Never Say Diet

If we live by the Spirit, we must also follow the Spirit – Galatians 5:25

There are some people making resolutions at the beginning of the year. I find it more useful and probably wiser to make resolutions at the top of the hour, or to follow the pattern of that most entertaining of television, The Weather Channel, and make them on the 8’s. In fact the only official New Year's resolution I will make this year is to make no resolutions. I think I can keep that one. Hmm, wait a minute…

I can sympathize with people who have obsessive-compulsive disorder just as I can sympathize with my Calvinist friends. I like things to be clean and neat, when possible; nevertheless, it is not always possible, and we will waste a lot of time and effort trying to keep things neat when they cannot be. I like the idea that salvation is determined, that I can’t mess it up, and, in a certain sense, that may be true. Even if I am not able to mess it up ultimately and eternally, I can certainly make myself miserable getting to that end – hence, the necessity of sanctification. So, like the cook who lays aside neatness for the sake of culinary satisfaction, we won’t worry too much about the why of sanctification in light of grace. We can sense at the deepest level that sanctification is a requirement, and we can concern ourselves merely with attaining it.

Even as I say “attaining”, I know I am wrong. For as to the spirit, it is not a state but a process. I do not reach a state of having been sanctified; rather I follow a path of being sanctified. If holiness is a status, then every failure, every episode of sin, of pettiness, greed, rage, or smugness self-righteousness is a fall from that state. If, on the other hand, we see it as a process where we are always learning, growing, and moving – you know, like something alive might do – then we can see the occasional eruption of sin for the hindrance that it is, instead of a sign that we have deceived ourselves, lost our salvation, or fallen from grace.

Think of it as a way of life.

“That which is perfect” is a Being, who hath comprehended and included all things in Himself and His own Substance, and without whom, and beside whom, there is no true Substance, and in whom all things have their Substance. For He is the Substance of all things, and is in Himself unchangeable and immoveable, and changeth and moveth all things else. But “that which is in part,” or the Imperfect, is that which hath its source in, or springeth from the Perfect; just as a brightness or a visible appearance floweth out from the sun or a candle, and appeareth to be somewhat, this or that. And it is called a creature; and of all these “things which are in part,” none is the Perfect. So also the Perfect is none of the things which are in part. The things which are in part can be apprehended, known, and expressed; but the Perfect cannot be apprehended, known, or expressed by any creature as creature. Therefore we do not give a name to the Perfect, for it is none of these. The creature as creature cannot know nor apprehend it, name nor conceive It. – Theologia Germanica

Now there’s a lot more to that quote than I’m able to deal with in my limited understanding, but there is this: that we are by the very nature of being creatures “in part” and therefore imperfect. Yet, this is not the end of it. We are, by grace through faith, delivered from the bondage of “creatureness” and able to move toward the Perfect. Of all creatures, we are alone in this ability for the moment, and the destiny of all creation – the ability of all creation to be perfected -- rests with us.

Walking the way of holiness is a way of perceiving the Holy One. To know God we must know perfection and it is impossible for us to know that except by experience. If we are not too proud to admit it, our weakness can instruct us as to the strength of the One who could bear the burden. Even to fail in a thing is to better understand what is required to succeed.

Holiness as a mental exercise is not holiness at all. Sanctification is an everyday practice -- not a theory.

Heirs of God

I was reading Ephesians yesterday and I noticed that we are both the heirs of God and the inheritance of God. We are in Christ and Christ is in us. The relationship between God and man is paradoxical. Faith is a gift of God and the means for receiving the gift. We are filled with the Spirit, yet in Him we live and move and have our being.

We inhabit what is visibly a three-dimensional space plus time. It is almost impossible for us to think concretely in terms of multiple dimensions. God certainly inhabits a multiplicity of dimensions and is outside, or better, transcends the dimension of time. What seems like paradox in the space-time continuum available to our animal senses is not only possible but perhaps even obvious when viewed “from above” in additional dimensions. (And by the way, I wrote this before I read the comment on the Dawkins post.)

Christ is the Vine and I am a branch. I have grapevines growing in my backyard. I do not think, often, of the vine versus the branch. I look at a vine and see a vine. It is only when I need to do some pruning that a branch takes on separate significance. The vine-branch picture is about as good as we can do for showing the relationship.

While the vine could exist of itself and alone, it would be a rather pointless existence. God, alone, is still God, still whole, complete, and real. Yet, because of His very nature, like the vine, He will not exist alone, un-branched, if you will. As the vine will produce branches, so God will produce sons. Like the branch, we are part of Christ, and, just as the branch draws life from the vine, so we live because of the life of Christ flowing through us.

We are “heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ” because all that we are and have comes through the Vine. We are receiving life, abundant life. But what we receive is not for ourselves any more than the branch draws sap for its own growth. We live in order to be the inheritance of God, in order to blossom and produce the fruit which, in turn, contains the seed. We are sons yet we “father” the fruit that spreads the life of God to others.

Natural life is a reflection of the real life of the spirit. Everything producing after its kind, seed-bearing fruit, is a first principle which is related in the opening lines of Genesis. Replicating Himself is one of the things God does. No wonder the materialist finally stumbles upon the truth found in the gene that wants to reproduce itself. The sage won’t chastise him for being a couple of millennia late.

From the heart

To the man who does not try to order his thoughts and feelings and judgments after the will of the Father, I have nothing to say; he can have no light to let shine. For to let our light shine is to see that in every, even the smallest thing, our lives and actions correspond to what we know of God... MacDonald from "The Hope of the Gospel"

Most people attempt to live the Christian life ass-backwards. I should know. That's certainly how I did it. A few years ago Larry Crabb wrote a book called "Inside Out". If someone runs across it, it is not a bad read, but all a person really needs to know is in the title.

Christ always works from the inside out. In the quote above the emphasis is on "thoughts and feelings and judgments" -- all internal processes. If I can get my thoughts in line with God's will, I have made a huge move in the right direction. No alteration of behavior is possible without, at a minimum, the decision to try to do right. That's what the Bible means by repentance -- change your mind: metanoia.

Esau despised his birthright, but later wished to inherit the blessing. Speaking of this in Hebrews 12:17, it says, "...he was rejected because he didn't find any opportunity for repentance, though he sought it with tears." In Wuest's expanded translation, he uses the old King James phrase "place of repentance", then puts in brackets, "room to repent". Esau could find no space to turn around. I picture someone crawling through a very tight tunnel. It makes me a little claustrophobic just thinking about it.

But let me change the picture slightly. Now the tunnel is not quite so tight and the only reason the person can't turn around is that he or she is wearing a huge backpack and those long, funky clown shoes. It is obvious to the person that he has taken the wrong turn. To turn around and get to safety, all he has to do is get out from under the backpack and lose the shoes. Simple enough. The shoes are awkward and uncomfortable, and the backpack contains nothing but heavy, worthless junk.

I suspect Esau could have turned around but he was looking for an opening big enough to turn around with his pack. That's what he couldn't find. He wanted to turn around yet retain his bag, though its contents were worthless. He wanted to hang on to his bitterness, resentment and his victim status. He wanted everyone to know how he had been wronged and swindled. He wanted people to tell him what a dirty deal he had gotten.

The reason the road to hell is paved with good intentions rather than self-pity: sooner or later people drop their good intentions but they carry their self-pity all the way.

Conversely, if we are willing to change our thinking around to match God's eventually the externals follow the inner man. We are to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all the external stuff will be added as we go along.

It all starts, really, with a single point of desire. John 7:17 begins, "If anyone wants to do His will, he will understand...". If I just want to do the will of God, understanding and everything else will flow from that point, like a river being born as a tiny spring.

For most of us, that's the very trouble. Many call themselves Christians and fill church buildings regularly who want God to do their will. They do all manner of things they think are "religious" in order to manipulate God, to put Him under obligation to them. If it were not so pathetic it would be laughable. Meanwhile, they remain unchanged in their thinking, feeling and judgment, still trying to crawl through the wrong tunnel with their burdens.

I don't have a "life verse". Speaking strictly for myself I don't get the concept. I suppose if I were forced to pick a single verse from the Bible that sort of epitomizes my view of life, I might pick Romans 12:2 -- "Do not be conformed to this age [world], but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may discern what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God."

There is a kind of feedback loop to thinking and action. That's why I put more emphasis on the desire to do God's will. The "want to" is the pivot point, the ground for the feedback circuit. Doing right will start you thinking right and thinking right will start you doing right. And the more you do right, the more you think right. And the more you think right, the more right you will do.

It works the same in the negative, but we'll let that alone.