Perhaps you recognize our title from Hamlet’s soliloquy. Hamlet was musing within himself as to whether it was better to be alive or dead as was now the fair Ophelia. The problem in Hamlet’s mind was that if dead, then one might enter into dreaming.
To sleep: perchance to dream: aye, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil.
We have a similar problem. Our problem is also a life or death issue. But our issue is just the opposite from that of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. We are now an eternal people walking in condemned flesh. Life on God’s level is within our fleshly jar of clay. This is the very purpose of our new spiritual creation, birthed within us by our living God. God supplies eternal spiritual Life through the blood of an everlasting covenant in our condemned, dead body.
“To Be,” for us, is to put our animal flesh to death while nurturing our New Life in Jesus. His Life is reigning over our condemned flesh!
“Not to be” no longer exists for us! We are now eternally sealed, proclaimed “children of God” with an inheritance resting in Jesus and God Himself. We are called to exercise resurrection power, allowing Jesus to reign in our jar of clay. This is our glory, glorifying God within us.
Our Glorious God and Jesus our Savior created us with this free choice, a FAITH Choice in our hand effecting the totality of our eternal Life.
“For God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.” – 2Corinthians 4:6-7.
Pause a moment! Unlock these two verses dealing directly with our Faith choices. The word “faith” is not mentioned here, what is mentioned is the “surpassing power” belonging to God and not to us. This directly refers to our faith. God’s power is what our faith is all about! God’s power is linked to our faith! Using God’s resurrection power is vital in our God relationship!
Look at faith as a pair of bookends. Faith rests on the foundation of our resurrected Jesus; this is God’s “Treasure” and our possession! “We have this treasure in jars of clay.” Clearly, we are talking about Jesus’ resurrected Life within our mortal flesh. How did the Life of Jesus come to “dwell” in our mortal flesh? Answer, “For by grace you have been saved through faith ...”
Our first faith bookend is put in place by our decision to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, being saved! When we make this faith-choice, by this act of our will, we are created new in Jesus Christ, sealed by the Holy Spirit receiving the Treasure of God’s divine Life within our “jar of clay” … and set apart for His divine purpose!
Our second faith bookend is put in place by the same act of our will but includes allowing our Treasure to be manifested in our mortal flesh. It may be by the new sparkle in our eye or the smile of joy on our face telling the world we are now whole and complete deep inside our soul! We are justified in the first faith bookend, sanctified in the second.
We edited a sanctification piece published this past January, GN 01-15-20SRb, attached. We distinguished in this piece between “Eternal Sanctification” and “Temporal Sanctification.” We are eternally sanctified (justified) in the first bookend and temporally sanctified in the second bookend!
We are both justified and “eternally sanctified,” in our first bookend because we are created righteous, being born again in Christ Jesus. Our second bookend is a combination of being created righteous and set apart in Christ Jesus for God’s intended purpose. Being righteous and set apart for God’s intended purpose are both aspects of sanctification; they are in place by both bookends.
Justification and sanctification are possible by redemption. Jesus paid the price making us His own personal possession, setting us free from the bondage of sin. This is redemption! Our two bookends are in place because of Christ’s redemption. Redemption, justification and sanctification allows our Treasure to be richer and richer growing “much fruit” in our mortal flesh.
Our faith unlocks Jesus’ resurrection power as we spiritually exercise, exposing our new LIFE thru flesh! Our FAITH is in need of exercising, both in us and thru our flesh. Spiritually growing occurs just like physical growing, they both need exercise. Exercising faith is the best way to make it part of our normal spiritual LIFE.
Our Faith bookends are all about personal choices. Our faith-choices determine spiritual strength by releasing power from our Treasure. Faith and grace work in tandem growing us more fully into Jesus. This is all about relationship to our Father in Jesus, listening to His voice, and making faith-choices. Grace is God’s mercy to us and faith is our response to His power and grace.
Faith-choices grow LIFE itself, growing in glory and holiness. Our growing faith bookends increasingly expose our inside Treasure. Our bookends grow larger consuming grace and enlarging our capacity, growing more and more grace!
The magnificence of God’s Treasure grows within us as we grow our faith. It is a personal relationship between each one of us with our Lord Jesus! We must keep our relationship active and healthy growing in grace and knowledge of Jesus. It is Christ in us and us in Christ.
“For God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”
The Light shining out of darkness is original creation. God separated the Light from the darkness, creating the first day. This same shining out of darkness, is now Light shining in our heart. The LIGHT is the glory of Christ Jesus just as it was before the sun was put in our heavens.
We now have within us the knowledge of God’s glory. Faith bookend number one is in place. The Treasure itself is Christ in us, we also being in Christ. The resurrected Life of Jesus Himself is His glory in us. The glory of God has been placed in our mortal flesh so that we can experience its power. It is now our divine privilege to participate in the nature of God. Faith bookend number two is also in place, both justification and sanctification!
We, who have been born again in Christ Jesus, are now living in judged flesh but through our living Treasure within us; we can now give our new created LIFE visibility even in our condemned flesh. Do I hear an AMEN!
God created a spirit-soul containing our Treasure, this is the LIGHT out of darkness; it is contained inside of our flesh but not restrained inside our “jar of clay.” Life comes from out of God’s new creation giving Life to and thru our flesh! It requires our active faith; it requires faith-choices to make it visible!
If we do not apply faith to our existing natural life, we end up living a natural life and calling it our new Life in Jesus. Do you think this might make God happy or angry?
This is why we read in Micah about God’s judgment on both Samaria and Judah in Jerusalem. They were substituting idols in place of their living God who chose them to be His people on earth. They are examples of no faith! We are not only accountable for our fruit but also for our lack of fruit. The key is faith!
There is a relationship between self-choices and faith-choices. Faith-choices typically deny self-choices and consume grace. While we may be in this condition of self-choices, God is still working within us and has not turned his back on a lamb who is straying. He that hath begun a good work in us will continue until the day of Christ because we have His grace. What so ever is not of Faith is sin. God’s glory grows within us as we make faith-choices instead of self-choices.
Our choices create two levels of life for the believer in Christ Jesus. The High level of Life is the one we are discussing; these are our faith-choices. The lower level of life is one depending upon self. Even though we are born again, we can slip backward and begin relying upon self even while acknowledging our redemption. The scripture is clear, once we are born of God we cannot become unborn but we can walk in God’s mercy and grace without walking in His resurrection power.
The kind of faith the Bible talks about is our relationship between the Creator God and His creation to whom is also given His Life, not just a high form of animal life but Life with a capital “L,” the Treasure itself!
Biblical faith is rooted in God Himself. It is not about reciting Bible passages and arguing theology. Exterior knowledge cannot replace an internal relationship. Capital “L” life flows out of God Himself into His own born again child.
The “L” kind of Life is newly created Life, a new birth. We are actually created brand new spiritually in Jesus containing the glory of God. We are equipped in the power of God awaiting our new faith to unlock our new LIFE, glorifying God. Jesus said it best in His prayer to His Father and ours: “I have made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them”
We have first hand knowledge of God’s glory and power. It is in us because, we are in our Lord and Savior Christ Jesus. We also have the record of God, which is His Holy Word, the Bible! We have the witness of both history and the witness of His working presence within our own soul! We have no idea what a glorious, spectacular and astonishing event has occurred by our new birth!!! We are now standing in His grace, the grace of our Creator God!!!
The power of God is limitless. Jesus Himself suggested to us the power we have. Jesus is saying if we have the faith the size of a mustard seed we could say to a mulberry tree “Be uprooted and planted in the sea” and it would obey. But our faith is deficient and we are lacking because of it. We have power to “move mountains” but it requires more faith then we have yet expereinced!
The major inhibitor to our faith is actually our unbelief. We say we believe and to a degree we do but the nature of our own new identity requires us to take a believing faith, already in our mind, and accept it deep within our heart. We need to move the truth in our mind deeper, deep enough into our heart so that eternal reality penetrates decisions we make. Our belief, our faith, needs to extend so deep we are compelled to live in nothing less than total commitment, in complete dependence upon the Lord Jesus Christ in everything.
Our faith is also limited by boundaries! Boundaries created by our lack of faith? Yes, but we are accustomed to understanding things that are measured by form, fit and function. Everything we do and think about is within natural limits. Faith is not, it has no limits since faith is sourced in God Himself and not in us.
But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.
When we experience something outside our measured perspective, we begin to image what could be and ask what is beyond our own personal perspective. The truth for those in Christ Jesus is, everything is possible! We are in the love and mercy of the living God who is also creator of LIFE. His Life is our TREASURE alive within us to teach us who He is and who we are because we are in Him! In Christ Jesus everything is possible; it is within our faith capacity because we are in the Creator God but the “surpassing power belongs to God and not to us!”
We become so narrow in our thinking and faith because we live within the boundaries of natural life. When we actually touch and feel life outside these boundaries then our life is quickened! The reality of who we are in Jesus also becomes alive when we open the door of our heart to His reality instead of simply living within the natural reality of flesh. Read Revelation 3:20 again. Our Lord Jesus is in us, knocking on our heart’s door!
We are accustomed to walking under trees growing 30 to 50 feet high; we begin to see things in this natural perspective. This is normal experience. It is hard for us to grasp a tree 300 feet tall with a bottom base 18 feet wide. This sounds like fiction, like an unreal wonderland written only in a story book. But even when we see a picture of it, it is not as real as when we walk in its shadow and breathe in the air from its roots and limbs.
Faith is our doorway opening us to what is beyond our finite conception and our imagination’s capacity to explore. Just seeing a picture of the Redwoods is not the same as a stroll under their shade smelling their presence.
Faith is not fiction! God is a real living person. Jesus lived on earth and died a death of crucifixion; Jesus rose from the dead, spoke and walked with hundreds of people in His resurrection body. He gave to us His own Holy Spirit on a day when every man assembled in Jerusalem hear their own language spoken. This resurrection power is what is encased within our faith. This resurrection power of faith that moves mountains and mulberry trees is contained within every believer who has been born again and created spiritually brand new!
“To Be” requires our faith to be operative. It is not an external thing to be manipulated by horizontal relationships, people to people. If we do not have an intimate vertical relationship, with God Himself through our Jesus, then our horizontal effect, our behavior in this natural culture, is not empowered by our faith. It can become a false idol and under God’s judgement. Yes, it is that simple and that serious! We are accountable for God’s grace given to us. Faith is our response to His grace. Faith is our response to the TREASURE residing in every person whom God has declared to be eternally righteous. What are we doing with His grace? Is it private and personal only?
Faith Rule No. 1 rests in our reality of God’s righteousness and truth found only in Jesus, who is our Treasure! This is an eternal provision of our new creation in Christ. This vertical relationship is based upon a knowing and an acceptance of God’s grace, Then our faith will be effectively reaching horizontally into relationships with others and the world.
Faith Rule No. 2 rests on Faith Rule No. 1. We need an active living connection in God so there are no power disconnects from our heavenly source. God’s line to us is solid but our receptor needs to be clean and operative within the love and grace line we are plugged into. This means knowing and accepting all the above. This means constant contact, an intimate relationship with our indwelling Treasure which is Jesus Himself!
Faith Rule No. 2 has a horizontal outreach requiring the same love component connecting with others. Before we can be effective in our horizontal outreach to others, we must already have Faith Rule No. 1 fully operational.
This kind of faith is not in our modern dictionary. It is the kind of faith granted to us because we are in Christ Jesus. It is unbounded and limitless because we are now children in the family of the Living God. This kind of faith derives its power out of the reality of who we are because we are in Christ Jesus. We have become an eternal being who will be above angels and judge mankind!
We don’t need to make the trip to California to visit God’s Forest of Faith. It lies within each of us becoming actively alive, exploring Jesus Himself through His Word, walking with Him in His reality, learning love, depending on His mercy and power … growing Faith!
It is God’s grace; God Himself is enabling our faith. Only as we grow in grace do we equip ourselves into a deeper faith. Our element is responding in truth to who He is; our response has to be in faith.
Whatsoever is not of faith is sin! Do all to the glory of God because without faith it is impossible to please God! God’s glory in us is evidence of our faith. Our ability to grasp grace, our ability to consume grace is key to our capacity to move mountains or mulberry trees.
Sometimes we need to walk a little bit physically before seeing spiritually. Pray to your Father in heaven! Take a walk of faith in your neighborhood! You might find a forest of faith without any gigantic redwoods at all. God can show you something up close and personal that is your own Giant Redwood, something bigger than a mere tree. When we see how huge a gigantic tree can be in our own life, we can begin to understand the limit of our own boundaries and the limitlessness of God who is our indwelling Treasure.
“Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lively, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” -Philippians 4:8.