Whatever Jesus Christ Was In His Earthly Life, The Father Is Eternally In Himself.

So, according to the previous post, how is John the Baptist's declaration that he should become less so Jesus can become greater, good news and an echo of the life of the Trinity?

It can be good news, because John is doing exactly the same thing he sees Jesus doing. It's not that Jesus does one thing and the rest of us do another. Yes he is our substitute, but he is also our pattern/example as he reveals the heart of God to us his image bearers.

The reason I say this is because I have often thought of Jesus as tolerating his Father's wish to become a frail, mortal human. That he felt a bit like Haman leading Mordecai round the city. (Great story, read it here.) That when he washed his disciples' feet, Jesus was inwardly saying to himself Just wait until I get resurrected, then you'll see me as I am and I'll get the glory I deserve, and I won't have to wash your smelly feet anymore!!

In other words, I fall into the trap of thinking that sacrifice is something God tolerates and does, rather than the natural overflow of who God is.

This is so important to get right. Jesus didn't tolerate his serving and suffering, his bleeding and dying, it was the natural overflow of his heart, which is that of a self-sacrificing and extravagant lover.

That's not to say that Jesus enjoyed the cross, he clearly endured it - and painfully so. But that endurance was not a Rambo style pain threshold test, after which he would say self-aggrandisingly "Look at me! I'm the man!" (Although let's be clear, he is the man!). It was a labour of love like the pain of child birth, knowing that when it was all over, anguish would give way to the joy of new birth, new life and new love!!

Jesus lived not to pursue his own agenda, but to honour his Father and to give life to the church. To put it in the words of John the Baptist, he made himself less so that others could be greater. Moreover, in this he is showing us the self-effacing heart of the unseen Father, which again is sacrificial love - hence the title of this post.

The pinnacle of God's glory is not some abstract brand of super-light-bulb brightness, but their self-effacing, other-centred, self-sacrificing love as demonstrated in their honouring of each other and in giving life to all those who believe in them. A pattern those who call themselves Christians are all called, like John the Baptist, to imitate.

Even now as the ascended reigning King of Glory, Jesus is still, in love, deferring his glory elsewhere. Can you think where?

When Best Man Goes Bad, Man

Have you ever been at a wedding when the Best Man upstaged the bride and groom and made himself the focus of attention - a little like the cartoon on the right?

Probably not, for the simple reason that it's unthinkable - not in the sense of "impossible to imagine" (like a one-ended stick) but morally outrageous.

Had John the Baptist tried to muscle on in his ministry and not make way for Jesus, he would have behaved like the inappropriate Best Man at the wedding.

Instead, he says something sublime: he [Jesus] must become greater whilst I must become less.

The problem with that line is that we read it from the perspective of life under the curse of the fall, where all is about self-aggrandisement and self-glorification.

In our shrivelled little hearts we can only conceive the (survival of the fittest) idea that if one person goes up the ladder of prosperity, someone else somewhere else has to go down. If one person is getting the attention of others, the rest melt into the shadows.

The natural conclusion from that starting point of the Fall is to say that in this statement, John the Baptist bizarrely accepts his disappearance into anonymity to let Jesus take self-aggrandising centre stage. We then comfort ourselves with the theology of "Well let's face it, he's God, so he's allowed to." And that of course is true, but it is also misleading.

You see, if you make your starting point, not the vague mist of your own fallen existence, but rather the rock-solid eternal God of love who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, then the sights, smells and sounds of this statement take on even more glorious hues, aromas and harmonies.

Far from turning himself into a person-less cypher, the great forerunner of the Bridegroom is simply getting his life into harmony with the song that the God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit has enjoyed singing eternally.

Confused?

More to follow...

In Whose Body Are You?

According to Christakis, character traits spread like diseases:



Of course, wisdom literature has told us this stuff for thousands of years. Scientific method, in this case, lives only to confirm what we already know.

What I found even more fascinating was his talk about people acting as one big social organism. Forgive me if I sound like an insufferable know-it-all, but I'm pretty sure I've heard that one before too.

Writing to My MP Again

If, like me, you were happy to wake up and find out who won, then you would have missed the declaration of the result for Reading East. But thanks to the wonders of modern technology, you can relive that moment as many times as you like:

From what little I know of Annaliese Dodds, I agree with Mr Wilson's commendation of her.

Today, I hand-wrote to Mr Wilson, although I typed it first to make sure I didn't get half way through a sentence only to discover it was a grammatical disaster!!

I would have written to whoever won, in the name of good British sportsmanship, to congratulate them. Here's an extract:

I’m not entirely sure what I make of all the wheeling, dealing and policy churning currently going on in Westminster, suffice to say I do believe the best candidate in Reading East won and I’m pleased you’ll be representing us to the rest of the nation.

May I also take this opportunity (as a Christian) to commend you both for your voting record and for coming out clean in all of the expenses scandals of the last twelve months. Those two things more than any others say what a billion words of campaign rhetoric never could, and bear testimony to me of your trustworthiness for the task ahead.

The more I think about it, the more I think it's about personality not policy, and when I say personality, I don't mean who is the most charismatic leader, I mean who has the greatest integrity. So long as I trust them to do what's right, I'll submit to their lead, whatever their political colour or policy statement.

If the system is full of people of integrity, then the policy will work itself out more or less right. If however, there is no integrity, then we're headed for trouble no matter how well the policy be worded and mediated.

In Praise of Beards (Just for fun ;-)>

According to Wikipedia, and some famous early saints, beards are the way forward for real men!

St Clement of Alexandria:
"The hair of the chin showed him to be a man."

"How womanly it is for one who is a man to comb himself and shave himself with a razor, for the sake of fine effect, and to arrange his hair at the mirror, shave his cheeks, pluck hairs out of them, and smooth them!...For God wished women to be smooth and to rejoice in their locks alone growing spontaneously, as a horse in his mane. But He adorned man like the lions, with a beard, and endowed him as an attribute of manhood, with a hairy chest--a sign of strength and rule."

"This, then, is the mark of the man, the beard. By this, he is seen to be a man. It is older than Eve. It is the token of the superior [unfortunate word me thinks] nature....It is therefore unholy to desecrate the symbol of manhood, hairiness."

"It is not lawful to pluck out the beard, man's natural and noble adornment."

St Cyprian:
"In their manners, there was no discipline. In men, their beards were defaced."

"The beard must not be plucked. 'You will not deface the figure of your beard'."

Lactantius:

"The nature of the beard contributes in an incredible degree to distinguish the maturity of bodies, or to distinguish the sex, or to contribute to the beauty of manliness and strength."

Apostolic Constitutions:
"Men may not destroy the hair of their beards and unnaturally change the form of a man. For the Law says, "You will not deface your beards." For God the Creator has made this decent for women, but has determined that it is unsuitable for men."

Augustine of Hippo:
"There are some details of the body which are there for simply aesthetic reasons, and for no practical purpose—for instance, the nipples on a man's chest, and the beard on his face, the latter being clearly for a masculine ornament, not for protection. This is shown by the fact that women's faces are hairless, and since women are the weaker sex, it would surely be more appropriate for them to be given such a protection."

The Relationship Between Circumcision And Baptism

When you don't understand what it was about, biblical circumcision is at best an odd thing and at worst a downright cruel thing, inflicting pain on the unsuspecting and weak.

NB. There is NO Biblical warrant or even encouragement for so called "female circumcision."

However, there's more going on here than a mere pain threshold test. It was a sign cut into the flesh of the male Israelites - a reminder that would never be washed away by soap, nor obscured by new growth. It would live with them wherever they went.

Consider then the nature of this sign: A knife was taken and used to shed the blood of the baby boy in the removal of the foreskin on the 8th day after birth.

:: The knife - Symbolic of the scriptures and more specifically the judgment of God.

:: The penis - Symbolic of the promised offspring (it is the place where seed or offspring come from - those "seeds" are planted in the "soil" of the womb)

:: Blood is shed - Symbolic of death.

:: On the 8th day - Symbolic of new creation.

:: Done to a baby by their father - Symbolic of God's initiative and our helplessness.

:: Hidden to the eye under clothes - symbolic of the gospel being hidden until the proper time.

So in circumcision, the LORD reminded his people of his promise that he would send one born of a woman who would fall under the judgement of God and whose shed blood would purchase the renewal of the whole creation - something that we ourselves could never do - nor even think of doing.

The reason circumcision is no longer mandatory in the New Testament is because we are no longer looking for the promised offspring, he has already come in the person of Christ, who bore the judgement of God and shed his blood on a cross 2000 years ago, purchasing the renewal of the whole creation.

Circumcision was only done to men because it was a man who would one day die to win for himself a bride (the church). The church does not win herself a Christ. You and I don't/can't earn our way to God. It is at best ridiculous and at worst blasphemous to suggest otherwise.

We are no longer waiting for the shedding of Messiah's blood. It has all been finished. Instead we have water baptism as the sign of cleansing, new birth and union with Christ, through the Spirit.

When a person is baptised, it is a sign that they have a place in the (re)new(ed) humanity.

What an awesome God.

God's Choice

I never noticed/realised until this weekend, (even though I must have read it several times before) that Reuben squandered his birthright as the first born son of Jacob when he "went into" (slept with) one of his father's concubines.

All the patriarchs: Abraham, Issac and Jacob, saw the first fruits of their loins - the ones who they thought would be the primary heirs of their estates - the ones who they thought had it coming - passed over by God to another of his choosing.

Even though Abraham was a mighty man of faith, for some strange reason, he still hankered for Ishmael to be the chosen offspring.

Even though Esau had sold his birthright to his younger brother and even though God had said in a prophecy that the older would serve the younger, Isaac still sought to give Easu preeminence.

And now as mentioned above, Reuben had it coming to him, but foolishly threw it away.

In all of this, God witnesses three times that he does not work through the assumptions and ways of fallen humans like you and me to achieve his purpose. He is not impressed by what we are impressed by - accidents of birth, social position, wealth, looks, skill, intellect, good deeds etc.

He turns the tables on all the ways that we ascribe glory to one another and uses the least expected methods to achieve his ends.

God's choice, his election, is all about Christ - who, like Isaac Jacob and Joseph before him, was rejected by the so called wisdom of man, but who has become the heir - in this case, of the whole cosmos, seen and unseen.

God's wisdom is not to use the assumptions (strength) of man to work out his purposes in human history, but rather those things that we did not expect at all because we were too proud to see them.

Whether you're a Christian or not the standard is the same: when you realise you have nothing to offer God, your heart is in the best position to make an approach to him.

Take heart and be humbly bold. He'll give you his best.