05/22/2017
Is my relationship with God close enough? Am I one with other believers and with Jesus? These are my thoughts as I go through this day. Will you join me in searching the answer to these questions within ourselves?
Jesus wants more than a casual relationship with us, and in this desire of His, He is exhibiting the will of the Father. They don't want to just just know us and have us know them, they desire for us to become one with them. To join in a relationship that is far beyond a spiritual acknowledgement...
“that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.”
John 17:21-24 ESV
We see a physical parallel to this spiritual joining in the relationship between man and woman in marriage. It began almost immediately in Genesis when we read these words regarding God's intention for Adam and Eve...
“Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.”
Genesis 2:24 ESV
And God's will for oneness between man and woman carries on throughout the Bible to this very day. We read this in the book of Mark as Jesus teaches...
“But from the beginning of creation, 'God made them male and female.' 'Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.' So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate."”
Mark 10:6-9 ESV
It has always interested me how the Lord gives us images of the spiritual in our physical lives. He gives us love, desire, humility, want... all of these are reflections of Him. He also desires for us to become one, not because we are identical; because Adam and Eve were not the same... but to make us complete in one another.
By joining as one flesh we see the will of God for us spiritually. In one flesh man and woman bring forth new life and join in love. In becoming one spiritually with Jesus we also increase in love and see an newness in Spirit. In our joining with Jesus and through Him, our joining with God, we find a type of spiritual marriage. Is it any wonder that the Church is called the bride of Christ?
“Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.”
Ephesians 5:25-27 ESV
Physically we are imperfect and we see that imperfection in ourselves and our marriages, yet our love for one another can hide those faults. Love erases the blemishes our spouse has, and we see them differently from the rest of the world. When we join with Jesus, His sacrifice will have made us perfect. In the eyes of God we will have no fault. This too is a parallel between the physical and the spiritual. So my desire today is to draw closer to Jesus; so close that we become one and that in Him I find that I am not only one with God, but seen as perfect through His loving eyes.
Prayer:
Father, I thank you for your Son Jesus and for His redeeming me from sin. I thank you Father for your plan to become one with your Son, and, through Him, to become one with me. Let me love you Father, just as you love me, and in our joining let all my faults fall away before you. Lead your Church, the bride of Jesus, before you... even as a man and a woman take each other in marriage. Let one flesh teach us of becoming one spirit, and one love of man for woman teach us of spiritual love... you for us, and we for you. So as man becomes one Church and the Church becomes one with Jesus, and Jesus becomes one with you... let us find perfection and new life in you for eternity, and your will for us complete. As I strive each day to increase in faith, I pray that I am coming closer to the bride you desire and the moment in which we become spiritually as one. I pray Lord that in your eyes I become acceptable, and that my faults find no home. I pray that by your love I appear perfect before you.
Rich Forbes