Eternal Intentions: The Real Jesus | Faith in God: 1 Cor. 2:5 | The Deep Things of God: 1 Cor. 2:7-12

I want to tell you about Jesus. He is a Jesus you may not recognize. One who loves you not because you're good or because you do the right thing, but one who just loves you - period. He doesn't want "you" to clean up your act "...or you'll go to hell." This Jesus, the real Jesus, the Jesus of the Bible, the Jesus who is God wants to clean you up. He knows you cant' do it. What He mainly wants is to overwhelm you so much with His Love that you then genuinely love Him back. He wants Love to come full circle, as it was intended - to continually flow and in eternity. He does want you to be different, but it's not like you've heard before.

Potential; it's all about your eternal potential as a person. It was by Him and through Hom that you were created. He knows fully what you were created to be and to have. This is what grieves Him. He knows fully what you can be and He know fully how far you are from that. This is what else he knows: He know that He is the way that has been provided for you to once again become what you were created to be. Transformation, not "conformation." We're not talking about conforming your outward behaviour to some set of rules or even "principles." What we're talking about - what God is talking about through Jesus is being "transformed" from within into a different person. That God Himself would come and live in you becoming on with your spirit and proceed from there to transform the rest of you into the fully formed child of God you were eternally intended to be.

Eternal Intentions: The Real Jesus | Faith in God: 1 Cor. 2:5 | The Deep Things of God: 1 Cor. 2:7-12 | Top of the page

1 Cor. 2:5
"...so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God."

That we might not put trust in some wisdom that comes from something temporal, something which is not connected with His eternal life in us. For when we do so, we in a sense, separate ourselves from Him. If gain our life and the wisdom for living that life outside Him, then what use is there for us (at least in our perception of it) in having any contact with God? Ween if we had had such "contact" at one time, if we begin thinking that we have some valuable wisdom in ourselves which has come to us independent of God, then we have begun the suspension of our dependence, our useful and fruitful connection, our relationship with Him. So, it is important that our faith not rest in our ability to "figure it out" or to answer all the questions that arise, but in Him and only in Him.

1 Cor. 2:7-9
"...we speak of God's wisdom, mysterious, hidden... eye has not seen, and ear has not heard... what God has prepared for those who love Him."

It would seem we are hopelessly in the dark - that our eyes are closed to the deep things of God, even to the things He has prepared for us. "Seems" is as far at that goes, and unless we continue to see it this way, we can move along.

1 Cor. 2:10
"...this God has revealed to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit scrutinizes everything, even the deep things of God."

"Even the deep things of God." A statement worthy of deep conderation. And what Spirit is it that knows these things?

"...no one knows what pertains to God except the Spirit of God."

The life's breath of God Himself. That same Spirit which has been given to us, who lives in us, and is in fact, a part of us. We are told in another place in this same letter that our own spirit and His Spirit are one.

"...whoever is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with Him." -1 Cor. 6:17

1 Cor. 2:12
"We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit that is from God, so that we may inderstan the things freely given us by God."

Are we given His own Spirit that we should remain in darkness about who He is or what His plans are for us? No, it is quite clear that the Spirit is given us that we may be able to understand even the deep things of God. We can, with the Spirit of God in us, understand all that is freely given to us. And what is it that is not FREELY given? ...Nothing... Nothing! All is given freely and it is He who gives it, and He who tells us that we must receive it as "freely given" in order to truly conprehend and fully experience and transmit all that He gives. It is the very Spirit of Grace who teaches us Grace. It is He who transmits to us the gift and gives us the ability to fully grasp what it is we are being given. You see, this term "freely given" is not just a hap-hazard choice of words. It is a necessary element in our right comprehension of the whole or our salvation. If, indeed, what we are understanding is something "worked for" or in some way attained by striving, then our understanding is not by the Spirit of God. For what His life's breath gives us to understand is only that which is true in eternal reality - and that is, that all that He gives, He gives freely, out of His nature of Love. And to the merely human mind, this makes no sense. Understood without the enlightening power, the transforming power of the Holy Spirit, it seems to be nonsense and unjust.