[An excerpt from the book “What My Dog Has Taught Me About Life?” by Gary Stanley]
There’s a natural affection built into Labradors. If Luci and I are in different rooms, Griff will position himself in the hallway so he can keep track of his family. Sit still for long, and Griff’s economy-size nose will find its way under your hand.
Still, there is one moment when Griff wants nothing to do with affection. Walk by his “tollbooth” (the pantry where his dog biscuits are kept), and all thoughts of affection take a back seat to what’s inside the pantry door. A creature of habit, he heads for his tollbooth whenever he’s been outside. Griff takes up his station on the edge of the carpet, ears erect, head tilted, still as death. He’s just so darn fetching! All you want to do is give him a big hug and scratch behind his ear. Dream on!
Trying to pet Griffin in front of the pantry is like trying to put a super-charged worm on a fishhook. Can’t be done. Waste of time. Don’t even try. Rubs him the wrong way when affection delays his divine right to a goody.
It happened again early this morning when Griffin whined me out of bed. I marched down the hall across the cold kitchen floor, pulled open the sliding glass door, and welcomed the Griffmeister back from the wilds of the backyard. Straight to his tollbooth. Ears erect. Head tilted. He looked so doggone huggable. I walked over and extended a loving hand. You’d have thought I had a cattle prod and some nasty intentions. He ducks my hand and resists my affectionate overtures. He lets me know in no uncertain terms that our agendas are light-years apart.
Oh, well. The demanded treat is placed into Griff’s mouth. The non-relational ritual is over. Expectation met. Rebuff accepted. I hear sounds of crunching as I walk down the hall to the bedroom.
A few minutes later, I hear the unmistakable sound of paws clipping the carpet as Griff makes his way into our bedroom. Feigning sleep, I soon feel the familiar touch of Griffin’s muzzle under my hand. Companionship is now restored – on his terms. It’s hard to play second fiddle to a dog biscuit.
God knows just how I feel. I do the same thing to Him all the time. I’m more interested in His hand-out than His heart.
“I know. I know. But just let me read the newspaper first, then we’ll spend some time together. Don’t press so close. I’ve got work to do, deadlines to meet, and I need some inspiration for the next chapter. After that, I’ll go along and let you love on me. But not now. What I’d really like is for You to open Your hand, not Your heart. See how straight I sit, countenance focused, visibly worthy. Give me what I want first, and then I’ll accept the offer of Yourself.”
My stomach keeps crowding in front of my soul. Feeding the flesh becomes more important than savoring the fellowship.
As I look back on my Christian experience I see that the things that I “know for sure” about my Creator God - the doctrinal basis of my faith - have been steadily shrinking in the last two decades of my life.
In my younger years, as I studied about God and the Bible, I came to some very definite conclusions concerning church doctrine. As I perceived each doctrine that I thought God wanted me to believe and do, I immediately placed them in my “know for sure” mind file.
Consequently I peaked with about 80% of my spiritual knowledge in the “know for sure” section and the other 20% was in the “I’m still finding out” section and could be tossed around and discussed and revised with new information.
There has been a gradual shifting of these sections in my spiritual growth during the last twenty years so that now my “I’m still finding out” section is much larger than my “know for sure” part.
Know For Sure
Let me explain my “know for sure” section to you. The first thing I ever learned about God was in my Catholic kindergarten catechism. The first question in the book was: “Why did God make you?” The answer was: God made me to KNOW Him, to LOVE Him, and to SERVE Him in this world, and to be HAPPY with Him forever in the next.”
Now through the next forty years of my Christianity I packed a lot more into my “know for sure” section.
But during the last twenty years, my “know for sure” part has shrunk back to, for all practical purposes, conform to that first kindergarten question. Here is what I see that I “know for sure”:
* God made me to KNOW Him. God deals with each person that He creates to bring him to the knowledge that he needs God in his life. Then God deals with us to know Him in the form of Jesus Christ – God, Man, and Messiah. Due to man’s sinful nature at birth, he needs a Savior (Jesus Christ) and must choose to make Christ the Lord of his life.
* God made me to LOVE Him. With a person’s repentance for sin and belief in Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross, the person receives an eternal new birth with the LOVE nature of God entering him through the indwelling Spirit of Jesus Christ. Jesus gave the command to “love God and love your neighbor.” Now that person in union with Christ forever is able to love God in return with the love nature that God has given him and is able to love his neighbor.
* God made me to SERVE Him. Now that Christ is IN the person, as he stays aware of who he is in Christ, the person recognizes his dependence on God’s strength and receives His guidance to become a useful tool for God to the person’s own little surrounding world. And as the Christian serves God in this world, he receives the built-in fulfillment and blessing which comes with the territory.
* God made me to be HAPPY with Him forever in the next world. The rebirthed Christian will live forever after his human death with God in His spirit realm called “heaven”. The Bible says that we actually are CHILDREN OF GOD or OFFSPRING OF GOD as actual members of His Family. We will live the HAPPY lifestyle of God forever!
I ‘m Still Finding Out
I love to search out knowledge with my mind. And as I see it, everything that I have not mentioned in my present “know for sure” section is up for discussion, debate, revision - such topics as the following:
God’s sovereignty vs. man’s responsibility.
Bible prophecy.
The how of creation.
Sacraments and rituals.
Why does God allow _____?
Why do bad things happen to good people?
Why so many denominations within Christianity?
Etc., Etc., Etc
What are your “know for sure” spiritual doctrines? What are the facts of your faith? Are you like I used to be - thinking that you know for sure too many Christian doctrines? Or, on the other hand, are you unsure about any spiritual things? Hebrews 11:1 tells us that “faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the EVIDENCE of things not seen.” There is evidence in God’s Word on which to build a “know for sure” spiritual basis. Every Christian must be clear in his mind what doctrines are untouchable bottom-line “faith-facts” and what are up for GRACIOUS DISCUSSION.
People who know they are secure in God’s hand find their motives shaped in that awareness. They learn to live with grace, to disagree in kindness, to love freely, and to trust God from day to day when matters beyond their control don’t go as they desire.
Gracious discussion and gracious disagreement are the way to be “harmless” in a violent world.
We often take for granted our wonderful God-given sense of hearing. Although many animals have been blessed with a much greater capacity to hear distant sounds and with a greater frequency range of sound than the human species has, we can nevertheless know that God has given us what we need to do the job of auditory intake.
Have you ever stopped to consider the limited frequency range of human hearing? Humans can hear only in the frequency range of about 40 cycles per second up to about 20,000 cycles per second. Dogs, for instance, can hear up to about 40,000 cycles per second - thus the use of the “dog whistle”. And scientists believe that part of the process of migration of birds and animals is based on their ability to receive very low frequency sounds, possibly down to 4 cycles per second.
I have occasionally though it would be great to have a larger range of hearing, but then would it really? The constant bombardment of great ranges of sound would probably drive us crazy. We do appreciate quiet times.
In Matthew Chapter 13, Jesus is answering the question of why He speaks to the people in parables. He basically says that the general population is not ready to hear the message of the kingdom of God like the disciples are. He says that the people “in hearing, they don’t hear and they don’t understand” (v13) and the people’s “hearts are heavy and their ears are dull of hearing” (v15).
How many times in life do we have something said to us that enters our ears but, for whatever reason, doesn’t register on our brains? We may deliberately ignore it because it doesn’t seem to apply to us. We may not actually believe it and so discount the message. We may be thinking of something else at the time and miss what is being said.
But let’s all stop now and thank God that we have ears to hear - and, for that matter, eyes to see, tongues to taste, noses to smell and fingers to feel with. Our sensory intake is a wonderful necessity.
My own ears were physically “dull to hearing” once. My wife and I had learned to SCUBA dive and were anxious to do some serious diving in the Caribbean. We booked a vacation with Windjammer Cruises for a sailing vacation in the British Virgin Islands. A highlight of our trip was to be a dive on the “wreck of the Rhone.” The Rhone was a sailing vessel with passengers and cargo which sunk in 1882 during a hurricane off the coast of Virgin Gorda, an island in the British Virgins. The remains of the vessel were very well preserved in 90 feet of water.
The movie “The Deep” with Nick Nolte and Jacqueline Bisset had just come out a couple of years before. And many of the underwater scenes in the movie had been filmed on the wreck of the Rhone. It was an exciting film and we were anxious to see where it had been made.
There were about eight of us in the diving party on a beautiful tropical day. They anchored the dive boat right over the wreck and we were all to proceed down the anchor line to the wreck. When I had gotten up that morning, I had some nasal and sinus congestion but it seemed to pass and I ignored it. But when I started down the anchor line and began to clear the pressure in my ears as you must do when you start descending, I couldn‘t clear my ears! I went down and up and down and up between 15 and 20 feet trying to “pop” the pressure but it didn’t work. All the others were descending okay along the rope and I desperately wanted to go too. So I did a foolish thing as a comparative novice diver. I forced myself to go anyway hoping that my ears would somehow be alright. The pressure pain built as I reached 30, then 40 feet and suddenly the pain stopped - everything seemed okay. I continued on with the group and had a great experience down on the Rhone. We explored for about a half hour and then time was up.
As we ascended (making stops along the way for decompression), everything seemed normal to me. But when I reached the dive boat and was pulled in, I had blood dripping out of both ears and I couldn‘t hear! Only a very distant background sound came to me.
Blood had filled up my middle ears and the pressure had ruptured both of my ear drums. I had really messed myself up. The bleeding stopped pretty quickly, but my ears continued to be “dull of hearing” - people had to shout at me for me to try to understand.
The divemaster said that I was very lucky I didn’t drown. Usually when this happens, you lose your sense of equilibrium and your ability to navigate underwater because the vestibular mechanism which controls equilibrium is in the middle ear.
The trip home in the airplane was troublesome because the difference in cabin pressures gave me a headache.
Back at home, the ear doctor told me that my middle ears were completely filled up with solidified blood clots and that they would probably be absorbed gradually by my body but it would take a long time - how long he didn’t know. There was no way to remove them safely without destroying things. So I had to wait and see what happens.
I had done a foolish thing and now I was going to pay for it. I fortunately never had any equilibrium problems but the loss of hearing continued for six months. Suddenly one day while I was mowing my grass in the yard (with only a distant mower sound), my hearing popped back to almost normal in one ear. It was a dramatic and a thankful to God moment for me. A few days later the other ear popped back to normal and everything was right again. A hearing check on the doctor’s machine showed normal hearing again.
I tell you this story to give you a greater appreciation of your physical senses and a greater compassion and understanding for those who are deaf (or blind or incapacitated in any physical way).
No matter our day to day troubles, we have much to be thankful for. God has made us children in His Family. He has given us the power (when we choose to use it) to live this human life in the best way. And He has given us the assurance that we will spend eternity with Him, at home with Him in new spirit bodies. With the blessings we have with our human sense organs, we can hardly imagine the spiritual “senses” we will have with our new total spirit bodies!
“In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.” 1 Thessalonians 5:18
Think of our Earth. It is composed of three general parts: liquid center or core, hard surface or crust and an amorphous, changing mantle in between. Man has a generally similar composition: spirit center or core, body on the surface and an amorphous, changing soul in between.
Yes, we seem to many to be a surface, body people with little access to our natural Center. Yes, the unconverted person lives on the boundaries of his life almost exclusively. And if the surface of our lives were consistently evil, then our lives would be easier to moralize about. But boundaries and edges are not bad as much as they are passing, accidental, sometimes illusory, too often needy of defense and decoration.
Our skin is not bad; it’s just not our soul. However, “skin” might be the only beginning point available to a modern people. But we often remain on the surface for so long it seems like life. Not many people are telling us there is anything more. Some speak of a mysterious “soul” but even less do you hear about your core, your center, your SPIRIT.
As we live on the surface of the earth, our life is concerned with the surface. We occasionally recognize the mantle under the surface when a volcano erupts or an earthquake shifts the surface plates or we visit hot springs or geysers. But very, very seldom does the average man consider the core or the center of the earth. But without the core with its heat and power, the mantle and the crust could not exist. Likewise, without our spirit, the soul and body could not exist. You are what you are at your core. You are a spirit; you have a soul (a mind, emotions and will); and you live in a body. Your spirit, your core is stable and unchanging just as the core of the earth is forever a liquid. Your soul is amorphous, changeable, just as the mantle of the earth is amorphous, sometimes harder, sometimes softer depending on the influences coming from the core and the crust. And your body is your surface contact with what’s around you and is controlled by your soul, just as the hard plates of the earth’s crust are controlled by the mantle underneath. This is a rough analogy which we can see as a type.
Just as the earth is a whole sphere and real knowledge demands that we think of it that way, the person living on the surface must come to see that real knowledge demands that he see himself as a whole sphere. He must make an “inner journey” of understanding. This inner journey is the blood, guts, and history of the whole Bible. It is both an awakening and a quieting, a passion for and a surrendering to, a caring and a not-caring. We are both core and surface and we are not meant to be in charge of either one.
Each person comes into this world with the “wrong core”. Of course, as we live on the surface of our “earth model”, we can’t see our core or even feel much influence of our core, but it is there operating in us with an unknown action. The Bible says that we are born with the nature or “core” of Satan. But we don’t realize it. Things look pretty nice and normal from our surface perspective. What the “core” is doing to our amorphous “mantle” underneath is virtually unrecognized.
God’s purpose in our existence is to recreate us as an analogous “new earth” with a brand new and different “core”- God Himself in the Spirit of Christ. Then there will be no more destructive actions coming up at us from the spirit core through the mantle of our souls.
But an unknowing person has to begin somewhere. For most of us the beginning point is on the surface of our lives. Yet the teachers tell us not to stay there! The journey from the rigors of the surface to the exchange of core centers is called conversion.
We don’t resolve the question about our core in our heads. The body is usually the beginning point. Living in this material world, with a physical body, and in a culture of affluence which usually only rewards the outer self; it is both more difficult to know our spiritual self and all the more necessary. Our skin-encapsulated egos are the only self that most of us know, and therefore for many people their only beginning place. But these egos are not the only or even the best place to begin.
Our contemporary culture often doesn’t see the need for any “inner journey” of conversion. In fact, we actively avoid and fear it. In most cases we no longer even have the tools to go inward, because we are inflamed and entrapped in the outer self in the private surfaces of our private lives. In such a culture, the core seems remote and distant. People on the crust of the earth need an earthquake to jar their thinking about what is underneath them.
And when they have been awakened to the destructive core beneath them and have called out for a new creation core in Christ, how do they accept and deal with it? By thinking about it? By praying and meditating? By silence and solitude? Yes, all of these. But perhaps mostly by living - and living consciously. The surface things, when they are suffered and enjoyed and felt and listened to, lead us back to the Center where God is obvious.
The street person feels cold and rejection and has to go to a deeper place for warmth. The hero pushes against his own self-interested boundaries and finds that they don’t matter. The alcoholic recognizes how he has hurt his family and breaks through to a compassion beyond himself. In each case, the boundaries - surface things - suffer, inform and then partially self-destruct. They are all found to be unnecessary, and even part of the problem. That which feels the pain also lets it go, and the Center under the amorphous mantle and troubled surface stands revealed and sufficient! We don’t find our own Center; we don’t find God; GOD FINDS US!
The troubled body and the amorphous soul are the place of contact and the place of surrender. I don’t believe that we think ourselves into a new way of living. WE LIVE OURSELVES INTO A NEW WAY OF THINKING! The journeys around the surface lead us to a greater journey through the soul mantle to the radical and absolute LIFE at the core Center. Then, by what is certainly a vicious and virtuous circle, the Center calls all the journeys at the surface back into question!
The ruthless ambition of the businessman can lead him back to the very failure and emptiness that is the point of his final conversion. Is the ambition therefore good or evil? Do we really have to sin to know salvation?
That doesn’t mean that we should set out to intentionally sin. We only see the pattern after the fact. Julian of Norwich, a man of God in early England, put it perfectly: “Usually, first we fall and later we see it - and both are the mercy of God.” Wow! How did we ever lose that kind of wisdom?
The overwhelming problem today is that people - who have very little hint of their own psychological or theological center - are creating and letting go of boundaries.
Those who create their own boundaries often end up with hardened and defended surfaces, without permeability for others to move in or out. They may become either racists, afraid of the “not-me”; or co-dependents, manipulating the world to meet their love and security needs.
Those who too easily let go of boundaries will seek their soul and spirit forever outside themselves: “She will make me happy.” “I need him for my sense of self” They often pride themselves on their openness and tolerance. But even here there is both virtue and vice. When tolerance is rooted in God, it is certainly the voice of wisdom. But the too-quick tolerance of the skeptic is usually no more than a need to be liked or a need to be popular. The first is the authentic lover, the grounded agent of change. The second serves a selfish ego. Unfortunately, the second is much more common on the American scene today, in social justice circles and elsewhere.
Those who have firmed up their boundaries too quickly without finding their essential Center will be the enemies of cooperation, the enemies of forgiveness, and the enemies of vulnerability and peace-making between nations and classes and individuals.
The greatest gift of surrendered and core-exchanged people is that they know themselves as part of a much larger history, of a larger universe, of a larger Plan. They may seem conservative, knowing that they only stand on the shoulders of their Godly ancestors and that they are meant to be another shoulder for the generation to come. Yet they are paradoxically liberal, open and reformist, because they have no private agendas and self-interest to protect. People who have learned to live from their God-centers, where God lives and reigns, know which boundaries are worth maintaining and which can be surrendered. Both reflect an obedience.
Probably the most obvious indication of people not recreated at the core, and therefore eccentric people is that they are a pain to live with! Every ego boundary must be defended, negotiated, and glorified: my reputation, my nation, my job, and even my ball team are really all I have to tell myself that I am somebody. No wonder wisdom understanding and community have come upon hard times!
In this new century, we find ourselves condemned to live in a world where the surfaces reign supreme. Most of the gods we have met in our narcissistic age have been no more than projected and magnified images of surface selves.
Conclusion
We live on a beautiful blue and green planet Earth and have grown to understand much about its composition. Unfortunately, we can only humanly deduce some idea about its future destiny.
In the Christian, the analogous “New Earth of God” person, the stable core of the nature of God will shape the mantle of the soul which, in turn, will stabilize the surface plates of activity. There will be peace on the waters and on the land. And any external influences hitting the surface will be counteracted, used, or eliminated.
In addition, we know that this New Earth Christian has an eternal destiny. There is no doubt about the future. This “Earth” will not overheat at its core and blow up. It will not cool down at its core and become dead and frozen. No comets or meteors will smash it and destroy it.
So the converted person needs to grow in the knowledge of who he is at his Center. This puts all surface activity in perspective. And his soul (mind, emotions and will) are to be totally controlled by his Center ( Spirit in union with God through Jesus Christ). Then all the surface boundaries which the body deals with will ultimately be used by God for the good of the whole person (Romans 8:28). This is the school-house of life: The inward journey to core recognition and the exchange of core nature forming A NEW EARTH OF GOD.
Fatherhood has fallen on hard times. Too large a percentage of families today have no father figure in the home.
This Father’s Day, we need to look to God as a perfect Father who is completely devoted to His children.
Let me remind you of the greatest truth in the whole Bible. It is that I as a Christian and you as a Christian are related to the Father. I am a child in the family of God the Father.
You know, my dad was a real popular person among our friends as we lived as a family. It was not uncommon for me to be known as Lucian (Lou) Hodapp’s boy on frequent occasions. I was Lou Hodapp’s boy for several different reasons: first of all, I was named after him: Lucian Hodapp Jr.; secondly we had the same nose; thirdly he and I liked the same kind of activities like, for example, golf; we were seen often together. Yes, we had a lot in common, dad and me. But these were just outward evidences of an inward reality. We were the same blood; I had my dad’s blood running all through my veins, and because of THAT reality, I was his son.
Now sometimes, for sure, I didn’t act like his son. I’d decide to do things which went against everything he stood for. But understand, that did not mean I was not his son. It didn’t change my nose. I still had the same blood flowing through my veins, and NOTHING was going to change that. I could do a lot of different things. I could run away from home. I could do everything in my power to embarrass him if I wanted. I could fail to live up to the great plans he had for me. But none of these things could alter the fact that his blood coursed through my veins. Lucian J. Hodapp was and is the name of my father on my birth certificate. There is nothing I can do that is going to change that. It’s in the records in St. Louis courthouse or wherever they keep those things.
You know something exciting? JESUS’ BLOOD RUNS THROUGH MY VEINS. My blood relationship with Jesus is the same as it is with my dad. I can do all the same things where God is concerned. That whole list of things I can do against my dad, I can do against God, but I can never change the fact that when I accepted Him as my Lord and Savior, I became a new creation – I became a new person with a new spiritual Father.
I can run away from home. Occasionally, I can embarrass Him. I can fail to live up to the great plans He has for me. But none of these failures on my part can mess up the fact that I have a Father-son relationship with God. God the Father’s name is and always will be the name on my new life birth certificate. Jesus Christ is my legal brother and in the record of heaven, it’s there.
You know, Christ now dwells in a spiritual child of God. But the child is now offering himself as what? – a living sacrifice. It’s a two way street. He lives inside of me but I have to offer myself to Him on a daily basis – not just one time, but daily.
Alright, let’s get down to it. Here is the reality of the matter. I still engage in the actions of a person who is a natural person without God. Yes, I’m talking about me. And I know you’re the same way. The lifestyle of the child of God is the model – it’s the ideal – it’s that thing we strive for, the thing in which we journey.
I can do it; He has given me all the resources to make that happen, to live that lifestyle, it is possible. For the Scripture didn’t say, well, you’re kind of a loser, just do the best you can. No. It said I have everything I need BECAUSE I am a child of God. The condition, “flesh”, is still present, but the child of God has the freedom and the option to crucify that flesh and consider himself dead to sin.
The fact of the matter is this: most of us live in the middle, don’t we? Journey is the operative word here. And, unfortunately, most of the time, I’m living in the middle of the flesh and the spirit.
On this Father’s Day, my heavenly Father has no intention of beating me up, demeaning me, and making me feel small in His sight. My heavenly Dad wants me to sit down with Him and talk about the sin in my life so that He can get it out of my life. For I now operate on a love system with Him and He operates on a love system with me.
I think it is really significant that the Bible tells me “I will never leave you or forsake you”. In the original Greek, do you know what that really says? “I WILL NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER LEAVE YOU!” That is how much Jesus wanted to get across to us that He wasn’t going anywhere, that He wanted to stay and fellowship with us, no matter what. If that scripture is true, do you understand that whenever you go into sin, He goes there with you?
When I first thought about that, I thought, “I don’t like that!” When I go to visit sin, I want the leave Jesus at the house. I want to choose when Christ is going to be separated from me. The Bible is contrary to that, friends. If Jesus never leaves, that means that when I go and I do my thing, whatever it may be, He is right there with me. Do you know what kind of intense love that takes? I know I’m talking to a lot of people just like me. Do you understand how much your Father and Jesus love you?
Now I have some friends that are dear to me in my life. But I’m telling you right now, I don’t know that I would be strong enough to stand by them if they did certain things. But Jesus and my Father do that for me.
My Father will not disown me as a son. He just wants me to gain control over some annoying habits that are messing up His house. God says, “Son, we are going to keep working at this and keep working at it until we get it right!” If you look at it like that, it will change your motive.
Sometimes my Father just says, “Now son, don’t.” Sometimes He says, “Son, you’re going to get yourself grounded.” Next time He may say, “Get in here!” But I’m telling you, my family relationship with my Father never changes! I’m always His son! I have that assurance.
I am on a journey. At times I’m more fleshly than other times. But I’ll tell you, when I’m the least fleshly is when I stay connected in awareness of Christ living in me. THEN EVERY DAY IS FATHER’S DAY!
Adam’s choice to sin had serious consequences for the rest of humanity: namely that all human beings became subject to death and eternal condemnation. It may seem unfair to us that sin and death should enter the world through one man. Why should we have to suffer the consequences of one man’s choice? Don’t we get a choice in the matter? Why should we be punished with the death penalty as a consequence for an action we did not choose to commit? And so many gripe and complain that God is unfair. After all, we never chose to be born, let alone be born into a state of condemnation before God. Why such far-reaching consequences for every man and woman who has ever lived and will ever live?
When God created us, He made us morally free persons in His own image (Gen. 1:26-27). He gave to Adam and Eve the capacity to choose whether or not they would obey Him or obey Satan and so, in either case, join themselves spiritually to a power which would then operate them from within. An essential aspect of that moral freedom is that our choices and actions have consequences for ourselves AND for others. In other words, the choices we make effect others. We only need to think of the effect our behavior has upon our children to know this is true. I am sure we can all remember instances where our parents spoke particularly harsh words to us, or perhaps they even neglected or abandoned us. On the other hand, if we are parents, I’m sure we can think of instances where we have done the same kinds of things to our own children.
Why must this effect on others be true? Why did God arrange matters so that our actions could have such devastating consequences for other human beings around us? We must remember, however, that OUR CHOICES CAN ALSO HAVE CONSEQUENCES WHICH EFFECT OTHERS FOR THEIR ULTIMATE GOOD AS WELL.
The reason is that God created us to be social beings, just as He Himself is a social being, since He is a Trinity. God created us with the capacity to love, to have an effect for good on others. God could have created us without the ability to relate to and effect others, but then we would not be persons and would not possess moral freedom. The point of making choices at all is to cause some kind of change. So any choice that does not produce some kind of effect or consequence is ineffectual and irrelevant.
So if we object that God is unfair because Adam’s choice effects all of us, then we must also realize that we are in effect saying that we would rather be non-persons without the ability to choose at all, without the capacity to love. For love is meaningless unless it is morally free and unless it can have an effect on others. When we call God unfair, what we are really saying is Cain’s age-old complaint: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Gen. 4:9).
To get angry with God for making us the way we are is an evasion of responsibility as persons to use our moral freedom in a way that benefits others. Instead of complaining about the choice that Adam made and its consequences for us, we ought to be making choices in our own lives that reverse those consequences for others.
But how can Paul say that as a result of one man’s sin, death came to all men? Isn’t that unfair? Absolutely not! Paul says that death comes to all men NOT MERELY because Adam sinned but because we all have sinned. It is for our own sins that the sentence of death is pronounced against us.
But if I am born with a spiritual hook-up to Satan’s nature, isn’t it inevitable that I will sin? How is it that God can condemn me as a sinner when I couldn’t even choose whether or not I would rebel against God? But that is not so. In fact, each of us from the beginning have had glimmers of moral consciousness, knowing at a rudimentary level the difference between right and wrong and have willfully chosen what is wrong. Even at age two or three, we make a rudimentary choice to rebel against our parents, knowing that we were doing wrong. As we live on in the world, we ratify Adam’s choice as our choice, thus sealing our pact with the devil. We were born with a hook-up to Satan’s nature, but that hook-up was sealed by our own choice. BY ADAM’S CHOICE SIN GAINED ENTRY INTO THE WORLD. BY OUR OWN CHOICE SIN GAINED POSSESSION OVER OUR OWN LIVES.
In Romans 5:13-14, Paul deals with the objection that many people have lived who have not had knowledge of God’s law - how can they be held accountable since sin is not taken into account where there is no law? But sin was already in the world even when there was no codified law. Although humanity did not have specific commands from God against which sin could manifest its rebellious character, nevertheless that rebellion or Satanic lie of independence manifested itself clearly, as we see happened before the flood (Gen. 6) and at the Tower of Babel (Gen. 11). And so DEATH reigned from the time of Adam until the time of Moses, even though people in that time did not sin by breaking an explicit command from God as Adam did.
Unless God had set it up that one person’s actions could have consequences for all humanity, Christ could not have died for us. His death on the cross would have no effect on lost sinners. But BECAUSE God created us as social beings whose choices and actions have effects on and consequences for others, that means not only that Adam’s choice led to death for all humanity, but that Christ’s obedience led to eternal life for those who believe.
But the salvation and eternal life that Jesus Christ brought through His obedience are so much greater than the consequences of Adam’s disobedience that they can hardly be compared. We not only live eternally, but we have the nature and the power of God within and are seen by God as His REAL CHILDREN!
And even more, the choice that we make to obey God by not believing Satan’s lie of self-operating independent self has consequences not only for us, but for all those around us. A pebble dropped in a pond creates ripples that spread outward to effect the whole pond, and so our choices have consequences for people we may never know, Our choice of continuing in negative unbelief may mean a person does not get to hear the truth of the gospel from us because we were too busy indulging in self-gratification or self-pity to focus our life on others. But our choice to believe in Christ as our Savior brings His power and guidance from within giving us the ability to effect others for good in many ways.
Like Adam and Jesus Christ, our every choice has eternal and far-reaching consequences, not only for us, but also for those around us.
A friend recently asked, “Why is it many non-Christians seem to have more of the fruit of the Spirit than many Christians do?”
Of course, tremendous change has been wrought in countless lives through the gospel. How many have been brought back from the brink of suicide because they heard the good news of forgiveness and peace with God through Christ? Who can number the ailing marriages which have been saved from total breakdown?
What about the hardened criminals whose lives have been turned into productive channels? Or the prostitutes and drug addicts who have found a new lease on life?
And yet, it is true that millions of Christians do not know the fulfilled life that Jesus promised – the “abundant life which He said we could experience right here and now.
In my own life, I have found myself many times being forced to face the inescapable conclusion that I am nothing but a weak individual when it comes to living up to the standard of Christ. I have been in situations over and over again in which God has absolutely nailed down my weakness, demonstrating beyond a shadow of doubt that I am no stronger today than when I first believed!
“But surely I’ve changed over many years as a Christian?” you ask. No, you haven’t changed. What you DO might have changed, but you are the same clay pot that first came to the foot of the cross to be cleansed. You are just as weak, just as incapable of living up to the life of Christ as you ever were.
Of course, if you don’t yet know that, then you will have to keep struggling and falling down until you finally see that you are able to do precisely nothing toward living the life of Christ. If Jesus Christ Himself was so weak in His own power that He could do precisely nothing in His own strength (see John 5:30), where does that leave you? Some see it through the ordinary failures of daily life. Others, especially those with strong natural talents, have to be broken in pieces before they will confess that they can’t do anything to help themselves be like Christ.
In my own case, I went through years of dedicated living before I came to the end of myself. I faithfully attended church, I gave generously of my assets, I studied the Word of God praying and meditating about it.
And don’t tell me that I did it out of fear or a sense of duty. I did it because of a sincere desire to really know God’s power in my life, as have many of you reading this article. I sought to draw near to God so that He might draw near to me.
But at the end of it all, I finally had to admit that I was just as weak and unable to do the will of God as when I began! I was frankly no better! I had only learned to act a little differently.
Jesus talked about a man drinking from Him and NEVER thirsting again. Again, Jesus described Himself as the “bread of life” and assured the disciples that if they would once eat of this bread, they would NEVER hunger again. Jesus was clearly saying that no daily routine of drawing additional spiritual water from the wells or additional spiritual food from the pantry would be necessary.
This sounds so opposite to what we have all been taught and practiced for years – work harder to improve yourself.
Here then is an enigma. Jesus confessed that He could do nothing. He was unable to contribute a single thing toward the fulfillment of God’s will in His life. Yet at the same time, He manifested the life of God totally.
Further, He said that we would be able to do even greater works than He did, and that we too could know the totally fulfilled, abundant life which He knew.
How can we do NOTHING and yet do EVERYTHING?
It all has to do with our composition just as it all had to do with Jesus’ composition. Jesus was a man with a human spirit, soul and body just as we have. He had the intellect, emotions and will of the soul-mind and the temptations of the body just the same as we have. So far, Jesus and us are exactly alike.
But our actions are a far cry from what Jesus of Nazareth accomplished. Where is the difference? It is in the human spirit and its function.
Jesus was born as the first New Man or new species of man with God the Father joined to His human spirit in an eternal living union. And since your human spirit is WHO you really are and what your real nature is, Jesus said that when they had seen Him, they had seen the Father. He had the “divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4).
Jesus was born this way because He was the Perfect First New Man. And as a demonstration of perfection, He always joined His soul-mind to the will of the Father joined to His human spirit. Jesus knew all about the weakness of the human soul and body – “of My own self I can do nothing!” But in spite of this weakness, He lived a perfect life of submission to the Father.
Now what about your composition and my composition? As I said, soul-mind and body exactly the same as Jesus of Nazareth.
But we are born into the world with an entirely different human spirit. Our human spirit does not have the eternal union with the Father as did Jesus. Far from it. Our human spirit at birth contains the independent nature of Satan (John 8:44) symbolized by the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil”.
Paul speaks of us continually as an “inner man” and an “outer man.” The inner man of spirit manifests himself through an outer soul and body. What we ARE is the inner man of spirit. Yet it is the outer man that is visible to the world, and so we think of people in terms of what they look like and what they say and do. The Scripture tells us, however, to look through the outer man and judge rightly, instead of by external appearances.
At conversion and new birth, Satan’s nature is ejected and can no longer be joined to our spirit. The union of our spirit with his is broken. This union is called in biblical parlance “the old man.”
God now places within us the resurrected Christ in a new Spirit to spirit union. We are now children of God instead of children of the wicked one. We have become “partakers of the divine nature,” because He now indwells us and expresses His nature through us.
OK – what have we here. Jesus of Nazareth had the Father indwelling Him, and we have the resurrected Christ indwelling us. Jesus was the model perfect man and always mirrored in His soul and body what was in His spirit.
BUT WE DON’T! The purpose of this life on earth for a born again Christian is to grow in understanding of who we are in union with Christ, and learn to more and more each day mirror the nature of Christ within our human spirit out through our soul and body.
This begins to answer the question we started with, as to why we don’t see more of the fruit of the Spirit in our lives, and why it is that many unconverted people can appear more loving, more fulfilled, more at peace with one another.
Although the unconverted person’s spirit is “deceitful above all things and desperately wicked,” so that out of it can flow all kinds of evil such as “fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries”, and so on, the external man does not manifest the whole of what is in his spirit.
Back to that tree of “the knowledge of good and evil” – not just evil but also good! Jesus Himself said that we “being evil, know how to give good gifts.”
The nature of Satan expressed through the human vehicle is principally SELF. When it benefits us to do good, we will do good; when evil is to our advantage, we do evil. As long as the kingdom of SELF is advanced, Satan is delighted. So evil manifestations predominate in some, and good manifestations predominate in others, according to the circumstances of upbringing, environment, etc., and whatever is going to help SELF in those circumstances.
But the new man is also veiled in flesh. We have been made totally new within (2 Cor. 5:17). The union of old man nature ended at conversion, when we became identified with the crucified body of Christ. The old man is crucified, dead and buried, as pictured in baptism, and “old things are passed away.”
Yet it takes time for this new man to burst forth into manifestation at the level of soul and body. So we may appear the same externally, even though the new life is actual and not just “positional” as some falsely assert. There has been a real permanent change of nature.
This brings us to the experience of Paul in Romans 7. With our mind, we no longer really want to sin. We may be temporarily diverted through fleshly pulls, but at our core we now seek to fulfill the will of God.
And this is the paradox that most Christians eventually find themselves in. They desire to live the Christian life, but they find that they can’t do it! And it is meant to be this way. Rather than all pretending, we would do far better to be open and honest about these things. God wants us to be real. But that’s very difficult around super-spiritual brothers and sisters who would be shocked if we really “let it all hang out.” Instead, we go about trying to do what we are supposed to do, and the process of really coming to grips with the problem is delayed.
God wants us to cry out as Paul did, “Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?” He is waiting for that moment of honesty when finally we face up to the fact that we can’t live the Christian life.
Are we bound to continue in this frustrated situation for the rest of our time on earth? Thank God, no! When we see that we can’t, God reveals that CHRIST CAN. When we finally quit trying to keep His law and to do His will in our own strength, we discover that His purpose is “that the requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.”
It has to be this way, or we would have room to boast of our own contribution to our spiritual growth (1 Cor. 1:30-31).
Christ in us is our only hope of glory (Colossians 1:27), a glory that Jesus said He gives us NOW, in this life (John 17:22).
But the first rung of the ladder is to understand the reality of your union with Christ and to refuse to take any condemnation from yourself or from others for that weak soul and body. You quit fussing and worrying about the spiritual condition of your soul and trust that your real life (Christ in union with your spirit) will in God’s due time burst out into manifestation.
I never need to thirst, never need to feel dry, never need to hunger, again. The supply is endless because it is not some “thing” – not love, or joy, or peace as commodities that I ask Him to give Me – but it is He living through me as I trust and appropriate Him to do it.
From experience, I have seen that God rarely rushes the manifestation of righteousness in our lives. He does His work thoroughly. He makes sure we are “settled” in each step of the way. He rubs our noses in our failure before He shows us that there is another way. Then He allows the temporary diversions of the flesh to continue so that we can really become established in refusing condemnation.
Perhaps this thing of not taking condemnation is what roots us in the faith life above all else. In the face of great foolishness, we have to instantly refuse to feel condemned! We are bold in going right on, with only that simple recognition God asks of us, admitting that we acted foolishly.
Remember that God isn’t as interested in preventing us from committing individual sins as He is in seeing us fixed in the faith life once and for all. The flesh has not been redeemed, and Satan can still get at us there. We may temporarily falsely see ourselves as separate selves and forget that we are in union, thereby being caught out by temptation. But as we function in faith, seeing ourselves as the new man and not regarding the flesh as of any consequence, the life of Christ will even deliver us from the foolish diversion we take into this false separation thinking.
When God’s children don’t manifest the fruit of the Spirit, it isn’t that they are deliberately disobedient. They want to, but they can’t. So preaching obedience, and then preaching repentance because they fail, will never produce fruit. It is the deadlock of Romans 7. Seeing the standard isn’t the problem. We don’t need to be continually reminded that we are to live a certain way. It’s being able to do it that is the problem. And that’s the way God intends it to be, because it will never be us but Him!
There is an obedience in the new covenant. But it is not of works. It is “the obedience of faith.” It means that we affirm that what God says of us is true, against all feelings. And that will call forth the manifestation as “fruit.” We will desire to do right, be inclined to do right – and Christ in us will CAUSE us to walk quite naturally.
Do you know the difference between “fruit’ and “works”? Fruit is produced because of what a tree IS. It is the natural product of the tree. Works are like hanging apples on an oak tree. It may for a while look like an apple tree, but the fruit will soon rot and there will be no lasting crop. It may look as though the tree is producing fruit for a time, but in the final analysis it will be shown for what it is.
On the other hand, a young apple tree may have no apples on it. But because it doesn’t have apples, you don’t say that it isn’t an apple tree. You say that it IS an apple tree, despite the fact that there is no fruit. You affirm that it is what it claims to be, and you know that in due season that fruit will appear.
For a while, the one who walks by faith may look bad, even worse than many in the world. But as we are real, the true life within will manifest itself without our stewing over it and trying to make it happen in our own strength. And it is the only lasting, safe way for fruit to be produced in us. It puts Christ where He belongs – AS THE PRODUCER.
The following article appeared in Discover magazine August 1995:
One of the most startling sights on a first trip to Africa is a common one: women carrying things on their heads. Try to carry a suitcase on your head, and you’ll probably bite your tongue in concentration and wave your arms madly for balance. But African women walk for miles with heavy jugs of water or pots of food as if they weren’t carrying anything. Energetically speaking, they aren’t! Researchers have found that the women can carry enormous loads without using any extra energy. They aren’t defying any laws of physics, though; they’re being good PENDULUMS.
In 1977 a team of Harvard physiologists, in Kenya to study the locomotion of wild animals, found themselves distracted by the load-carrying women. “When we tried to pick up the loads, we were just amazed,” says Norman Heglund. “We wondered how the devil they did it.” As a first experiment, Heglund’s team convinced some Kenyan women to wear breathing masks as they carried their loads; the idea was to measure the women’s oxygen consumption, calculate how many calories they were burning, and then compare their performance with that of non-Africans. There the experiment ran into a snag: the non-African researchers couldn’t match the carrying capacity of the Kenyan women, at least not with their heads. Heglund and his colleagues had to resort to backpacks and to using old measurements from American Army recruits.
Still, the results were extraordinary. The African women could carry a fifth of their weight without burning a single extra calorie. And although larger loads did require more energy, the increase was only half of that needed by the American soldiers. Some women could carry 70 percent of their weight.
Funding agencies haven’t exactly been desperate for the answer to this riddle, so it’s only recently that Heglund has managed to get a step closer to one. While spending a year teaching at the University of Nairobi in 1989, he had some Kenyan women walk across force plates; last year in Belgium he repeated the experiment with European students. Force plates are devices that register the vertical and horizontal forces exerted by a walking animal.
A walking human is like a pendulum swinging. When the pendulum is at its lowest point, it is moving fastest, and its energy is almost all kinetic energy of motion. As the pendulum climbs up one side of its arc and is slowed and finally stopped by gravity, that energy isn’t all lost. Most of it is stored as potential energy and is converted back into kinetic energy when the pendulum starts to fall again. But some of the energy is lost to friction, both in the bearing and between the pendulum and the air.
Similarly, when you walk, the kinetic energy of your forward movement turns into potential energy as you rise on one foot and is converted back into kinetic energy as you fall onto the other foot. But with each footfall, only 65 percent of that kinetic energy is carried over into the next step; 35 percent is lost, mostly to internal friction in your leg. That 35 percent has to be made up by your leg muscles, which convert food energy into kinetic energy.
The 35 percent rule applies to Kenyan women too - until they start carrying things on their heads. Heglund’s force plate readings allowed him to calculate how much energy his subjects were transferring from one step to the next. Without a load, Kenyan women and Europeans both transferred 65 percent. When the Europeans carried loads on their backs, they still lost 35 percent - but now, since they were bearing more weight at the same speed, that 35 percent represented more energy in absolute terms, which they made up by burning more calories.
In contrast, the Africans simply became better pendulums. When they carried a fifth of their body weight on their heads, they somehow managed to transfer 75 percent of their energy from one step to the next, losing only 25 percent to friction. With a greater load, one woman even reduced her loss to 15 percent!
Heglund doesn’t know what biomechanical trick the Kenyan women are using - THEY COULDN’T TELL HIM! But it must have something to do with carrying things on your head. People who carry things for a living, he notes, from Kenyans to Sherpa mountain guides, tend to use their heads. “It’s just amateurs like us that use suitcases and backpacks,” Heglund says. [End of article]
As I finished reading the above article, the words of Christ in the Gospel came to mind: “Come unto Me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you REST. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you shall find REST for your souls. For My yoke is easy, and MY BURDEN IS LIGHT.” (Matthew 11:28-30)
Much the same type of “burden carrying” is available to the Christian as is used by the Kenyan women. Christ did not say that He would remove our burdens. He said that when we learned to TRUST in Him, our burdens would SEEM lighter.
By years of physical training, the women have found that carrying the load on their heads was as easy as not even having the load there at all. No extra energy was expended. But this ability required diligent practice and probably many loads dropped to the ground.
The Christian who comes to know his living union with Jesus Christ can have the same burden release as the Kenyan women have learned. Christ promises to provide the power energy to handle any burden of a Christian IF THE CHRISTIAN WILL TRUST IN CHRIST TO DO IT.
But the development of this trust is not instantaneous. Just as the women required physical training, we, as Christians, require spiritual training. AND THAT IS WHAT OUR HUMAN LIFE IS ALL ABOUT! As we feel the load of our burden start to shift and fall at times, we tend to want to grab it in our own strength. We tend to want to expend our own potential energy instead of allowing Christ to use His spiritual kinetic energy. There is much the same spiritual “pendulum rule” as the physical. And Christ is operating the pendulum.
There is a story in the Old Testament about a man named Uzzah that always seemed strange to me. David was moving the Ark of the Covenant from one place to another on a team of oxen. The Ark started to slip and fall as the oxen stumbled, and Uzzah leaped forward to grab the Ark to prevent damage. God immediately killed Uzzah on the spot for his rashness and disobedience in touching the Ark. (II Samuel 6:6-8) Wow! What a penalty! No second chance there! God’s using of the Law’s severe penalty here I see as a lesson for Christians today. It is a serious matter to try to take up our own burdens. God has promised to carry our burdens with His OWN ENERGY. If we rashly try to do the job in our own strength, we, in effect, turn our back on God’s promises. Christ WILL do the job for us.
And when it comes down to the bottom line, CHRIST’S PENDULUM RULE IS EVEN MORE EFFICIENT! Not 65-35, not 75-25, but the efficiency can approach 100-0 even with the heaviest load.
What do I mean? The more we develop the daily spiritual habit of placing our trust totally in the hands of Christ, the more He says that we can REST. And what is rest? Not only do we not USE energy at rest, but we actually recharge and strengthen our potential energy by rest. You mean having a burden carried by Christ can give us MORE energy than we had before? Yes. How it works, I have no idea. Just as it is a mystery to me how Christ can live within me in a living union of Spirit to spirit — just as it is a mystery to the scientists how the African women can expend no extra energy from their burdens - it is a mystery how TRUST in Christ can create a recharging PEACE in the midst of apparent trouble. BUT IT DOES! THE BIBLE PROMISES IT. I BELIEVE THE BIBLE. MY BELIEF BRINGS THE PEACE!
The "LORD'S SUPPER" - "COMMUNION" - What Does It All Mean?
The Church down through the ages has called the “Lord’s Supper” or “Communion” a sacrament. Catholics even call it the Blessed Sacrament. The word sacrament has been defined as an outward expression of an inward spiritual reality.
I would like to enlarge your perspective on what I believe Jesus meant at the Last Supper when He did that thing with the bread and wine – “This is my body… This is my blood.” What was He really instituting?
Much is made today about the ability to remember things, Books are written about memory techniques. Courses are given to teach how to remember what you see and hear. The ability to remember names and faces is a great factor in business success. We all wish that we could remember other people’s names and things about them better.
Practically every memory technique that you hear about involves the subject of “association”. People who have extraordinary talent at remembering names and other things mostly speak of their use of association. When they first hear about something which they wish to remember, they associate the name, the face, the event, with some other common thing or event. This way, they are able to recall the thing that they want to remember much more easily.
Some of these talented “rememberers” seem, to many of us, to use some very complicated associations at times, but for them it seems to work very successfully. Whether complicated or simple, associations do work for memory recall.
Well, I believe that Jesus Christ understood the principles of memory association very well. And this is what the “Lord’s Supper” is all about.
The event of the Lord’s Supper is described in three of the four gospels by Matthew, Mark and Luke. (John’s gospel, for some unknown reason, does not make mention of the event of the disciple’s partaking with Christ of the bread and wine.) There is a little different wording among the three gospels, Matthew 26:26-28, Mark 14:22-24, Luke 22:19-20. But Paul, in First Corinthians Chapter Eleven, covers everything mentioned in the three gospels. “For I have received of the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus, the same night in which He was betrayed, took bread. And when He had given thanks, He broke it, and said, ‘Take and eat. This is My body, which is broken for you. THIS DO IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME.’ In the same way also, He took the cup (of wine] when He had finished supper, and said, ‘This cup is the new testament in My blood. As often as you drink it, DO THIS IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME.’ For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are showing the Lord‘s death until He comes.” (I Cor. 11:23-26)
Much has been made of this event by Christians down through the centuries. But what are we to really see in the message Christ was giving to His friends?
I believe the key words of His purpose are the words: “in remembrance”. Jesus knew how easy it would be for Christians to temporarily forget Him because of their involvement in daily activities of the world. No one can keep his mind squarely on Christ at all times throughout the daily grind of life. Jesus knew that, and wanted Christians to play the game of “association” in their common daily routine of living.
Everyone has to eat. Every day. Everyone has to drink. Every day. Jesus figured that these times would be good times to associate with Him. I believe that the above quoted scripture could be paraphrased something like this:
“Okay, guys, you know that I‘m not going to be eating with you, living with you, teaching you much longer. But I want you to remember me. You are going to get busy with things of the world and tend to forget everything I mean to you. I don’t want you to forget. I am going to die. And my death won’t be very pretty, but everything about it will have a purpose. Look at this bread. You are going to be eating some of this every day of your life. When you take it into your mouth daily at mealtimes, think of my body, broken in death. Remember me as your Lord. Associate eating the bread with my body death, for you! Look at this wine. You are going to be drinking some of this at your mealtimes also. As you raise that cup to your lips daily, and swish that wine into you mouth, think of my blood being spilled in death, for you! Associate your daily wine with my blood. This is the best way that I can think of to keep you IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME.”
I believe that this is the basic theme. The event was meant by Christ to be a simple memory association. It was just Jesus’ way of getting Christians to remember Him, in the confusion of the world, at least three times a day!
The custom of saying “grace” or “blessing” the food at mealtimes is quite common among Christians. It is good to thank God for what He has given us. And Jesus was saying to remember Him at mealtime by association. When you eat and drink your breakfast, your toast and coffee, remember His body and blood. When you eat and drink your lunch, for instance a sandwich and fruit juice, remember His body and blood. When you eat and drink dinner, a dinner roll and wine with your entree, remember His body and blood. This will be a constant recall to us at mealtime of what Christ did for us in our place, and what He does for us on a daily basis as He guides our life from within us.
It is certainly good, proper and uplifting to assemble together as a church for a “Communion Service”, Worshipping God in music and prayer together, and then partaking of bread and wine or juice together is a fine way to increase our awareness of our new birth in living union with Christ. The Holy Spirit deals with our intellect, emotions and will (our human soul) in a mighty way when we assemble together. Man, on a human level, knows the power of a “Memorial Service” in honor of a person or an event. Man keeps annual remembrances by services for people and events such as Pearl Harbor, Martin Luther King, Memorial Day services for all the war dead, etc. Man has found that the assembling together enhances the remembrance and the meaning.
But I really believe that Christ had in mind a DAILY association of food with Him. “Think about Me often,” He seemed to say. And this was to be done, not to enhance His image and glorify Him, but rather for OUR benefit. The best way for us to stay in constant awareness of and TRUST in Christ‘s guidance is to REMEMBER HIM!
Isaiah 53 is recognized as a prophetic description of Christ’s suffering and death. And we are given there a twofold meaning to the Cross. “By His stripes, we are healed.” By Jesus’ broken body, we are to recall the promises of healing power available to a Christian. “For the transgression of my people was He stricken.” By the blood of Jesus, we are to recall the whole purpose of the Cross: to pay the penalty of sin for us. These are worthy considerations for a Christian to keep him aware of who he is.
Back in I Corinthians 11, the Corinthian church seemed to be making a “party time” out of the Lord’s Supper service. And Paul had to give correction on what communion was all about. He said that it was fine to come together for communion, but that it was not meant to be a giant feast. Paul said in verse 22: “Have you not houses to eat and drink in?” I believe Paul was saying that they could take the Lord’s Supper every time they ate at home. But to assemble together for it required a certain dignity of expression. This is what they were lacking.
I see communion not as a doctrinal requirement of Christ but as a prudent recommendation of Christ toward His Church. If you want to keep from drifting into independent thinking and the ways of the world, remember Jesus Christ by association with eating and drinking.
What do others say?
I have many Catholic relatives and friends and I hope that this article does not cause friction. Real Christianity contains many devout Catholic and Protestant people. But the Roman Catholic Church insists that when the wine and wafer is consecrated by a priest, it becomes the actual flesh and the actual blood of Christ. This is known as “transubstantiation”. But does a piece of bread or a cup of wine really become the flesh and blood of Christ? Is this what our Lord meant?
I believe not. He simply meant that these elements represented or were symbols of His flesh and blood. Such symbolism is often found in the Bible.
One time three of David’s friends heard him express a strong desire for water from the well at Bethlehem. In spite of extreme danger, these men broke through the host of the Philistines and brought the water to him. When David found out that these men had risked their lives in this way, he refused to drink the water saying, “Is not this the blood of the men who went in jeopardy of their lives?” (2 Sam. 23:17). No one would suppose that David meant this water was literal blood. No, he used the expression in a figurative sense.
Likewise, the Bible gives references to eating a book, hungering after righteousness, etc. - all of which are shown by the context to be figurative expressions. Jesus once said, “I am the door” (John 10:9). Surely no one would suppose that Jesus was or became a literal door! On another occasion, our Lord said, “I am the vine, you are the branches” (John 15:5). He had not become a literal vine. The scriptures speak of our Lord as a rock, “and that rock was Christ” (I Cor. 10:4).
Even the scriptural wording of the event suggests that the bread and wine do not change substance. If the elements of the communion become the actual flesh and blood of Christ, how could we take it “in remembrance...until He comes” if He thus becomes present in body, blood, soul and divinity?
If the wine becomes literal blood during the mass ritual - as in claimed - then to drink it would be forbidden by the scriptures (Acts 15:20, etc.)
The Council of Trent officially defined the doctrine of transubstantiation and made it required thinking of the church. And the Council said that not only did the elements of the mass contain Christ’s body and blood, but they were the WHOLE Christ. Then when the priest offers it up, he is believed to be actually sacrificing Christ AGAIN! Thus it is referred to as the “Sacrifice of the Mass” and as “a renewal of the sacrifice of the Cross.“ But the Bible says that Calvary is a finished work, once for all, In Hebrews 9:25-28, we find a comparison of the ONE sacrifice of Christ with those numerous sacrifices of the Old Testament. “And as it is appointed unto men ONCE to die...so Christ was ONCE offered to bear the sins of many”. In the Old Testament, sacrifices had to be continually offered because none of them was the PERFECT sacrifice. But with the perfect sacrifice of our Lord Himself, there was no longer any need for repeated sacrifices.
There is not one verse in the Bible that even hints at the idea that the sacrifice of Christ had to be continued. In fact the Bible stresses just the opposite.
By the end of the Eleventh Century, lest someone should spill God’s blood, the Catholic Church began to hold back the cup from the people. (But was it not also possible that the early disciples could have spilled some of the cup? But Christ did not withhold it from them on such a basis.) Finally, in 1415, the Council of Constance officially denied the cup to laymen. This practice continued until the 1970’s with the “modernizing” of Catholicism.
Why not keep it simple?
Why did the Catholic Church make such a big deal out of the “Sacrifice of the Mass”? Not being content with the simple, sincere, memorial taking of bread and wine, the Catholic Church attempted to compete with the elaborate rituals of the peoples around them. And this mixture of ritualism and the Lord’s Supper produced the ceremony known as the Mass,
But if Christ was instituting a new special doctrinal ceremony at the Last Supper, would we not have more about it than just in three gospels and Paul’s Corinthian letter? We should find reference to its requirement throughout the New Testament. But we don‘t. The apostle John, Jesus’ closest friend, makes no mention of the event at the Last Supper.
Many do use one of John’s verses to validate transubstantiation. John 6:53 says: “Then Jesus said to them, ‘Truely I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man arid drink His blood, you have no life in you. “
But this verse must be considered in the context of verse 35: “And Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life; he that COMES TO ME shall never hunger; he that BELIEVES ON ME shall never thirst.” This shows that Jesus was using symbolism in verse 53 above. Jesus just stated the basic requirements for conversion and new birth - coming to Him in repentance and believing on Him for salvation. And in verse 53, He emphasized, with figurative flesh-eating and blood-drinking, the requirements of verse 35 to satisfy the “hunger” and “thirst”.
The bottom line
In the light of the above stated analysis, and the little mention of the “Lord’s Supper” in the New Testament, I have arrived at the following conclusions.
1) Jesus was not instituting a ritualistic ceremony but rather was giving His disciples a useful “tool” of remembrance by association.
2) This remembrance can and should be done at any meal, at home, public restaurant or church assembly. Jesus used bread and wine because they were available. But any food elements for eating and drinking can be used for remembrance by association.
3) Eating for your hunger reminds you of coming to Jesus for healing of body and soul by His broken body.
4) Drinking for your thirst reminds you of believing on Jesus for salvation by the blood of His death.
5) Galatians 2:20 says that Christ is present in my human spirit in a living union. I do not have to take “communion” to have His Life inside of me. It is there already.
6) The church “Communion Service” is a beautiful way to involve all the elements of the soul - intellect, emotions and will – into A REMEMBRANCE OF JESUS CHRIST.
