Sunday, October 14, 2007

God is Life

I was outside the other night thinking about the law and the Spirit. It was so clear to me how we are to be good. I know that Adam and Eve did not have the law, since the law didn't come until Moses. So they had neither knowledge of good or evil. They had knowledge of God. It was in this Godward gaze that they were good (check out 2 Corinthians 3:18). The law empowers sin. Knowledge of GOOD and evil is to lose a Godward gaze and is now a meward gaze. Thus I get no where, because I have no life in me. It is not the law that has life in itself, but God has life in Himself. A sinner can ACT as good as he wants by observing the law, but that doesn't change the fact that he is a sinner.

Jesus said you will know His followers by their fruit, not their behavior. In other words, it will be natural for them because fruit is natural, and the Spirit produces it, because goodness is from God's Spirit, and it is natural of His Spirit to be good. Struggling to have your behavior change may make you seem good, but it can do nothing to give you life from death. God is life. "In Him was Life, and the Life was the Light of men." The Ten Commandments are nothing more than a shadow of the Reality. God is the life.

2 comments:

Joel Brueseke said...

Amen! Christ hasn't changed us from bad to good... but from dead to living! When we're living the Christ-life, the fruit (which includes "goodness") is natural.

Grace Walker said...

WOW, beautifully said Matthew and Joel, your comment is the icing on the cake!!

Thanks so much,
Sheryl