Gracing Humanity On the Edge
Introduction
My darling wife, who knows me more intimately than could ever be described, or comprehended, says, “You cannot be subtle. As soon as you open your mouth you stop being subtle.” If her testimony is true, let me therefore be blunt and direct. As I read the New Testament, it becomes bleeding obvious that most self-proclaimed “biblical” Christians are not very biblical at all. The more I listen to the voice of Jesus, emphasising here his humanity, the more I am persuaded that we fail to be grasped by the grace of God reaching out to our once glorious but now weak and pathetic humanity. This witness came to me not through quiet meditation but through the intense emotional dramas accompanying a super-stressful house move. Our inexperience with handling technology, to assure compliance with land agents, property managers, utility companies, bank, credit cards etc, has had us teetering on the brink of breakdown. (With accompanying howls and rages.) I counsel you to read, for example, of the holy prophet’s rage against the irresistible divine command of grace, “The Spirit lifted me up and took me away, and I went in bitterness in the heat of my (angry) spirit, the hand of the Lord being strong upon me.” (Ezek 3:14). There have been many times over the decades when the Spirit of the Lord left me no real choice but to obey or rebel! As the journey into the wilderness is always a preparation for a greater grace then the Father has something wonderful for the Church in our city. This is not a logical nor common sense deduction based on circumstances, but a spiritual truth grounded in the testimony of Jesus (Mark 14:36; Rev 19:20).
Jesus
The truth of the Gospel has long been confronted by insidious clever heresies that deny either the full deity or the complete humanity of Christ. The latter is the most common threat today. A vicious heresy (Docetism) teaches that Jesus only “seemed to be” human but was really only an apparition/phantom/holographic projection of the pure Spirit of God (cf. Koran 4:157-158). Modern Christians often miss the power and moral penetration of the humanity of the Son of God. In reading , “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14 cf. Rom 8:3; 1 Tim 3:16; Heb 2:14-15 etc.), we must understand “flesh” is not a neutral term simply implying “human”. Against its contemporary Greek background it is a more subtle term of derision implying weak and frail humanhood. Cf. “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever. ” (Isa 40:6; 1 Pet 2:24-25). Jesus the eternal Word knew how much he needed Spirit-power. At the end of his 40 day fast he was really “hungry” (Matt 4:2). Likewise, the Father used the Son’s being “wearied as he was from his journey” (John 4:6) as a vital contact point for the Samaritan woman. All on the way to his excruciating physical-mental-spiritual “I thirst” on the cross (John 19:28 cf. Ps 42:1). The wounds in Jesus’ hands and side, plus his capacity even as glorified, to eat food (Luke 24:36-43; John 20:20) remain forever as a testimony lest we lapse into worshipping a Lamb less than fully human Mediator (1 Tim 2:5; Rev 5:6; Rev 21:23). The humanity of Jesus comes to enable us in our ongoing frailties.
Paul
It is easy to think of the Apostle Paul as a species of super human, yet he mocks the so-called “super apostles” (2 Cor 11:5; 12:11) of the day. We ignore his personal testimony of weakness and struggle at our own spiritual peril. 2 Cor 1:8-9 is a classic which commonly embarrasses health-wealth believers, “we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. 9 Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death.” . In Acts we read of Paul’s need in Corinth, “The Lord said to Paul in a night vision, “Stop being afraid (present imperative active), but keep on speaking and don’t be silent.” (Acts 18:9)….I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling” (1 Cor 2:3). Paul sees a real danger of being “put to shame” (2 Cor 9:4) by the Corinthians and is utterly transparent in saying, “And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety (μέριμνα merimna ) for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I do not burn with indignation?” (2 Cor 11:28-29). Embarrassed translators try to deal with this anxiety by translating it with the weaker “care”, but the usual meaning of merimna is “worry” (Luke 8:14; 1 Pet 5:7). If the life of Jesus and his apostle are so transparently needy, what causes us to be so deep in denial about our need for grace?
Where Has the Grace Gone?
The Church of “the living God” (1 Tim 3:15) is called to live and breathe in an atmosphere of “grace upon grace” (John 1:16) flowing from the engraced flesh of Jesus (John 1:14). Paul was able to trumpet the triumph of grace in Christ because of his visibly weak bodily presence (2 Cor 10:10; 11:21; 12:7), like Moses (Ex 4:10) he likely stuttered and stammered! Whatever the case, he testifies, “by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.” (1 Cor 15:10). It seems that the Church in the West, so richly endowed with theological and musical resources, has missed out on dwelling in the “poverty” (2 Cor 8:9) of Christ crucified. If it was said of the completed Temple completed by Zerubbabel, “And he shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of ‘Grace, grace to it!’”” (Zech 4:7), how much more on that spiritual structure founded on Christ. We need to compare the spiritual strength of church in Smyrna and Third World believers today with the Laodicean church and our own spiritual impoverishment (Rev 2:9; 3:17).
Conclusion
I started this teaching with reference to Donna and myself being driven, not by choice, but by a sovereign uncomfortable call, to a revelation that we MUST live by grace alone. This isa place of learning it is always all about: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit” (2 Cor 13:14). This is the normal, and humanly undesirable, state of a life lived in faith. “For consider your calling, brothers: 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 being might boast in the presence of God.” (1 Cor 1:26-29) Amen and Amen PTL!!