Living in the Glory of God the Son

Introduction   https://youtu.be/CYctSo8Lt4Y

Last week I mentioned my distress at Christian leaders praying things like, “Dear God” and Loving God”, when Jesus himself characteristically prayed to God as…“Father/heavenly Father”. I used to think that men and women found it easier to relate to Christ ,compared to God the Father because Jesus is quite imaginable[1] as a human being. I thought this was why so many people prayed to “Jesus”. I now consider my analysis[2] to be mistaken. Jesus himself explained, ““I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me….Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?” (John 14:6,9-10a). Jesus explains that  intimacy with himself and with his Father are inseparable and reciprocal[3]. “The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. 11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me” (John 14:11). You cannot know the Father more or less than you know Jesus, or vice-versa[4]. We must not think however that we are free from such confusions.  Peter’s sermon in the Day of Pentecost, for instance, isn’t important because it climaxes in an announcement of our free forgiveness but because of it proclaims  the exalted status of Jesus, “Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.” (Acts 2:36). The benefits that flow from Jesus are great, vast and free, only because of the supremacy of his now-exalted Lord.

What is the Testimony of Jesus

Years ago, I heard a presentation which sought to expound life and ministry in terms of “the testimony of Jesus”[5] (cf. Rev 1:2, 9; 12:17; 19:10; 20:4). The Lord spoke to me so powerfully through that message that my self-understanding and life direction were stretched permanently. I began to understand see that all things were created through/by Jesus as a space-time canvas on which he might reveal his Father through the power of the Holy Spirit[6]. This is what Paul means by telling us “all things were created through him and for him” (Col 1:16)

The vast and glorious all-wise plan of the God we worship and adore[7] begins not in Genesis 1[8], but in eternity when God the Father “chose us in him (Christ) before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him” (Eph 1:3). When Father, Son and Spirit decided the Son of God would be “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world” (Rev 13:8; cf. 1 Pet 1:19-20) you were in the picture as someone to be saved through Christ[9]. Not only do we find ourselves in the picture at that pre-existent end of eternity, but because Jesus in Revelation describes himself as “the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”” (Rev 22:13), we are also in the final frame of creation. In other words, the testimony of Jesus is our guarantee of eternal life. The children of God (Rev 21:7) are an integral part of the testimony God has chosen to make of himself to the created order for his honour, praise and glory (Rev 4:9, 11; 5:12-13; 7:12; 21:26)[10]. Creation is the sphere[11] where the Spirit of God makes great claims for Christ[12].

Why is this Testimony so Opposed

Virtually from one end of the Bible to another the truth of the Lord’s grand narrative/great and vast story is opposed by the powers of evil[13]. Whilst Scripture never openly explains the motives of the devil, but since he is described in the Old Testament as appearing in the company of the angelic sons of God[14], this suggests that the ancient serpent (Rev 12:9; 20:2) was provoked to tempt Adam and Eve “from the beginning” (John 8:44) as part of a large-scale counterpart demonic plan to confound the plan of God inspired by envy and selfish ambition[15]. The fulness of God’s image and glory is not seen in the angels, but only in the humanity of Jesus and those who follow him (Rom 8:29; 1 Cor 15:49; 2 Cor 4:4; Col 1:15; 3:10). When the demonic world looks at you from the heavenly places (Eph 3:10) what they see of you in Christ moves them to great rage (Rev 12:12). We have a far too small vision of who the Lord is and what he has done for us in Jesus[16].

The temptation in Eden to eat of the tree of knowledge, ““You will not surely die. 5 For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”” (Gen 3:4-5) is most fully seen as an attempt not only to rob the first couple of glory in the first creation but to lure them away from their destiny to be conformed to the image of God’s beloved Son in the new creation order. The ultimate hatred of the devil for the God-given dominion of humanity over the world (Gen 1:26-28; Ps 8) is a loathing of the rule given to Jesus over all things which he shares with us as his people[17]. Paul expounds this, “all things are yours, 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, 23 and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.” (1 Cor 3:21-23 cf. Matt 19:28; 1 Cor 6:3; Rev 20:1-6).

Overcoming the Opposition

In my personal estimation, whereas the great struggle of former generations[18] of disciples was over the deity/Godhead of Christ, today most believers find it hardest to come to terms with the truth that the miracle working, dead raising, sinless person we call Jesus of Nazareth was a complete human being (1 Tim 2:5). For decades I struggled to come to terms with my existence as a human being, until I finally accepted the meaning of humanity was never about my humanity but the life of Christ[19]. Increasingly over the decades I have received revelation that the humanity of the Son of God is the key to his Lordship over all things, a Lordship which he is pleased to share with us.

The most common problem facing Western Christianity is that we have too many resources compare to the Early Church and Third World believers. Whereas the first congregation I served in Perth, had, if my memory is correct, 16 people who could be called “Doctor so and so”[20], Paul testifies, “consider your calling, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; 28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, 29 so that no human being4 might boast in the presence of God.” (1 Cor 1:26-29). The great thing about St Mark’s is how starkly human and ordinary so many of you are[21]. This means most of you know you are not perfect which means you understand that you need to be perfected though faith in Christ alone[22]. In prayer the lord has spoken to me about how St Mark’s has been an important instrument in his humanising me! I am pleased to say that whilst most Christians are blinded by the idolatry of possessions, politics or intellect, this is not a problem I have encountered here[23]. I do believe the Spirit of the Lord, of whom I will speak much more next week, will soon[24] move in power in Perth but not as a top-down movement (with professional credentials) but through the mass of ordinary people indwelt by an extraordinary God[25].

Jesus’ personal sharing of his own life-testimony with his Body comes to a climax in the final book of the Bible, Revelation. Chapter 12 describes a fierce conflict between Satan and the Church in the context of global persecution. Our victory is expressed in these words, “And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers and sisters has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. 11 And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony[26], for they loved not their lives even unto death.” (Rev 12:10-11). If Jesus himself was only “made perfect” through suffering (Heb 2:10; 5:9), so it must be for us[27]. such suffering can be anything form minor inconveniences, illness etc. to severe persecution, whenever it is yielded to Christ it becomes part of “the testimony of Jesus” (Rev 19:10).

I ran into a pastor recently on his way to Japan to work with Christian young people, a nation with a very small percentage of Christians[28], and I was moved to remind him of the great sacrifices of the Japanese Church across the centuries[29], I quoted a famous statements of an early Church Father, “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.”[30] God never forgets the sacrifice of the saints[31]. Every sacrifice for Jesus will be rewarded.

Conclusion

We must always maintain a Christ-centred focus, because only the testimony of Jesus draws out our humanity in the “the breadth and length and height and depth” of the love of God that is greater than all understanding (Eph 3:18).

If all these great things, the things for which God created the world and sent his Son for us,, are true, how can we ever adequately respond? Let me take this back a step in preparation for my final sermon next week. When I was preaching in Fremantle the Sunday before we headed east last month, I ended my address with a challenge, that Jesus had said to me that my share in his sufferings was not yet complete[32], that is, my sufferings for Christ have not yet reached their God-appointed end. Our response to the testimony of Jesus must be as vital, radical and human as the life of Jesus himself. My old mentor Geoff Bingham, the man who for me embodied “the testimony of Jesus”, once wrote: “To bear testimony to Jesus means to have his testimony within us, and to have it as the primary consideration within our lives. The propagation/multiplying of this is the very purpose of our lives.” (Hence the call to mission, evangelism, social justice, doing good…..multiplying the testimony that “Jesus is Lord”) Next week we will share how Christ himself needed the power of the Spirit to perfect his call to be conceived of the virgin Mary, to minister God’s love, do divine works, suffer under Pontius Pilate die and to be raised from the dead. We need this power too.