WnT Guds rike & fåglarna
VARFÖR dessa återkommande Fåglar? Har bloggaren inget annat än pippi på huvu't? Är detta nån slags ornitologisk introduktionssajt, eller?
Stjärtmesen med blåmesen ätande på samma talgboll hemma på Hampus´ tomt, det är inte bara fåglar. Det är för mig en bild som talar. Oavsett vilken eller vilka fåglar som möter på mina Walks n' Talks.
"Se på fåglarna…" säger Mästaren. Säger han det för att vara romantisk? Lite småtrevligt folklig med franciskansk touch? Säger han det bara för att vi ska fokusera inte på morgondagens problem om vad att äta eller klä sig med - utan fokusera bekymmerslöshetens tonslinga i f-dur? Nej, Kristus Jesus har något mera och djupare att tala om - genom dessa bevingade i och för sig mycket intressanta kreationer av Klass I. Det Han talar om genom varje fågels möte med våra syn-nervsbanor är något mycket stort och förunderligt - nämligen: Guds rike. Det är alltid ämnet över alla ämnen. Och den undervisningen ges för den som kan se också via dessa audiovisuella hjälpmedel. Det både syns och hörs om fåglarnas liv. De har som sin största uppgift att vara kanske de främsta förkunnarna av Evangelium om Guds rike! Den som inte tänkt den tanken har alltså en möjlighet till en ny dimension för sin trosundervisning.
Se på Koltrasten. För en månad sedan satt den två meter lägre ned i trädet än idag. Varför? Därför att snart är det dags att inta den översta platsen i trädet och konsertera för hela auditoriet, och höras i hela Berwaldhallen med akustik som vore den ur Waldhäuser… Vad säger det om Guds rike? Det är den verklighet som gestaltas av församlingen och kommer allt närmre. Tonen från Himlen hörs allt närmre…
Se på Blåmesen, Ekorren och Koltrasthonan som alla tre i morgontimman före gryningen rör sig som vore de lekkamrater i buskarna utanför 159:ans kortsida. Så lekfullt, så nära varann, som vore de involverade i en familjär picknick. Vad säger det om Guds rike? I den verkligheten finner vi frihet, rymd, fantasi. Och kärlekens kreativitet helt utanför de gängse ramarna. I denna Guds rikes tillvaro får vi profetiskt gestalta ett livsalternativ bortom grottekvarn och ekorrhjul…
Det innebär att lyfta huvud och hjärta uppåt. Se på fåglarna. Rikta blick och vaksamhet uppåt. Med den parallella rörelsen av övernaturlig Nådesnärvaro ned in i behoven av trygghet, äventyr och kärlek - Faderns kärlek…
/Dag JustNu
Askonsdag 9/2-05
Mere Christianity
MERE CHRISTIANITY
Inledning: 'Only Christianity' som tills idag använts som ett samlingsuttryck för hela Den [samlade] svenska kristenheten byts ut mot C.S. Lewis egentliga term 'Mere Christianity'. Tack Chris Barenekow!
Här nedan följer ett utdrag ur eget inlägg från häromdagen i ett kyrkligt Diskussionsforum, Kyrkans Framtid:
'Only Christianity' - är en tanke som uppfyller mig mer och mer sedan lång tid… [Ni] känner mycket väl till C.S. Lewis och hans hållning visavi den tidens kyrkliga debattörer. Han om någon var skickad att gå i strid och i debatt med sin vassa penna och sitt klara intellekt med den akademiska profession han hade. Han valde att försvara den kristna tron och dess lära utifrån arenan och utgångspunkten 'Only Christianity', och inte såsom företrädare för den Anglikanska kyrkan. Temat och banéret med orden 'Only Christianity' är för alla kristtrogna också ett uttryck för visionen all kristenhet har. Det handlar om kallelsen att vara Body of Christ i tiden som Staden på berget, som Salt och ljus i den värld vi lever… Min […] undran är hur [ni] "känner för" tanken 'Only Christianity', som ju hör samman med Joh 17. Hur ser våra visioner ut för Svensk kristenhet? Hur ser Kyrkans Herre på den samlade Svenska kristenheten? Hur förenas den självklara visionen med alla frågor som jag lite "skämt"-samt benämner Avfalls-frågor? Själv har jag gärna stått upp för sanningen och gärna agerat för att hålla rent hus gentemot inomkyrkliga avfallsfrågor, av alla slag. Det jag själv lärt är att den inriktningen tog tid från den huvuduppgift vi har som kristenhet, nämligen missionens utmaning att på allt sätt se till att Evangelium om Guds rike når dem som är onådda, hemma på orten, i Sverige, samt ute i världen.
Detta utdrag ur eget inlägg ovan bemöts av en ortodox broder. Meningsbytet får illustrera får illustrera det som finns av olikheter och spänningar mellan traditionerna som också finns i svensk kristenhet. Samtal och kommunikation över gränser tarvar kunskap och respekt i Acceptans, under Bön, med Caritas i Delaktighet i kraft av ett Evangelium "i fullt mått". Min gode ortodoxe vän
skriver:
Detta är en viktig tanke, ännu viktigare eftersom gapet mellan organisation och innehåll gapar så vidt (dansk ordform, för tydlighetens skull! Neutrum av "vid" inte färgen, är vad som avses.) "Kyrkans framtid" är något annat än "Svenska kyrkans framtid" - i bästa fall har Svenska kyrkan något med saken att göra: åtminstone bör de som hör till Svenska kyrkan ta sig en tankeställare i vilkenderas framtid de vill vara. Det är inte likgiltigt, nämligen. En stor svårighet för svenska kristna i gemen ligger i att förstå att "Kyrkan" vare sig är = Svenska kyrkan; eller = alla kristna. Detta beror åtminstone delvis på att man uppfattar "kyrkan som en funktion" där Guds Ord rent och klart predikas och sakramenten förvaltas enligt Kristi instiftelse" men NT och hela den gamla kyrkan vet, att detta är fenomen som hör till, men inte är kärnan, för den är enheten med Kristus och alla de troende i det Nya Förbundets måltid: eukaristin, Nattvarden. Mellan den apostoliska kyrkan och nuet ligger ett antal brytningar, där nycklamakten brukats och ett avlägsnande (svårt att veta hur stort men Nycklamakten är säkert inte kraftlös!) från ovannämnda gemenskap har skett.
Brytningen med judendomen hör inte dit, men brytningen mellan biskopen av Rom och de östliga kyrkorna är en tydlig sådan. Konstanstinopel har visserligen hävt bindenyckelns lås över Rom 1967, men inte alla andra, och många av problemen kvarstår och måste lösas: Västkyrkans vägar från 1000-talet är en historia om nya teologier (skolastik mm) svårigheter, villovägar, nystarter och mera problem igen. (Som ortodox har jag mera gemensamt med de kyrkor som lämnade gemenskapen på 400-600-talet än jag har med de Romersk katolska som ändå var i kommunion med oss ytterligare fyrahundra år. )
Den stora andra brytpunkten kommer med Reformationen, som på nytt tar upp de misstag som utlöste den förra brytningen - men därtill inför så mycket nya ansatser att dessa med tiden äter upp de reformatoriska samfunden. Rom har velat (men driver inte längre den linjen som huvudlinje) se kyrkans mitt och därmed förenande band, i biskopen av Rom, snarare än Eukaristin . De från Rom utgångna kyrkorna är inte centrerade i Eukaristin som det förenande bandet mellan de (rätt) troende, och det har genomslag: de blir inte riktigt "kyrkor" på det sättet som de gamla kyrkorna, Rom inräknat, är. Det sätt den heliga nattvarden beskrivs på i Svenska kyrkans Kyrkoordning vittnar skrämmande tydligt om hur Nattvarden har blivit något individcentrerat "extra" istället för det sammanhållande uttrycket för Kyrkans enhet.
Vi är bestämda av det sammanhang vi står i. Därför kommer Dag S.s "mere christianity" inte riktigt att bli lik vare sig CS Lewis' eller de ortodoxas. Reformationskristendom har ställvis mycket god teori, men saknar gemenskapen med den ecklesiastiska kropp till vilken läran hör. Ty tron är inte bara teorier och känslor, utan också tillhörighet till den historiska gemenskap som grundats av Herren själv. Den kan inte väljas bort, om man vill vara samme Herren Jesus trogen.
Detta illustrerar med all önskvärd tydlighet att vi som kristtrogna ur olika traditioner representerar mycket stora olikheter.
Men kvarstår inte faktum att vi tillber en levande och nådefull Gud med orden "Fader vår..." och att vi faktiskt är varandras bröder och systrar också i den samlade Svenska kristenheten, eller...?
/Dag Selander M'Xp 050208
Inledning: 'Only Christianity' som tills idag använts som ett samlingsuttryck för hela Den [samlade] svenska kristenheten byts ut mot C.S. Lewis egentliga term 'Mere Christianity'. Tack Chris Barenekow!
Här nedan följer ett utdrag ur eget inlägg från häromdagen i ett kyrkligt Diskussionsforum, Kyrkans Framtid:
'Only Christianity' - är en tanke som uppfyller mig mer och mer sedan lång tid… [Ni] känner mycket väl till C.S. Lewis och hans hållning visavi den tidens kyrkliga debattörer. Han om någon var skickad att gå i strid och i debatt med sin vassa penna och sitt klara intellekt med den akademiska profession han hade. Han valde att försvara den kristna tron och dess lära utifrån arenan och utgångspunkten 'Only Christianity', och inte såsom företrädare för den Anglikanska kyrkan. Temat och banéret med orden 'Only Christianity' är för alla kristtrogna också ett uttryck för visionen all kristenhet har. Det handlar om kallelsen att vara Body of Christ i tiden som Staden på berget, som Salt och ljus i den värld vi lever… Min […] undran är hur [ni] "känner för" tanken 'Only Christianity', som ju hör samman med Joh 17. Hur ser våra visioner ut för Svensk kristenhet? Hur ser Kyrkans Herre på den samlade Svenska kristenheten? Hur förenas den självklara visionen med alla frågor som jag lite "skämt"-samt benämner Avfalls-frågor? Själv har jag gärna stått upp för sanningen och gärna agerat för att hålla rent hus gentemot inomkyrkliga avfallsfrågor, av alla slag. Det jag själv lärt är att den inriktningen tog tid från den huvuduppgift vi har som kristenhet, nämligen missionens utmaning att på allt sätt se till att Evangelium om Guds rike når dem som är onådda, hemma på orten, i Sverige, samt ute i världen.
Detta utdrag ur eget inlägg ovan bemöts av en ortodox broder. Meningsbytet får illustrera får illustrera det som finns av olikheter och spänningar mellan traditionerna som också finns i svensk kristenhet. Samtal och kommunikation över gränser tarvar kunskap och respekt i Acceptans, under Bön, med Caritas i Delaktighet i kraft av ett Evangelium "i fullt mått". Min gode ortodoxe vän
skriver:
Detta är en viktig tanke, ännu viktigare eftersom gapet mellan organisation och innehåll gapar så vidt (dansk ordform, för tydlighetens skull! Neutrum av "vid" inte färgen, är vad som avses.) "Kyrkans framtid" är något annat än "Svenska kyrkans framtid" - i bästa fall har Svenska kyrkan något med saken att göra: åtminstone bör de som hör till Svenska kyrkan ta sig en tankeställare i vilkenderas framtid de vill vara. Det är inte likgiltigt, nämligen. En stor svårighet för svenska kristna i gemen ligger i att förstå att "Kyrkan" vare sig är = Svenska kyrkan; eller = alla kristna. Detta beror åtminstone delvis på att man uppfattar "kyrkan som en funktion" där Guds Ord rent och klart predikas och sakramenten förvaltas enligt Kristi instiftelse" men NT och hela den gamla kyrkan vet, att detta är fenomen som hör till, men inte är kärnan, för den är enheten med Kristus och alla de troende i det Nya Förbundets måltid: eukaristin, Nattvarden. Mellan den apostoliska kyrkan och nuet ligger ett antal brytningar, där nycklamakten brukats och ett avlägsnande (svårt att veta hur stort men Nycklamakten är säkert inte kraftlös!) från ovannämnda gemenskap har skett.
Brytningen med judendomen hör inte dit, men brytningen mellan biskopen av Rom och de östliga kyrkorna är en tydlig sådan. Konstanstinopel har visserligen hävt bindenyckelns lås över Rom 1967, men inte alla andra, och många av problemen kvarstår och måste lösas: Västkyrkans vägar från 1000-talet är en historia om nya teologier (skolastik mm) svårigheter, villovägar, nystarter och mera problem igen. (Som ortodox har jag mera gemensamt med de kyrkor som lämnade gemenskapen på 400-600-talet än jag har med de Romersk katolska som ändå var i kommunion med oss ytterligare fyrahundra år. )
Den stora andra brytpunkten kommer med Reformationen, som på nytt tar upp de misstag som utlöste den förra brytningen - men därtill inför så mycket nya ansatser att dessa med tiden äter upp de reformatoriska samfunden. Rom har velat (men driver inte längre den linjen som huvudlinje) se kyrkans mitt och därmed förenande band, i biskopen av Rom, snarare än Eukaristin . De från Rom utgångna kyrkorna är inte centrerade i Eukaristin som det förenande bandet mellan de (rätt) troende, och det har genomslag: de blir inte riktigt "kyrkor" på det sättet som de gamla kyrkorna, Rom inräknat, är. Det sätt den heliga nattvarden beskrivs på i Svenska kyrkans Kyrkoordning vittnar skrämmande tydligt om hur Nattvarden har blivit något individcentrerat "extra" istället för det sammanhållande uttrycket för Kyrkans enhet.
Vi är bestämda av det sammanhang vi står i. Därför kommer Dag S.s "mere christianity" inte riktigt att bli lik vare sig CS Lewis' eller de ortodoxas. Reformationskristendom har ställvis mycket god teori, men saknar gemenskapen med den ecklesiastiska kropp till vilken läran hör. Ty tron är inte bara teorier och känslor, utan också tillhörighet till den historiska gemenskap som grundats av Herren själv. Den kan inte väljas bort, om man vill vara samme Herren Jesus trogen.
Detta illustrerar med all önskvärd tydlighet att vi som kristtrogna ur olika traditioner representerar mycket stora olikheter.
Men kvarstår inte faktum att vi tillber en levande och nådefull Gud med orden "Fader vår..." och att vi faktiskt är varandras bröder och systrar också i den samlade Svenska kristenheten, eller...?
/Dag Selander M'Xp 050208
9/2-05 M'Xp Askonsdag
Med.Dr Birgitta Peterson, New York US, har idag haft vänligheten att referera till den månatliga Tidskriften Touchstone som har ett intressant innehåll med skribenter från protestantiskt, katolskt och ortodoxt perspektiv, från Sverige Folke Olofsson. C.S. Lewis´ Mere Christianity är en av tidskriftens ledstjärnor.
Här nedan en betraktelse från Daily Reflections för ASKONSDAGEN:
Ash Wednesday, February 9
Proverbs 1: Verses 2-6 are a single sentence that states the intent of the book. It is an educational work, designed to lay down certain insights of prudence, or practical wisdom, in the form of short, pithy sayings, or "proverbs" (mishlim). The wisdom (hokma) conveyed in these sayings has to do with practical moral assessments that a man must make for a godly, just, and productive life (verse 2). This teaching, therefore, pertains to discipline (musar), or self-mastery, as well as the ability to make moral distinctions based on discernment (bina).
Therefore, the wise person (verse 3) will be cautious in the conducting of his life (hashkel), acquainted with the requirements of righteous living (sedeq), able to make sound judgments (mishpat), and do what is honest (mesharim). If a man learns such things when he is young (verse 4), his wisdom will increase as he grows older (verse 5).
This instruction will be grammatical, rhetorical, and imaginary (verse 6), but its principle is moral (verse 7), and its transmission comes from parental tradition (verses 8-9). Hence, religious docility is absolutely required for its attainment.
One of the first things to be acquired in the pursuit of wisdom is the courage to resist peer pressure (verses 10-19). The clear presumption here is that a young man is surrounded by other young men equally ignorant, and, left to their own devices, they will simply pool their ignorance for some common venture ill conceived. Therefore, the young man is first of all warned against their nefarious influence. All through this book we see an insistence on this point: Wisdom is to be learned from the past, not from one's contemporaries.
The first chapter closes with the first discourse of Wisdom (verses 20-33), an expression formulated by the feminine plural (hokmoth), designating an abstraction. This is Wisdom as it comes from the mind of God (cf. also Proverbs 8; Sirach 1 & 8; Wisdom of Solomon 6-9). The Christology of the New Testament will show this personification to be, in fact, a Person (Luke 11:31; John 1:1-18; Colossians 1:15-20). It is Wisdom that pours forth the Spirit (verse 23; cf. John 7:37-39).
M'Xp VISION FÖR MISSION
Inom kort - under Fastetiden - kommer en serie korta och längre artiklar under temat VISION FÖR MISSION
att publiceras med uttalanden från olika slags ledare och från
gräsrotsnivå bland Guds folk inom Den svenska kristenheten - från Ale
till Övertorneå.
I en tid som denna är det mer än någonsin av vikt att Guds folks enhet kan manifesteras i mindre sammanhang - såsom via denna lilla arena som en webbloggsida kan vara - och på andra och mera kända arenor i Svensk kristenhet.
"Only Christianity" var mottot för C.S. Lewis i hans första apologetiska författarskapsera efter sin omvändnelse. Han agerade inte i första hand som Trons försvarare utifrån sin tillhörighet i Anglican Church, utan som representant för kristenheten.
I en tid som denna när vi kommer allt längre fram i frälsningshistorien och dagen D, då Herren kommer åter i sin härlighet, är det alltmera av vikt att vi tillsammans söker fördjupa våra relationer samfund och kyrkor emellan. Vi klarar inte detta med knep och metoder, men med Herrens egen hjälp. Inte med konstlade medel eller svärmiska orealistiska medel och vägar, men med respekt för varandras historia och tradition.
I en tid som denna är det värdefullt och - fr.a. äras Herrens namn - när vi beder FADER VÅR i hela dess djup av den samhörighet som Fadern visar oss i sin kärlek. Vi har ännu steg att vandra på vår gemensamma Svenska krist-enhets stig. Vi behöver göra det i en anda av Walk and Talk. Tala och agera. Inte enbart tala. Utan i kärleken från ovan med mera av verkstad. Walk n' Talk är det som är signifikativt för all autenticitet. För Guds folk och Svensk kristenhet är detta A & O.
Men fortfarande har vi av skilda historiska skäl och på grund av mänsklig begränsning steg kvar att ta. Låt oss ha tålamod. Inte ge upp för att resultat tycks långt borta. Inget har ju egentligen hänt sedan 1925 och det Nathan Söderblom talade om med många av sin tids eldsjälar. Herren har kontrollen över tiden. Han vill inte isolationism och sektförklaringar av varandra som olika delar i hans hjord. Han vill inte bannlysning eller uteslutning. Han vill Nåd i Nådens evangelium. Han vill Nåd och Sanning. Han vill Walk & Talk. Här har vi ett ABC att stava vidare på. Acceptans, Bön, Caritas, Delaktighet, Evangelium... Only Christianity, med hel och full respekt för varandra i ett erkännande av varandra i Den helige Andes kraft och vishet.
I en tid som denna är det mer än någonsin av vikt att Guds folks enhet kan manifesteras i mindre sammanhang - såsom via denna lilla arena som en webbloggsida kan vara - och på andra och mera kända arenor i Svensk kristenhet.
"Only Christianity" var mottot för C.S. Lewis i hans första apologetiska författarskapsera efter sin omvändnelse. Han agerade inte i första hand som Trons försvarare utifrån sin tillhörighet i Anglican Church, utan som representant för kristenheten.
I en tid som denna när vi kommer allt längre fram i frälsningshistorien och dagen D, då Herren kommer åter i sin härlighet, är det alltmera av vikt att vi tillsammans söker fördjupa våra relationer samfund och kyrkor emellan. Vi klarar inte detta med knep och metoder, men med Herrens egen hjälp. Inte med konstlade medel eller svärmiska orealistiska medel och vägar, men med respekt för varandras historia och tradition.
I en tid som denna är det värdefullt och - fr.a. äras Herrens namn - när vi beder FADER VÅR i hela dess djup av den samhörighet som Fadern visar oss i sin kärlek. Vi har ännu steg att vandra på vår gemensamma Svenska krist-enhets stig. Vi behöver göra det i en anda av Walk and Talk. Tala och agera. Inte enbart tala. Utan i kärleken från ovan med mera av verkstad. Walk n' Talk är det som är signifikativt för all autenticitet. För Guds folk och Svensk kristenhet är detta A & O.
Men fortfarande har vi av skilda historiska skäl och på grund av mänsklig begränsning steg kvar att ta. Låt oss ha tålamod. Inte ge upp för att resultat tycks långt borta. Inget har ju egentligen hänt sedan 1925 och det Nathan Söderblom talade om med många av sin tids eldsjälar. Herren har kontrollen över tiden. Han vill inte isolationism och sektförklaringar av varandra som olika delar i hans hjord. Han vill inte bannlysning eller uteslutning. Han vill Nåd i Nådens evangelium. Han vill Nåd och Sanning. Han vill Walk & Talk. Här har vi ett ABC att stava vidare på. Acceptans, Bön, Caritas, Delaktighet, Evangelium... Only Christianity, med hel och full respekt för varandra i ett erkännande av varandra i Den helige Andes kraft och vishet.
M'Xp - SUNET Webbkatalog
Härmed kungöres att webblogg Mission Xp är publicerad som ny på SUNETs Webbkatalog den 7 februari 2005
The Mystery of Israel... Chapter 4
The Mystery of Israel and the Church
by ART KATZ
Chapter 4 - Israel and the Nations
We need to open our spirits and catch the flavor and sense of this mystery. God, in His wisdom, has chosen a nation to be central to all nations. This is not an unusual concept in the economy of God. Israel herself had twelve tribes, and God did not think it extravagant that one of the twelve, Levi, should have no other function but to be priests to the other eleven. In exactly the same way, and by the same principle, the entire nation of Israel is to be a nation of priests unto the world (Exodus 19:6). We know that the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable (Rom. 11:29); and when God makes a promise, establishes a covenant, or declares something, then we need to know that it is irrevocable.
Some biblical scholars suggest that the number of nations that proliferate today is the result of man's rebellion against God. We can see everywhere around us the splintering of national entities into sub-entities based on ethnic and religious lines. When the smoke clears from the devastation and destruction at the end of the age from the consequence and outcome of man's own inordinate ambition for nationhood, rivalry, sovereignty and pomp, we will find a vast reduction to the over two hundred nations that now exist. It is clear that God intended a definite number of nations at the first, in proportion to the number of the sons of Israel:
When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the children of men, He set the bounds of the peoples according to the number of the children of Israel. For Jehovah's portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance (Deut. 32:8-9).
Acts 17:26-27 seems to substantiate that:
And He made of one every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed seasons, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek God, if haply they might feel after him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us:
The nations must not think they can go on in an autonomous existence independent of the nation, Israel. God has made a provision to keep nations in certain boundaries and relationships that would keep them sane and healthy, with God the recognized Head over all, rather than them imposing themselves on one another by the use of violence. There is a place for legitimacy of nations, but only within a certain comprehensive structure that God Himself provided, namely, the centrality of Israel to all nations. The greatest tragedies that have afflicted mankind through history have come out of the rebellion of nations in their own independent determination to rule themselves, to their own self-aggrandizement, without regard to that nation which God intended as central. There will be no peace until that pattern is established on earth, which, in fact, marks the beginning of the Millennium, the thousand-year reign of Christ (Rev. 20:6).
The Millennium begins when Israel is restored to her God-appointed place in Him, and indeed, the nations will finally come up to Jerusalem on the Feast of Tabernacles to pay homage to God, whose sanctuary and dwelling place will be with the people Israel (Zech.14:16). The law must go forth out of Zion and the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem or there never will be a turning of swords into plowshares (Micah 4: 2-3). God is so in earnest about this that He says that the nation that will not honor Israel will suffer a curse (Zech.14:17). He will take from them rain and bring upon them the consequences of judgment if they still stubbornly refuse to submit to God's design and intention. The rebellion of mankind is deep-seated against God, and it is no more clearly reflected and revealed than in mankind's opposition to the nation that He has chosen. God's choice is the revelation of Himself as God, and it is a choice that is exactly the antithesis of man's. It is His choice, however, that will prevail, to the everlasting praise of His glory.
Nations cannot be related to God and recognize the boundaries and purposes of God independent of their recognition of, and their submission to, the centrality of Israel for all nations. The greatest drama of the Last Days, now already in process of coming to the fore in world history, is the attempted annihilation of Israel by the nations in order to remove God's very provision for their relatedness to Him. To remain, as a nation, outside of that relationship with Israel is to be outside of God.
Has God Rejected Israel?
With this in view, Paul finds himself having to answer a question raised by the believers in Rome, "Is God finished with Israel?"
I say then, God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be! I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin (Rom. 11:1).
Paul gives his own faith in God as the evidence that God is not finished with Israel. In a very real sense, Paul is in himself the very personification of that nation, all the more in his militant opposition to the faith followed by his radical conversion. We have in him an exact pattern of what the future of the nation itself is. He is in himself already explicating and setting forth Israel's own destiny and apostolate to the nations, namely, to be a blessing to all the families of the earth. This temporary setting aside of the Jew by God, however, is not some arbitrary decision independent of the judgment that Israel has incurred upon herself:
Just as it is written, God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes to see not and ears to hear not, down to this very day (Rom. 11:8).
Their blindness is a judgment,5 particularly over the issue of the rejection of their Messiah. It was not some momentary failure at a historical point in time; it was rather the culmination of a long history of apostasy and alienation from God that had become so deep-seated that when very God came in the person of Jesus of Nazareth as the fulfillment of their own scriptures and expectation, He simply could not be recognized. He was rejected, despised and brought to the place of death, albeit the instrumentality of that death was the Roman authorities. Their blindness was, and still is, the consequence of their own sin and must be judged by a righteous God.
God's Cosmic Purposes
The whole of this mystery is predicated on God's unswerving principle of death and resurrection. The glory of resurrection (the mercy of God) can only issue out of 'death,' so, in order to demonstrate His mercy as His final testimony before all nations (Ezekiel 39:7), a surviving remnant of the nation of Israel is scheduled for death and resurrection. We have known the resurrection phenomenon as individuals, but God intends it for Israel as a national demonstration. They will, and must, pass through death in their experience, without the comforting knowledge that it will result in resurrection (Ezekiel 37), for how else is death, death? Unless this takes place, there will be no consummation of the age; there will be no return of the Lord, and there will be no establishment of His kingdom. For His kingdom, by necessity, is the kingdom of David, the kingdom promised to Israel. It is not a kingdom for Israel's exclusive gratification, but a kingdom that will bless the nations through the nation that God has appointed and chosen to be central to all nations. We need, therefore, to have a sense of God's cosmic design for the nations, understanding that Israel is central to God's redemptive dealing with all the nations. Our view of redemption must be elevated from personal salvation to national salvation.
But the reader may ask, "Why should Israel be so central to us as the modern Church, since it was not central to generations of saints before, who were quite spiritual, yet did not recognize the centrality of Israel?" The answer lies primarily in the fact that these are the Last Days, and the Church that is impervious, or indifferent, to the purposes of God for the Last Days is, ipso facto, not the Church. In fact, reference to Israel is conspicuously absent from current teaching in the Church. It is simply outside their consciousness. The Church has a lot of great things to say, but in these Last Days, they are missing the focus of God that compels the Church to be Church.
Israel's final redemption is the final consummating event of God that concludes this age. Any preoccupation with prophets and prophetic things that omits reference to the great, epochal event that is yet future, namely, the restoration of Israel to her God after thousands of years of apostasy and alienation from God is also, by that definition, not prophetic. In fact, our continuing lament and criticism of the present celebration of prophets is that there is, even among them, for the most part, an absence of any significant reference to Israel and the Church's relationship to Israel. This is the most momentous thing that is before us historically, yet there is so little awareness or preparation that we cannot conceive of the fact that there should be a prophetic upsurge and this theme be absent. The very conspicuous absence of the theme makes us suspect whether indeed what is being celebrated is truly prophetic.
A serious hour has come, and we have to prepare ourselves, both spiritually and physically, in a way that we would not have ever conceived or bothered about before. We would have been content to be merely charismatic or evangelical, because that was sufficient for our purposes, but now a purpose has come to our attention that is His purpose, and it is an ultimate purpose. God is setting the stage, and Israel is appointed by God to be the nexus of His whole design for the government of the nations.
The Government of God
He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever; and His kingdom will have no end (Luke 1:32-33).
If that God, and that King, can reign over that stiff-necked people, a people whose last national statement towards God was, "We have no king but Caesar" (John 19:15f), then what do you think will be the disposition of other nations? If God can possess Israel, a people who, in all their unbelief and opposition to Him, have blasphemed His name in the nations, then He will have all the nations. It is going to take a final breakdown of Israel's last rebellion and self-will. There is no other way, but they will be grateful later.
For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this (Isaiah 9:6-7).
We are brought right into the whole reason why a Child is born and a Son is given, namely, that the government will rest on His shoulders. It is the rule of God going forth in His own character, that is to say, in the meekness of the Lamb. The rod of iron speaks of an absolute uncompromising stance, but it will be in the gentleness of the Lamb. It is the glorious benevolence of God! It is His great wisdom going out to the nations that will keep them from their own violence, hatred and perversion.
Is our government, then, upon His shoulder? How shall it come to the nations if it has not yet first come to the Church? Are there pockets of rebellion, self-will and independence of spirit to be found in the very congregations of God? Are we more ruled by convenience than we think? For example, are we saying, "Did you like the service? Do you like the pastor? Do you like the program, the worship?" If we do not like it, we find an alternative down the street. We should rather be asking the Lord where He would have us to be planted, and to suffer with that people, in that place.6
It says in Isaiah 2,
Now it will come about in the last days, the mountain of the house of the LORD will be established as the chief of the mountains, and will be raised above the hills; and all the nations will stream to it (Is. 2:2).
This is highly symbolic language. The word 'mountain' always refers to rule and government. However mighty the nations think they are, there will come a time when they will humble themselves and stream to Israel. Can you imagine the proud nations, who are now devouring one another, being broken and submitting to God and God's choice? This is future. In the Last Days it shall come to pass.
And many peoples will come and say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; that He may teach us concerning His ways, and that we may walk in His paths" (Is. 2:3a).
That is what government is. It is not bureaucracy; it is not shuffling papers, or men stuffing their pockets with political gain. The purpose of government is to teach us concerning His ways, and that we may walk in His paths. It is the righteousness of God as it pertains to the relationships of a moral mankind on earth.
For the law will go forth from Zion, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. And He will judge between the nations, and will render decisions for many peoples; and they will hammer their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, and never again will they learn war (Is. 2:3b-4).
When the kingdom of God comes, men will be changed in all of their ways, but in the wisdom of the Holy Spirit this one thing is cited: Men will hammer their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, and never again will they learn war. God has put His finger on the heart of the kingdom of violence and death that has raised up an elaborate and enormous network of profit-feeding agencies that make men dependent upon it for their livelihood. Nice guys, who go to ball games, are trembling lest peace should come and there be no need for the weapons they produce. They would lose their high-paying jobs and the lifestyles that such an income supports. The most drastic thing that could happen to nations today is peace, real peace, where there is no necessity for armament, nor for having a great military establishment that designs and requires the high-tech implements of war.
If the veil could be lifted, we would be shocked to realize how much the production of armaments is dominating and directing the course of nations. The manpower, the energy, the time, the brilliance, the brains and all of the faculties that could have ended poverty in the world overnight are producing, instead, the things that pertain to death. It is the wisdom of the Powers of the air, promoting and fostering greed, ambition, lust, power, influence, violence and death. This is cosmic in its proportions. These fallen angels, who want to continue to manipulate mankind and exert their notorious, false rule over them will be finished when the King comes.
The Restoration of All Things
Jesus is waiting,
...whom heaven must receive [or, contain] until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time (Acts 3:21).
God has bound Himself, and confined and kept His Son from actual entry into His creation to rule and reign as King, until the restoration of all things spoken by the prophets has been fulfilled. When you read the prophets, there is one great theme that they express, namely, the restoration of Israel from ages-long apostasy, at the end of the age, out of a time of unbelievable calamity, back to God and back to the Land.7 That people and that Land are God's locus and the conveyer of the millennial kingdom that will be established with them physically and geographically, and be expressed through them. Israel is finally brought into their call as a nation of priests and a light unto the world. Jews are brilliant and gifted people, but God did not primarily call them to music, to the stage, to the theater, to the film industry and all of that. The ushering in of the millennial kingdom brings true government from Zion, the government of God, the only government that is a true government and that will ever bring peace and righteousness on this earth.
Naturally speaking, we do not actually anticipate the kingdom as a literal, explicit and political entity. There is a sense in which the kingdom is inward, subjective, and consists of kingdom principles and values. This, however true in part, should not, however, be allowed to eclipse or to displace the larger part, an anticipation of an actual, literal and political rule of God. The government of God is theocratic; it is executed in perfect righteousness without any self-seeking. It is the benevolence of God, and the wisdom of God on how to live being brought to mankind. We must not take the literal statements of God and spiritualize their meaning away. By so doing, we do a disservice to God that is presumptuous and tantamount to blasphemy. Our whole faith will be revolutionized when we give to God's Word the literal meaning that He Himself intends for it to have. It is so radical in its implications that it is little wonder that we spiritualize it away. Could it be that we do not have the courage, nor faith, nor desire to take it at face value?
…a hardening has come upon part of Israel, until the full number of the Gentiles come in, and thus all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, "The Deliverer will come from Zion, He will remove ungodliness from Jacob. And this is My covenant with them, when I take away their sins" (Rom. 11:25b-27).
This does not mean every Jew, but only that surviving remnant from among them that constitutes the elect Israel of God. The rest will suffer the attrition and death that comes to those who are rebellious against God and will not receive His salvation, despite His every appeal, as we shall see when we begin to examine the book of Amos. It is an enormous Last Days' saga, and the Church is the principal actor. It is the Church coming into the solemn configuration of what God intended for it as a glory. It is brought to fullness and maturity, and prepared for its own millennial destiny and glory, namely, to rule and reign with Christ from heavenly places (Rev. 20:6).
To Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen (Eph. 3:21).
That means the end of the Church as a plaything and a denominational enterprise where men of ambition find platforms for themselves. God has chosen Israel, not because she is lustrous, nor because she is numerous, nor because she was one of the great ancient powers. She was always a nothing people, and that is precisely why He has chosen her. He will be who He will be, and He will choose what He will choose. The critical question is: "Will the Church choose what He chooses?"
Israel is becoming increasingly aggressive and offensive in her self-defense, and her behavior is going to become worse; this must, we believe, of necessity, be so. Jews everywhere are suffering the adverse consequence of Israel's declining reputation. This is part of the program of God to bring Jews worldwide into a place of opposition, contempt and finally, persecution by unregenerate man in the nations. It is the Powers of darkness themselves who are aiding and abetting in all of this hostility and opposition. They want to avoid losing their place of power by annihilating this people from the face of the earth so that Israel cannot be restored. That is the nexus of the fierce anti-Semitic hatred that is presently escalating. If we do not understand this invisible realm of reality that underlies the world, its structures, its governments and its society, then the mystery of Israel will continue to be bewilderment to us, and we will be ourselves offended in Israel's impending calamity.
We are summarizing the mystery of Israel as the issue of world government and rule over creation, which includes the place that God has designated for this people with regard to other nations. When the kingdom comes, it is not only theocratic and millennial, but also forever. We are not talking about some transient thing or some temporary administration, but rather the final, decisive and conclusive work of God for all creation, and that endures eternally. In other words, when the Powers of darkness are finally out, because Israel is finally in, they are out eternally, and therefore it helps us to understand why they are so vexed. We can expect a global anti-Semitism of which the Nazi era was a mere forerunner. However vicious the systematic annihilation of six million European Jews was, it must yet be seen as a preview of what we shall expect globally in the Last Days when that same satanic hatred is poured out in every nation.8 The Church in Germany collapsed like the 'proverbial deck of cards' under that demonic power; we need to be instructed by their collapse, because we have every reason to expect the same phenomenon, this time as it will be seen in every nation, including our own!
by ART KATZ
Chapter 4 - Israel and the Nations
We need to open our spirits and catch the flavor and sense of this mystery. God, in His wisdom, has chosen a nation to be central to all nations. This is not an unusual concept in the economy of God. Israel herself had twelve tribes, and God did not think it extravagant that one of the twelve, Levi, should have no other function but to be priests to the other eleven. In exactly the same way, and by the same principle, the entire nation of Israel is to be a nation of priests unto the world (Exodus 19:6). We know that the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable (Rom. 11:29); and when God makes a promise, establishes a covenant, or declares something, then we need to know that it is irrevocable.
Some biblical scholars suggest that the number of nations that proliferate today is the result of man's rebellion against God. We can see everywhere around us the splintering of national entities into sub-entities based on ethnic and religious lines. When the smoke clears from the devastation and destruction at the end of the age from the consequence and outcome of man's own inordinate ambition for nationhood, rivalry, sovereignty and pomp, we will find a vast reduction to the over two hundred nations that now exist. It is clear that God intended a definite number of nations at the first, in proportion to the number of the sons of Israel:
When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the children of men, He set the bounds of the peoples according to the number of the children of Israel. For Jehovah's portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance (Deut. 32:8-9).
Acts 17:26-27 seems to substantiate that:
And He made of one every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed seasons, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek God, if haply they might feel after him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us:
The nations must not think they can go on in an autonomous existence independent of the nation, Israel. God has made a provision to keep nations in certain boundaries and relationships that would keep them sane and healthy, with God the recognized Head over all, rather than them imposing themselves on one another by the use of violence. There is a place for legitimacy of nations, but only within a certain comprehensive structure that God Himself provided, namely, the centrality of Israel to all nations. The greatest tragedies that have afflicted mankind through history have come out of the rebellion of nations in their own independent determination to rule themselves, to their own self-aggrandizement, without regard to that nation which God intended as central. There will be no peace until that pattern is established on earth, which, in fact, marks the beginning of the Millennium, the thousand-year reign of Christ (Rev. 20:6).
The Millennium begins when Israel is restored to her God-appointed place in Him, and indeed, the nations will finally come up to Jerusalem on the Feast of Tabernacles to pay homage to God, whose sanctuary and dwelling place will be with the people Israel (Zech.14:16). The law must go forth out of Zion and the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem or there never will be a turning of swords into plowshares (Micah 4: 2-3). God is so in earnest about this that He says that the nation that will not honor Israel will suffer a curse (Zech.14:17). He will take from them rain and bring upon them the consequences of judgment if they still stubbornly refuse to submit to God's design and intention. The rebellion of mankind is deep-seated against God, and it is no more clearly reflected and revealed than in mankind's opposition to the nation that He has chosen. God's choice is the revelation of Himself as God, and it is a choice that is exactly the antithesis of man's. It is His choice, however, that will prevail, to the everlasting praise of His glory.
Nations cannot be related to God and recognize the boundaries and purposes of God independent of their recognition of, and their submission to, the centrality of Israel for all nations. The greatest drama of the Last Days, now already in process of coming to the fore in world history, is the attempted annihilation of Israel by the nations in order to remove God's very provision for their relatedness to Him. To remain, as a nation, outside of that relationship with Israel is to be outside of God.
Has God Rejected Israel?
With this in view, Paul finds himself having to answer a question raised by the believers in Rome, "Is God finished with Israel?"
I say then, God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be! I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin (Rom. 11:1).
Paul gives his own faith in God as the evidence that God is not finished with Israel. In a very real sense, Paul is in himself the very personification of that nation, all the more in his militant opposition to the faith followed by his radical conversion. We have in him an exact pattern of what the future of the nation itself is. He is in himself already explicating and setting forth Israel's own destiny and apostolate to the nations, namely, to be a blessing to all the families of the earth. This temporary setting aside of the Jew by God, however, is not some arbitrary decision independent of the judgment that Israel has incurred upon herself:
Just as it is written, God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes to see not and ears to hear not, down to this very day (Rom. 11:8).
Their blindness is a judgment,5 particularly over the issue of the rejection of their Messiah. It was not some momentary failure at a historical point in time; it was rather the culmination of a long history of apostasy and alienation from God that had become so deep-seated that when very God came in the person of Jesus of Nazareth as the fulfillment of their own scriptures and expectation, He simply could not be recognized. He was rejected, despised and brought to the place of death, albeit the instrumentality of that death was the Roman authorities. Their blindness was, and still is, the consequence of their own sin and must be judged by a righteous God.
God's Cosmic Purposes
The whole of this mystery is predicated on God's unswerving principle of death and resurrection. The glory of resurrection (the mercy of God) can only issue out of 'death,' so, in order to demonstrate His mercy as His final testimony before all nations (Ezekiel 39:7), a surviving remnant of the nation of Israel is scheduled for death and resurrection. We have known the resurrection phenomenon as individuals, but God intends it for Israel as a national demonstration. They will, and must, pass through death in their experience, without the comforting knowledge that it will result in resurrection (Ezekiel 37), for how else is death, death? Unless this takes place, there will be no consummation of the age; there will be no return of the Lord, and there will be no establishment of His kingdom. For His kingdom, by necessity, is the kingdom of David, the kingdom promised to Israel. It is not a kingdom for Israel's exclusive gratification, but a kingdom that will bless the nations through the nation that God has appointed and chosen to be central to all nations. We need, therefore, to have a sense of God's cosmic design for the nations, understanding that Israel is central to God's redemptive dealing with all the nations. Our view of redemption must be elevated from personal salvation to national salvation.
But the reader may ask, "Why should Israel be so central to us as the modern Church, since it was not central to generations of saints before, who were quite spiritual, yet did not recognize the centrality of Israel?" The answer lies primarily in the fact that these are the Last Days, and the Church that is impervious, or indifferent, to the purposes of God for the Last Days is, ipso facto, not the Church. In fact, reference to Israel is conspicuously absent from current teaching in the Church. It is simply outside their consciousness. The Church has a lot of great things to say, but in these Last Days, they are missing the focus of God that compels the Church to be Church.
Israel's final redemption is the final consummating event of God that concludes this age. Any preoccupation with prophets and prophetic things that omits reference to the great, epochal event that is yet future, namely, the restoration of Israel to her God after thousands of years of apostasy and alienation from God is also, by that definition, not prophetic. In fact, our continuing lament and criticism of the present celebration of prophets is that there is, even among them, for the most part, an absence of any significant reference to Israel and the Church's relationship to Israel. This is the most momentous thing that is before us historically, yet there is so little awareness or preparation that we cannot conceive of the fact that there should be a prophetic upsurge and this theme be absent. The very conspicuous absence of the theme makes us suspect whether indeed what is being celebrated is truly prophetic.
A serious hour has come, and we have to prepare ourselves, both spiritually and physically, in a way that we would not have ever conceived or bothered about before. We would have been content to be merely charismatic or evangelical, because that was sufficient for our purposes, but now a purpose has come to our attention that is His purpose, and it is an ultimate purpose. God is setting the stage, and Israel is appointed by God to be the nexus of His whole design for the government of the nations.
The Government of God
He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever; and His kingdom will have no end (Luke 1:32-33).
If that God, and that King, can reign over that stiff-necked people, a people whose last national statement towards God was, "We have no king but Caesar" (John 19:15f), then what do you think will be the disposition of other nations? If God can possess Israel, a people who, in all their unbelief and opposition to Him, have blasphemed His name in the nations, then He will have all the nations. It is going to take a final breakdown of Israel's last rebellion and self-will. There is no other way, but they will be grateful later.
For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this (Isaiah 9:6-7).
We are brought right into the whole reason why a Child is born and a Son is given, namely, that the government will rest on His shoulders. It is the rule of God going forth in His own character, that is to say, in the meekness of the Lamb. The rod of iron speaks of an absolute uncompromising stance, but it will be in the gentleness of the Lamb. It is the glorious benevolence of God! It is His great wisdom going out to the nations that will keep them from their own violence, hatred and perversion.
Is our government, then, upon His shoulder? How shall it come to the nations if it has not yet first come to the Church? Are there pockets of rebellion, self-will and independence of spirit to be found in the very congregations of God? Are we more ruled by convenience than we think? For example, are we saying, "Did you like the service? Do you like the pastor? Do you like the program, the worship?" If we do not like it, we find an alternative down the street. We should rather be asking the Lord where He would have us to be planted, and to suffer with that people, in that place.6
It says in Isaiah 2,
Now it will come about in the last days, the mountain of the house of the LORD will be established as the chief of the mountains, and will be raised above the hills; and all the nations will stream to it (Is. 2:2).
This is highly symbolic language. The word 'mountain' always refers to rule and government. However mighty the nations think they are, there will come a time when they will humble themselves and stream to Israel. Can you imagine the proud nations, who are now devouring one another, being broken and submitting to God and God's choice? This is future. In the Last Days it shall come to pass.
And many peoples will come and say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; that He may teach us concerning His ways, and that we may walk in His paths" (Is. 2:3a).
That is what government is. It is not bureaucracy; it is not shuffling papers, or men stuffing their pockets with political gain. The purpose of government is to teach us concerning His ways, and that we may walk in His paths. It is the righteousness of God as it pertains to the relationships of a moral mankind on earth.
For the law will go forth from Zion, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. And He will judge between the nations, and will render decisions for many peoples; and they will hammer their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, and never again will they learn war (Is. 2:3b-4).
When the kingdom of God comes, men will be changed in all of their ways, but in the wisdom of the Holy Spirit this one thing is cited: Men will hammer their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, and never again will they learn war. God has put His finger on the heart of the kingdom of violence and death that has raised up an elaborate and enormous network of profit-feeding agencies that make men dependent upon it for their livelihood. Nice guys, who go to ball games, are trembling lest peace should come and there be no need for the weapons they produce. They would lose their high-paying jobs and the lifestyles that such an income supports. The most drastic thing that could happen to nations today is peace, real peace, where there is no necessity for armament, nor for having a great military establishment that designs and requires the high-tech implements of war.
If the veil could be lifted, we would be shocked to realize how much the production of armaments is dominating and directing the course of nations. The manpower, the energy, the time, the brilliance, the brains and all of the faculties that could have ended poverty in the world overnight are producing, instead, the things that pertain to death. It is the wisdom of the Powers of the air, promoting and fostering greed, ambition, lust, power, influence, violence and death. This is cosmic in its proportions. These fallen angels, who want to continue to manipulate mankind and exert their notorious, false rule over them will be finished when the King comes.
The Restoration of All Things
Jesus is waiting,
...whom heaven must receive [or, contain] until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time (Acts 3:21).
God has bound Himself, and confined and kept His Son from actual entry into His creation to rule and reign as King, until the restoration of all things spoken by the prophets has been fulfilled. When you read the prophets, there is one great theme that they express, namely, the restoration of Israel from ages-long apostasy, at the end of the age, out of a time of unbelievable calamity, back to God and back to the Land.7 That people and that Land are God's locus and the conveyer of the millennial kingdom that will be established with them physically and geographically, and be expressed through them. Israel is finally brought into their call as a nation of priests and a light unto the world. Jews are brilliant and gifted people, but God did not primarily call them to music, to the stage, to the theater, to the film industry and all of that. The ushering in of the millennial kingdom brings true government from Zion, the government of God, the only government that is a true government and that will ever bring peace and righteousness on this earth.
Naturally speaking, we do not actually anticipate the kingdom as a literal, explicit and political entity. There is a sense in which the kingdom is inward, subjective, and consists of kingdom principles and values. This, however true in part, should not, however, be allowed to eclipse or to displace the larger part, an anticipation of an actual, literal and political rule of God. The government of God is theocratic; it is executed in perfect righteousness without any self-seeking. It is the benevolence of God, and the wisdom of God on how to live being brought to mankind. We must not take the literal statements of God and spiritualize their meaning away. By so doing, we do a disservice to God that is presumptuous and tantamount to blasphemy. Our whole faith will be revolutionized when we give to God's Word the literal meaning that He Himself intends for it to have. It is so radical in its implications that it is little wonder that we spiritualize it away. Could it be that we do not have the courage, nor faith, nor desire to take it at face value?
…a hardening has come upon part of Israel, until the full number of the Gentiles come in, and thus all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, "The Deliverer will come from Zion, He will remove ungodliness from Jacob. And this is My covenant with them, when I take away their sins" (Rom. 11:25b-27).
This does not mean every Jew, but only that surviving remnant from among them that constitutes the elect Israel of God. The rest will suffer the attrition and death that comes to those who are rebellious against God and will not receive His salvation, despite His every appeal, as we shall see when we begin to examine the book of Amos. It is an enormous Last Days' saga, and the Church is the principal actor. It is the Church coming into the solemn configuration of what God intended for it as a glory. It is brought to fullness and maturity, and prepared for its own millennial destiny and glory, namely, to rule and reign with Christ from heavenly places (Rev. 20:6).
To Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen (Eph. 3:21).
That means the end of the Church as a plaything and a denominational enterprise where men of ambition find platforms for themselves. God has chosen Israel, not because she is lustrous, nor because she is numerous, nor because she was one of the great ancient powers. She was always a nothing people, and that is precisely why He has chosen her. He will be who He will be, and He will choose what He will choose. The critical question is: "Will the Church choose what He chooses?"
Israel is becoming increasingly aggressive and offensive in her self-defense, and her behavior is going to become worse; this must, we believe, of necessity, be so. Jews everywhere are suffering the adverse consequence of Israel's declining reputation. This is part of the program of God to bring Jews worldwide into a place of opposition, contempt and finally, persecution by unregenerate man in the nations. It is the Powers of darkness themselves who are aiding and abetting in all of this hostility and opposition. They want to avoid losing their place of power by annihilating this people from the face of the earth so that Israel cannot be restored. That is the nexus of the fierce anti-Semitic hatred that is presently escalating. If we do not understand this invisible realm of reality that underlies the world, its structures, its governments and its society, then the mystery of Israel will continue to be bewilderment to us, and we will be ourselves offended in Israel's impending calamity.
We are summarizing the mystery of Israel as the issue of world government and rule over creation, which includes the place that God has designated for this people with regard to other nations. When the kingdom comes, it is not only theocratic and millennial, but also forever. We are not talking about some transient thing or some temporary administration, but rather the final, decisive and conclusive work of God for all creation, and that endures eternally. In other words, when the Powers of darkness are finally out, because Israel is finally in, they are out eternally, and therefore it helps us to understand why they are so vexed. We can expect a global anti-Semitism of which the Nazi era was a mere forerunner. However vicious the systematic annihilation of six million European Jews was, it must yet be seen as a preview of what we shall expect globally in the Last Days when that same satanic hatred is poured out in every nation.8 The Church in Germany collapsed like the 'proverbial deck of cards' under that demonic power; we need to be instructed by their collapse, because we have every reason to expect the same phenomenon, this time as it will be seen in every nation, including our own!
LOVE NOT THE WORLD by W. Nee
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Prophetic College EPC@Comhem.se - Via e-postbeställning till Lars Widerberg på den adressen sänds de övriga kapitlen.
LOVE NOT THE WORLD
By Watchman Nee
Preface
The greater part of this book derives from a series of addresses on the subject of "the world" given by Mr. Watchman Nee (Nee To-sheng) of Foochow to Christian believers in Shanghai city in the early period of the Sino-Japanese War. They are thus colored a little by the economic pressures of those days. To them have been added other talks on the same general theme given at various places and times during the period 1938-41. For example, Chapter Three is based on a sermon preached at a baptismal service in May 8 1939. I am indebted to several friends for the notes which have supplied the book's source material.
The author sees the cosmos as a spiritual entity behind the things seen, a force always to be reckoned with. He deals with its impact upon the Christian and his impact upon it, with the conflicting claims upon him of separation and involvement, and with the destiny of the man in Christ to "have dominion." As always, Mr. Nee's studies display original thinking and he is not afraid to be provocative, stirring both heart and mind to a response. It is my prayer that, despite the inevitably piecemeal construction of the book, its theme will prove to have coherence as a picture of the man of God in the world, and further, that it may challenge us all who name the name of Christ to move more courageously and positively through this earthly scene, with thought always for our role here in God's eternal purpose concerning his beloved Son.
ANGUS I. KINNEAR
London
1968
Chapter 1
The Mind Behind the System
Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted from the earth, will draw all men unto myself" (John 12:31, 32).
Our Lord Jesus utters these words at a key point in his ministry. He has entered Jerusalem thronged by enthusiastic crowds; but almost at once he has spoken in veiled terms of laying down his life, and to this heaven itself has given public approval. Now he comes out with this great twofold statement. What, we ask ourselves, can it have conveyed to those who have just acclaimed him, going out to meet him and accompanying him home on his ride? To most of them his words, if they had any meaning at all, must have signified a complete reversal of their hopes. Indeed the more discerning came to see in them a forecasting of the actual circumstances of his death as a criminal (verse 33).
Yet if his utterance destroyed one set of illusions, it offered in place of them a wonderful hope, solid and secure. For it announced a far more radical exchange of dominion than even Jewish patriots looked for. "And I ..." - the expression contrasts sharply with what precedes it, even as the One it identifies stands in contrast with his antagonist, the prince of this world. Through the Cross, through the obedience to death of him who is God's seed of wheat, this world's rule of compulsion and fear is to end with the fall of its proud ruler. And with his springing up once more to life there will come into being in its place a new reign of righteousness and one that is marked by a free allegiance of men to him. With cords of love their hearts will be drawn away from a world under judgment to Jesus the Son of man, who though lifted up to die, is by that very act lifted up to reign.
"The earth" is the scene of this crisis and its tremendous outcome, and "this world" is, we may say, its point of collision. That point we shall make the theme of our study, and we will begin by looking at the New Testament ideas associated with the important Greek word cosmos. In the English versions this word is, with a single exception shortly to be noticed, invariably translated "the world." (The other Greek word, aion, also so translated, embodies the idea of time and should more aptly be rendered "the age.")
It is worth sparing time for a look at a New Testament Greek Lexicon such as Grimm's. This will show how wide is the range of meaning that cosmos has in Scripture. But, first of all we glance back to its origins in classical Greek where we find it originally implied two things: first a harmonious order or arrangement, and secondly embellishment or adornment. This latter idea appears in the New Testament verb cosmeo, used with the meaning "to adorn," as of the temple with goodly stones or of a bride for her husband (Luke 21:5; Rev. 21:2). In 1 Peter 3:3, the exception just alluded to, cosmos is itself translated "adorning" in keeping with this same verb cosmeo in verse 5.
(1) When we turn from the classics to the New Testament writers we find that their uses of cosmos fall into three main groups. It is used first with the sense of the material universe, the round world, this earth. For example, Acts 17:14, "the God that made the world and all things therein"; Matt. 13:35 (and elsewhere), "the foundation of the world"; John 1:10, "he was in the world, and the world was made by him"; Mark 16:15, "Go ye into all the world."
(2) The second usage of cosmos is twofold. It is used (a) for the inhabitants of the world in such phrases as John 1:10, "the world knew him not"; 3:16, "God so loved the world"; 12:19, "the world is gone after him"; 17:21, "that the world may believe." (b) An extension of this usage leads to the idea of the whole race of men alienated from God and thus hostile to the cause of Christ. For instance, Heb. 11:38, "Of whom the world was not worthy"; John 14:17, "whom the world cannot receive"; 14:27, "not as the world giveth, give I unto you"; 15:18, "If the world hateth you ..."
(3) In the third place we find cosmos is used in Scripture for worldly affairs: the whole circle of worldly goods, endowments, riches, advantages, pleasures, which though hollow and fleeting, stir our desire and seduce us from God, so that they are obstacles to the cause of Christ. Examples are: 1 John 2:15, "the things that are in the world"; 3:17, "the world's goods"; Matt. 16:26, "if he shall gain the whole world, and forfeit his life"; 1 Cor. 7:31, "those that use the world, as not abusing it." This usage of cosmos applies not only to material but also to abstract things which have spiritual and moral (or immoral) values. E.g., 1 Cor. 2:12, "the spirit of the world"; 3:19, "the wisdom of this world"; 7:31, "the fashion of this world"; Titus 2:12, "worldly (adj, kosmicos) lusts"; 2 Pet. 1:4, "the corruption that is in the world"; 2:20, "the defilement's of the world"; 1 John 2:16, 17, "all that is in the world, the lust ... the vainglory ... passeth away." The Christian is "to keep himself unspotted from the world" (James 1:27).
The Bible student will soon discover that, as the above paragraph suggests, cosmos is a favorite word of the apostle John, and it is he, in the main, who helps us forward now to a further conclusion.
While it is true that these three definitions of "the world," as (1) the material earth or universe, (2) the people on the earth, and (3) the things of the earth, each contribute something to the whole picture, it will already be apparent that behind them all is something more. The classical idea of orderly arrangement or organization helps us to grasp what this is. Behind all that is tangible we meet something intangible, we meet a planned system; and in this system there is a harmonious functioning, a perfect order.
Concerning this system there are two things to be emphasized. First, since the day when Adam opened the door for evil to enter God's creation, the world order has shown itself to be hostile to God. The world "knew not God" (1 Cor. 1:21), "hated" Christ (John 15:18) and "cannot receive" the Spirit of truth (14:17). "Its works are evil" (John 7:7) and "the friendship of the world is enmity with God" (James 4:4). Hence Jesus says, "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18:36). He has "overcome the world" (16:33) and "the victory that hath overcome the world" is "our faith" in him (1 John 5:4). For, as the verse of John 12 that heads this study affirms, the world is under judgment. God's attitude to it is uncompromising.
This is because, secondly, as the same verse makes clear, there is a mind behind the system. John writes repeatedly of "the prince of this world" (12:31; 14:30; 16:11). In his Epistle he describes him as "he that is in the world" (1 John 4:4)and matches against him the Spirit of truth who indwells believers. "The whole world," John says, "lieth in the evil one" (5:19). He is the rebellious cosmocrator, world ruler-a word which, however, appears only once, used in the plural of his lieutenants, the "world rulers of this darkness" (Eph. 6:12).
There is, then, an ordered system, "the world," which is governed from behind the scenes by a ruler, Satan. When in John 12:31 Jesus states that the sentence of judgment has been passed upon this world he does not mean that the material world or its inhabitants are judged. For them judgment is yet to come. What is there judged is that institution, that harmonious world order of which Satan himself is the originator and head. And ultimately, as Jesus' words make clear, it is he, "the prince of the world," who has been judged (16:11) and who is to be dethroned and "cast out" for ever. Scripture thus gives depth to our understanding of the world around us. Indeed, unless we look at the unseen powers behind the material things we may readily be deceived.
This consideration may help us to understand better the passage in 1 Peter 3 alluded to above. There the apostle sets "the outward adorning (cosmos) of plaiting the hair, and of wearing jewels of gold, or of putting on apparel" in deliberate contrast with "the incorruptible apparel of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price." By inference, therefore, the former are corrupt and worthless to God. We may or may not be ready at once to accept Peter's evaluation, depending upon whether we see the true import of his words. Here is what he is implying. In the background behind these matters of wearing apparel and jewelry and make-up, there is a power at work for its own ends. Do not let that power grip you.
What, we have to ask ourselves, is the motive that activates us in relation to these things? It may be nothing sensuous but altogether innocent, aiming by the use of tone and harmony and perfect matching merely to gain an effect that is aesthetically pleasing. There may be nothing intrinsically wrong in doing this; but do you and I see what we are touching here? We are touching that harmonious system behind the things seen, a system that is controlled by God's enemy. So let us be wary.
The Bible opens with God's creation of the heavens and the earth. It does not say that he created the world in the sense that we are discussing it now. Through the Bible the meaning of "the world" undergoes a development, and it is only in the New. Testament (though perhaps to a lesser extent already in the Psalms and some of the Prophets) that "the world" comes to have its full spiritual significance. We can readily see the reason for this development. Before the Fall of man, the world existed only in the sense of the earth, the people on the earth, and the things on the earth. As yet there was no cosmos, no "world," in the sense of a constituted order. With the Fall, however, Satan brought on to this earth the order which he himself had conceived, and with that began the world system of which we are speaking.
Originally our physical earth had no connection with "the world" in this sense of a Satanic system, nor indeed had man; but Satan took advantage of man's sin, and of the door this threw open to him, to introduce into the earth the organization which he had set himself to establish. From that point of time this earth was in "the world," and man was in "the world." So we may say that before the Fall there was an earth; after the Fall there was a "world"; at the Lord's return there will be a kingdom. Just as the world belongs to Satan, so the Kingdom belongs to our Lord Jesus. Moreover it is this Kingdom that displaces and that will displace the world. When the "Stone not made with hands" shatters man's proud image, then the kingdom of this world will "become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ" (Dan. 2:44, 45; Rev. 11:15).
Politics, education, literature, science, art, law, commerce, music-such are the things that constitute the cosmos, and these are things that we meet daily. Subtract them and the world as a coherent system ceases to be. In studying the history of mankind we have to acknowledge marked progress in each of these departments. The question however is: In what direction is this "progress" tending? What is the ultimate goal of all this development? At the end, John tells us, antichrist will arise and will set up his own kingdom in this world (1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3; 2 John 7; Rev. 13). That is the direction of this world's advance. Satan is utilizing the material world, the men of the world, the things that arein the world, to head everything up eventually in the kingdom of antichrist. At that hour the world system will have reached its zenith; and at that hour every unit of it will be revealed to be antiChristian.
In the book of Genesis we find in Eden no hint of technology, no mention of mechanical instruments. After the Fall, however, we read that among the sons of Cain there was a forger of cutting instruments of brass and iron. A few centuries ago it might have seemed fanciful to discern the spirit of antichrist in iron tools, even though for long the sword has been in open competition with the ploughshare. But today, in the hands of man, metals have been turned to sinister and deadly uses, and as the end approaches the widespread abuse of technology and engineering will become even more apparent.
The same thing applies to music and the arts. For the pipe and the harp seem also to have originated with the family of Cain, and today in unconsecrated hands their God-defying nature becomes increasingly clear. In many parts of the world it has long been easy to trace an intimate relationship between idolatry and the arts of painting, sculpture, and music. No doubt the day is coming when the nature of antichrist will be disclosed more openly than ever through song and dance and the visual and dramatic arts.
As for commerce, its connections are perhaps even more suspect. Satan was the first merchant, trading ideas with Eve for his own advantage, and in the figurative language of Ezekiel 28,which seems to reveal something of his original character, we read: "By thy traffic thou has increased thy riches, and thine heart is lifted up" (verse 5). Perhaps this does not have to be argued, for most of us will readily admit from experience the Satanic origin and nature of commerce. We shall say more of this later.
But what of education? Surely, we protest, that must be harmless. Anyway, our children have to be taught. But education, no less than commerce or technology, is one of the things of the world. It has its roots in the tree of knowledge. How earnestly, as Christians, we seek to protect our children from the world's more obvious snares. And yet it is quite true that we have to provide education for them. How are we going to solve the problem of letting them touch what is essentially a thing of the world, and at the same time guarding them from the great world system and its perils?
And what of science? It, too, is one of the units that constitute the cosmos. It, too, is knowledge. When we venture into the further reaches of science, and begin to speculate on the nature of the physical world-and of man-the question immediately arises: Up to what point is the pursuit of scientific research and discovery legitimate? Where is the line of demarcation between what is helpful and what is hurtful in the realm of knowledge? How can we pursue after knowledge and yet avoid being caught in Satan's meshes?
These, then, are the matters at which we must look. Oh, I know I shall appear to some to be overstating things, but this is necessary in order to drive home my point. For "if any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (1 John 2:15). Ultimately, when we touch the things of the world, the question we must ask ourselves always is: "How is this thing affecting my relationship with the Father?"
The time has passed when we need to go out into the world in order to make contact with it. Today the world comes and searches us out. There is a force abroad now which is captivating men. Have you ever felt the power of the world as much as today? Have you ever heard so much talk about money? Have you ever thought so much about food and clothing? Wherever you go, even among Christians, the things of the world are the topics of conversation. The world has advanced to the very door of the Church and is seeking to draw even the saints of God into its grasp. Never in this sphere of things have we needed to know the power of the Cross of Christ to deliver us as we do at the present time.
Formerly we spoke much of sin and of the natural life. We could readily see the spiritual issues there, but we little realized then what equally great spiritual issues are at stake when we touch the world. There is a spiritual force behind this world scene which, by means of "the things that are in the world," is seeking to enmesh men in its system. It is not merely against sin therefore that the saints of God need to be on their guard, but against the ruler of this world. God is building up his Church to its consummation in the universal reign of Christ.
Simultaneously his rival is building up this world system to its vain climax in the reign of antichrist. How watchful we need to be lest at any time we be found helping Satan in the construction of that ill-fated kingdom. When we are faced with alternatives and a choice of ways confronts us, the question is not: Is this good or evil? Is this helpful or hurtful? No, the question we must ask ourselves is: Is it of this world, or of God? For since there is only this one conflict in the universe, then whenever two conflicting courses lie open to us, the choice at issue is never a lesser one than: God ... or Satan?
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LOVE NOT THE WORLD
By Watchman Nee
Preface
The greater part of this book derives from a series of addresses on the subject of "the world" given by Mr. Watchman Nee (Nee To-sheng) of Foochow to Christian believers in Shanghai city in the early period of the Sino-Japanese War. They are thus colored a little by the economic pressures of those days. To them have been added other talks on the same general theme given at various places and times during the period 1938-41. For example, Chapter Three is based on a sermon preached at a baptismal service in May 8 1939. I am indebted to several friends for the notes which have supplied the book's source material.
The author sees the cosmos as a spiritual entity behind the things seen, a force always to be reckoned with. He deals with its impact upon the Christian and his impact upon it, with the conflicting claims upon him of separation and involvement, and with the destiny of the man in Christ to "have dominion." As always, Mr. Nee's studies display original thinking and he is not afraid to be provocative, stirring both heart and mind to a response. It is my prayer that, despite the inevitably piecemeal construction of the book, its theme will prove to have coherence as a picture of the man of God in the world, and further, that it may challenge us all who name the name of Christ to move more courageously and positively through this earthly scene, with thought always for our role here in God's eternal purpose concerning his beloved Son.
ANGUS I. KINNEAR
London
1968
Chapter 1
The Mind Behind the System
Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted from the earth, will draw all men unto myself" (John 12:31, 32).
Our Lord Jesus utters these words at a key point in his ministry. He has entered Jerusalem thronged by enthusiastic crowds; but almost at once he has spoken in veiled terms of laying down his life, and to this heaven itself has given public approval. Now he comes out with this great twofold statement. What, we ask ourselves, can it have conveyed to those who have just acclaimed him, going out to meet him and accompanying him home on his ride? To most of them his words, if they had any meaning at all, must have signified a complete reversal of their hopes. Indeed the more discerning came to see in them a forecasting of the actual circumstances of his death as a criminal (verse 33).
Yet if his utterance destroyed one set of illusions, it offered in place of them a wonderful hope, solid and secure. For it announced a far more radical exchange of dominion than even Jewish patriots looked for. "And I ..." - the expression contrasts sharply with what precedes it, even as the One it identifies stands in contrast with his antagonist, the prince of this world. Through the Cross, through the obedience to death of him who is God's seed of wheat, this world's rule of compulsion and fear is to end with the fall of its proud ruler. And with his springing up once more to life there will come into being in its place a new reign of righteousness and one that is marked by a free allegiance of men to him. With cords of love their hearts will be drawn away from a world under judgment to Jesus the Son of man, who though lifted up to die, is by that very act lifted up to reign.
"The earth" is the scene of this crisis and its tremendous outcome, and "this world" is, we may say, its point of collision. That point we shall make the theme of our study, and we will begin by looking at the New Testament ideas associated with the important Greek word cosmos. In the English versions this word is, with a single exception shortly to be noticed, invariably translated "the world." (The other Greek word, aion, also so translated, embodies the idea of time and should more aptly be rendered "the age.")
It is worth sparing time for a look at a New Testament Greek Lexicon such as Grimm's. This will show how wide is the range of meaning that cosmos has in Scripture. But, first of all we glance back to its origins in classical Greek where we find it originally implied two things: first a harmonious order or arrangement, and secondly embellishment or adornment. This latter idea appears in the New Testament verb cosmeo, used with the meaning "to adorn," as of the temple with goodly stones or of a bride for her husband (Luke 21:5; Rev. 21:2). In 1 Peter 3:3, the exception just alluded to, cosmos is itself translated "adorning" in keeping with this same verb cosmeo in verse 5.
(1) When we turn from the classics to the New Testament writers we find that their uses of cosmos fall into three main groups. It is used first with the sense of the material universe, the round world, this earth. For example, Acts 17:14, "the God that made the world and all things therein"; Matt. 13:35 (and elsewhere), "the foundation of the world"; John 1:10, "he was in the world, and the world was made by him"; Mark 16:15, "Go ye into all the world."
(2) The second usage of cosmos is twofold. It is used (a) for the inhabitants of the world in such phrases as John 1:10, "the world knew him not"; 3:16, "God so loved the world"; 12:19, "the world is gone after him"; 17:21, "that the world may believe." (b) An extension of this usage leads to the idea of the whole race of men alienated from God and thus hostile to the cause of Christ. For instance, Heb. 11:38, "Of whom the world was not worthy"; John 14:17, "whom the world cannot receive"; 14:27, "not as the world giveth, give I unto you"; 15:18, "If the world hateth you ..."
(3) In the third place we find cosmos is used in Scripture for worldly affairs: the whole circle of worldly goods, endowments, riches, advantages, pleasures, which though hollow and fleeting, stir our desire and seduce us from God, so that they are obstacles to the cause of Christ. Examples are: 1 John 2:15, "the things that are in the world"; 3:17, "the world's goods"; Matt. 16:26, "if he shall gain the whole world, and forfeit his life"; 1 Cor. 7:31, "those that use the world, as not abusing it." This usage of cosmos applies not only to material but also to abstract things which have spiritual and moral (or immoral) values. E.g., 1 Cor. 2:12, "the spirit of the world"; 3:19, "the wisdom of this world"; 7:31, "the fashion of this world"; Titus 2:12, "worldly (adj, kosmicos) lusts"; 2 Pet. 1:4, "the corruption that is in the world"; 2:20, "the defilement's of the world"; 1 John 2:16, 17, "all that is in the world, the lust ... the vainglory ... passeth away." The Christian is "to keep himself unspotted from the world" (James 1:27).
The Bible student will soon discover that, as the above paragraph suggests, cosmos is a favorite word of the apostle John, and it is he, in the main, who helps us forward now to a further conclusion.
While it is true that these three definitions of "the world," as (1) the material earth or universe, (2) the people on the earth, and (3) the things of the earth, each contribute something to the whole picture, it will already be apparent that behind them all is something more. The classical idea of orderly arrangement or organization helps us to grasp what this is. Behind all that is tangible we meet something intangible, we meet a planned system; and in this system there is a harmonious functioning, a perfect order.
Concerning this system there are two things to be emphasized. First, since the day when Adam opened the door for evil to enter God's creation, the world order has shown itself to be hostile to God. The world "knew not God" (1 Cor. 1:21), "hated" Christ (John 15:18) and "cannot receive" the Spirit of truth (14:17). "Its works are evil" (John 7:7) and "the friendship of the world is enmity with God" (James 4:4). Hence Jesus says, "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18:36). He has "overcome the world" (16:33) and "the victory that hath overcome the world" is "our faith" in him (1 John 5:4). For, as the verse of John 12 that heads this study affirms, the world is under judgment. God's attitude to it is uncompromising.
This is because, secondly, as the same verse makes clear, there is a mind behind the system. John writes repeatedly of "the prince of this world" (12:31; 14:30; 16:11). In his Epistle he describes him as "he that is in the world" (1 John 4:4)and matches against him the Spirit of truth who indwells believers. "The whole world," John says, "lieth in the evil one" (5:19). He is the rebellious cosmocrator, world ruler-a word which, however, appears only once, used in the plural of his lieutenants, the "world rulers of this darkness" (Eph. 6:12).
There is, then, an ordered system, "the world," which is governed from behind the scenes by a ruler, Satan. When in John 12:31 Jesus states that the sentence of judgment has been passed upon this world he does not mean that the material world or its inhabitants are judged. For them judgment is yet to come. What is there judged is that institution, that harmonious world order of which Satan himself is the originator and head. And ultimately, as Jesus' words make clear, it is he, "the prince of the world," who has been judged (16:11) and who is to be dethroned and "cast out" for ever. Scripture thus gives depth to our understanding of the world around us. Indeed, unless we look at the unseen powers behind the material things we may readily be deceived.
This consideration may help us to understand better the passage in 1 Peter 3 alluded to above. There the apostle sets "the outward adorning (cosmos) of plaiting the hair, and of wearing jewels of gold, or of putting on apparel" in deliberate contrast with "the incorruptible apparel of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price." By inference, therefore, the former are corrupt and worthless to God. We may or may not be ready at once to accept Peter's evaluation, depending upon whether we see the true import of his words. Here is what he is implying. In the background behind these matters of wearing apparel and jewelry and make-up, there is a power at work for its own ends. Do not let that power grip you.
What, we have to ask ourselves, is the motive that activates us in relation to these things? It may be nothing sensuous but altogether innocent, aiming by the use of tone and harmony and perfect matching merely to gain an effect that is aesthetically pleasing. There may be nothing intrinsically wrong in doing this; but do you and I see what we are touching here? We are touching that harmonious system behind the things seen, a system that is controlled by God's enemy. So let us be wary.
The Bible opens with God's creation of the heavens and the earth. It does not say that he created the world in the sense that we are discussing it now. Through the Bible the meaning of "the world" undergoes a development, and it is only in the New. Testament (though perhaps to a lesser extent already in the Psalms and some of the Prophets) that "the world" comes to have its full spiritual significance. We can readily see the reason for this development. Before the Fall of man, the world existed only in the sense of the earth, the people on the earth, and the things on the earth. As yet there was no cosmos, no "world," in the sense of a constituted order. With the Fall, however, Satan brought on to this earth the order which he himself had conceived, and with that began the world system of which we are speaking.
Originally our physical earth had no connection with "the world" in this sense of a Satanic system, nor indeed had man; but Satan took advantage of man's sin, and of the door this threw open to him, to introduce into the earth the organization which he had set himself to establish. From that point of time this earth was in "the world," and man was in "the world." So we may say that before the Fall there was an earth; after the Fall there was a "world"; at the Lord's return there will be a kingdom. Just as the world belongs to Satan, so the Kingdom belongs to our Lord Jesus. Moreover it is this Kingdom that displaces and that will displace the world. When the "Stone not made with hands" shatters man's proud image, then the kingdom of this world will "become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ" (Dan. 2:44, 45; Rev. 11:15).
Politics, education, literature, science, art, law, commerce, music-such are the things that constitute the cosmos, and these are things that we meet daily. Subtract them and the world as a coherent system ceases to be. In studying the history of mankind we have to acknowledge marked progress in each of these departments. The question however is: In what direction is this "progress" tending? What is the ultimate goal of all this development? At the end, John tells us, antichrist will arise and will set up his own kingdom in this world (1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3; 2 John 7; Rev. 13). That is the direction of this world's advance. Satan is utilizing the material world, the men of the world, the things that arein the world, to head everything up eventually in the kingdom of antichrist. At that hour the world system will have reached its zenith; and at that hour every unit of it will be revealed to be antiChristian.
In the book of Genesis we find in Eden no hint of technology, no mention of mechanical instruments. After the Fall, however, we read that among the sons of Cain there was a forger of cutting instruments of brass and iron. A few centuries ago it might have seemed fanciful to discern the spirit of antichrist in iron tools, even though for long the sword has been in open competition with the ploughshare. But today, in the hands of man, metals have been turned to sinister and deadly uses, and as the end approaches the widespread abuse of technology and engineering will become even more apparent.
The same thing applies to music and the arts. For the pipe and the harp seem also to have originated with the family of Cain, and today in unconsecrated hands their God-defying nature becomes increasingly clear. In many parts of the world it has long been easy to trace an intimate relationship between idolatry and the arts of painting, sculpture, and music. No doubt the day is coming when the nature of antichrist will be disclosed more openly than ever through song and dance and the visual and dramatic arts.
As for commerce, its connections are perhaps even more suspect. Satan was the first merchant, trading ideas with Eve for his own advantage, and in the figurative language of Ezekiel 28,which seems to reveal something of his original character, we read: "By thy traffic thou has increased thy riches, and thine heart is lifted up" (verse 5). Perhaps this does not have to be argued, for most of us will readily admit from experience the Satanic origin and nature of commerce. We shall say more of this later.
But what of education? Surely, we protest, that must be harmless. Anyway, our children have to be taught. But education, no less than commerce or technology, is one of the things of the world. It has its roots in the tree of knowledge. How earnestly, as Christians, we seek to protect our children from the world's more obvious snares. And yet it is quite true that we have to provide education for them. How are we going to solve the problem of letting them touch what is essentially a thing of the world, and at the same time guarding them from the great world system and its perils?
And what of science? It, too, is one of the units that constitute the cosmos. It, too, is knowledge. When we venture into the further reaches of science, and begin to speculate on the nature of the physical world-and of man-the question immediately arises: Up to what point is the pursuit of scientific research and discovery legitimate? Where is the line of demarcation between what is helpful and what is hurtful in the realm of knowledge? How can we pursue after knowledge and yet avoid being caught in Satan's meshes?
These, then, are the matters at which we must look. Oh, I know I shall appear to some to be overstating things, but this is necessary in order to drive home my point. For "if any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (1 John 2:15). Ultimately, when we touch the things of the world, the question we must ask ourselves always is: "How is this thing affecting my relationship with the Father?"
The time has passed when we need to go out into the world in order to make contact with it. Today the world comes and searches us out. There is a force abroad now which is captivating men. Have you ever felt the power of the world as much as today? Have you ever heard so much talk about money? Have you ever thought so much about food and clothing? Wherever you go, even among Christians, the things of the world are the topics of conversation. The world has advanced to the very door of the Church and is seeking to draw even the saints of God into its grasp. Never in this sphere of things have we needed to know the power of the Cross of Christ to deliver us as we do at the present time.
Formerly we spoke much of sin and of the natural life. We could readily see the spiritual issues there, but we little realized then what equally great spiritual issues are at stake when we touch the world. There is a spiritual force behind this world scene which, by means of "the things that are in the world," is seeking to enmesh men in its system. It is not merely against sin therefore that the saints of God need to be on their guard, but against the ruler of this world. God is building up his Church to its consummation in the universal reign of Christ.
Simultaneously his rival is building up this world system to its vain climax in the reign of antichrist. How watchful we need to be lest at any time we be found helping Satan in the construction of that ill-fated kingdom. When we are faced with alternatives and a choice of ways confronts us, the question is not: Is this good or evil? Is this helpful or hurtful? No, the question we must ask ourselves is: Is it of this world, or of God? For since there is only this one conflict in the universe, then whenever two conflicting courses lie open to us, the choice at issue is never a lesser one than: God ... or Satan?
*******************
The European Prophetic College
EPC@Comhem.se
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The European Prophetic College
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OM News 7/2-05
Welcome to Headlines - a news service for Operation Mobilisation produced by OM News and Information (OMNI.
OM news, prayer information and stories for the week: 7 - 13 February, 2005
1) POWER STRUGGLE IN NEPAL
2) A NEW ERA - Belgium
3) PRESSING ON - Malaysia
1) POWER STRUGGLE IN NEPAL
The clampdown on international lines of communication continues in the Kingdom of Nepal, where the King seized power on Tuesday 1 February. Phone and internet lines have been out of action since the king sacked his government and took control. The crisis has arisen over the continued conflict with Moaoist rebels in Nepal.
Since then, it has not been possible to contact workers in the country. It is reported that the capital, Kathmandu is peaceful, although soldiers are out on the streets, and that people are remaining quietly in their homes, awaiting the outcome of this
enforced world silence.
Please pray with us for renewed contact with workers in the country as soon as possible.
Source: South Asia Communications
2) A NEW ERA
As church and mission leaders gathered to celebrate the 40th anniversary of OM's ministry in Belgium last month, they also marked a new era in the work - the merger of OM Belgium with OM Zaventem. Under the leadership of Jan Wisse (NL), the new OM Belgium will move forward as one team. In his inauguration speech, Jan emphasized that Belgium is still a country in need of missionaries, and yet in order to reach Belgium for Christ we must invest in the young Christians in the Belgian churches. Leo Proot, who led the work OM Belgium for many years, will now focus on church planting in Gent, while Edwin Braker, former leader of OM Zaventem, will continue to serve with the Zaventem team.
Source: OM Belgium / Anne Marit Viljoen
3) Pressing On
Suffering the after-effects of the Earthquake and Tsunami disaster that hit countries around the Indian Ocean, OM Malaysia continues to press on, mobilising for missions and relief work around the world. Malaysian Christians have given generously to war-torn Sudan and to Tsunami stricken countries despite economic difficulties.
Currently, over 30 Malaysians are serving with OM in 16 countries and on board both Ships. Peter Maiden, OM International Director will be speaking in Kuala Lumpur at a Missions Conference organised by a church in June. At the end of the year, OM Malaysia will launch TeenStreet Malaysia with the desire to train the next generation of workers. TeenStreet founders, Dan and Suzie Potter will visit the country this month to help with preparations.
Please pray for the ministry of OM Malaysia and for many more Malasian churches to get involved with world missions as a result.
Source: OM Malaysia.
David & Sara på Råslätt
Uganda - Afrikas pärla - Se Läs om Uganda
På Råslätt finns några nya ansikten. David Kyobe-Lule & hans fru Sara kommer från Kampala i Uganda. De har båda fäder som var stamhövdingar. De har båda ekonomiexamina i företagsekonomi. David har med sitt liv och erfarenhet ett mycket mäktigt vittnesbörd att berätta om. I Uganda var båda i bankvärlden. Men David har också varit med i gerillan under fem år i Uganda, innan han kom till Sverige och läste teologi. Sedan några år har han varit ungdomspräst i en samarbetskyrka i Jönköping. Sedan 1 februari är han arbetslös på grund av att tjänsten han haft varit tidsbegränsad och projekttjänst.
Sara prövar sig fram på Råslätt i en butik som hon kallar Beauty Boutique. Titta gärna in i Gallerian till Sara. Hon har haft en Hair Boutique i Uppsala - innan de flyttade till Jönköping för 1½ år sedan.
Bed gärna att dessa ugandier få se hur nya vägar öppnas och dörrar öppnas för dem i Sverige i deras situation just nu.
Framlidne biskop Festo Kivengere upplevde på nära håll Idi Amins skräckvälde, då c:a 300.000 dödades. Hans bok Revolutionary Love finns översatt till svenska under titeln Revolutionerande KÄRLEK, 1984, EFS-förlaget, ISBN 91-7080-617-9.
/DSr
"Företagandet som mission" [SAM]
Svenska Alliansmissionen har genom bl.a. Tommy Josefsson visat nya spår i GNOSJÖ
Vecka för unga ledare [EFK]
AKTIV - vecka för unga ledare 14-18 mars på GÖTABROSKOLAN
Lovsångskonferens 4-6 mars Göteborg
"Älska Gud - Älska människorna!" i Göteborg Vineyard 4-6 mars
Brev från missionärer [SKM]
Läs ett antal brev SKM har från ett flertal missionärer från olika världsdelar.
Frågor om Metodistkyrkan
Frågor och svar om METODISTKYRKAN
Från muslim till kristen - en livsresa
Läs om Reem 28 år som nu går på Frälsningsarméns Distansbibelskola
Katastrofarbetet i Indien
Läs om hjälpen till Andamanerna från Missionskyrkan. Läs om hjälpen till INDIEN
Påvens hälsotillstånd
Senaste nytt Fastlagssöndagen 6 februari om Påvens hälsa
M'Xp Guds rike gestaltas...
Guds rike gestaltas av församlingen. Uppdraget församlingen/kyrkan har är att gestalta Guds rike. Det är den allt övergripande kallelsen given åt 'Ecclesia Christi'. Skriften talar därför om vad som är det centrala i evangelium. Vi läser om definitionen på ett stort antal ställen i NT, att evangelium är Evangelium om Guds rike - Mt 4:23, 9:35, Lk 4:43, 8:1, 9:2, 9:60, 16:16, Apg 1:3, 28:31. Det är vad församlingen har att förkunna och undervisa om.
När vi betraktar hur Guds rike gestaltas - i en socken, på en ort, i en stad, i en region eller ett land - ser och hör vi oändligt mycket som gläder Fadern. God förkunnelse och undervisning som ges i enlighet med Guds ords riktlinjer gläder Fadern och oss som är åsyna vittnen till gestaltningen av Guds rike. Det som gestaltas det sker utifrån den förståelse som församlingen har av denna sin uppgift. Den gläder och den inspirerar och uppbygger trons bröder och systrar i deras skiftande traditionstillhörigheter.
Vad vi kan höra på en ort eller i en stad kan skifta. Men mycket är sig likt i alla landets 290 kommuner. Mycket är gott och gläder Faderns hjärta. När han ser sina barns skiftande traditioner och deras sätt att interkommunicera med andra trossyskon av annan bekännelse och trostillhörighet, då finns också sådant som Fadern sörjer över. Några generella iakttagelser kan vi ana att Fadern inte gläds över.
Det är att ortodoxa kan se på frikyrkliga bröder och systrar som vore de en sekt, ja, de kan t.o.m. ibland tala om att de är "Jehovas vittnen", underförstått att här har vi att göra med icke-kristen tradition.
Eller det kan vara grupper av troende som betraktar trosrörelsen som enbart problem och där lösningen enbart är att dessa "fångar" behöver befrias med terapi via organisationer som FRI.
Eller det kan vara som i dagarna när man vigt till biskop och därmed har dessa meningsfränder trätt över gränsen till vad som kan accepteras; man har exkluderat sig själva.
Tre exempel på vad vi kan höra och se. Fadern torde från sin Tron se alla sina barn som tillgångar. Han torde se alla de sina trots skillnader som tillgångar och såsom vi faktiskt är varandras syskon, enär han ensam är vår Fader. Hur har han det, Far i himlen? Där bak i bilen tycks det alltid vara bråk och kiv…
Vad vi hör, anar och ser från Fadern och hans fadershjärta är att hans ögon tåras dels av sorg för vad han ser, dels tåras av glädje över allt som äger rum i hans kärlek och i hans Ande. Kärlekens Ande är ju Nådens och Sanningens Ande som vill inget hellre än att få föra de sina åter och åter till Korset och till Försoningens faktum och källflöde.
Vad vi kan höra och se från Fadershjärtats utflöden ibland Hans folk är Acceptans, Bön, Caritas, Delaktighet och Evangelium… om Guds rike; och hur det gestaltas av Hans församling, på orten, i socknen, i staden, regionen och i landet i den samlade Svenska kristenheten. I Faderns hjärta finns en bokstav före de andra. Det är B. Bönens Ande flödar ut över Guds folk i vår tid med Kärlekens nya välsignelseströmmar.
/Dag Selander
Fastlagssöndagen den 6 februari 2005
6/2-05 MISSION Quiz # 2 - vecka 6 -
SVAR PÅ MISSION Quiz # 1
(1) Vilka personer har skrivit följande psalmtexter där nedanstående strofer ingår?
(a) "Medan hemligheten djupnar viskar Fadern ömt mitt namn"…
SVAR: JONAS JONSSON
Texten börjar: I Guds tystnad får jag vara ordlös
(b) "Mörkret är ej mörkt för dig och i dunklet ser du mig"…
SVAR: ELIS MALMESTRÖM
Texten börjar: Gud, för dig är allting klart
(c) "Var icke snål, bered din själ till fest"…
SVAR: NATHAN SÖDERBLOM
Texten börjar: Se, kärlet brast, och oljan är utgjuten, dess doft uppfyller världens sorgehus
(d) "Den för över världen den levandes bud och vittnar bland svärden och bålen om Gud"…
SVAR: FRANS MIKAEL FRANZÉN
Texten börjar: Vad ljus över griften! Han lever, o fröjd! Fullkomnad är skriften, o salighets höjd!
(e) "Vi sitta med dörrarna lykta, en räddhågad lärjungarund, då Herren oss väntat att finna därute, där striderna brinna, i manligt och troget förbund"…
SVAR: EINAR BILLING
Texten börjar: Nu gläd dig, min ande, i Herran, upp, jubla, min själ, i din Gud.
(2) Har författarna något gemensamt?
De är alla biskopar
(3) Vilken var författarnas verksamhetsregion?
Jonas Jonsson i Strängnäs stift, Elis Malmeström i Växjö stift, Nathan Söderblom i Uppsala stift, Frans Mikael Franzén i Härnösands stift samt Einar Billing i Västerås stift.
------------------------------------------------
MISSION Quiz # 2 - vecka 6 -
(1) Vilka betydelser har ordet "0ktav"?
- Det finns sex betydelser, ange minst 3 betydelser
(2) Bakgrund till "Trafikfråga":
Brita talade i mobiltelefon med sin man ute på Walk n' Talk häromdan, och påminde honom att inte tala i mobilen när han går över gatan. George Verwer - OM:s grundare - talade i mobilen medan han gick längs järnvägsrälsen på Sri Lanka i september, vilket höll på att sluta med döden. [Se länk: George Verwer] Brita påminde alltså sin man om att se upp vid övergångsställen.
Frågan är: - VARFÖR TITTAR MAN FÖRST ÅT VÄNSTER OCH SEDAN ÅT HÖGER, INNAN MAN GÅR UT I GATAN?
Svaren på frågorna återfinns nästa helg den 13 februari Första söndagen i Fastan
på Kategori 5. MISSIONS'HISTORIA under rubriken MISSION Quiz # 3
Lösningar på frågorna om
1. "Oktav" och 2. "Trafikfråga"
sänds per e-post: MissionXp@myway.com
Lycka till
Red. MISSION Quiz
/Brita
5/2-05 WnT / Lappmesen & Bygdeå
Hej Farbror Dag!
Hälsningar från Uppsala!
Här har vi en liten lappmes som bor i stadsskogen utanför vårt vardagsrumsfönster.
Sen i slutet av Januari har man sett den. Vi har en granne som matar fåglarna här ute.
En lördag morgon såg vi massor av människor som gick med kikare & förstod att det var nån intressant fågel dom kikade på. Jag och killarna tog en sväng på skidor. Då vi stannade till och frågade vad det var dom kikade på. Då fick vi veta att det var en lappmes. Ovanlig här i Uppland.
Trevlig lördag kväll, hälsa Faster Brita!
Kram Sara
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LAPPMESEN FRÅN SARA
Den här hälsningen är verkligen både mycket kär och speciell. Tack Sara för bilden och raderna. Den lilla fågeln, lappmesen, är rar, dvs speciell. Lappmesen - den är också lite av en hembygdshälsning - från Bygdeå - eftersom den hör hemma i norr, uppe i fjällbjörkarnas Lappland och Norrbotten.
KYRKOMÅLARE TORSTEN NORDBERG
Igår på Sankt Ansgars dag överraskades jag också av hemlandshälsningar, när jag fick frågan om vem som hade målat altartavlan i min hemkyrka i Bygdeå. För Göran Åberg är kyrkomålare Torsten Nordberg känd eftersom hans konst också finns i Bankeryds kyrka, "De 8 Saligprisningarna". Nu har jag kontaktat Västerbottens Museum för att lära känna Torsten Kyrkomålare hemma i Bygdeå.
/Dag JustNu
lördagkväll 5/2 kl 21.15
5/2-05 WnT - LÄNGS KUNGSVÄGEN...
Tänker på Gerhard Karnå, organist och körledare i Lysekil under många år. Gerhard började sin musikaliska karriär uppe i nordligaste Sverige, men flyttade hem till Bohuslän på 70-talet. Många är minnena från gudstjänsterna i Lysekils kyrka, som ute till havs också var ett välkänt sjömärke. Alta Trinita beata, Gerhard och kören är toner jag hör mäktigt. - Mariannes musikaliska gåvor och inspiration kommer också för mig när Ljungarums kyrka med sin Mariavackra klockstapel i trä och rött passeras under förmiddagens Walk n’ Talk. – En sak står så där absolut klart på vandringen hittills denna lördag. Det är att fåglarnas konserterande och sångarglädje talar sitt tydliga språk idag. Budskapet är tydligt för den som vill höra. Våren har gjort sitt intåg. I luften skimrar det liksom av kyrkoårets heliga Vår när nu fastan inleds - efter Carne Vale på tisdag - med Askonsdag den 9 februari.
Docenten och domkapitelsledamoten Göran Åberg berättar om när Bo Hörnberg deltog vid en kyrklig vigning i Växjö. Det var prästvigning och Sven Lindegård förrättade sitt biskopsuppdrag. Bo Hörnberg och biskopen hade kommit att stå varandra mycket nära – inte minst med anledning av förberedelser och arbete inför J 83. Därför var han nu med. Göran Åberg hade i egenskap av Jönköpings Nathan Söderblom att lotsa och leda Bo Hörnberg igenom denna gudstjänst. Domkyrkans orgel lyfte och bar fram psalmtextens ord: - Veni Sancte Spiritus, reple tuorum corda fidelium, et tui amoris in eis ignem accende… - O, du helge Ande, kom. Fyll de dina trognas hjärtan med nåd och frid och tänd i dem kärlekens eld, din levande låga… Vid detta tillfälle under sången och orgelns mäktiga toner sågs tårars väldiga flöden strömma nedför den ledande pingstförkunnarens kinder. Samtidigt som han viskande hördes säga: Detta var nog den mäktigaste utgjutelse av Anden jag varit med om i hela mitt liv.
Vandra längs Kungsvägen med Herren är stort. Då flödar ibland tårar av hjärtats glädje och/eller förkrosselse, när Guds gode Ande verkar och för oss till Kristus Jesus. Vandra längs Kurirvägen utmed Strömsberg är också stort, på sitt sätt. Att sätta sina steg längs en väg som är 3.000 år gammal gör att vandringen det vägavsnittet nästan blir till en helig upplevelse. Koltrasten tittar på från sitt utkik –ännu inte längst upp i trädet, utan mitt emellan. Än så länge tystlåten. Blåmes och Stjärtmes samsas så fint vid talgbollarna utanför Nr 7 vid Strömsbergsdammen. Nötväckan och trädkryparen gör sina klättraruppvisningar.
Jag är Vägen - Jag är Sanningen - Jag är Livet. Det är utsagan av honom som är Kungars Kung och Herrars Herre. Han är Vägen. Som leder rätt. Som leder framåt och hemåt till Fadershuset.
”Vandren i ande” heter det i KB 1917. Dessa bibelord i Galaterbrevet 5:16 översätts med ”Vandra i Anden” av Svenska Folkbibeln. Bibel 2000 översätter ”låt er ande leda er”.
När jag vandrar Kungsvägen längs Kurirvägen i Vårens tid på väg hemåt, då är det som att orden ”Vandra i Anden” är enklare och mera naturligt.
Dessutom tycks det som om Vårbäckarna börjat porla med ny förväntan i hela Svenska kristenheten…
Från Ale – över Jönköping – till Övertorneå…
/Dag JustNu
4/2-05 M'Xp Ledare DE GODA NYHETERNA
AVFALLSFRÅGOR
Porrnovellen i Nackaskolan för 6-åringar [se: DN/kultur 050204] - den är ett av oändliga exempel på avfallsfrågor i landet. Och som kyrka, församling och enskilda kristna så kan uppslukas av att halva ens vardag och hela kungariket upptas av dessa avfallsfrågor.
DE GODA NYHETERNA
Erfarenheter som gjorts tillsammans med Bibelns egen undervisning säger att vad kyrka och församling ska ägna sig åt är inte avfallsfrågor, utan Missionsutmaningen att göra Jesus Kristus känd, lydd och trodd. Det är kyrkans och församlingens uppdrag och kallelse. Evangeliets - De goda Nyheternas förkunnelse.
Kyrkan och församlingen har dock en klar och tydlig roll i att vara salt och ljus. Det vill säga också vara en profetröst i samhället. När denna webblogg därför igår går in och talar om barnens behov av familj - en kvinnlig mor och manlig far - då är det utifrån en avfallsfråga där landets parlament och regering samt kristenheten i stort har ett ansvar som måste tas.
Fortsättningsvis kommer denna webblogg inte att ägna sig åt avfallsfrågor. Dessa avfallsfrågor får andra miljöinstanser ansvara för. En soptipp är sopornas plats. De andliga avfallsfrågorna har att hanteras på annat sätt än via samhällets media.
Denna webbloggs syfte och ändamål [se: Kategorier Om Mission Xp] är uttryckt på följande sätt:
Mission Xp
- delar alla kristnas i Sverige vision om den svenska kristenhetens enhet
- delar alla kristnas vision om bönens och kärlekens betydelse för inbördes relationer mellan alla olika kyrkor och samfund
- delar alla kristnas vision om missionsuppdraget som behöver mobiliseras och kraftsamlas i svensk kristenhet
Mission Xp vill därför vara ett hjärta och en röst med hela den svenska kristenheten, det vill säga stå tillsammans med alla kyrkor och samfund i Sverige med alla dess församlingar, ledare, präster, pastorer, biskopar och allt Guds folk - i ett enda uppdrag, nämligen att sprida De goda Nyheterna.
Evangelium är uppdraget. Och... Tessalonikiförsamlingen hade tydligen fått det "i fullt mått", men hur är det egentligen ute i den globala och nationella verkligheten? Den frågan är vida mera viktig än nog så många spaltmeter, Upprop och DiskussionsForum som oftast fokuserar på avfallsfrågor.
/Dag Sr
PM Skriv och berätta...
Skriv en rad eller två om det som ligger på ditt hjärta.
Det kan vara skiftande ämnen vi kan dela med varann som Guds folk. Här ges sju exempel på vad vi kan skriva om bland säkert tusen skiftande angelägenheter:
- Något speciellt från din församling
- Något du bär som din vision
- Antalet församlingar & samfund från din kommun
- Meddelande om något viktigt som händer i ditt samfund, din kyrka, på din ort
- Något du tror kan uppmuntra GUds folk på din ort, i din region eller varför inte i hela Sverige
- Något du läst som du vill länka till
- Något du undrar inför på denna webblogg
Skriv och berätta...
Till MissionXp@myway.com
eller
Under Kommentarer:
Vad skulle Jesus gilla/inte gilla i vår församling?
VAD SKULLE JESUS GILLA/INTE GILLA I VÅR FÖRSAMLING? Upp 2:8-11
Vi står i början av ett år och årsskifte är naturliga brytpunkter för oss som enskilda och församling.
En del av er har kanske fattat nyårslöfte om förändringar ni vill se.
Vi som församling har ett församlingsmöte på onsdag, då vi också kommer att lyfta fram vad vi vill sträva efter, vad vi önskar och ber ska vara vår inriktning under året.
Vad är det vi i RFG [Råslätts Församlingsgemenskap] lämnar för avtryck?
Vad säger och tänker vi om oss själva?
Vad säger andra om oss? Det heter om dig att du lever, men…
Vad vill vi det ska sägas om oss? Vad vill vi bli kända för? Det är inte oviktiga frågor hur vi uppfattas, och hur vi vill uppfattas, av den omgivning vi finns.
Men det viktigaste. Församlingen är Guds församling. Han är dess ursprung, dess liv.
- Vad gillar han i vår församling? Vad tänker Gud om oss? Vad gläder han sig över?
- Vad gillar han inte hos oss?
I Uppenbarelsebokens kap 2 och 3 beskrivs 7 olika församlingar. Och i början av presentationen av församlingen står det:
A.) Jag känner dig och dina gärningar, jag vet om dig.
Varje församling beskrivs med sina goda sidor, sina förtjänster och det som Gud gläder sig åt och berömmer dem för.
Men det står också:
B.) Detta har jag emot dig. Det finns det som Gud ser med smärta på och som han ber att de ska omvända sig från.
Om ett liknande omdöme skulle skrivas om RFG vad skulle det stå? Vad skulle vi önska, vilja och hoppas att det skulle stå.
Sardes, Ladoikeia, Filadelfia, Smyrna, Pergamon, Thyaira, Efesos. – Dessa församlingars förtjänster och brister har jag läst och mediterat kring. Det finns församlingar som kallar sig för Filadelfia och Smyrna, men de andra namnen har jag inte hört. Varför? Filadelfia och Smyrna är bara omtalade i positiva termer. Om vi börjar med det positiva, och det kan vi hoppas att det finns, även om kanske det inte heller är så självklart. En församling heter Sardes och där fanns en liten skara som lyste, men annars höll de inte måttet i Guds ögon. Vad finns det i vår församling som Gud ser med glädje på?
(Fundera i några minuter och skriv ner det på ditt papper.)
Jag vet inte hur Gud ser på oss, men jag vill lyfta fram tre goda saker jag tror Gud gillar hos oss, och som jag önskar se hos oss.
VAD GILLAR HAN? (Positiva först)
1. Ni har bevarat mitt ord - 3:8 Filadelfia – ”Jag känner dina gärningar. Se, jag har ställt en dörr öppen för dig som ingen kan stänga. Din kraft är ringa, men du har bevarat mitt ord och inte förnekat mitt namn.”
Vi inser att vår kraft och vår styrka inte ligger i vår egen förmåga att skapa förändring, utan i den utsträckning vi släpper loss Ordet i våra egna liv. Att vi strävar efter att höra och lyssna till vad Jesus sagt och lärt oss. Jesus själv är Ordet. Vi är inte Ordets herrar utan ordets tjänare. Vi vill lyssna, lära och lyda. Vi vill inte ta lätt på det, utan ge Ordet plats i vår gemenskap och vara en auktoritet.
Det finns alltid en uppenbar risk att församlingen glömmer vilka vi är, vad Gud gjort och vad Gud vill med sin församling om vi försummar att lyssna till Guds vägledning. Ps 106:35-36 De beblandade sig med främmande folk och lärde sig deras seder. De tjänade deras avgudar och lät sig snärjas av dem.
Rom 12:2 Anpassa er inte efter denna världen, utan låt er förvandlas genom förnyelsen av era tankar, så att ni kan avgöra vad som är Guds vilja: det som är gott, behagar honom och är fullkomligt.
Det finns hos oss ett förtroende för Ordet och vi vill låta det vägleda oss. 2 Tim 3:16-17
Varje bok i skriften är inspirerad av Gud och till nytta när man undervisar, vederlägger, vägleder och fostrar till ett rättfärdigt liv, så att den som tillhör Gud blir fri från sina brister och rustad för alla slags goda gärningar.
När vi samlas till gudstjänst, när vi möts i husförsamlingarna kommer vi med en lyhördhet, en öppenhet för Ordets inflytande.
Ordet ger oss inre styrka, mättnad, vägledning, urskiljning.
2. Kärlek uttryckt i goda gärningar. Upp 2:18-19 ”Och skriv till ängeln för församlingen i Thyatira: Så säger Guds son, han som har ögon som eldslågor, och hans fötter liknar gyllene brons. Jag känner dina gärningar, din kärlek och din tro, ditt tjänande och din uthållighet och vet att dina senaste gärningar är fler än de första.”
Ibland kan vi fokusera för mycket på det som inte är så bra, men jag har genom åren mött och sett och ser mycket kärlek som Gud har lagt ner i vår församling och jag gläds när jag hör människor berätta om det.
Jag vet att Gud gillar och ser med glädje när någon av er sitter ner och lyssnar till den som har det svårt. När kärleken tar sig uttryck i en barmhärtig blick som rymmer empati och förståelse.
När någon behöver en hjälpande hand så finns det många som är beredda att finnas där.
3. Uthållighet, trohet – Upp 2:19
Jag känner dina gärningar, din kärlek och din tro, ditt tjänande och din uthållighet.
Ett ofta återkommande positivt gillande till de sju församlingarna handlar om uthållighet och trohet. Det finns också i vår församling. Det handlar om att vi lyssnat till uppmaningen att hålla fast vid det vi har, om en inre fasthet som leder till att vi inte snabbt kastar in handduken när vi möter besvikelser, uteblivna framgångar, när det blir påfrestningar eller motstånd utan församlingen präglas av en målmedveten envishet och uthållighet, att få genomsyra vårt område Råslätt med livets goda. Vi är inte nöjda med de som redan är en del av vår gemenskap, vi vill uthålligt och tålmodigt arbeta för att allt fler få lära känna Kristus.
Vi tror på församlingen som Guds unika redskap i den här världen. Den är ingen modenyck, den är ingen trend, utan församlingen är den arena Gud tänkt att våra kristna liv ska mogna och växa. Vi vill därför uthålligt hålla fast vid varandra och inte ge upp.
Det handlar inte framförallt om att vara uthållig på platsen Råslätt, även om det också kan innebära det, men det handlar om att uthålligt göra det som är gott, att inte förtröttas.
Jesus älskade sina lärjungar till slutet och han önskar se det hos sina efterföljare. Det finns alltid risk att vi tröttnar på relationer, att vi bryter upp för den skull, men jag vet att Jesus ser med glädje när vi håller ut med fördragsamhet med varandra framförallt, men också i de arbeten vi startar. Uthållighet ger trovärdighet och skapar trygghet.
Vad gillar han inte?
(Ta några minuter och fundera)
1. Ljumhet, likgiltighet – lagom Upp 3:15-16 Jag känner dina gärningar, du är varken kall eller varm. Om du ändå vore kall eller varm! Men nu är du ljum och varken varm eller kall, och därför skall jag spy ut dig ur min mun.
Jag har alltid upplevt dessa ord provocerande. Det handlar inte om avfall, utan om en svalnad iver. Det som jag en gång brann för, det fångar mig inte längre, det berör mig inte längre. Jag bryr mig inte längre i någon större utsträckning om människor går förlorade eller inte. Ivern har svalnat.
Vetskapen om att flodkatastrofen i Sydostasien fått katastrofala följder för många fattiga och att varje dag dör barn p.g.a brist på mat. På något sätt tar det inte tag i mig och jag berörs bara sådär lite lagom.
OK, kanske vi säger, för att överleva måste jag hålla det smärtsamma på avstånd. – Ja, jo men ändå likgiltigheten, bekvämligheten smyger sig in och jag vill ha det ombonat och skönt.
Upp 2:4 Men det har jag emot dig, att du har övergett din första kärlek. Men det mest smärtsamma är att kärleken till Jesus har svalnat av. Och frågan som Petrus fick av Jesus: Älskar du mig, känns nästan pinsamt svår att möta.
Det handlar inte om att jag ska bete mig och uttrycka min kärlek på samma sätt som det kanske började för 30 år sedan, men värmen och intensiteten kan finnas kvar genom livet. Helig Ande uppväck igen den kärlek som en gång fanns där, men som har svalnat och blivit ett fritidsintresse som jag lite halvhjärtat ger mig åt, men där det inte får bli för mycket, kräva för mycket, bara lite lagom.
2. Splittring – ideer, läror, personer som leder till att söndring uppstår i församlingen. Ett återkommande problem i de uppräknade församlingarna i Upp. Tyvärr brottas även vi i vår församling med konflikter där somliga har svårt att leva i endräkt.
Församlingen riskerar alltid att slås sönder antingen utifrån eller inifrån. Ju fler individer vi är i församlingen, med olika bakgrund, erfarenheter, sår, övertygelser, ju större risk är det att splittring uppstår i kroppen och slitningar uppstår.
Det är oundvikligt att konflikter uppstår, men när vi inte löser dem i ödmjukhet och med Guds och varandra hjälp, utan sätter prestige, egna ambitioner i centrum och håller oss till den ena eller den andra, då vet vi att vi går Fiendens ärende som inte vill något hellre än att stjäla, slakta och förgöra.
Kristus har kommit för att ena och samla sin hjord, men när den splittras, ser han med smärta på oss.
Varje gång någon av oss sår frö av avundsjuka, av skvaller, av lögn och går bakom ryggen på varandra, då har vi Jesu tydliga ord att han har något emot oss och han uppmanar oss att vända om.
3. Sluten – Det mest kännetecknande för inkarnationen, att Jesus blev människa, är att han lämnade härligheten, blev en av oss, gav sitt liv i döden för att rädda oss förlorade. ”Såsom min Fader har sänt mig så sänder jag er.” – När vi tenderar att bli upptagna med vårt egna navelskåderi, våra egna bekymmer och problem och bli helt upptagna av dem och glömmer att se uppdraget vi fått att uppsöka och rädda det som var förlorat, då vet vi att det gillar inte Gud. Lyft upp era ögon säger Jesus. Skörden är stor men arbetarna är få.
Avsl: ”Du som har öron, hör vad Anden säger till församlingarna!" – Så slutar orden till varje församling. Hör vi vad Anden vill säga till oss/dig och mig.
Vad av det goda vill vi stärka? Vad vill du tillföra av det Gud gillar?
Vad behöver vi/du/jag förändra och omvända oss ifrån? Vill vi i ännu större utsträckning få låta Guds ljus skina genom oss?
Råslätt den 15 januari 2005
Håkan Karlsson
The Mystery of Israel... Art Katz - Chapter 3
The Mystery of Israel and the Church, Chapter 3
Art Katz
From verse 6 of Romans chapter 9, Paul rolls up his sleeves and begins to dig into the great issues that are raised by Israel’s rejection of her Messiah. The fact that Israel could reject her own promised Messiah and Deliverer according to her own scriptures has got to be one of the greatest anomalies and contradictions of the history of mankind. That God Himself foresaw, even ordained it, is staggering in its proportions. Even more significant is the question of God’s apparent failure: How could God and His Word fail?
But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel; neither are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants, but: “Through Isaac your descendants will be named.” That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants. For this is a word of promise: “At this time I will come, and Sarah shall have a son” (Rom. 9: 6-9).
The same apostolic man whose heart is grieved over Israel and its lost condition, and who wishes that he himself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of his Jewish kinsmen, is as grieved over the question of God’s honor and the truth of His word. Paul’s jealousy for the glory of God, His name, His honor and His faithfulness to His word makes him to grieve over the unsaved condition of his kinsmen; this is the apostolic heart. He is grieved that Israel’s failure to recognize their Messiah would appear to be a demerit against God; and that the people who were appointed and called sons, and who were given the privileges of adoption, the covenants, the promises, the glory and the ministry of the Temple, are bringing, by their unbelief, a reproach against God and a blasphemy against His name.
But if God’s word fails, then God is no longer God; for God is eminently the God of the word, the God of the word of the covenant, and the God of the word of promise. If He cannot keep the word that He Himself gave, then that is the end of God as God. This is the great enigma. How could God’s word have failed? Can God fail? Can God’s word fail? These are the great, theological problems that Paul had to answer for the Church in Rome and, by extension, all the churches in every generation. He is thrust, therefore, into an uncanny and precarious place, and has got to wrestle his way through.
The Israel of God
Paul begins to answer them by showing that the failure is not with God’s word. God’s word will succeed. The fact that the nation rejected the Messiah is not the statement of the failure of God’s word. It shows, rather, that not all the nation was Israel. It is more than the issue of being naturally Israel and being descended from Abraham. Ishmael was also a son, but it does not make him the ‘Israel of God.’ As Paul says in verse 8,
...it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God (Rom. 9:8).
A Jew may be a physical descendant of Abraham, but that does not automatically make him a candidate for glory. The fact that Israel has rejected the Messiah shows that they were not among the elect; it was just as much a statement then as it is now. If a Jew or a Gentile is unregenerate, he is neither the child of promise, nor the descendant of Isaac. In his letter to the Galatians, Paul uses the phrase ‘the Israel of God’ (Galatians 6:16) to indicate something beyond, or other than, just ethnic Jews.
Paul continues to probe deeper into an unfolding of the genius of God in all of this. What seems to be disappointment and failure on God’s part is shown by Paul to be the revelation of God’s glory. In the outworking of His whole redemptive purpose, there always seems to be two tracks, as has been suggested historically through the choosing of Jacob and the rejection of Esau, or the choosing of Isaac and the rejection of Ishmael. It is the true, the chosen and the called, as opposed to that which appears to be all the above, but is rejected of God. It is no coincidence that the thing rejected by God often seems to have all the right credentials. But from the beginning of His whole salvation history, God is showing that He will choose whom He will choose; it is not our democratic notions of what we think is fair. God’s whole intention through Israel is to show mankind that He is God, sovereignly God!
Mankind is so stubborn and self-willed in his own categories that nothing less than what God will actually demonstrate at the end of the age, in the choosing and sifting of the Israel of God, will reveal how much God is God, even to the nominally Christian nations.
I AM WHO I AM
When Moses asked God to name Himself to the people of Israel, God replied,
“I am who I am,” and “...The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.” This is My name forever, and this is My memorial name to all generations” (Exodus 3:14a, 15b).
‘I am who I am’ is also taken to mean, ‘I will be who I will be,’ which is to say, ‘I will do what I will do’ because ‘I AM GOD.’ In other words, “I am God, and I will choose what I will choose, and I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy. You don’t think that Israel deserves it? That is all the more reason why I have chosen them. Your thinking shows the rottenness of your heart. It is a good thing you are not God, because it shows that your mercy would have been proportionate to those whom you think deserve it, especially yourself. But I will yet choose whom I will choose.”
And not only this, but there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac; for though the twins were not yet born, and had not done anything good or bad, in order that God’s purpose according to His choice might stand, not because of works, but because of Him who calls (Rom. 9: 10-11).
This is a laser beam aimed at the heart of the whole mentality of the world and of human wisdom, both of which are contrary to God. The wisdom of the world is predicated upon works, merit and performance, and upon what we think we deserve because of what we do. In God’s economy, everything is predicated on one principle only: “I am God, and I will choose what I will choose.” That is the historical conflict. In his deepest heart, where man really lives his life, he wants a ‘god’ made in his image, which, in fact, makes him secretly ‘God.’
Paul’s statement here in Romans 9:11 contains the whole antagonism between the world and God as well as the whole antagonism between Judaism and Christianity. The whole issue of man versus God is summed up in that one statement in which God demonstrated throughout the history of Israel, and even in the sons of Rebekah, that He will choose whom He will choose. God does not give us mere abstract principles; they are exemplified and written in the flesh and blood of men. To turn our back, therefore, on the history of Israel, or to have a faith that has voided or lost its Hebraic content, is not to have the faith. Israel’s history reveals God in His deepest principles and mind.
Not by Works
Two sons were born,
...in order that God’s purpose according to His choice might stand, not because of works... (Rom. 9:11a).
In other words, the decision was made simply in their being birthed. They had not yet an opportunity to do anything that would influence God’s choice, which in itself cuts right into the heart of a world that is totally predicated on doing. When the heavenly dove came down over Jesus in His baptism, the Father’s voice was heard from heaven, “Thou art My beloved Son, in Thee I am well pleased” (Luke 3:22b). It is a remarkable statement made to a Son who had not yet done anything so as to please the Father. God is not pleased because we do something. If we are ever called to do anything, it will be out of a love that has been obtained on another basis, namely, our acceptance in the Beloved through the Cross, the suffering and the death of His Son. We cannot obtain that relationship by doing, but having obtained it by grace, we had better do, because then the doing becomes the measure of our apprehension, as also of eternal reward. God is completely deaf to the principle of ‘works’ as the justification for a relationship with Himself.
If ever we could get the idea that we do not have to do or perform in order to obtain God’s esteem and perfection, we would have the most liberating and freeing of truths. Only then could we truly serve God selflessly, with no holds barred, no strings attached. There would be nothing that we need or want in return, or things for which we would secretly hope. A relationship with God on the basis of works would be a symbiotic and self-loving relationship, motivated by self, and this is, for the most part, at the root of the Church’s present attitude toward Israel. Any act of man will instantly be rendered as no longer priestly by the slightest unconscious twinge of motive for one’s own interest, even those actions that are supposedly for the purposes of God. Only priestly acts bear the anointing of God for the purposes of God. To come to that place in one’s life and ministry requires this extraordinary confidence that there is nothing we can do to obtain God’s esteem. We are accepted in the Beloved, and therefore we can be freed from the depth of this most pervasive thing that runs through the whole tenor of modern civilization. The world is a works-oriented, performance-oriented civilization that predicates its rewards, its certificates, its ‘Oscars,’ and everything else on the basis of performance. It is a wisdom whereby men are compelled to do and to perform.
Oh, the hidden depths of what is in man! Who can know them? Who can know his own heart? Who can know the depths of his own sin? That is why it is the greatest grace of God to reveal our iniquity. And so, when the twins were born, and before they could do anything, a choice was expressed which was God’s:
...in order that God’s purpose according to His choice might stand, not because of works, but because of Him who calls, it was said to her, “The older will serve the younger” (Rom. 9:11b-12).
Not only is God repudiating conventional Jewish wisdom, but also His own ordinance, because in Hebraic life, the first-born is rightly the inheritor:
Just as it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be! (Rom. 9:13-14).
God has a preference that is not affected by what either of these two men did. The choice was God’s before they were capable of doing anything. How should we understand that? God has made a choice, but the choice is not predicated upon performance, which is the very basis upon how we esteem men. But God is not God on that basis. God has spoken, therefore, let every mouth be stopped. God has called. God has chosen. That is the issue.
And this is from the very inception of Israel’s history and the bringing forth of a Jacob who, however intense he was in wanting the spiritual inheritance and blessing, could not obtain it by his natural birthright. He obtained it only by the forfeiture of his strength when he wrestled with the angel of God and was made lame. Only then did he become Israel. Only the lame find favor with God, not man in his works, nor man in his sap and in his humanity. God works through the weakness of men, indeed, His strength is made perfect in weakness. The great principles of the faith that are described in the New Testament are already explicated in the Old, for He is the same God. The issue of Israel, therefore, is the issue of God as nothing else is calculated to reveal Him. It is not because of Israel’s qualification or their deserving, but because of God’s choosing.
So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy (Rom. 9:16).
Man is so triumphant in his flesh and egoism that God, in wanting to make His point, has chosen to demonstrate Himself in His dealings with Israel, a people who exemplify man in the flesh. Jacob is the quintessence of the man of flesh, even in his spiritual aspiration, and therefore he requires the most strenuous dealing in order that, at the end of the age and for all eternity, all creation will know that God is God. Israel is chosen to reveal Him as His witness people, not in their success, but eminently in their failure.
That lesson is so eternally necessary for all mankind that God does not think it too elaborate to use Israel as an illustration throughout her whole painful history. She will be saved by the mercy of God through a Church who themselves have been dealt with by God. It is only by Israel’s shameful rejection of her Messiah that the questions revealing the deeper mystery are opened, and that is true for all of us. It is in the failure, the disappointment and the thing that defies what we had hoped for, even spiritually, that the greater thing is opened.
The Judgment and Mercy of God
Paul is negotiating through very difficult statements, but that is his great task. His reasoning, interpretation and use of Old Testament scriptures sometimes seems arbitrary, or he will quote the Old Testament from the Septuagint, the Greek rendering, which often ‘seems’ not even quite accurate, but he will bend it to make a point that he is seeking with complete confidence that this is God’s perspective. He is handling extraordinary concepts that have to do with God’s judgment and His mercy that, on the face of it, seem to present an image of God as being ruthless. It would appear that God created a certain people as vessels for destruction and others for mercy in order that His glory might be revealed. What kind of a God is it who makes men His device to reveal what He wants to reveal about Himself in a seemingly cruel manner? How do we reconcile that with a God whom we know is ‘just and righteous altogether?’
God is mercy, and He manifests what and who He is in His acts. God does what He is. That is not always true for us! We can put on a nice face and be cordial and polite while all the time our hearts are set on something else. But God is One, inseparable and indivisible, much the same as the seamless garment that Jesus wore. He is one through and through. He is mercy, and we know it because He demonstrates it, and that is how we know what He is in Himself. When the Church is like that, we will have ‘arrived.’ When the world sees what we as the Church do and are, and that those are one and the same because there is no disparity or contradiction between our words, our conduct and our character, then we will have come to the place that God is after.
The Name of God
For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth.” (Rom. 9:17).
This is more than a mere vocalization. Jesus said in John 17, “I have revealed Your name.” It is a form of language unique to the scriptures, but it is getting at something that we, as modern people, have lost sight of. God is jealous for His name. A name is indicative of the character of the one who bears it. To proclaim His name, therefore, is to let the earth and the nations know who God, in fact, is. His name is in keeping with what He is in Himself. Jesus was saying, “I have set You forth as God. I am showing people who and what the Father is by the way in which I have deported Myself.” We read that God raised Pharaoh up that He might bring him down. The judgments on Egypt were horrendous. God displayed His power to deliver His people from a Pharaoh king that would not let them go, “that he [Israel] might serve Me” (Exodus 4:23b). To serve God is to proclaim His name throughout the earth.
So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?” On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? (Rom. 9:18-20a).
Paul construes raising a question about God as being the same as answering back to God. Do we realize how often our raising a question to God is a form of rebellion rather than a request for information? We are really provoking God, if not mocking Him. What we are saying is that His way does not make sense to us. The greatest surrender and submission to God is to not raise the question at all, but to simply submit to the truth of God as it pleases Him to express it. In this instance, to raise a question is itself a statement of rebellion, where no question ought to have been raised at all, because God is God and “Who are you, O man?”
These questions are implying that no one has a legitimate argument with God. After all, He has got the power, and though we do not agree and do not really like what He chooses and what He has mercy on, who has an argument with Him? It is striking a note of contempt and saying, “If I could, I would really take issue, but since He is God and I cannot really battle with Him, I will just surrender.” But it is surrender with clenched teeth, a begrudging condescension, and not the surrender of a sweet-spirited yielding before a God who alone is right.
The Holy Spirit is giving Paul the quintessence of man in his naked rebellion against God, summed up in the terseness of this question, “Who is He then that we should argue against Him?” In an imagined statement it bespeaks the condition of man, not only in the time of Paul, but for all generations.
Who are you, O man, who answers back to God? (Rom. 9:20a).
What an affront! It is a remarkable impertinence to answer back to God.
The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it? (Rom. 9:20b).
Yes, it will, if it is yet carnal!
Or does not the potter have the right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use, and another for common use? (Rom. 9:21).
If the potter makes something from the clay, but it does not come out right, then he is free to smash it and to rework it. It is his prerogative, and we do not argue with a potter. Just to be, and not to be productive, is a great stigma of shame in our performance and production-oriented world. It is because we are unwilling to bear that shame that we, as the clay, take ourselves off the shelf and do our own thing. We end up forming our own image of God and performing our own functions instead of bearing the suffering of waiting. 3
The Revelation of God’s Glory
What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? And He did so in order that He might make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory (Rom. 9:22-23).
What do you think of a God who, in order to make His power and glory known, will demonstrate something through wrath and judgment? What if God is that God, then what? Is He still your God? What if God would go so far as to employ wrath and judgment to make His power, His name and His glory known? Paul raises this very question. What if He is not the God you would like Him to be, and He would go so far as to employ wrath to bring His purposes to pass? We are not playing with a little, chintzy word here. Biblical wrath or the judgment of God is devastating, and what if He will go so far as to employ it to make His power known, since that is the revelation of His glory? Paul’s question is a weighted and calculated offense against our religious sensibilities with regard to how we would like God to be and to be known.
If we have a problem with the wrath of God, we need to see it as it was demonstrated at the Cross. The Cross is the final statement of God in His wrath, and the ultimate contradiction of all religious categories. The wrath of God for the sins of mankind was visited upon Jesus in utter devastation, so much so, that He could hardly be recognized as a man. When you see that 16th century, glorious Holy Spirit masterpiece, The Isenheim Altar,4 painted by Grünewald, you would think you were looking at an animal more than a man. The figure of Christ looks so deranged; the body is so elongated, so grotesque and broken that you wonder whether it is a man or some groveling beast. Will God go that far? What if God, in order to show His glory, will manifest His wrath and His judgment? What if it is the only way and the most profound way that God reveals His glory, will you surrender to that? The fact that Israel could not surrender to that revelation has left them without God for two thousand years and more, because they could not buy the fact that that wretched piece of humanity was the Son of God, suffering the judgment of God as God. The greatest revelation of God, however, is precisely where we least expect it to be, and it comes in the manner in which we least think it will come. It is God’s calculated stroke against man’s religious imaginings, daring to make God in his own image. God calls it idolatry, and the end of it is death. It is the most deplorable of sins, and in order to break into that, God has got, for our sake, to reveal Himself through wrath.
Israel is going to be brought into this final revelation of God, whom they have forsaken and rejected for millennia, through their own Last Days’ judgment. God’s wrath is the ultimate statement of His love and mercy. The greatest love toward God is to love Him in His judgments and, moreover, to love His judgments. It is not a mere tolerating or bearing of them like castor oil that somehow must be swallowed down. The most distasteful and most painful thing, and the thing most calculated against our own religiosity is the most precious and deepest revelation of God. We should not despise the chastening of the Lord, but rather esteem it. It is only out of the fires of judgment that we will recognize the goodness of God in the severity.
...He did so in order that He might make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, even us, whom He called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles (Rom. 9:23-24).
To miss the words ‘for glory’ is to miss everything, because it shows that He is not just arbitrarily doing these things in order to announce the fact that He is God. The ultimate issue is the issue of His glory. He is not an egoistic who needs to be glorified, but the truth is rather that mankind is the beneficiary of a God who is glorified. The world is dying for the lack of the visible demonstration of God’s glory. Drug addiction, sexual molestation and every corrupt thing that mankind is doing have their origin in the vacuum of the absence of God’s visible glory. He is not just a God jealous over His own delight in His glory, but He recognizes that it is an ultimately redemptive thing, even for all of His creation.
It is no accident that in the messianic and millennial era, the glory of the Lord, the true knowledge of Him, will fill the earth as the waters cover the sea (Isaiah 11:9b). And there is nothing that will bring the revelation of that glory better than a wrath and judgment that precedes this mercy. It is a judgment that we will find, in every case, totally deserved. The retribution of God against Israel is not an arbitrary matter, but will be in exact proportion to Israel’s sins, whose sins are mounting every day.
God’s mercy is His glory, but it is a mercy that cannot be revealed except it first be preceded by judgment. Only then does it become mercy. As we will see, the last acts against the present political state of Israel will be violent; but what concludes it is the totally undeserved mercy that will bring them back from the places to which they will have been brought as captive. In the absence of any hope in themselves, God Himself supernaturally and powerfully restores a surviving remnant of Israel in His mercy. The brokenness and repentance that will follow has no basis for description or comparison. The depth of their coming down before God at the revelation of that kindness, out of hopeless despair, will result in a new name for them. They will become His ministers and be honored above every nation on the earth. They will no longer remember fear and terror or any such thing, for God will wipe away every tear.
God’s Choice
God is inextricably drawn into the life of the nation, Israel. But what was His whole purpose in choosing Israel? What are they chosen for? Why should He be required to choose at all? Why did He not just somehow demonstrate His salvational principles and make them available on an equal basis to whomsoever will among all the nations? Why was He required, by the very necessity of the thing, to choose a nation and set that nation before all other nations? Even Israel, who is the chosen nation, does not understand it, and is offended by their being that choice. They would rather be just like everybody else, but God’s love for mankind will not allow them that condescension.
Israel was chosen to be God’s witness nation because God is faced with the problem of communicating heavenly reality and truth to people on the earth, and it cannot be communicated as abstract principle. It has got to be made incarnate, embodied and exemplified by the acts of a people relating to the truth and reality of God. That should not be so foreign an idea to us as believers because we also are called to be witnesses unto Him, to show forth His, rather than our own virtue. How a person or nation acts in response to God and His requirements, and how God deals with them, is the revelation of God, both in judgment and in mercy. That is why there are some vessels fitted for wrath and some for mercy, but in Israel’s case, they are fitted for both, though they do not seem to understand or be aware of it.
Even Isaiah chapter 53 is interpreted traditionally by Jews in saying that the Suffering Servant is not Jesus, but the nation, Israel. In fact, it may well be that one of the principal ways in which Israel will finally surrender to the truth of God about the character of their Messiah King, in His humility and willingness to suffer humiliation, is to experience it themselves. Out of their experience, they will catch a glimpse of the Suffering Servant, the Lord Himself, and catch the revelation of what they failed to recognize two thousand years ago. They did not recognize God then, because a Suffering Messiah was not part of their religious concept of who God is, and yet God chose to reveal Himself in the witness of this very same Servant.
At this present time, in the dispensation of the Gentiles, it is the Gentile Church that is called to reveal the Lord, because what is the Church but the Body of the Head? It was a Gentile, Simon from Cyrene, of low public esteem, who bore the Cross. This is very appropriate because the Church, also, is called to be a lowly entity, an object of derision and contempt in the world in every generation, especially in the time of Israel’s soon-coming suffering. That is why a Church that is full of swagger and believes they ‘have it all together’ nullifies and disqualifies itself as being the witness of the Lord to Israel in the Last Days.
Art Katz
From verse 6 of Romans chapter 9, Paul rolls up his sleeves and begins to dig into the great issues that are raised by Israel’s rejection of her Messiah. The fact that Israel could reject her own promised Messiah and Deliverer according to her own scriptures has got to be one of the greatest anomalies and contradictions of the history of mankind. That God Himself foresaw, even ordained it, is staggering in its proportions. Even more significant is the question of God’s apparent failure: How could God and His Word fail?
But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel; neither are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants, but: “Through Isaac your descendants will be named.” That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants. For this is a word of promise: “At this time I will come, and Sarah shall have a son” (Rom. 9: 6-9).
The same apostolic man whose heart is grieved over Israel and its lost condition, and who wishes that he himself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of his Jewish kinsmen, is as grieved over the question of God’s honor and the truth of His word. Paul’s jealousy for the glory of God, His name, His honor and His faithfulness to His word makes him to grieve over the unsaved condition of his kinsmen; this is the apostolic heart. He is grieved that Israel’s failure to recognize their Messiah would appear to be a demerit against God; and that the people who were appointed and called sons, and who were given the privileges of adoption, the covenants, the promises, the glory and the ministry of the Temple, are bringing, by their unbelief, a reproach against God and a blasphemy against His name.
But if God’s word fails, then God is no longer God; for God is eminently the God of the word, the God of the word of the covenant, and the God of the word of promise. If He cannot keep the word that He Himself gave, then that is the end of God as God. This is the great enigma. How could God’s word have failed? Can God fail? Can God’s word fail? These are the great, theological problems that Paul had to answer for the Church in Rome and, by extension, all the churches in every generation. He is thrust, therefore, into an uncanny and precarious place, and has got to wrestle his way through.
The Israel of God
Paul begins to answer them by showing that the failure is not with God’s word. God’s word will succeed. The fact that the nation rejected the Messiah is not the statement of the failure of God’s word. It shows, rather, that not all the nation was Israel. It is more than the issue of being naturally Israel and being descended from Abraham. Ishmael was also a son, but it does not make him the ‘Israel of God.’ As Paul says in verse 8,
...it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God (Rom. 9:8).
A Jew may be a physical descendant of Abraham, but that does not automatically make him a candidate for glory. The fact that Israel has rejected the Messiah shows that they were not among the elect; it was just as much a statement then as it is now. If a Jew or a Gentile is unregenerate, he is neither the child of promise, nor the descendant of Isaac. In his letter to the Galatians, Paul uses the phrase ‘the Israel of God’ (Galatians 6:16) to indicate something beyond, or other than, just ethnic Jews.
Paul continues to probe deeper into an unfolding of the genius of God in all of this. What seems to be disappointment and failure on God’s part is shown by Paul to be the revelation of God’s glory. In the outworking of His whole redemptive purpose, there always seems to be two tracks, as has been suggested historically through the choosing of Jacob and the rejection of Esau, or the choosing of Isaac and the rejection of Ishmael. It is the true, the chosen and the called, as opposed to that which appears to be all the above, but is rejected of God. It is no coincidence that the thing rejected by God often seems to have all the right credentials. But from the beginning of His whole salvation history, God is showing that He will choose whom He will choose; it is not our democratic notions of what we think is fair. God’s whole intention through Israel is to show mankind that He is God, sovereignly God!
Mankind is so stubborn and self-willed in his own categories that nothing less than what God will actually demonstrate at the end of the age, in the choosing and sifting of the Israel of God, will reveal how much God is God, even to the nominally Christian nations.
I AM WHO I AM
When Moses asked God to name Himself to the people of Israel, God replied,
“I am who I am,” and “...The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.” This is My name forever, and this is My memorial name to all generations” (Exodus 3:14a, 15b).
‘I am who I am’ is also taken to mean, ‘I will be who I will be,’ which is to say, ‘I will do what I will do’ because ‘I AM GOD.’ In other words, “I am God, and I will choose what I will choose, and I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy. You don’t think that Israel deserves it? That is all the more reason why I have chosen them. Your thinking shows the rottenness of your heart. It is a good thing you are not God, because it shows that your mercy would have been proportionate to those whom you think deserve it, especially yourself. But I will yet choose whom I will choose.”
And not only this, but there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac; for though the twins were not yet born, and had not done anything good or bad, in order that God’s purpose according to His choice might stand, not because of works, but because of Him who calls (Rom. 9: 10-11).
This is a laser beam aimed at the heart of the whole mentality of the world and of human wisdom, both of which are contrary to God. The wisdom of the world is predicated upon works, merit and performance, and upon what we think we deserve because of what we do. In God’s economy, everything is predicated on one principle only: “I am God, and I will choose what I will choose.” That is the historical conflict. In his deepest heart, where man really lives his life, he wants a ‘god’ made in his image, which, in fact, makes him secretly ‘God.’
Paul’s statement here in Romans 9:11 contains the whole antagonism between the world and God as well as the whole antagonism between Judaism and Christianity. The whole issue of man versus God is summed up in that one statement in which God demonstrated throughout the history of Israel, and even in the sons of Rebekah, that He will choose whom He will choose. God does not give us mere abstract principles; they are exemplified and written in the flesh and blood of men. To turn our back, therefore, on the history of Israel, or to have a faith that has voided or lost its Hebraic content, is not to have the faith. Israel’s history reveals God in His deepest principles and mind.
Not by Works
Two sons were born,
...in order that God’s purpose according to His choice might stand, not because of works... (Rom. 9:11a).
In other words, the decision was made simply in their being birthed. They had not yet an opportunity to do anything that would influence God’s choice, which in itself cuts right into the heart of a world that is totally predicated on doing. When the heavenly dove came down over Jesus in His baptism, the Father’s voice was heard from heaven, “Thou art My beloved Son, in Thee I am well pleased” (Luke 3:22b). It is a remarkable statement made to a Son who had not yet done anything so as to please the Father. God is not pleased because we do something. If we are ever called to do anything, it will be out of a love that has been obtained on another basis, namely, our acceptance in the Beloved through the Cross, the suffering and the death of His Son. We cannot obtain that relationship by doing, but having obtained it by grace, we had better do, because then the doing becomes the measure of our apprehension, as also of eternal reward. God is completely deaf to the principle of ‘works’ as the justification for a relationship with Himself.
If ever we could get the idea that we do not have to do or perform in order to obtain God’s esteem and perfection, we would have the most liberating and freeing of truths. Only then could we truly serve God selflessly, with no holds barred, no strings attached. There would be nothing that we need or want in return, or things for which we would secretly hope. A relationship with God on the basis of works would be a symbiotic and self-loving relationship, motivated by self, and this is, for the most part, at the root of the Church’s present attitude toward Israel. Any act of man will instantly be rendered as no longer priestly by the slightest unconscious twinge of motive for one’s own interest, even those actions that are supposedly for the purposes of God. Only priestly acts bear the anointing of God for the purposes of God. To come to that place in one’s life and ministry requires this extraordinary confidence that there is nothing we can do to obtain God’s esteem. We are accepted in the Beloved, and therefore we can be freed from the depth of this most pervasive thing that runs through the whole tenor of modern civilization. The world is a works-oriented, performance-oriented civilization that predicates its rewards, its certificates, its ‘Oscars,’ and everything else on the basis of performance. It is a wisdom whereby men are compelled to do and to perform.
Oh, the hidden depths of what is in man! Who can know them? Who can know his own heart? Who can know the depths of his own sin? That is why it is the greatest grace of God to reveal our iniquity. And so, when the twins were born, and before they could do anything, a choice was expressed which was God’s:
...in order that God’s purpose according to His choice might stand, not because of works, but because of Him who calls, it was said to her, “The older will serve the younger” (Rom. 9:11b-12).
Not only is God repudiating conventional Jewish wisdom, but also His own ordinance, because in Hebraic life, the first-born is rightly the inheritor:
Just as it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be! (Rom. 9:13-14).
God has a preference that is not affected by what either of these two men did. The choice was God’s before they were capable of doing anything. How should we understand that? God has made a choice, but the choice is not predicated upon performance, which is the very basis upon how we esteem men. But God is not God on that basis. God has spoken, therefore, let every mouth be stopped. God has called. God has chosen. That is the issue.
And this is from the very inception of Israel’s history and the bringing forth of a Jacob who, however intense he was in wanting the spiritual inheritance and blessing, could not obtain it by his natural birthright. He obtained it only by the forfeiture of his strength when he wrestled with the angel of God and was made lame. Only then did he become Israel. Only the lame find favor with God, not man in his works, nor man in his sap and in his humanity. God works through the weakness of men, indeed, His strength is made perfect in weakness. The great principles of the faith that are described in the New Testament are already explicated in the Old, for He is the same God. The issue of Israel, therefore, is the issue of God as nothing else is calculated to reveal Him. It is not because of Israel’s qualification or their deserving, but because of God’s choosing.
So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy (Rom. 9:16).
Man is so triumphant in his flesh and egoism that God, in wanting to make His point, has chosen to demonstrate Himself in His dealings with Israel, a people who exemplify man in the flesh. Jacob is the quintessence of the man of flesh, even in his spiritual aspiration, and therefore he requires the most strenuous dealing in order that, at the end of the age and for all eternity, all creation will know that God is God. Israel is chosen to reveal Him as His witness people, not in their success, but eminently in their failure.
That lesson is so eternally necessary for all mankind that God does not think it too elaborate to use Israel as an illustration throughout her whole painful history. She will be saved by the mercy of God through a Church who themselves have been dealt with by God. It is only by Israel’s shameful rejection of her Messiah that the questions revealing the deeper mystery are opened, and that is true for all of us. It is in the failure, the disappointment and the thing that defies what we had hoped for, even spiritually, that the greater thing is opened.
The Judgment and Mercy of God
Paul is negotiating through very difficult statements, but that is his great task. His reasoning, interpretation and use of Old Testament scriptures sometimes seems arbitrary, or he will quote the Old Testament from the Septuagint, the Greek rendering, which often ‘seems’ not even quite accurate, but he will bend it to make a point that he is seeking with complete confidence that this is God’s perspective. He is handling extraordinary concepts that have to do with God’s judgment and His mercy that, on the face of it, seem to present an image of God as being ruthless. It would appear that God created a certain people as vessels for destruction and others for mercy in order that His glory might be revealed. What kind of a God is it who makes men His device to reveal what He wants to reveal about Himself in a seemingly cruel manner? How do we reconcile that with a God whom we know is ‘just and righteous altogether?’
God is mercy, and He manifests what and who He is in His acts. God does what He is. That is not always true for us! We can put on a nice face and be cordial and polite while all the time our hearts are set on something else. But God is One, inseparable and indivisible, much the same as the seamless garment that Jesus wore. He is one through and through. He is mercy, and we know it because He demonstrates it, and that is how we know what He is in Himself. When the Church is like that, we will have ‘arrived.’ When the world sees what we as the Church do and are, and that those are one and the same because there is no disparity or contradiction between our words, our conduct and our character, then we will have come to the place that God is after.
The Name of God
For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth.” (Rom. 9:17).
This is more than a mere vocalization. Jesus said in John 17, “I have revealed Your name.” It is a form of language unique to the scriptures, but it is getting at something that we, as modern people, have lost sight of. God is jealous for His name. A name is indicative of the character of the one who bears it. To proclaim His name, therefore, is to let the earth and the nations know who God, in fact, is. His name is in keeping with what He is in Himself. Jesus was saying, “I have set You forth as God. I am showing people who and what the Father is by the way in which I have deported Myself.” We read that God raised Pharaoh up that He might bring him down. The judgments on Egypt were horrendous. God displayed His power to deliver His people from a Pharaoh king that would not let them go, “that he [Israel] might serve Me” (Exodus 4:23b). To serve God is to proclaim His name throughout the earth.
So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?” On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? (Rom. 9:18-20a).
Paul construes raising a question about God as being the same as answering back to God. Do we realize how often our raising a question to God is a form of rebellion rather than a request for information? We are really provoking God, if not mocking Him. What we are saying is that His way does not make sense to us. The greatest surrender and submission to God is to not raise the question at all, but to simply submit to the truth of God as it pleases Him to express it. In this instance, to raise a question is itself a statement of rebellion, where no question ought to have been raised at all, because God is God and “Who are you, O man?”
These questions are implying that no one has a legitimate argument with God. After all, He has got the power, and though we do not agree and do not really like what He chooses and what He has mercy on, who has an argument with Him? It is striking a note of contempt and saying, “If I could, I would really take issue, but since He is God and I cannot really battle with Him, I will just surrender.” But it is surrender with clenched teeth, a begrudging condescension, and not the surrender of a sweet-spirited yielding before a God who alone is right.
The Holy Spirit is giving Paul the quintessence of man in his naked rebellion against God, summed up in the terseness of this question, “Who is He then that we should argue against Him?” In an imagined statement it bespeaks the condition of man, not only in the time of Paul, but for all generations.
Who are you, O man, who answers back to God? (Rom. 9:20a).
What an affront! It is a remarkable impertinence to answer back to God.
The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it? (Rom. 9:20b).
Yes, it will, if it is yet carnal!
Or does not the potter have the right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use, and another for common use? (Rom. 9:21).
If the potter makes something from the clay, but it does not come out right, then he is free to smash it and to rework it. It is his prerogative, and we do not argue with a potter. Just to be, and not to be productive, is a great stigma of shame in our performance and production-oriented world. It is because we are unwilling to bear that shame that we, as the clay, take ourselves off the shelf and do our own thing. We end up forming our own image of God and performing our own functions instead of bearing the suffering of waiting. 3
The Revelation of God’s Glory
What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? And He did so in order that He might make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory (Rom. 9:22-23).
What do you think of a God who, in order to make His power and glory known, will demonstrate something through wrath and judgment? What if God is that God, then what? Is He still your God? What if God would go so far as to employ wrath and judgment to make His power, His name and His glory known? Paul raises this very question. What if He is not the God you would like Him to be, and He would go so far as to employ wrath to bring His purposes to pass? We are not playing with a little, chintzy word here. Biblical wrath or the judgment of God is devastating, and what if He will go so far as to employ it to make His power known, since that is the revelation of His glory? Paul’s question is a weighted and calculated offense against our religious sensibilities with regard to how we would like God to be and to be known.
If we have a problem with the wrath of God, we need to see it as it was demonstrated at the Cross. The Cross is the final statement of God in His wrath, and the ultimate contradiction of all religious categories. The wrath of God for the sins of mankind was visited upon Jesus in utter devastation, so much so, that He could hardly be recognized as a man. When you see that 16th century, glorious Holy Spirit masterpiece, The Isenheim Altar,4 painted by Grünewald, you would think you were looking at an animal more than a man. The figure of Christ looks so deranged; the body is so elongated, so grotesque and broken that you wonder whether it is a man or some groveling beast. Will God go that far? What if God, in order to show His glory, will manifest His wrath and His judgment? What if it is the only way and the most profound way that God reveals His glory, will you surrender to that? The fact that Israel could not surrender to that revelation has left them without God for two thousand years and more, because they could not buy the fact that that wretched piece of humanity was the Son of God, suffering the judgment of God as God. The greatest revelation of God, however, is precisely where we least expect it to be, and it comes in the manner in which we least think it will come. It is God’s calculated stroke against man’s religious imaginings, daring to make God in his own image. God calls it idolatry, and the end of it is death. It is the most deplorable of sins, and in order to break into that, God has got, for our sake, to reveal Himself through wrath.
Israel is going to be brought into this final revelation of God, whom they have forsaken and rejected for millennia, through their own Last Days’ judgment. God’s wrath is the ultimate statement of His love and mercy. The greatest love toward God is to love Him in His judgments and, moreover, to love His judgments. It is not a mere tolerating or bearing of them like castor oil that somehow must be swallowed down. The most distasteful and most painful thing, and the thing most calculated against our own religiosity is the most precious and deepest revelation of God. We should not despise the chastening of the Lord, but rather esteem it. It is only out of the fires of judgment that we will recognize the goodness of God in the severity.
...He did so in order that He might make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, even us, whom He called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles (Rom. 9:23-24).
To miss the words ‘for glory’ is to miss everything, because it shows that He is not just arbitrarily doing these things in order to announce the fact that He is God. The ultimate issue is the issue of His glory. He is not an egoistic who needs to be glorified, but the truth is rather that mankind is the beneficiary of a God who is glorified. The world is dying for the lack of the visible demonstration of God’s glory. Drug addiction, sexual molestation and every corrupt thing that mankind is doing have their origin in the vacuum of the absence of God’s visible glory. He is not just a God jealous over His own delight in His glory, but He recognizes that it is an ultimately redemptive thing, even for all of His creation.
It is no accident that in the messianic and millennial era, the glory of the Lord, the true knowledge of Him, will fill the earth as the waters cover the sea (Isaiah 11:9b). And there is nothing that will bring the revelation of that glory better than a wrath and judgment that precedes this mercy. It is a judgment that we will find, in every case, totally deserved. The retribution of God against Israel is not an arbitrary matter, but will be in exact proportion to Israel’s sins, whose sins are mounting every day.
God’s mercy is His glory, but it is a mercy that cannot be revealed except it first be preceded by judgment. Only then does it become mercy. As we will see, the last acts against the present political state of Israel will be violent; but what concludes it is the totally undeserved mercy that will bring them back from the places to which they will have been brought as captive. In the absence of any hope in themselves, God Himself supernaturally and powerfully restores a surviving remnant of Israel in His mercy. The brokenness and repentance that will follow has no basis for description or comparison. The depth of their coming down before God at the revelation of that kindness, out of hopeless despair, will result in a new name for them. They will become His ministers and be honored above every nation on the earth. They will no longer remember fear and terror or any such thing, for God will wipe away every tear.
God’s Choice
God is inextricably drawn into the life of the nation, Israel. But what was His whole purpose in choosing Israel? What are they chosen for? Why should He be required to choose at all? Why did He not just somehow demonstrate His salvational principles and make them available on an equal basis to whomsoever will among all the nations? Why was He required, by the very necessity of the thing, to choose a nation and set that nation before all other nations? Even Israel, who is the chosen nation, does not understand it, and is offended by their being that choice. They would rather be just like everybody else, but God’s love for mankind will not allow them that condescension.
Israel was chosen to be God’s witness nation because God is faced with the problem of communicating heavenly reality and truth to people on the earth, and it cannot be communicated as abstract principle. It has got to be made incarnate, embodied and exemplified by the acts of a people relating to the truth and reality of God. That should not be so foreign an idea to us as believers because we also are called to be witnesses unto Him, to show forth His, rather than our own virtue. How a person or nation acts in response to God and His requirements, and how God deals with them, is the revelation of God, both in judgment and in mercy. That is why there are some vessels fitted for wrath and some for mercy, but in Israel’s case, they are fitted for both, though they do not seem to understand or be aware of it.
Even Isaiah chapter 53 is interpreted traditionally by Jews in saying that the Suffering Servant is not Jesus, but the nation, Israel. In fact, it may well be that one of the principal ways in which Israel will finally surrender to the truth of God about the character of their Messiah King, in His humility and willingness to suffer humiliation, is to experience it themselves. Out of their experience, they will catch a glimpse of the Suffering Servant, the Lord Himself, and catch the revelation of what they failed to recognize two thousand years ago. They did not recognize God then, because a Suffering Messiah was not part of their religious concept of who God is, and yet God chose to reveal Himself in the witness of this very same Servant.
At this present time, in the dispensation of the Gentiles, it is the Gentile Church that is called to reveal the Lord, because what is the Church but the Body of the Head? It was a Gentile, Simon from Cyrene, of low public esteem, who bore the Cross. This is very appropriate because the Church, also, is called to be a lowly entity, an object of derision and contempt in the world in every generation, especially in the time of Israel’s soon-coming suffering. That is why a Church that is full of swagger and believes they ‘have it all together’ nullifies and disqualifies itself as being the witness of the Lord to Israel in the Last Days.
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