It is in death that we have life (Phil 1:21); we can only be strong in our brokenness (2 Cor. 12:9-10), only when we have accepted Christ AND let go of/lose self will we have “wholeness”, “For the full content of divine nature lives in Christ, in his humanity, and you have been given full life in union with him.” (Col 2:9-10). Accepting Christ is the entering into “wholeness”, where we can begin to build our lives and become stronger in faith (Col 2:6-7). Although there is still much left to be done and realised, although we are still bound by our bodies, we are whole when we are in Christ (not in ourselves) (Is 53:5), looking beyond our frail bodies and fleshly temptations we must realise that we are a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17), not in body but in Spirit, so God’s spirit in us is a guarantee of what is to come for us (2 Cor. 5:5).
The essence of who I am is whole in Christ, my body is weak and easily broken, but my body is not the measure of my wholeness, Christ in me is.
This is right, it is in our giving that we receive, when we lose ourselves we find ourselves, when we are broken we can be filled,when we are poured out wine we can bring the fragrance of Christ to the suffering, when we die to self we can live for Christ, when we are crucified with Christ we can experience His resurrection power. We can be made whole - whole in Christ - not in ourselves. MOM
ReplyDeleteHi Jonathan! I really like your blog. Well done! And thanks for engaging with me on these ideas. I like what you are saying and where you are coming from.
ReplyDeleteHowever, a virtual wholeness is not wholeness. We can say that we are a lot of things in Christ (whole, healed, rich, etc), and there is a sense in which those things might be true metaphorically, but if I am still dying of cancer then I am not healed. And if I am still selfish and self-centered in my relationships then I am not 'whole' in that part of my life. Same if I am still living in a body that will one day die. I think you would agree with me that death throws a serious spanner into claims about wholeness today. Until all of these issues are dealt with in space time reality in us, we cannot say that wholeness has been achieved. We can say that we are on the way, that progress is being made, that God is making me whole. It's just if this (what people claim to have achieved when they say they've been made whole) is what wholeness is, then God have mercy on us. So yes, I agree, Christ has achieved all these things, but we are citizens of space and time and are certainly not experiencing their fullness. I like to think of it as John Stott said some years ago, 'I have been saved. I am being saved. I will be saved.' Because salvation is fundamentally relational, Salvation is ultimately a process.
Thank you for your response! I understand better what you are saying.
ReplyDeletePerhaps Mark 11:24 has a role to play in some of our declarations of "wholeness": "Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours." So, in the spirit of this verse, we declare (as an act of our belief maybe?) that we are whole, even though we know we are not yet whole, we still say so (on the basis of Christ), not to be deceptive or naive but rather as an act of faith of what we know we will recieve. The Holy Spirit being the "deposit", or "gurantee" of that (2 Cor 5:5). Kind-of like when my Dad payed the deposit for my motorbike, I didn't have it yet...but I knew it was mine and I told everyone it was mine although it was still being built in the factory.