels (Matthew 26:53)?

 

What proof would you have that Jesus is the Son of God as He suffers and dies for you? What would satisfy you that you might give your life to Him and take up your cross and follow Him?

 

Behold the cruelty He is enduring! Behold the isolation! Behold the hatred! Listen to the vitriol! Sense the venom spewing from the mouths of the religious leaders! See how pleased they are to finally be rid of Jesus! (Does He not threaten their detente with Rome, with the Imperial Cult? Does not Jesus threaten their religious – political alliances? Does He not pose the same threat to us today?)

 

What proof must we have that Jesus is God?

 

Jesus is displaying what is perhaps the greatest evidence of His Divinity as mockery and hatred is hurled as Him, as His suffering body undergoes the torture of crucifixion, as His very soul bears our sins, our wickedness, our evil – personal and collective, as He moves toward a curtain of darkness, as the judgment of God falls upon Him as both Priest and Sacrifice…as all of this swirls around Him and within Him…

 

He is saying, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.”

 

Now, dear friend, what more would you have?

 

What more would you ask from Jesus?

 

The Cross - Our Way of Life (2)

 

 

“Now from the sixth hour darkness fell upon all the land until the ninth hour. About the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, ‘Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?’ that is, ‘My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?’” (Matthew 27:45 – 46).

 

“The cup that I drink you shall drink; and you shall be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized” (Mark 10:10:39).

 

To be called into the fellowship of His sufferings is to be called into depths of Divine mystery. Whether with the psalmist of Psalm 22, with Jesus on Calvary, or with Paul and his friends in their affliction in Asia (2 Cor. 1:2 – 11), we are called to places we will not always understand, places not always visible to the natural eye.

 

Paul writes, “We were burdened excessively beyond our strength, so that we despaired even of life; indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we would not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead” (2 Cor. 1:8 – 9).

 

Paul knew that the sufferings he and his companions experienced were for the blessing of others. “We are comforted by God so that we may comfort you” (2 Cor. 1:4). “If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation” (2 Cor. 1:6).

 

“So death works in us, but life in you” (2 Cor. 4:12).

 

Do we not see our Lord Jesus in Paul?

 

“We are to fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2).

 

There is, my friends, a shame associated with the Cross of Christ. We are told that we are to “go out to Him outside the camp, bearing His reproach” (Heb. 13:13).

 

Jesus was not ashamed of His shame; He despised it in the light of the joy set before Him. Likewise, we ought not to be ashamed of the shame that the world, the flesh, and even the religious world associates with following the Christ of the Cross, of being associated with the Cross of Christ, of hanging on the Cross with Jesus for the world to see.

 

Paul writes, “I am not ashamed of the Gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek” (Rom. 1:16).

 

The Gospel is foolishness in many ways to the world, it appears weak to the world (and to many professing Christians, which I suppose is why we employ the ways of the world), but we are to “know nothing but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2; see also 1:17 – 31).

 

This foolishness of the Gospel extends from Jesus dying on the Cross to reconcile us to God, into the Way we live our lives for Him and others. Jesus says that if we are to follow Him that we must deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow Him. He asks the quite reasonable question, “What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and lose his soul?” (Mark 8:34 – 38). Jesus tells us that we must lose our lives for His sake and the Gospel.

 

Paul writes, “He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf” (2 Cor. 5:15).

 

Whether we are seeing Jesus in the Gospels, in Psalm 22, Psalm 116, Psalm 118, Isaiah 53, or elsewhere throughout the Bible, we can be assured that the darkness will lift and the light of the glory of God will shine on His servant, on His Son, in glorification and joy and pleasure. This is true of the Body of Christ, and it is true of you and of me, it is true of us.

 

We are indeed called to be broken bread and poured out wine in the hands of Jesus for others. We are the fish and bread with which He feeds the multitudes. We are the lambs the Good Shepherd chooses to give their lives on behalf of others. O what glory to be chosen by our Shepherd, to know that we are in His arms and hands as He offers us up, just as the Father so loved the world that He gave His Son Jesus Christ. Can there be any more glorious fellowship?

 

Some Christians think that Jesus died so that they would not have to suffer, this is a lie. One of the reasons Jesus died on the Cross was that He might bear the wrath of the judgment of God for sin and sins; that our sins might be atoned for and that our sinful selves might be put to death on the Cross, buried with Him, and that we might be raised to newness of life in Christ Jesus – a New Man (Romans chapters 1 – 8).

 

Because we are now raised to newness of life in Jesus Christ, we are called to the life of the Cross, called indeed to suffer; not to suffer for our sins, not to suffer the wrath of God, but to suffer for the glory of God and the blessing of others. We are called to suffer as our Father transforms us into the image of the Firstborn Son.

 

One way to put this is that because of Jesus’ death on the Cross we do not suffer the wrath of God but are now called to suffer for the sake of Christ and others. Jesus did not die so that we might live life on earth in some kind of Christian Disneyland, but so that He could send us into a world of pain and suffering and chaos and hunger and death – so that we might bring the light and love and grace and mercy of Jesus Christ to others…so that the Cross of Christ and the Christ of the Cross might be seen in us and through us.

 

During this season of Lent, will we enter into the sufferings of Jesus Christ? Will we seek to know the fellowship of His sufferings (Phil. 3:10)?

 

Will we and our congregations become broken bread and poured out wine for others?

 

The Cross - Our Way of Life (1)

 

“But standing by the cross of Jesus were His mother, and His mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus then saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing nearby, He said to His mother, ‘Woman, behold your son!’ Then He said to the disciple, ‘Behold, your mother!’ From that hour the disciple took her into his own household” (John 19:25 – 27).

 

This was a horrid and cruel scene; a violent and bloody and drawn-out torture of three men filled with taunts directed to the One in the center. “If you are the Son of God, save Yourself, come down from the cross!” When the veil is drawn back, we often see the world’s leadership for what it is, including its religious leadership – here we see the “heirs” of Moses and Abraham not as they purport to be, but as their hearts truly are. What about our hearts?

 

Whether we trace our inheritance to the Fathers, to a branch of the Reformation, to the Ancient East, to more recent traditions and distinctives, or even to the Apostles; what about our own hearts?

 

The mother of Jesus stands by her Son in His agonizing death. Thank God she is not alone, other women are with her, and the disciple whom Jesus loves is there. Amid the shouts, the jeers, the gambling away of His clothing (is anyone selling popcorn?), the life of Jesus is ebbing away, His blood is dripping from the cross; it is on the wood, on the ground…is the blood of Jesus on those gathered around Him? Are Mary’s tears intermingled with Jesus’ blood?

 

Where are the multitudes whom Jesus has fed?

 

Where are the lepers He cleansed?

 

Where are the many who followed Him?

 

Where are the few who were with Him in the Upper Room?

 

These are not questions that matter so much, the question that matters is, “Where am I?”

 

Where are you?

 

Today, it is not enough to ask, “Am I standing by the cross?”

 

I must ask, “If I am standing by a cross, which cross am I standing by?”

 

Am I standing by a cross that has a dollar sign affixed to it? Is it a cross with a national flag wrapped around it? Is it a cross used to budgeon, imprison, and trample on others? Is it a cross employed to gather votes? Has the cross I am standing by been wrapped in cotton candy and entertainment? Has it had a “do over” to make it attractive and tasteful and profitable?

 

There are typically only two types of crowds around a cross, one crowd is crucifying the Son of God, the other crowd is around a cross they have made to order – a Christless cross. Perhaps the only place we shall see a faithful crowd around the true Cross is in heaven…at least until heaven is manifested fully on earth.

 

If there is no reproach, no shame…there is likely no true Cross with Christ crucified.

 

We are taught that we are to “Go out to Him outside the camp, bearing His reproach. For here we do not have a lasting city, but we are seeking the city which is to come” (Hebrews 13:13 – 14). How tragic when professing Christians are made the servants and slaves of the powers, leaders, and agendas of this world.

 

The Cross is offensive, it is foolishness, it is a stumbling block – it always has been, in this present age it always will be (1 Cor. 1:17 – 2:2).

 

On Easter morning the message of His resurrection first came to those women who had stood by the Cross of Jesus. As we know Him in the koinonia of His sufferings, we will know Him in the koinonia of His Resurrection!

 

 

 

Confrontation in Nazareth (14)

 

“Sacrifice and meal offering You have not desired; My ears You have opened; burnt offering and sin offering You have not required. Then I said, ‘Behold, I come; in the scroll of the book it is written of me. I delight to do Your will, O my God, Your Law is within my heart. I have proclaimed glad tidings of righteousness in the great congregation; behold, I will not retrain my lips, O LORD, You know’” (Psalm 40:6 – 9; see also Hebrews 10:5 – 10).

 

When Jesus says in Nazareth, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing (Luke 4:21), He is also fulfilling Psalm 40:6 – 9. We may hear five voices in Psalm 40: the voice of David, the Voice of Jesus Christ, the voice of the man or woman in Jesus Christ, the Voice of the Body of Christ, and the Voice of the whole Christ. In Christ, these voices are One, they are the Voice of many waters.

 

In Hebrews 10, Psalm 40 is quoted from the LXX, and here we have the notable, “Sacrifice and offering You have not desired, but a body You have prepared for me.” As with the “voice” of Psalm 40, so with the “body” of Psalm 40. We see the body of King Daivd, the body of Jesus Christ in the Incarnation, the body of the individual man or woman in Christ, the corporate Body which the Father prepared for the Son – that is the Body of Christ, and we may also see the Body of the whole Christ – Head and Body.

 

I expect it may take us time to meditate on these things and to begin to “see” them in Christ, but that is as it should be, they cannot be understood or “seen” in the natural (1 Corinthians Chapter 2).

 

Paul writes in Ephesians 2:10, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.”

 

We all have a purpose and destiny in this life, and it has many dimensions and unfolds in many ways...none of which we can fully understand, such is the mystery of it all in Christ. We all are called to say, “I glorified You on the earth, having accomplished the work which You have given Me to do” (John 17:4).

 

We are called to say this as individuals, as marriages and families, as local congregations, as the Body of Christ. As an individual I am called to not only say this for myself, but if I am married I have a calling within my marriage, if I have a family I have a calling as a member of my family, and I have a calling as a member of Christ’s Body, both locally and transcendently. I must not think solely in terms of myself, my calling and purpose and destiny is so much more than “Jesus and me,” it is about others, both those who know Jesus and those who have yet to meet Jesus.

 

Are we encouraging one another to discover and fulfill our callings in Christ Jesus?

 

Are we as husbands and wives seeking to discover and fulfill what has been written the book for us to fulfill?

 

Are our congregations viewing themselves as a people with a calling and destiny for their particular time and place that manifests itself in worship, the building up of the Body of Christ, and sacrificial mission to the world?

 

When our brothers and sisters venture out to discover their calling, do we, as the people of Nazareth say, “Who does she think she is?”

 

When someone in our midst speaks of the widow of Sidon or of Namaan the Syrian, do we respond with anger or with thanksgiving and compassion?

 

Should someone bring into our presence a Sidonian or Syrian will we embrace them, love them, care for them, and protect them?

 

Dear friends, in one sense until the Book becomes our book it is just a book. When Jesus reads Isaiah 61 in the synagogue in Nazareth He makes Isaiah His book. Yes, yes, for sure it has always been His Book, but in an incarnational sense He is consummating (or beginning the consummation) it when He reads it and then says, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

 

Now we know and believe that the words of the Bible are the words of God, the Word of God. We also acknowledge that this Word was delivered through human beings, and as such carries the flavor of the person just as wine carries the flavor of the cask in which it was aged. With this in mind, until the Word of God becomes your Word in Christ, until it ages within your heart and soul and mind and spirit, until it resides within you…you cannot call it yours, you can only call it something “out there.”

 

O dear, dear friends! The New Covenant is not “out there”! It is “in here.” “I will put my laws upon their heart, and on their mind I will write them” (Hebrews 10:16). Do we see that the Old Covenant is external, while the New Covenant is internal? Can we see that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit come to live within us in the New Covenant?

 

We are called to say, “This Word is mine in Christ. I will read this Word and live in this Word among my brothers and sisters. Together we will read this Word and live in this Word and manifest this Word to one another and to the world.”

 

I recall one morning in a small group about eight years ago. We were in John Chapter 14, the first few verses, about the Father’s House. There was much talk, much speculation, and the guys tended to talk over each other at times. As I listened I heard one of the men quietly say, “If it isn’t happening within you, if it isn’t real inside of you, then it doesn’t matter.”

 

I think I may have been the only one who heard what this brother said, and I have often wondered if I should have called a “timeout” and asked him to repeat himself. I wish I had done so.

 

Jesus invites us to know Him in the koinonia of His Word, to share His Life in His Word, to read Isaiah aloud, to read Psalms aloud, and to confess, “This day this Scripture is being fulfilled in my life, in our lives, in the Body of Christ; this day we are becoming one with the Word and the Word is becoming one with us.”

 

In the scroll of the book it is written of Christ Jesus, of you in Christ, of me in Christ, of us in Christ.

 

 

 

 

Cruciform Lives

 

Good morning friends,

Below is a note I wrote to a friend after a recent conversation. 

Are we living cruciform lives?

Much love!

Bob

Dear friend…some follow up thoughts…

 

I was thinking about one of the blessings of old age can be the Cross, it can be coming to the end of our strength, if we not yet done so, and having our hip knocked out of joint as Jacob with the Lord – it is good to walk with a limp.

 

“What happened? Why are you now walking with a limp? Did you have an accident?”

 

“O no, no accident, Jesus Christ brought me to the end of my own strength. Would you like to join our fellowship?”

 

Jesus says to Peter, “When you were younger, you used to gird yourself and walk wherever you wished; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will gird you, and bring you where you do not wish to go” (Jn. 21:18). John tells us that Jesus was signifying by what kind of death Peter would glorify God.

 

Then Jesus says, “Follow Me!”

 

Peter later writes, I am presently “knowing that the laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent, as also our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me” (2 Peter 1:14).

 

Dear brother Paul writes, “But my it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world” (Gal. 6:14).

 

Peter writes of the way of the Cross, the cruciform life; Paul writes of the way of the Cross, and John writes of the way of the Cross. In Revelation it is those who do not love their lives even unto death who conqueror, those who follow the slain and risen Lamb, those who have the testimony of Jesus.

 

Lately I’ve been thinking that Romans 1:1 – 8:35 is all to prepare us to be the sacrificial lambs of our Good Shepherd of Romans 8:36. Lambs who have supreme confidence that they are more than conquerors through Him who loves us. If we fall short of Romans 8:36 we have fallen short of our calling and glory; indeed, perhaps Romans 8:36 is the redemptive answer to Romans 3:23, perhaps it demonstrates the recovery of the glory that we lost.

 

In any event, when we are old we can learn…more than ever…to allow ourselves to be carried to the Cross, by the Cross, on the Cross, through the Cross…with outstretched hands as we participate in the sufferings of Christ (Phil. 3:10; Col. 1:24; 1 Peter 4:13; Galatians 2:20).

 

Dead men need not respond to the world, for all that is in the world…is not of the Father (1 John 2:15 – 16). Was John wrong when he wrote, “The whole world lies in the power of the evil one” (1 John 5:19)?

 

Are there exceptions?

 

Of all people, the elders of the Israel of God (Gal. 6:16), the Church, ought to display “the wisdom from above” which is “first pure, then peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits…” sowing what we say and do in peace (James 3:13 – 18).

 

How often the Holy Spirit has convicted me of being an ass! How often He has convicted me of not displaying 2 Timothy 2:24 – 25! “The Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition…” Ha…what a fool I have often been!!!

 

Much love,

Bob

Confrontation in Nazareth (13)

 

 

 

As I continue to ask myself why Jesus begins His ministry in His hometown of Nazareth with confrontation, I am drawn to John 2:13 – 25 and the beginning of His ministry in Jerusalem. Consider that in this passage He introduces Himself to Jerusalem by making a whip of cords and driving out those who are making merchandise of worship. “Take these things away; stop making My Father’s house a place of business.”

 

Then He says, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”  These are words that will be used against Jesus in His “trial” before Caiaphas, the priests, and the Council (Mt. 26:61).

 

In spite of Jesus’ words and actions in John 2, in the next chapter a Jewish ruler named Nicodemus comes to Jesus by night. Once again, Jesus begins with a challenge, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God” (Jn. 3:3). Why begin with a challenge, why not ease Nicodemus into things, into a relationship with Himself?

 

Unlike the crowds, unlike the group of religious leaders of which Nicodemus is a member, Nicodemus listens to Jesus, asks questions, and believes (John 7:50 – 52;19:39)

 

What else do we see in John’s Gospel? Consider this pattern:

 

In Chapter 4 Jesus challenges His disciples’ ingrained notions about people outside their racial, national, and religious identity, for He leads them to Sychar, a village in Samaria, and begins His ministry in Samaria with a woman and her village, remaining with them two days. It is unlikely that any of Jesus’ disciples ever contemplated having social or religious communication with Samaritans, they were unclean, they were despised, they were to be avoided.

 

Do you think that the disciples were going to write home and tell the folks of their own home synagogues of what they had done with Jesus? Do you think the first words out of their mouths on their return to Galilee was about the wonderful experience they had in Samaria?

 

Consider, when Jesus says that the “fields are ripe unto harvest” (Jn; 4:35) He is saying it while they are in Samaria!

 

Was this a great experience for the disciples, or did they reluctantly live with it since they wanted to be with Jesus? After all, you can hardly jettison a way of thinking and living that you’ve grown up with, that you’ve been religiously taught, in the course of one or two days. Ponder what Peter went through in Acts Chapter 10, in the council in Jerusalem of Acts 11, of the turmoil that he bought into in Galatians 2.

 

When Peter and John returned to Samaria in Acts Chapter 8, were their hearts and minds transported back to the events of John Chapter 4?

 

In John Chapter 5 Jesus heals in Jerusalem on the Sabbath, stirring up more opposition.

 

In John Chapter 6 He calls Himself the Bread of Life, teaching that we must eat His flesh and drink His blood. Jesus is the true Manna from heaven, giving food that is superior to what Moses gave. Not only does this teaching alienate the crowds, but many of His “disciples withdrew, and were not walking with Him anymore” (John 6:59 – 71).

 

John Chapter 7 shows us some in the crowd were accusing Jesus of having a demon, and the religious leaders sending officers to arrest Jesus.

 

In John Chapter 8 the religious leaders attempt to stone Jesus to death (we’ve explored this in a previous reflection).

 

John Chapter 9 shows Jesus healing on the Sabbath yet again and the religious leaders once again attacking Jesus.

 

In Chapter 10 the religious leaders accuse Jesus of having a demon and being insane, and they once again attempt to arrest Him.

 

We see a continuing conspiracy to murder Jesus in John 11:53.

 

Chapter 12 brings us to Holy Week, a week of escalating tensions leading to crucifixion.

 

I have preached through the Gospel of John in one morning with a focus on Jesus and His signs, with His revealing Himself to be the I AM; the Bread, the Light, the Life, the Resurrection. I could also preach through John with a focus on conflict, for from beginning to end there is conflict, indeed, we see the introduction to conflict in John 1:5, “The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.”

 

For decades I have viewed the unrelenting conflict in John in the framework of Sonship; the issue is whether Jesus will confess His Father or cave into pressure and persecution and deny Him. This is our challenge as well, will we confess our Father, our Elder Brother, and the sonship we have in them? Will we maintain, by God’s grace, our testimony that our Father is bringing us to glory in Jesus Christ? (Hebrews 2:10 – 13; Rom. 8:29 – 30; and of course the Upper Room).

 

Simply put, will we confess that we are saints and no longer sinners? What will be our core identity in Jesus Christ? (Christians are termed “saints” in the Bible far far more often than any other term). Why do we insist on denying this glory of the Gospel?

 

Also, in the framework of John’s Gospel, this attack on Jesus Christ’s identity relentlessly comes from the religious leadership, just as it does in our own day. The Romans are not the enemy of Jesus in the Gospel, the world at large is not the enemy, it is the people who ought to know better that are the enemy to the confession of the Son and the Father. Of course the resistance and outright persecution will come from the greater world and from the Roman Empire as the Gospel spreads, but it begins in the realm of people who should know better – and once they begin their attack they will continue it, from Jesus to the Apostles, to Stephen, to Paul, and beyond. Furthermore, the attack will come from without and within the professing church – then as now.

 

But what I want to say is that I’ve never realized how Jesus could have avoided much of this opposition, whether in Jerusalem in John, or in His hometown of Nazareth (and elsewhere in Galilee), by not directly challenging and confronting religious culture, and racial and national identities. Jesus did not have a gradual approach to His revelation of grace and truth.

 

Jesus could have healed on days other than the Sabbath, and of course He did. Why heal in synagogues on the Sabbath? Jesus could have accepted the following of those who were believing in Him (in some measure) in John Chapter 8, rather than confronting them with not being free and then telling them that the devil was their father…not a method likely to retain followers.

 

In Luke Chapter 4, Jesus need not have introduced the widow of Sidon or Namaan the Syrian into His message, He knew it would not be well received!

 

I’m not really sure what this all means. It is challenging to me and I don’t fully understand it. It does make me wonder how many times I’ve taken the easy way out in teaching and preaching, and in interacting with other pastors, in parachurch small groups, and so forth. I wonder how many times my own witness to others has been watered down.

 

I am surprised to be going down this road in my exploration of the Confrontation in Nazareth, Luke 4:14 -30. I had no idea I’d be here. I began this with simply a sense that I wanted to explore this passage, and now here I am…with questions…plenty of questions.

 

Joseph - Reflections (8)

 

“And He called for a famine upon the land; He broke the whole staff of bead. He sent a man before them, Joseph, who was sold as a slave. They afflicted his feet with fetters, he himself [his soul] was laid in irons; until the time that his word came to pass, the word of the LORD tested him” (Psalm 105:16 – 19).

 

There is a sense in which we can speak of three Josephs when we read Genesis and Psalm 105. This may seem strange to us, it may even seem outrageous to some, but it is the truth. It would not have always been viewed strangely, certainly not, I think, in the early days of the Church, the Church which was seeing Christ throughout all Scripture, and in seeing Christ was seeing His Body, and in seeing His Body was seeing themselves.

 

In Joseph we see Jesus Christ. We see Jesus rejected by His brothers, sold into death, released from prison, exalted to the right hand of God. In Jospeh we see Jesus in that what men meant for evil, God meant for good. In Joseph we see Jesus in forgiveness. In Joseph we see the salvation of many through suffering, and thus we see Jesus. Joseph becomes a source of salvation, a refuge for many, a picture of Jesus the Christ. Just as Joseph’s brothers rejected the message of Joseph’s dreams, so Jesus’ brothers, Israel, along with mankind rejected the Word of Jesus. Just as the Word of the LORD was tried in Joseph, so the Word was tried within Jesus Christ. “Though He were a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered” (Hebrews 5:8 – 9).

 

There are, of course, contrasts in the story of Joseph and Jesus. Jacob did not knowingly send Joseph down into Egypt; the Father knowingly, willingly, and lovingly gave His Only Begotten Son. Joseph did not understand that betrayal, slavery, and prison lay between his dreams and their fulfillment, Jesus knew that the Cross beckoned Him.

 

If then we see Jesus Christ in and through Joseph, we also see the Body of Christ in and through Joseph, for as Augustine says, “As with the Head, so with the Body.” That is, if we are the Body of Christ, then we participate with Christ in His story, in His calling, in His mission. This is a theme of the Bible and an explicit teaching of the New Testament. We love as He loves, we are in the Trinity in Him, we are sent as the Father sent Him, we are to live in the koinonia of His sufferings, we are even to “fill up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions” (Col. 1:24, whatever that may mean). We are, let us recall, to be conformed to His image (Romans 8:29).

 

This means that we suffer on behalf of others, that what others mean for evil, our God means for good. It means that we, as His Body, are tried in the fires of testing and obedience and persecution just as Joseph and Jesus were tried. It means that God’s Word is tested within us, as His Word was tested in Joseph and Jesus (1 Peter 1:3 – 9). It means that the calling of God the Father is within us, just as it is in Jesus Christ. It means that the Incarnation continues within us because Christ lives within us His Body.

 

This further means that when we read “they afflicted his feet with fetters” that we can read, “They afflicted His feet with fetters.” The feet of the Body of Christ were afflicted with fetters, they are being afflicted with fetters, they are bound, their movement is restricted, they are in prison.

 

Can we see “they afflicted His feet with fetters” in Romans 8:18 – 25? Can we see that “the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed in us” (Rom. 8:18)? Just as the sufferings of Joseph were not worthy to be compared with his exaltation to Pharoah’s right hand and his feeding of the people and his family, just as the sufferings Jesus were not to be compared with the “joy set before Him” (Heb. 12:2), so our present sufferings pale in comparison to the coming glory of Christ in us and us in Christ. Indeed, Christ in us fully and completely is our “hope of glory” (Col. 1:27; see also 2 Thess. 1:10 – 12).

 

The culmination of the suffering of the saints in Revelation is the glory of God in His People and His People in God (Revelation chapters 21 – 22).

 

O dear friends, our hope is in Jesus and His Word, our hope is in the promises of our Father, through which we partake of His Nature (2 Peter 1:4). The temptation while we are in prison is to scheme our own way out rather than wait for God. We have pressure to build the House of God when only God can build His House (Psalm 127:1 – 2). Our Christianity is driven by a “make it happen” mentality which abandons abiding in the Vine (John 15:1ff).

 

We have left our first love, and we pride ourselves on our sparkling and entertaining and man-centered Christianity – we have no grain with which to feed the people, there is a famine for the Word of God (Amos 8:11 – 12). Let there be no mistake, we can know the Bible in the sense of knowing its informational content and not know the Word of God. The Word of God transforms us into the image of Jesus Christ. The Word of God results in radical obedience to Jesus. The Word of God emanates from the Cross of Christ. The Word of God bears the fruit of Matthew 25:34 – 40, a fruit which transcends political, economic, social, national, and cultural considerations – in fact, it puts the earthly to death.

 

I take great hope in Psalm105:16 – 22 and the story of Joseph. I believe that while our feet may be in fetters, that while the Word of God tries us, that Romans 8:18 – 25 awaits us. I believe that the manifestation of the sons of God not only awaits us, but that blessing awaits the peoples of the earth, for whatever we are experiencing is for the glory of God and the blessing of others.

 

Just as Joseph was able to say, just as Jesus has told us again and again, we also can say both now and in the consummation of the ages, “What you meant for evil. God meant for good.”

 

As the Father sent Joseph, as the Father sent Jesus, so Jesus sends us (John 17:18; 20:21).

 

 

 

 

The Four chaplains

Robert L. Withers

February 7, 2026

 

“I’ve got a conference call this afternoon at 2:00, it’s concerning a memorial foundation I’m associated with back in Philly. I don’t suppose you’ve ever heard of it; it’s called The Four Chaplains.”

 

“Of course I know about the Four Chaplains, I was raised knowing about them,” I replied to my client Frank, who had lived in Philly before retiring to Richmond, VA.

 

When I was growing up in the D.C. area in the 50s and 60s, Washington City had a wax museum and among the exhibits were The Four Chaplains. I can still see the wax figures of Rev. George L. Fox (Methodist), Reform Rabbi Alexander D. Goode, Father John P. Washington (Roman Catholic), and Rev. Clark V. Poling (Reformed Church in America) standing together by the rail on the troop ship Dorchester, the water of the dark display lapping against the hull of the ship.

 

My mother made sure I knew the story, she made sure that I was not looking at entertainment but at sacrifice, at the way we were to live our lives. As I write this, I realize that all the trips we took to museums were about learning and exploring and understanding, understanding where we had come from and where we ought to be going. Understanding who we ought to be. To me, libraries and museums were sacred spaces, easily on par with the sanctuary of our Presbyterian church. The image of Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial, which I stood before in awe, was the image of God I had while being with Mom in church. I suppose Lincoln was an ikon to some degree.

 

The troopship was torpedoed on February 3, 1943, at 12:55 AM off Newfoundland. There were not enough life jackets for everyone, so these four young chaplains, from different backgrounds and traditions, gave their life vests to others. In the midst of confusion, chaos, and terror, these four men guided others to lifeboats, encouraging and comforting the frightened men around them…and then, having done all they could, linked arms together, stood together, prayed together and sang hymns…and died together.

 

Grady Clark, a survivor, wrote the following:

 

As I swam away from the ship, I looked back. The flares had lighted everything. The bow came up high and she slid under. The last thing I saw, the four chaplains were up there praying for the safety of the men. They had done everything they could. I did not see them again. They themselves did not have a chance without their life jackets.

 

William Bednar, a survivor said, "I could hear men crying, pleading, praying and swearing. I could also hear the chaplains preaching courage to the men. Their voices were probably the only things that kept me sane."

 

Having heard this story as a young boy, having seen it depicted in the wax museum as a lad, having a mother who emphasized the sacrificial nature of the story, and the fact that these men represented different traditions, it would be impossible to forget Fox, Goode, Washington, and Poling. It would be impossible to forget what unity in sacrifice can look like.

 

This past Tuesday I was thinking about the conversation with my former client, which took place about ten years ago. As I continued to think about the Four Chaplains on Wednesday, I decided to look up the foundation and refresh my memory. Then I saw that Tuesday, the day before when I had started thinking about them, February 3, was Four Chaplains Remembrance Day. I had no idea, no idea at all.

 

Dear friends, all around us is confusion and cursing and darkness, the question is not whether we have extra life vests to give to others, the question is whether we will give our own life jackets away.

 

“For God so loved the world that He gave His Only Begotten Son…” (John 3:16).

 

“As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world” (John 17:18; 20:21).

 

“We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16).

Unfinished Thoughts On The Soul (3)

 

Return to Your Rest

 

Where do our souls live?

 

Where are we headed today?

 

As our souls return to our Father through the Lamb, we learn to live in that City whose Builder and Maker is God (Hebrews 11:8 – 16). This means that the One and only Light of the soul is our Father and the Lamb (Revelation 21:23; 22:5). We do not wait for a future day for this to be so, we learn to live by the Light of God and the Lamb Today. It is today that we are not to harden our hearts and souls, it is today that we are to hear His Voice and obey, and it is today that we enter into His rest (Hebrews 4:1 – 9).

 

Entering into His rest means that we cease from our own works, even as God did from His on that first Sabbath; indeed, now we come to know and see that Jesus Christ is our Sabbath and that we abide in Him (Heb. 4:10; John 15:1ff). We can do nothing in and of ourselves, only as His Life flows in us and through us can we live and bear fruit (see also Galatians 2:20).

 

Our souls come to know our Father and the Lamb as our Temple (Rev. 21:22). All the images of Tabernacles and Temples in Scripture are lifted upward and subsumed in the Godhead, we enter into Him and He enters into us. The Incarnation is consummated in the Marriage of the Lamb, for the Marriage Supper is more than a shared meal, the Marriage Supper is the prelude to a consummation, the Nature of which is beyond us, it is beyond us because it is hidden in Christ – there is a reason marriage bedrooms have doors that are shut.

 

When the soul comes home to the Father and Lamb it does so with these words ringing without and within:

 

“Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them” (Rev. 21:3).

 

Now friends, as we live in that City we must surely know that we must live in the Light of the Lamb and the Father, and we must surely know that nothing can be hidden, nothing should be hidden; that there should be no subterfuge, no shades of meaning, no “spin,” no guile. We must surely know that the wrath of man has no place in this City, that the violence of man will not be admitted to this City, that the greed and selfishness and pride of man will not enter the City or the Temple – for God is All in all.

 

To enter into this City is to dwell on the Holy Mountain in which “they shall neither hurt nor destroy.”

 

The souls of those purchased by the Lamb belong to this City, we are citizens of this City. This City is not only our future destiny, we are to breathe the air of this City today, to walk the streets of this City today, to fellowship with the inhabitants of this City today, to live in the Temple of this City today, to follow the Lamb of this City today.

 

If the Lamb (and the Father) is the Light of this City, then all of life is to be lived in the Light of the Lamb – all of life today. The Lamb shines His Light in our hearts, minds, and souls. He shines His light on all around us. We do not “see” as others see (2 Cor. 4:18; 5:7; Heb. 11:1), we do not judge as others judge, we do not discern and evaluate as others evaluate – our eyes are fixed on the Lamb, the Sun of Righteousness…and there is no righteousness apart from Him…all pretense to righteousness is as filthy rags…it is disgusting. This is true whether it is personal, institutional (religious or other), national, ethnic, economic, or philosophical. O how foolish we are to look anywhere other than Jesus Christ for identity, for righteousness, for fulfillment, for a place for our souls to live and abide.

 

As we live in this City, the Name of our God is on our foreheads, the Name of the Father and the Lamb (Rev. 22:4; 14:1; 3:12), indeed, even the Name of the glorious City is written upon us. This City comes down upon us out of heaven, we enter the City and the City enters into us.

 

Shall we not cry with the psalmist, “Return to your rest, O my soul, for the LORD has dealt bountifully with you”? (Psalm 116:7).

 

Are not our deaths precious to our God because through them we come home to Him and our City? (Psalm 116:15).

 

Do we not anticipate rejoicing in the presence of the saints? (Psalm 116:14, 18, 19).

 

Is not the House of God and Jerusalem (Psalm 116:19) that City we see in Revelation chapters 21 – 22?

 

Yes, the LORD has indeed rescued our souls from death and our eyes from tears (Psalm 116:8; Rev. 21:4).

 

Let us say today, and tomorrow…to ourselves and to one another, “Return to your rest, O my soul! Return to the City of God!”