Perhaps we have heard counter arguments against our being the seekers.  After all, the great initiative surely rests with Christ in this regard since he came from heaven to earth, from the throne to the manger, from God’s side to ours.  As one of the great punchlines of Luke’s Gospel tells us, “the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost.” (Luke 19:10) The story of Christmas and the first Easter are conclusive, “while we were still sinners Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8)

Accepting that Jesus moved toward us before we could ever move in his direction, let’s ponder what we might call the encounter.  In John’s Gospel we get the stunning opening prologue that introduces us to the Word of God who is at the Father’s side, but who pitches his tent among us, comes to reveal the Father, full of glorious grace and truth, who comes to his own but they do not receive him, and yet is able to give the right to become the children of God to those who do.

After this prologue the introduction really continues for the first four chapters or so as we are introduced to great themes that will continue to develop under the intense pressure of the tension between Jesus and the authorities.  In these opening chapters we are introduced to themes of belief, of glory, of signs, of witness and more.  And in these opening chapters we get incident after incident of people encountering Jesus.

John the Baptist comes as our first witness to Jesus, declaring that he is not the Christ, but is just a voice preparing the way.  He declares that he is just baptizing with water.  But he points to the coming Christ who is the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, and the one who will baptize people with the Holy Spirit.  The focus is well and truly on Jesus when he finally walks into the action and starts to meet people.

After a couple of John’s disciples follow Jesus, one of them brings his brother to Jesus.  Jesus seems to already know him.  As soon as they meet, Jesus renames him.  Next verse we have another person being brought to Jesus by the witness of another, this time it is Phillip bringing Nathanael.  Nathanael is understandably skeptical about the idea that the Messiah could come from Nazareth, but as he approaches Jesus he also finds that Jesus already knows him.

What Jesus says to Nathanael seems to stir an extreme change in Nathanael.  Jesus makes one comment about the lack of deceit in Nathanael and he suddenly declares that Jesus is the Son of God and king of Israel.  That is a big shift from his skepticism about Nazareth.  Looking at the clues in the text at this point it feels like Nathanael may have been pondering the story of Jacob as he sat under the fig tree, maybe he was praying about it.  Jesus knew Nathanael.  He knew what he had been thinking or praying and proved it with his deceit comment.  He reinforced it with a reference to angels ascending and descending (but notice who is the connection between heaven and earth – it is Jesus!)

In the second chapter Jesus starts to reveal his glorious kindness, sensitivity and power at the wedding in Cana, before heading for the temple in Jerusalem.  He created a stir there and people started to trust in him at some level.  But interestingly we are told that Jesus did not entrust himself to them.  Why?  Because he knew what was in man.  So we are introduced to an example man – Nicodemus.

Jesus and the teacher of Israel have a conversation in chapter three that again begins with Jesus revealing that he does indeed know what is in man.  Nicodemus comes to Jesus with kind words and Jesus seems to rebuff him by stating that unless he is born from above, then Jesus can’t chit chat with him about the God subject.  Jesus knows that this great teacher is actually still spiritually dead on the inside.  Nicodemus is confronted not by a Rabbi come from God that he can approach, but by someone who sees to the core of who he is and what he lacks.

In chapter four we get another person encountering Jesus.  This time it is a troubled woman shunned by her own peers who meets Jesus at a well.  Not surprisingly it soon becomes clear that Jesus knows what is going on in her life too.  While she is still thinking this is just another man trying to make a connection with her, Jesus tells her about her five husbands and live-in lover.  She is undone.

Just as we cannot take credit for seeking Jesus, nor can we take credit for getting to know him first.  When we meet Jesus we are meeting one who knows all about us.  Maybe this is an aspect of evangelism that we have let slip over the years?  Perhaps we are proclaiming a gospel that focuses too much on the person, and too little on Jesus?  Perhaps as people encounter Christ they will be undone as they come to discover that he already knows them, and yet loves them still!

Maybe this is an aspect of our own relationship with Christ that has slipped from our awareness too?  How easily we can slip into presenting ourselves carefully to Christ as if he does not know all the gritty reality of our inner lives.  How easily we can pray wearing a mask.  How easily we forget that Jesus really knows us, and fully loves us.  We are totally vulnerable before him, whether we know it or not, he knows us.  We are fully known, and yet fully loved!

The post Fully Known, Fully Loved first appeared on Cor Deo.

This truism will stretch us but, as followers of Christ, we must receive it. And as we explore it we have at least two rails to run on. First we take up the Genesis disclosure that in marriage, by God’s Spirit, two become one—making a single male-and-female human. And, second, we embrace the New Testament disclosure that all who share Christ’s Spirit are one in Christ.

The common point is that the Spirit shares and sustains God’s eternal, invisible, and immaterial relationship and, by the Father’s love, extends that relationship to us and, potentially, through us.

In other words God’s being explains our being. He created us in his image as beings-in-relation. Yet, as an important sidebar, God’s enemy posits just the opposite. He insists that both God and humanity exist as autonomous beings—as individual gods. So we won’t find these relational insights affirmed by any who lack the Spirit’s life—anyone not “born again.” Which is incredible, given that in life we are immersed in relationships.

That warning aside, this relational image—our “likeness” to God—allows us to commune with him once we know him. The eyes of our hearts are opened when we turn away from satanic premises of autonomy and live, instead, by faith in God working through his love.

Love is key. Love is the label for God’s inherent mutual devotion. Importantly, it is not something external to God—some sort of commodity or power. It is, instead, God’s relational bond. The Father initiates love; the Son responds to it; and the Spirit shares it. Or, as Augustine of Hippo summarized it, in God we meet the true lover, his beloved, and the one who communicates their reciprocal love. And salvation is the fruit of the Spirit sharing that love in human hearts.

From the very beginning, then, as relational beings we were made to love and to be loved. And, in human marriage, to be united in the flesh as the male-female who can then bear children in love engendered by the Spirit’s indwelling presence.

The distinctions in God and in us are key. In reading John’s gospel, for instance, the differing roles of the Father, Son, and Spirit are underscored. So, too, partners in a marriage differ in ways that make a whole—not simply in biological distinctions but as whole persons—with differences that attract and intrigue. God means for these wonderful and sometimes mystifying distinctions to complement and fulfill the one-with-another bonding of love.

And even apart from marriage Christians are members of Christ’s body by his Spirit—and, collectively, the bride of Christ. Our being-in-communion is God’s shared love present in us. By his love we are bonded both to him and to each other.

But what does this mean in practice? Much more than any blog entry can explore! But let’s at least start.

I picked up one lesson in a seminary counseling course. “Remember,” the professor told us, “in marital counseling you counsel the marriage, not the individuals.”

His point was that the two spouses share a relationship. And the relationship is what needs the care. It consists in shared values, choices, hurts, hopes, friendships, children, and more. Each spouse brings different qualities to the whole—as complementary distinctions—so any problems will only be resolved when the spouses come to a more profound and effective bond through Christ’s love.

The claim of 1 John 4 that “God is love” sets all this in play. His love in us makes all the difference—something John unpacks in his letter.

Another lesson comes by collating the Bible accounts of Genesis 3 and John 3. The Spirit has been eternally present in the divine communion of the “one” who is also the “us” of the Genesis creation account. Which is to say that the fruit of the Spirit—his sharing Christ’s heart—should characterize growing Christian relations.

This lesson—that the Spirit grows us—was the point Jesus made to Nicodemus in John 3.  At a minimum, knowing God involves a wholehearted response to God’s love as the Spirit shares that love. His voice, offered in the Scriptures, is needed to make salvation—and marriages—work. It also offers the basis for true church growth.

Jesus summarized this in John 13:15—“By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” This characterizes his bond with the Father and he treated it as the goal of his incarnation in John 17:22, “that they may be one even as we are one.”

So the practice of responding to God rightly consists in always treating his being-in-the-communion-of-love as the basis for every relationship. He is the ground of every true aspect of creaturely reality. We are, in other words, meant to live in the union and communion of love by always aligning our hearts with God’s heart. There we find shared values and practices.

This isn’t simply a matter of learning truths—though learning is always present—but growing in love. The Father is always initiating in love and the Son is always responding; and the Spirit is always communicating in an eternal swirl of initiative-and-response. And we are invited to join in.

So we are called to be one, just as God is one. This takes place in a progression of heart changes as we have his Spirit working in us. We begin to grasp our own unique distinctions as elements of a whole—as members of Christ’s body—and not as capacities to be used for our selfish ends.

Then in our self-giving we reveal God’s heart—as a holy whole—to the world. And that invites unbelievers—those enslaved to autonomy—to taste and see God’s goodness through our love for each other. His loving kindness lasts forever and we, as his beloved children who are all distinct yet one, offer living samples of what that means!

The post One with Distinctions first appeared on Cor Deo.

In this story God—the Father, Son, and Spirit God—is the protagonist. And the Son’s captivating qualities set the scene: to know him is to love him. The Father delights in the Son and wants him to have a Bride who can love and enjoy him as the Father does. The Spirit’s mission is to arrange the marriage: he sets up introductions.

God’s motive in this is love—a giving heart—and marriage is his venue for sharing. The story began before the foundation of the world as the Father, Son, and Spirit communed in a shared glory. It was in this period that the Bride was anticipated: “chosen” even before creation.

Of course this marriage transcends human marriage: it is neither physical nor temporal. Instead the Bride is the collective body of men and women who respond to the Spirit’s wooing. So the Bride is spiritual in the sense that she is “one” not in any tangible sense but in the reality of the shared Spirit.

How the divine Son can take a bride from the creation is central to the plot. First, humans were made in God’s “likeness” to be suitable candidates. But another step was needed. The Son had to join humanity: to share the tangible life of the Bride. And as such he became a bridge for the Bride to join the Father’s family. The Son was already united to the Father in his divinity and then by a physical birth he joined humanity to take his Bride. And all—Father, Son, and Bride—share the one Spirit. By this bond the Bride has eternal life.

This epic story explains both our creation and, for the Bride, salvation. Yet to many of us it sounds odd and unfamiliar. Why?

Because an antagonist muddles this true story with false accounts.

This is the Liar: an angel gone bad. In his beauty and free self-expression this figure became an arch-narcissist: loving himself in place of God. And with that he sought to take over the creation by forming a counter-kingdom: a realm of moral opposition.

He was, of course, only a creature himself and unable to form his own creation. Instead he plotted to take over humanity and through seduction to rule the creation through humans. His ploy has been to replace good with evil in every aspect of reality. This is the moral equivalent of making old-style film negatives: he converts light to darkness and vice versa.

In his plan he presumed God, as pure goodness, would lose access to all who were part of this morally-reversed realm. And when the Holy Spirit’s bonding love was quenched in Adam—and the Spirit now stood outside human souls—humanity as a whole turned instead to the reversed narratives offered by the Unholy spirit.

And this spirit—Satan—reconceived each element of God’s goodness by overt reversals. His new realm treats God as a disaffected singularity rather than a God who is love; it offered animated death in place of Life. It replaced love for others with a love of self; a devotion to light with a fascination for darkness; the power of love with the love of power; a proper form of marriage with improper forms; and much, much more.

So the Bible calls him the Serpent, the Devil, the Accuser, and more. The Son called him the Liar and the Father of lies. No truth will ever be found in him or offered by him.

His ultimate Lie is that we can “be like God.” As if humanity, apart from God, can do just fine. God may still be useful since he sustains the creation but he seems to be impotent.

The Bride in God’s story is gathered from those who accepted the Lie and were then devoured by Satan’s living death. But, in an amazing turn, the Son devours death for those who love him. He entered death to rescue us and to reverse our moral polarities. Satan didn’t anticipate this.

How did the blameless Son die? In the great exchange of marital properties he took on our evil; and we received his life. He, as God, swallowed our death and was raised from death on the basis of his unquenchable life. And so we now live in him by faith.

So the true Epic ends with the Bride returning to the Living Truth and sharing his glory—the glory of the Father—with the new life of the Spirit making it all work. The Unholy spirit, on the other hand, still has death—along with all who spurned the Son’s Life—forever.

It’s an epic reality that brings us to the one True Love worth living for.

The post Living Truth first appeared on Cor Deo.

God’s attractions become ever more obvious to the eyes of faith. We realize that he created all things well. Beauty displays his creative goodness. Healthy relationships reflect his Triune love as we—created in his relational image—first receive and then share this love. The Father’s love is expressed in Jesus who wants us to know the Father. And the Spirit lives in us to fulfill that vision.

Heaven is the future of faith—a hope that motivates us and grounds us morally. We are beloved children looking to our homecoming. And Christianity is an eternal community of those who know the Father, love the Son, and walk by the Spirit.

Yet this summary of God’s plan presents a puzzle. Why is it that so few seem to be delighted by Christ? Even among churchgoers? Those of us who do enjoy his beauty assume there should be throngs of captivated devotees. After all, everyone wants what he offers: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, and the like. But when God the Son walked among us he was spurned and crucified. And even today he remains a marginal figure in most social circles.

Let’s chase this puzzle.

Jesus pointed to a problem when he engaged Nicodemus in John chapter three. Nick was a major religious leader of the day but he still lacked the life and love of the Spirit. His was a life “in the flesh” and Jesus dismissed it. Flesh is motivated by a love for what comes with darkness rather than light.

What may be missed here is that Jesus in speaking of “the flesh” as “from below” set it over against a life transformed from “above.” God is the sole focus of faith—never a mere option or add-on—and he changes everything. So the language of love is critical: to know God by the Spirit is to respond to God’s love. New life by the Spirit shows up as a heartfelt devotion to God. In this light Nicodemus wasn’t a reprehensible figure; but he was spiritually inert.

In the next chapter of John’s gospel the focus moves to a new place on the moral spectrum: away from the disaffected life of Nicodemus to the more overt ungodliness of the woman at the well. Yet notice how the stories are parallel. Like Nicodemus this woman lacked the Spirit but it showed up in different ways. Jesus offered the Spirit to the morally shiny Nicodemus; and he offered “living water” to the morally shady Samaritan woman.

And against our common sense—but in alignment with Bible texts such as 1 Cor. 1:26-30—it was the shady Samaritan who believed. Jesus, in her words, exposed “everything I ever did” yet he still cared for her. So she responded.

This certainly speaks to our mystery. If church members today are spiritually indifferent could it be the result of un-Spirit-based religion? Nicodemus was a religious leader but he still lacked the crucial connection to God by his Spirit.

Notice that Jesus didn’t call Nicodemus to a religious or creedal formula—but to be born by the Spirit. Nor did the Samaritan woman need to do anything special to receive his promise of living water. The apparent lack of faith on the one hand, and the woman’s spontaneous faith, on the other, set out two options in the narrative of faith. The religious leader didn’t respond—at least in this section—while the woman went off and started a local revival! What accounts for the difference? God knows. What we know is that the difference in the woman’s life was dramatic.

Now let’s return now to the question I raised about the apparently small numbers of devoted and delighted believers in too many churches today. It could be that my sample is too small or peculiar. Or I might be misled by what looks like indifference. Perhaps most believers delight in Christ but for some reason are able to hide it.

The Samaritan woman’s response unmasks such prospects. She became spiritually magnetic as soon as she realized Jesus was the Christ and that he cared for her. He offered her an opportunity to “worship in Spirit and in truth” and she immediately began to collect others.

So the magnetic invitation Jesus offered still stands. If we prefer to look morally shiny while maintaining our spiritual autonomy and indifference . . . well, there’s already plenty of that to go around. But if we respond to his offer of life in the Spirit and find him captivating, feel free to spread the joy!

The post Magnetic Faith first appeared on Cor Deo.

In our shared pleasure I realized how rare we seem to be. It’s as if we’re members of a secret society: the “We like God” clan. The society is wide open but, despite incredible benefits, it remains poorly enrolled.

All Christians, in fact, should be members—given the Romans 5:5 promise that the Spirit has poured out God’s love in our hearts. But that love seems muted or missing in too many cases. A key indicator is that many, if not most, professed believers don’t read their Bibles with any delight or sustained devotion.

Some may ask, Why this focus on the Bible as an indicator of our response to God? Isn’t the linkage too narrow? I often hear, for instance, of many non-readers who claim to love God deeply even if they pay little attention to the Bible.

That’s a conversation non-readers can take up with God himself: he alone can process claims with a soul-searching ability we don’t have. Love always finds a way to listen to one who is loved.

We also press this link because of Bible assumptions. Scriptures share God’s character and values—his attractive qualities—in sustained and tangible terms. This is especially conspicuous in the Old Testament periods of Josiah and Ezra where rediscoveries of lost Scriptures led to explosive responses. Bible exposure captivates searching souls.

So, too, in the New Testament Jesus dismissed claims of faith by a group who had “believed in him” but who rejected what he was saying—see John 8:30-59. In that encounter he eventually identified these “believers” as children of the devil! So professions of faith don’t always ensure true faith.

There’s no news in this, of course. Jesus said as much in his parable of the soils: “The sower sows the word” but most of the sown word/seed either fails to germinate or to prosper (e.g. Mark 4). The Word can be stolen, crushed, choked; but in some cases it will be fruitful, with multiplied growth.

By highlighting this reality—that not all professed believers delight in God’s word—we come to a crucial point.

Jesus isn’t angry when he’s ignored. He never begs for attention. In fact there’s nothing pathetic about how he presents himself—no pearls are cast before the crowds. He simply delights in those who delight in him and leaves it at that.

While gathering crowds wasn’t his aim he did, because of his compassion, feed thousands on a pair of occasions: one of these is reported in John 6. Yet even then some of the more vocal figures in the crowd tried to use his compassion as a lever: “We’ll follow you and even make you a king if you promise to feed us like this all the time!” Jesus responded by telling them to focus on his life as spiritual food rather than making physical food their big ambition. So the crowds soon evaporated.

There’s a lesson here. Jesus knows how attractive love is. He came to offer us his Father’s love, and to share that love in all he did. And if someone doesn’t find that love attractive it doesn’t change the reality that God’s love is, in fact, incredibly attractive! It only tells us that whatever a person or a crowd loves instead of, or in place of, God’s love is blocking their affective “heart-gaze” on Christ and his Father.

This brings us back to our secret society. Some of us have been stunned by God’s beauty revealed in Christ and presented in the Scriptures. Our faith is now working through love—with love being a response to his prior love for us. Nothing . . . absolutely nothing! . . . is more captivating than seeing and hearing Jesus saying, “Come to me, all you who are tired—who long for the real freedom of my embrace.”

We somehow were blessed with an insider’s awareness of his love and loveliness. Everything else is sawdust and popcorn by comparison.

So the invitation still stands: “Oh taste and see, the LORD is good!”

The post A Secret Society? first appeared on Cor Deo.

One of his twists is that God is necessarily distant from the creation. This portrayal of God as “incommensurate” to us shows up most often in the mystical wing of Christianity that relies on the Platonic themes of Plotinus and Proclus—both non-Christians. It was carried into Christianity by a mysterious figure we now call Pseudo-Dionysius. He earned his tag by claiming to be Paul’s Athenian convert of Acts 17:34. It was a lie: his writings were actually composed late in the 5th century and relied on Plotinus and Proclus, and not on the Bible.

The twist here is that God is eternally inaccessible to us as one who is “beyond being”—so he is only engaged by exposures to his darkness or unknowability. In other words we can never hope to know him but we can somehow still experience him. The secret is to “undo” our thinking and to engage in a three-stage ascent into this Unknowingness of a non-discursive “One” by taking steps of purgation, illumination, and—hopefully—union.

God, however, begs to differ.

God’s whole point in the creation is, instead, to invite us into the eternal communion of his Triune sharing—what and who he really is! Jesus is God’s “Word” who makes God known in terms we can grasp.

Jesus reminded followers of this in stunning terms: “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9). Later in the same gospel Jesus set out the true basis of faith—versus claims of a passive mystical ascent: “And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (17:3). Jesus is the true source of knowledge about God.

And the communion God shares in himself—as One God in three eternal distinctions—explains his creation and redemption purpose as a self-sharing love: “I have made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it know, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them” (17:26).

Another misportrayal of God focuses on his wrath. This is a bit tricky because God is, indeed, furious at times and in his wrath he will eventually confront all those who oppose him. But the way this feature is marketed by his Enemy has a huge twist in it.

The twist comes when God’s wrath is presented as a quality of his essential being: as the fiery side of his justice. And God’s justice is linked to his holiness as if these labels are two sides of one divine coin.

The reality, however, is that before Satan and Adam came along God always existed as Father, Son, and Spirit: so he is eternally relational. He was, of course, always holy but before the fall nothing unholy existed. So, too, God was and is right or “righteous” in all his ways, but there was no counterpoint called unrighteousness to support such discriminations. Instead the label of 1 John 4:8&16—“God is love”—forever summarized his eternal communion.

So this is a second point where God begs to differ.

Why? Because he tells us that love was his motivation for creating and engaging humanity—not justice, holiness, or even glory. Consider John 3:16—“For God so loved the world”—and John 17:24—“Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me.”

But what about the many biblical references to God’s righteousness, holiness, wrath, and glory? First, these aren’t eternal commodities. God isn’t made up of building blocks. Instead these terms speak of God’s triune relationality that only appear because of sin.

Holiness, for instance, refers to moral alignment in the Trinity: no disharmony or discord exists in God’s communion. Thus he is holy—fully harmonious and coherent as Father, Son, and Spirit—without any violation ever occurring. It is only when sin brought discord into God’s creation—a misalignment with God’s character—that unholiness emerged. It is not an eternal reality; and its counterpoint, holiness, made sense only after Adam’s fall.

Righteousness and goodness are also relational realities in God. He is always right and good as the measure for such terms. But rightness and goodness only come into view when sinful alternatives emerge. Before the creation God was not trying to satisfy a greater-than-God reality called goodness or righteousness.

Love, on the other hand, was always present in the Father’s heart toward the Son, and vice versa, as shared by the Spirit who searches out the depths of the one and reveals it to the other.

But, again, what about wrath?

Wrath exists in the context of sin as seen in John 3. There we find God’s love for the world has been dismissed by the world: “people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil” (3:19). This was a realm where the Son is despised. The Father, properly jealous for his Son’s bride, warns that only one realm will continue into eternity: “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him” (3:36).

The “angel of light” has other misportrayals in play. He treats God as a cultural misfit; as a self-absorbed narcissist; and as somehow fixated by his own power—to name just a few. Given his effective rhetoric we need to abide in Christ’s word where he begs to differ with the twists Satan continually offers.

He alone offers us the truth that keeps us free.

The post God Begs to Differ first appeared on Cor Deo.

Typically we think that the solution to two extreme views will be a blending of the two. So in this case, is sanctification best understood as a cooperative effort where God does his bit, and I do my bit? I don’t think that will help us. Our flesh will corrupt that model. Instead, let’s ponder the big biblical framework for sanctification.

Marriage.

The Sin Problem – Let’s back up a bit. We have to grasp the depth of the problem before we can fathom the wonder of the solution. The core of the sin problem is not bad behavior or faulty thinking or a weakened will. The core of the sin problem is the lie that we can be “like God” – that is, like the false god who made the original offer. We believe that we can be autonomous and it is that self-orientation which drives and corrupts everything about us.

Our inclination to autonomy can show itself in two ways. Some will lean toward licentiousness, casting off all restraint and living like the world. Others will lean toward asceticism and legalistic self-made righteousness, and also living like the world. Worldliness is not just one end of that spectrum. Worldliness is always shot through with the DNA of autonomy.

But God – We were dead in our sin, but God. We were living as dead folks in the realm of death, but God. God sent his Son to die for us, in our place, winning our hearts by pouring out his love into our hearts by the Spirit, and thus uniting us to Christ in a marital union. We are now one Spirit with Christ our bridegroom. We died with Christ. Our life is hidden with Christ. In Christ. Christ in me. Union. Marriage.

When we start to see how much marital union language there is in Scripture, it should start to purge us of the contractual approach we function with in this world so much – i.e. obey stipulations for the sake of gaining reward. But it is not easy to shake this idea, for our flesh will always pull us back in the direction of autonomy.

The danger of autonomy – So how do we see sanctification? In the context of a marital union the groom washes his bride by the washing with the water of the Word, that she should be holy and blameless before him, without spot or wrinkle. So he is proactive and at work in the bride to cleanse and transform her by the Spirit through whom the union exists.

As we read the epistles of Paul, for example, we can start to spot the union language that creates the ethos for the instructive elements . With Christ. In him. Christ in you. This is key to avoiding the danger of our autonomous impulses.

So on the one hand, we have to beware of the danger of autonomy. A healthy marriage is not marked by autonomous action. A healthy marriage is not two individuals doing their own thing, in their own way, by their own strength, with a mere tip of the hat to a status of unity.

The opposite danger – This raises an issue though: if it is not about our self-moved effort, are we saying we are therefore totally passive? Some go that way. It is all of God, and what I do doesn’t matter because it is “all of God.” This can lead to either licentious living – a marriage marked by the bride going off after other lovers. Or it can lead to mere passivity – a marriage marked by the bride being totally unengaged in life.

Again, we need to bring to the fore the reality of our marital union with Christ. In being united to him we do not become puppets. Not autonomy, nor automatons. Christ doesn’t desire to be married to a mannequin.

Thus we have language of union to counter our tendency to self-made righteousness. And we have instruction and direction to counter the possibility of puppet-ness.

Is the bride engaged in life, active and alive? Never more so! Biblical sanctification anticipates an active engagement from us. And in the context of a fleshly inclination that has always dominated us, there is need for clarification of what it means to walk in a manner worthy of the spouse who has captured and won our hearts. But that instruction must never be corrupted into a self-driven autonomous obedience for the sake of reward . . . there is nothing of marital union in that thinking.

Two Ugly Wives – Some churches are characterized by an autonomous self-driven effort, a legalism and rule-based obedience for the sake of reward. Some churches are characterized by an unengaged laxity, a sinful sloppiness that treats the desires of the bridegroom as effectively irrelevant to the life of the bride. Both are ugly. The dutiful wife who works hard but is totally self-absorbed in her diligence to be seen as a good performer of wifely duties, and also the straying wife who cares little for what her husband desires and plays the harlot with other lovers, are both broken images of marriage.

The Glorious Bride – The biblical image of Christ’s sanctified bride is so glorious. She is captivated by Him, beautified by His love, actively engaged in a dynamic communion with him and living moment by moment for him, her gaze firmly fixed on the one who loved her first.

The post Holy and Blameless Before Him first appeared on Cor Deo.

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We finished our sermon series in Luke’s gospel on Sunday. Having begun in Advent 2013 with the birth narratives (and having broken off for a couple of breaks along the way to look at other books) it was fitting to reach the resurrection in chapter 24 on Easter Sunday. With all the skill and pacing of a master story-teller, Luke builds his narrative to a great climax through the crescendo to the death and resurrection of Christ in the final chapters of his gospel. It has certainly been a powerful journey.

Looking back over the whole series in Luke, I have so many reflections, but allow me to just dwell on one: the element of Luke’s account that has had the deepest impact on me. It is this, that Jesus passionately and faithfully loves his Father in heaven and those around him, even in the greatest suffering.

So many of the key events in Luke’s account seem to focus on this relationship between God the Son and his Father; Jesus’ baptism, with the great affirmation of his Father in love and the anointing of the Holy Spirit, and the subsequent temptations – all of which seem to tempt Jesus with an alternative path dependent on breaking that love relationship with his Father – to name just two. But this unshakeable love between Father and Son is perhaps seen nowhere more clearly than in the Easter narratives.

Firstly, consider Gethsemane. Remember what is in prospect for Jesus as he wrestles in prayer there. The thought of the physical suffering of crucifixion alone would make a trembling wreck of the strongest of us, then add in the emotional suffering of betrayal, denial and desertion of his closest friends and even this is just the beginning. The eternally beloved Son is about to be separated from the love of His eternally loved Father – for what reason? – to bring rebels and rejecters of the eternal love of God back into loving relationship with him. And when we grasp something of this context, Jesus’ prayer that the Father’s will be done (over and above his own comfort, even his own life) is simply staggering, and can only be an expression of the most staggering love.

Secondly, consider the cross. In the middle of all the pain already mentioned, surrounded by people who simply can’t wait for him to die, who taunt and mock him while he is doing so, and Jesus is thinking about, Jesus is loving, Jesus is forgiving… them. “Father, forgive them…”, “…today you will be with me in paradise…” I say it again, this is simply staggering love, a love so unlike any other love we can or will ever experience. Small wonder that at least two people witnessing the scene, seeing how Jesus dies, come to understand why Jesus dies!

And it is this which is my abiding impression from our little odyssey through Luke’s gospel, this extraordinary love of Christ (for his Father and for us) which remains faithful and true in even the greatest of suffering. Then when we take a moment of reflection to see things from his Father’s perspective, we see also the extraordinary love of the Father (for his Son and for us) which remains faithful and true in the worst of suffering.

So now, may that love which is poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit move us to love in response to the extraordinary love of our triune God!

The post Luke’s Gospel of a Loving God first appeared on Cor Deo.

I love the days leading up to Christmas, the anticipation of fun & tasty family traditions and restful moments of being home with family. I love the numerous ways we celebrate the great promises we have in Christ. From the carol services to the incredible smells you experience as you walk through a Christmas market. And what make these celebratory moments great are the people we get to share them with!

But these very same moments and people can be the source of Christmas pain. When we share Christmas with friends and family it can’t help but make us feel nostalgic of the joys we’ve had before and with whom we shared those joys. Inevitably thoughts of those missing this year will come to mind. For me, it’s talking with grandma in her kitchen as she makes all kinds of pies for after Christmas dinner. I wasn’t much help in the kitchen, I just watched and drooled over the pies already made, while she cooked and told stories of yesteryear. I miss her pies, and I miss her even more!

The friends and family members who are no longer with us aren’t necessarily the only source of pain and sorrow at Christmas. The holidays can be a great source of stress and tension because of the very people we love being with. Especially when members of your family don’t see eye to eye on things like religion and politics. These differences aren’t just abstract concepts but through time shape the texture of our individual lives when we are apart. When these different textures are in the same room, friction can occur.

But let’s face it, we can agree with people about the most fundamental things in life and still have conflict. Especially at this time of year where stress to make Christmas special and/or personality differences create tension. Familiarity and history with those we are celebrating the holidays may even cause us to come to conflict sooner.

So what do we do about the mixed feelings of Christmas, especially those feelings that may lead to conflict? Please don’t think I want you to avoid people in order to avoid tension in the holidays. Relationships are what make us who are; they are the joy of life.

These moments, like all moments in life, are an opportunity to love others as God has loved us.

I’ve heard and learned some great tactics to have love grow for people around us. One is to pray for God to give eyes to see others they way he sees them. They are clearly special to him; so special in fact that the Father sent his Son to save the world. Everyone around us are wonderfully made and are special, we just need God to help to see this. This is a powerful way to engage God and others. You’re asking God because you can’t do this on your own and you’re asking to have your heart align with his, prayers I’m confident he wants us to pray! Prayers I’m certain will change your life.

Recently I came across another perspective on loving others in relationship, which I think will be beneficial for Christmas and in everyday moments. Augustine’s (354-430 AD) ultimate goal in his preaching was to have his congregation make God their greatest affection. He understood that the battle in this life lies in the heart, that in our fallen nature our priorities are all wrong and we must find joy in Jesus above all else.

Even in our relationships Augustine taught that our love for God was the source of love for others. When speaking of friendship Augustine said, “For you truly love that friend, by loving God in your friend. Either because he is in him, or that he might be in him” (Confessions, 4.7 in Sanlon, Augustine’s Theology of Preaching, 163).

Did you catch that? Augustine believed that God resided or could reside in those around him. He knew this from Romans 5:5, the Holy Spirit is the gift of grace who unites us to Christ. Therefore, to love others in our lives is to love God that’s in them. God must be so prior to any other affection that he is even the motivation to love those we love. Even those we are to cherish we do so because God is in them or possibly in them. And the same Spirit who unites us to Christ is the Spirit and love that we are united to one another.

Even in moments of conflict, if we have this perspective the Spirit may produce his fruit because we’ll have the mind of the Spirit. Our Christmases will have the Spirit of giving, patience, and humility, things that can often be missing even thought we’re surrounded by other gifts.

In many ways it’s an abstract thought, but here’s the important bit. As we spend time with those we love over Christmas, the celebration of our God’s humility and love, ask God to show us himself in those we love. Could you imagine what Christmas would be like for us if we loved God like this? We may still feel the pain of those missing this Christmas but we’ll enjoy those God has given us this Christmas far more than we could imagine.

The post Loving God at Christmas first appeared on Cor Deo.

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“You don’t need to be alone… It’s real love.“

So says John Lewis / Tom Odell / John Lennon! I’m certain that this is the love we all want. The love that we all spend our lives, time and money trying to find. Love that will not let us go. And as so many of us sing carols up and down the country we remind each other of the Source of this love. The God who comes near. Emmanuel. God not in a grotto but in skin.

That’s crucial to remember at Christmas: God is not Santa. Perhaps our default view of God is that He bears more than a passing resemblance to the jolly fellow in red. White beard, lives in a far off place, only cares about us being good. When we die and face him in heaven he will ask Santa’s question – “have you been good?” But what does he mean by ‘good?’ Probably anything above horrendous – everyone gets a present right…?

Luke 2 gives us Christmas in one sentence: “To you is born a Saviour who is Christ the Lord.” Underneath the hay and linen strips, the cracker jokes and sprouts, is a Rescuer on a rescue mission. Why is that important? Two reasons: we are not good, and we’re not good because we’re slaves.

Christmastime is a generosity explosion! But, to be honest with you, it’s a blip in a year that’s all about me. I know Christmas is about peace and goodwill to all, but I much prefer peace and quiet, for me. I’m a slave to comfort – I’ll do all I can to get it! It’s worse though. Even being generous and giving presents is stressful. What if they don’t like what I got them? What if I get them socks and they get me an Xbox? What if it’s the other way round?? I’m a slave to other people – to their acceptance or respect. And that’s precisely our problem all year round. We’re slaves. However Christmas is a rescue mission – God in skin come to love and forgive. The gospel message is look and receive Him.

Krish Kandiah once said that you know how much trouble you’re in by who comes to rescue you. Imagine you’re on your gap year and there’s a crisis (you can picture whatever you like!) and you need to be rescued. The guy from the British government knocks on your door. You open it and… Mr Bean! It’s likely that in that situation either you’re not in as much danger as you thought, or the government isn’t bothered about you surviving! But say you open the door and Mr Bond is there. You’d know immediately that you’re in real trouble and that the government wants you safe.

“To you is born a Saviour who is Christ the Lord.” The baby in the manger is God in skin. God with us. The God who is pleased to well with humanity.

God is not like Santa. He knows we’re not good. He knows we’re slaves, powerless to change no matter how many New Year’s resolutions we make every January. But God doesn’t sit in a grotto waiting for us to find him. He doesn’t tell us to be good boys and girls. He comes for us. He runs to meet us where we are. Jesus is God in skin. He comes in love for us who are unlovely.

The baby in the manger is the man on the cross. Dying, with outstretched arms, saying “come – I’ve paid to rescue you.”

Have a brilliant Christmas! Remember that nothing matters more than Jesus. The Saviour, who is Christ the Lord.

[If you need a late present, check out ‘Pleased to Dwell’ by Peter Mead. Excellent unpacking of the Christmas story, showing that it’s not just for December!]

The post God in Skin first appeared on Cor Deo.