CIP
The Christian Institute of Philosophy
The Most Important Thing
With all the different requirements and responsibilites of the Christian life, don't you wish God would tell us what is most important - so we could make sure to focus on that one thing and at least get that one thing right? Well, in fact, He did.
" Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord, thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment." Matthew 22: 36-38
According to Jesus, intimacy with God is the most important thing in a Christian's life.
To develop intimacy with God there are 5 things you need to understand.
Editor's Note:
The statements below are theological proposals. You may be a member of a denomination that disagrees with some of these proposals. As always, CIP is a site where you have to decide what is applicable to your own life and your own denominational background. You are always encouraged to talk with your pastor or a good Christian friend about these issues. What you will read below are the perspectives that made the difference for me and dramatically changed the course of my life. I share them now as a beggar telling others where I think the bread is. From here on, I leave the results to be worked out between you and the Lord.
Five things you need to know
1. God is Spirit
Many people have an idea that God is "the man up stairs". According to scripture, God is not a man with a long white beard, He is eternal Spirit and infinite mind. Our minds are finite. If we are come to God we must humble ourselves to accept the fact that we are finite and He is infinite. This would seem to be an obvious truth, but our Old Man is naturally arrogant and will fight this simple fact. The Old Man wants to believe he can figure it all out on his own. The Old Man feels God must accommodate him rather than the other way around.
... the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a Spirit; and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.
The words of Jesus: John 4:24
To develop an intimate relationship with God, we must be willing to acknowledge our need for Him, and come to Him with the heart of a child.
2. Christ has completed a finished work which reconciles us to God.
"But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. Romans 5:8-10
When Jesus said it is finished on the cross, He had completed the first part of His finished work. His death paid the penalty for all our sins - past, present, and future. This meant that the penalty of God's judgement and wrath would now "passover" us which allows us to be reconciled to God. Reconcile means to co-exist in harmony or peace. Christ's finished work gave us harmony and peace with God by taking the penalty of our sin upon Himself as He died on the cross.
It is important to note that our reconciliation does not take away the natural corruption of sin. Sin creates corruption, and corruption creates death. This is the nature of sin and that remains the same. But, the judgement and wrath of God has been paid for through Christ's suffering. This is important, because it allows God to establish personal relationship with us and reconcile us to Himself.
Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows:...But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. Isaiah 53:4-6
The second part of His finished work was His resurrection from the dead. In the power of His resurrection Jesus was able to send the Holy Spirit of God to be in and around us. It is the Holy Spirit that takes the scripture and applies it to our everyday circumstances to produce Spiritual reality in our lives.
3. We are reconciled to God by accepting the finished work of Christ and resting our lives upon it.
The most difficult obstacle to accepting Christ's finished work is that we have to give up on our own efforts to save ourselves. Christ has reconciled us to God even though there is no goodness in us. You would think this would be a great joy, but the Old Man who is at war with God is not impressed. He does not like the idea that there is no good in him. He wants to present something to God to show that he is at least a little worthy.
Surrendering this Old Man to God and accepting God's definition of us; is what opens our heart to Christ. As Christ comes into our heart through the person of the Holy Spirit, we become born again - this time not physically but Spiritually. And because God is Spirit, we now become Spiritually alive to Him and have Spiritual relationship with Him.
Resting into the finished work of Christ is accepting that our salvation and reconciliation RESTS totally in what He has done, and not in any goodness of our own. Once we surrender the Old Man and allow God to give us a New Nature and the beginning of a New Man - we begin to see what Jesus has done for us, and we rest into His finished work. It is in this rest that we rejoice in this great new relationship. A relationship of rest, reconciliation, and acceptance. All based on what Jesus has done at the cross and in the resurrection. Based in rest the Christian life takes on a whole new dimension. Now we are intrigued about what God is doing in and around us. We are looking daily to see His work, in and around us based on the finished work of Christ.
Perhaps the most vivid example of this new life of rest is found in the story of Mary and Martha.
4. In Christ we find the answers to life.
5. Christ in us builds our lives.
More to come on this subject.
I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. - Jesus Christ