In recent months I've spent considerable time meditating on the subject of the blessing of the Lord.
It maketh rich, and He addeth no sorrow.
It includes health, wealth, inheritance, land, primary produce, gold, lots of children, house, and strong nationhood, etc.
I've also had some questions about prosperity:
1. Does the expectation to prosper conflict with the lifestyle of Jesus and of Paul?
In answer, Jesus said to me:
"If more people lived like me, the nation would be more blessed and there would be more blessed nations".
In other words, living the lifestyle of Jesus can result in prosperity, not always the opposite.
And Paul was a follower of Christ, therefore following Paul can also lead to wealth.
Jesus had to suffer the death of the cross - so we don't have to. We don't have to die at age 33. He will satisfy us with long life.
He came not to destroy the Law, but to fulfill the Law. Since He didn't destroy the Law, that means He didn't destroy the blessing of the Law either, because the blessing is part of the Law.
Since He came to fulfill the Law, that means He fulfills the blessing of the Law also, because the blessing is part of the Law. He never abolished our Covenant right to expect to prosper. He came to confirm it - to confirm the promises made to the fathers. He came to vouchsafe the blessing to Israel - and we Gentiles are grafted-in.
2. Is there somehow more sacrifice required of disciples under the New Covenant than was expected of Jews under the Old Covenant?
Is the New Covenant somehow a less material covenant than theblessings promised in the Old Covenant?
Persecution was a possibility under the Old Covenant just as much as it is a certainty under the New Covenant. Many Old Testament saints suffered too, despite the covenantal promises.
But neither Covenant deliberately imposes poverty.
We are more free now, because Christ already made the once-for-all sacrifice. All we have to do now is believe.
The Law points to Christ. Therefore if a person believes Moses, he will follow Christ. And if he is persecuted for Christ's sake or if he sufers for Christ, then his sacrifice would be as much a consequence of his former allegiance to the Law as it is a consequence of his allegiance to Christ - because it was the Law that led Him to Christ.
So the blessing under the Law was not intrisically any more material than it will be under the New Covenant. In Paul's Jewish mind, inner spirituality and external social life are inseparable.
Jesus came to deliver from the curse of the Law. Judgment was due to those who broke the Law - how much more to those who neglect so great a salvation. So Jesus didn't come to remove the possibility of blessing, rather, He came to redeem from the certainty of the curse. Jerusalem could have avoided their fall if they'd believed in Jesus.
The Law, the Old Testament, the New Testament and even pre-Law times each preached the coming of the Lord with wrath, judgment and reward.
The Law and the Gospel both focus on God, on faith, on love, on hope. Both admitted that the godly may suffer persecution on behalf of the elect, like Elijah and Paul.
Both testaments admit times of peace, like what David and Solomon experienced; and in the New Testament, Paul said to pray for peace (I Timothy 2:1-8). Notice that Paul states why we should pray for political peace - because God wants all men to come unto the knowledge of the truth. That is quite similar to why God wanted peace for them under the Old Covenant. Paul slotted the fact and the function of his apostleship into this:
(Apostleship + peaceful government = spread of Gospel)
We can expect an answer to such a prayer, or else Paul wouldn't have exhorted us to pray for it!
Therefore we can expect the same and greater national blessings under the New Covenant that they were promised under the Old Covenant - along with persecutions. And as in the Old Covenant, our focus in the New Covenant remains the unseen, heavenly things, where Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father; we still live for the unseen, we are still motivated by the unseen, in the same way that they were under the Old Covenant. But with greater freedom now!!
Paul still encouraged people to work, that they may have to give. "Be not weary in well doing," he said.
We don't live in a state of diminished expectation; in a state of any less actualization than they did under the Law. We live in more! We live in a better hope, but not in less actualization than they. Without us they were not made perfect. Even we wait for that which is perfect to come. So both they waited, and we wait. Since waiting is not exclusive to the New Covenant, neither is the expectation of being blessed now. The nation can be blessed now. And yet, it's nothing like what we will see at the resurrection and the coming kingdom!
Did Israel have the "kingdom of God" under the Law? In a sense yes (I Chronicles 29:23) "Solomon sat upon the throne of the Lord". Well if he sat upon the throne of the Lord, it means he sat in God's kingdom, doesn't it? A throne implies a kingdom. And yet they were still in a sense waiting for the Kingdom of God.
Do we, through the Gospel, now inherit the Kingdom of God? We can experience Christ's rulership in Gentile nations similar to what David and Solomon experienced (Romans 15:12). We can also enter the Kingdom in a real way, unlike in the Old Covenant. And yet in a sense we still wait for the coming Kingdom.
Under both covenants, there was a sense of having the Kingdom already, and also a sense of still waiting for it. We are nearer to it now, we are freer, we have more power, we have a foretaste of glory, and we are real partakers of the Holy Ghost!
Therefore the blessing of the nations now, under the Gospel economy, can be equal to and greater than what was promised under the Old Covenant - with persecutions, and subject to the same qualifiers that applied under the Old Covenant.
Some of the qualifiers:
David had to go to war; Solomon didn't.
Israel spoiled the Egyptians; Elisha said, "Is this a time to receive?..."
David was chased by Saul; Nehemiah said, "Shall such a man as I flee?"
David prospered and caused the nation to prosper; Jeremiah was put in a dungeon and pronounced deportation upon the nation, and he himself became subject to the occupying nation with regard to where he would live.
For everything there is a time.
The lifestyle of Jesus and of Paul does not conflict with prosperity - it procures it. It procures it for God and for the brethren, eternally - even if you have to make sacrifices and die in the process. Some men of faith in the Old Testament had to die too.
Our's is not a lesser contract than the Old. It is a better one, far better, even with regard to prosperity and nationhood. The core values of the New Testament lifestyle are no different to the core values of the Old Testament - which is love (the New Commandment) which fulfills the Law. Therefore since they had the promise of prosperity, wealth and health - this promise is yes, and amen in Christ unto the glory of God by us.
Paul's choices were morally no different, and his priorities came from the same values that they held under the Old Testament. (Remember, Paul was actually an Old Testament young man, originally!)
So don't think the Old Testament promises are annulled or destroyed. They are fulfilled! Since Jesus came not to destroy but to fulfil the Law, then this includes the blessing (of the Law), not only the commandments contained in ordinances!
In each of the New Covenant, the Old Covenant and the period before the Old Covenant, the same values existed: faith, hope and love. None of these three values takes away in any way from the promise of health, healing and prosperity. These three values have the same promise in every dispensation.
God still wishes above all things that you, his beloved, prosper and be in health even as your soul prospers.
The prosperity that is due to faith, hope and love in not negatively affected by the introduction of the second covenant. In fact, the likelihood of it is increased under the New, because it is based on better promises. And we still look forward in hope to the coming Kingdom.
Everything in Matthew 10:16-42 is true, but the apostles did appeal to law in their defence (Isaiah 8:20); Paul also demanded his civil rights, and appealed (Acts 16:37; 22:25; 25:11). Pennsylvania was a 'holy experiment'. Australia was an achievement.
Go and "teach all nations" Jesus commanded. Who knows if the result of teaching the nations would not be the establishment of the Kingdom of God in a political sense? Social life and spiritual life are inseparable in Paul's mind, being the Jew that he is.
To preach the Gospel among the nations, you have to live among them. If you live among them, you have the right to carry on a business among them. The business is not aimed at gaining a monopoly over the people so as to put them down. It is to help you to raise them up! It's ok to expect to receive some profit for your work. Service, at a profit.
Jesus said you may be welcomed, and if not, to leave.
The motive of our work there must be to honour God, to love, to serve, not to be greedy, not to pud down, to introduce Christ's Law, not our own or another man's. Take the Law of Christ to the nations: grace and truth. Take the commandment of love, which is the fulfilling of the Law.
Jesus commanded them to go and preach the Gospel (good news); teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you; be wise as serpents, harmless as doves. Take the Law - the royal law of love.
In the process of preaching this message, who is to say that new nations won't be the result; or that a new political and legal system won't be adopted; or even that new people could begin to dominate in new lands, regardless of race or status or inheritance? This could be like colonizing, only with the royal law of love.
"God lifts up and puts down".
"The upright shall have dominion over them in the morning" (Psalm 49:14).
Is the "morning" restricted to mean the second coming?
It means the second coming, but the day brightens even before the sun is seen over the horizon. In Psalm 90 "morning" is given the opposite meaning - so its meaning doesn't necessarily need to be restricted to mean the last day. Those who are still living have dominion over the already dead.
Taking the Gospel is taking a Law, a testimony, acting as a witness; it is a teaching, an announcement, a proclamation, a preaching, it is good news, it is heraldic.
The "signs" that follow it, done by the Lord, are additional legal testimonies to the point of Law we are announcing, namely - the remission of sins in His name through the blood of the Cross (Iaiah 8:16,18).
They proved from the Scriptures that Christ is the Saviour.
Not the terms "bind up" and "seal". Jesus used "bind" and "loose". He makes lawyers out of all of us! Lawyers proclaiming emancipation, the acceptable year of the Lord, the year of Jubilee, the remission of sins, grace and truth - because of the blood.
I wonder if "bind" means to put in writing, so to speak; and if "loose" means to unseal?
It would be good to study:
- The values of the Kingdom - righteousness, peace & joy in the Holy Ghost
- The Gospel - Jesus saves, heals, baptizes with the Holy Ghost, coming King
- The things Jesus commanded (the new commandment of love)
Paul was a follower of Christ and he told us to follow him. He told us to put on Christ.
It's the way to live!
By adopting Paul's and Jesus' lifestyle, you will lose nothing that you weren't going to keep anyway, had you stayed under the Old economy.
Instead, you will eternally gain everything that the Law promised, and more!
Living the Paul way, the Jesus way - which is the way of love, the way of the cross - you have nothing to lose (in comparison to what was available under the Law) and everything to gain.
No comments:
Post a Comment