When the tide comes in, it does not matter the size of the
ships in the harbor, they all rise to the same level.
When the love of Christ comes into his church, it does not
matter the condition of anyone’s soul, the life they have led, the sins they
have confessed, the things that are still hidden, every child of God is loved
the exact same amount. As someone has said, there is level ground at the foot
of the cross.
Yesterday, God gave me great comfort by driving this point
home into a part of my inner self that has long felt inferior to others. Life
is a bully, and it has done its utmost to let me know I am worthless. However, God
is a Father, and he has done far more to let me know my worth as his beloved
son.
God’s work to minister worth to my true Soul-Condition has
followed the familiar route of the Beatitudinal Valley.[1] He
has shown me the poverty of my spirit in relation to knowing my worth. He has
led me to mourn the things the world, the flesh, and the devil, have done to me
to convince me of my worthlessness. He has brought me to the meekness that
admits I cannot fix anything that is wrong with me, whether it be my sins
against God, or other people’s sins against me. He has stirred up within me a
hunger and thirst for the righteousness that is offered as a gift (including Jesus-like
worth), to be received by faith.[2]
Yesterday’s ministry included a reminder of many Scriptures
that identify that there is absolutely no distinction in the worth of any child
of God compared to all the rest. There may be distinctions in what we are like
as male or female, how we fit in to our local society, how we are gifted to
serve others in love, but there is no distinction whatsoever in the identity,
and standing, and worth, of each and every child of God.
Here are a few things that ministered to me to remind me of
my worth, especially in relation to the most recent discoveries of my true Soul-Condition
in this regard:
·
“For all
who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.”[3]
Since all of us are sons through the leading of the Spirit, there is no
distinction between any of us. All our sons,[4]
and all enjoy the exact same status and privileges of sonship.[5]
·
“And we
impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit,
interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.”[6] Again,
Paul cuts ties with all that he had attained through “human wisdom”, and presents what is taught to all believers “by the Spirit”. We do not understand
spiritual truths because some of us are better than others, but because the
Spirit interprets spiritual truth to all God’s children because all God’s
children “are spiritual”.
·
“In him
you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.”
[7] When
Paul says, “you also,” he means that
the Gentile believers, along with the Jewish believers, are being built
together into the one and only dwelling place for God on earth, which is the
church. This all happens “by the Spirit,”
not by any of our own good works, so there is no distinction between
believers based on anything we do.
·
“For we
are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ
Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh…”[8]
There was a time when Paul saw himself as distinct and superior because of how
perfectly he had kept the law, including the rite of circumcision. When he was
born-again, he saw that there was no human basis for distinction, and that the
true identity of God’s people was those who worship God by the Spirit,[9]
not through the law, or any level of good works. We are a people who glory in Christ
Jesus, not in ourselves. We are those who “put
no confidence in the flesh,” meaning that we have no personal basis for
thinking of ourselves more highly (or lowly) than other believers.
There seemed to be a kazillion more thoughts woven into these
things, overwhelming my soul with the undeniable word and will of God, that
there is no distinction of worth among the children of God. NONE!
This led to something I didn’t see yesterday, but was obvious
when I saw it today. If there is no distinction of worth among the children of
God, meaning that I am not the worthless piece of garbage I was led to believe,
it also means that there is no distinction in worth between me and the children
of God who have hurt me. In other words, while I obviously need the ministry of
God to help me see that I am not inferior in my worth in relation to other
believers, I also need to see that there are no believers in Jesus Christ who
are inferior in their worth in relation to me.[10]
In other words, the same tide of God’s love, and grace, and
mercy, that brings my lil’ ol’ dingy up to the same level place of worth as the
great soul-winning ship of the apostle Paul, also leads me to see that all the
believers in Jesus Christ who have hurt me, and reinforced my worthlessness
worldview with their not-so-much-like-Jesus behaviors, have the exact same
worth to God as every other believer, including myself.
This two-sides of the same coin, or two-edged sword of the
Spirit,[11]
may be difficult to bear on both counts, but is absolutely essential for what
Paul refers to as “the unity of the
Spirit in the bond of peace”.[12]
The unity in the church is based on the Spirit, not the qualifications of the
people, and all the people have come into this unity in the same way, through
the “bond of peace”, the gospel of
our Lord Jesus Christ.
As Paul said earlier,
14 For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15 by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, 16 and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.[13]
The bond of peace is that all believers, including the great
divide between Jew and Gentile, have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
not through anything distinctive about us. The hostility between Jews and
Gentiles has been killed, and any other hostility in the church needs to be put
to death in the same way. The bond of peace is the same for all believers, and
the Holy Spirit is the same for all believers, so there is to be unity in the
Spirit as we all relate to God with equal standing, and worth, and identity.
The message to me, even as I easily recall so many ways God’s
people have wronged me, is that they still have the same worth as me, and we
all have the same worth as Paul, and we are all loved by God in the same way as
he loves Jesus. All issues of justice against every believer in Jesus Christ
have been dealt with on the cross, so God will not mete out a vengeful kind of
justice on his sons who have hurt me, while showing only mercy towards me.
God does not show favoritism towards me because I have been
hurt, and he does not show partiality against them because they have hurt me.
The same mercy that makes it safe for me to be in fellowship with God makes it
safe for them to be in fellowship with God. The same mercy that overlooks my
sins (because they were all punished on Jesus at the cross) overlooks their
sins (for the same reason).
If I want a God who still judges sin in the people for whom
Christ died, he will need to constantly judge my sins in the same way (which he
cannot do because it would be unjust). If I am drawn to God for his saving
mercies that are “new every morning,”[14]
I must delight to know that the same mercies (withholding the judgment we
deserve) are shown to brothers who have wronged me.
What do I expect to happen now? I expect that, as God is
leading me through the Beatitudinal Valley to hunger and thirst for the
righteousness of my true identity in Jesus Christ, he is going to make me one
of “the merciful,” who delight to
show the same mercy to people who have wronged me, as God has shown to me who
has wronged him (and who knows whom else!).
This growth in mercy will lead into the pure-heartedness that loves God
and his will so much that everything in me will be love, and grace, and mercy,
in Christ, and to all others. This pure-heartedness will stir up a single-minded
desire to bring people to have peace with God through faith in Jesus Christ,
and this single-minded peacemaking will help me appreciate the blessing of
being persecuted for the sake of the righteousness that is by grace through
faith.[15]
In practical terms, I expect God to give me the freedom to
meet people who have wronged me and feel no inferiority to them, no difference
of true worth than them, and a genuine feeling of mercy towards them, longing
more for the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace than I could ever wish
them harm when I’m feeling sorry for myself in the flesh.
Everything is different in the Spirit, and I expect God to
put me in difficult relationship situations so that he can, finally, make all
the difference in the world.
© 2015 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517,
Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted,
Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English
Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good
News Publishers.)
[1]
Based on Jesus’ presentation of the Beatitudes in Matthew 5:3-12.
[2]
All this is in the context that he deals very fully with my own sin in so many
ways. I am only identifying how God has used the Beatitudinal Valley to also
deal with this issue of deep and crippling worthlessness.
[3]
Romans 8:14
[4]
Galatians 3:23-29 makes this abundantly clear.
[5]
I would LOVE to explain why the “sons and daughters” of some of the modern
translations are not only fraudulent translations, but they create two forms of
citizenship in God’s kingdom (some are sons, and others are daughters), and put
in place a distinction that exists nowhere in the New Testament. God’s book
does NOT say “sons and daughters” in the original, and it does not mean “sons
and daughters” in the context, so there is no grounds for reading-in
contemporary preferences to the breathed-out words of God. There is a reason
that God calls all his children “sons,” and presents all of us with the same
adoption as sons (Romans 8:15; Galatians 4:5; Ephesians 1:5). We need to know
why our Father prefers to have all his children think of ourselves as sons (as
Galatians 3:23-29 also makes very clear).
[6]
I Corinthians 2:13
[7]
Ephesians 2:22
[8]
Philippians 3:3
[9]
This is exactly what Jesus told the Samaritan woman when he said that God
wanted worshippers who worship in spirit and in truth (John 4:23-24).
[10]
This is true even if I think they have acted more poorly than myself. It doesn’t
look that way to God!
[11]
Hebrews 4:12; Ephesians 6:17
[12]
Ephesians 4:3
[13]
Ephesians 2:14-16
[14]
Lamentations 3:22-23
[15]
This is primarily a focus on the second half of the Beatitudes given in Matthew
5:3-12
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