One: On Knowing the Whole and the Member/The Sameness Within the Body

 On Knowing the Whole and the Member:

The Sameness Within the Body:

It is true that we may know the individual by the whole to which he or she is attached. It is equally true that we may know the whole through the character of the individual. For example, a police officer will look and talk like a police officer. All members of the police whole share the traits of the whole that mark the individuals. For another example, doctors write like doctors. Our demeanor, our actions, the things that come out of our mouths, all mark us and identify us with the greater entity to which we are aligned.

We should know the whole and we should know the individual. We should know each by the other. Within the body whole, there is a sameness of members. Membership is seen in uniformity. Think of the uniformity within the military. It does not matter so much whether they are in the Navy, the Marines, the Army, or the Air Force, despite the fact that each branch has its own distinctive uniform, all of them may be identified by the wearing of a uniform. There is a sameness that identifies the whole. That whole conveys to its individual members the traits and tokens through which we may understand the whole.

Let us, now, turn our attention to spiritual traits. In Christianity, we may understand God by the traits of Christ. We may understand Christ by the traits of Christians. In the old testament, for example, a man of God was identified when he flew into a rage. Think of Samson. When Samson flew into a rage and trashed the enemies of the chosen, it was said that the spirit of God came upon Samson. God was understood by the might seen in one of his servants. Likewise, although not necessarily seen in a rage, the spirit of God came upon David, Elijah, Gideon, Saul, and Jesus. We understand the Son of God simply because we can see with our own eyes, so to speak, the nature of the Father in the son. What did Christ share with men in his teachings? He shared the nature and truth of the Father in him.

Look at the explanation of that nature as the son, himself, explained it for our benefit. John 3:8 “The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.”

It is shown clearly and may be understood without mistake, that the spirit of the Father did not stop when it was shared with the son. The son shared that same spirit with his followers, thus adding to them a sameness, a token by which they may be identified with the greater entity. John 13:34 “A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.” Don't overlook the verse that immediately follows. John 13:35 “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.” The uniform a disciple wears is his love for one another. To see that identifying mark tells us two things at once; first, it tells us that the individual is a disciple of the son of God, and second, it tells us that the trait of the member, love for one another, is the shared nature of the whole. God is love.

Sameness within the whole is the same thing as unity. Synonyms for the word unity include union, integration, amalgamation. I speak of oneness, the whole. It is the kind of oneness that mathematicians speak of when they say that both sides of an equation are equal. There is an equation expressed in the following verse, and both sides of it are the same. 1 Corinthians 3:8 “Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one.”

In Wikipedia, the definition of a peace treaty is this. A peace treaty is an agreement between two or more hostile parties. There is a peace treaty between God and his chosen. Basically, the victor states, I will stand for you as long as you abide by the terms of the treaty. Historically, that has been a roller-coaster ride. To be the chosen or to be the not chosen, each side wears its identifying uniform. In the old covenant, the uniform was a strict adherence to the letter of the law. Well, that did not work out so good. In the new covenant, the uniform is the adoption of the nature of the victor.

When we speak of the difference between a winner and a loser, we may speak in terms of a wall that separates the two. We may point to God and mankind being separated, or we may point to a man and a man being separated. When you can finally reach the last apple and add it to the bag, what we have is the whole plus one, which is the same thing as saying the whole. What kept the last apple from being reached? It was not accessible. It was in another place. Perhaps there was enmity. When two family members disagree, there is no peace. The family is broken. When peace returns, it is because the disagreement has formally been put aside. The following verses explain an important truth for all who believe in God, and some who do not. Ephesians 2:14 “For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us.” Ephesians 2:15 “Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace.” Ephesians 2:16 “And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby.”

Those verses in the book of Ephesians are about a peace treaty between opposing camps. They can indicate the Christian who opposes himself, as in the case of the Apostle Paul's lament that his spirit and his flesh were at war with each other. Equally, those verses can point to the conversion of Jews to Christianity, as in the argument about faith vs works. They can also speak of the inclusion of the lost tribes of Israel back into the fold, as in “other sheep have I that are not of this fold.” And of course, the one body by the cross is the body of Christ who is the new peace treaty between God and mankind.

We see men as different, but the word of God paints a picture of an underlying sameness. There is one God, and every man, woman, and child with a spirit has a piece of God inside. All the differences in mankind are of our own making. In God's eyes, we are the same. There is actually only one difference; either you give your spirit over to God and become one with him, or you withhold your spirit and stand apart. According to the author of the book of Romans, there is one God, one faith, and one justification for both the chosen people of God and the Gentiles. Romans 3:30 “Seeing it is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith.”

How many races do we have in this world? How many religious beliefs and non-beliefs do we know of. How many types of people can we name? God has an overview. God is a spirit, as Jesus explained, and God sees your spirit, the part of you that is Him. Galatians 3:28 “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.”

Just look what we have done to ourselves! What a mess we have made! Yet, God holds out that any one of us can not only be one with God but one with each other. The new covenant in Christ makes that a possibility for the Christian, the Jew, the Muslim, the Atheist. Faith is all it takes. Once we look at ourselves the way God looks at us, we know that the spirit inside us is more the determining factor than anything of our outward fiction. Romans 2:28 “For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh.” Romans 2:29 “But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.”

An old expression states that we are what we eat. We may extend that to include what we drink. When we drink water, we are hydrated. The spirit we have in us, despite opinions to the contrary, comes from God. The spirit we accept is like water, it fits our present form as surely as water fits the cup it is poured into. The Bible expresses the spirit as fluid, something that flows forward, something that spills over. If we incorporate the flesh of Christ, we are Christ. If we incorporate the blood of Christ, we are Christ. And Christ is one with God. Another way to say the above is, when we drink the spirit of Christ, we are Christ. And Christ is God, the whole. Is your leg your body? It is as much your body as your arm or head. The whole includes the members and imbues the members with the whole. 1 Corinthians 12:13 “For by one spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one spirit.”

If two balloons are each filled with helium, then both are helium balloons. They are one. If a Jew and a Gentile both turn to and believe in Christ, then both are one through the shared spirit of faith in Christ, which, by extension, is faith in God. Why? We have followed an example. Jesus was that example of God in man. For any of us to be a man of God, that is to have the spirit of the living God living in us, we must incorporate the spirit of Christ. When Jesus said that he was the way, what we must understand is this; in order to go where Jesus went, we must be Jesus, by which I mean, we must be God in man. Ephesians 2:18 “For through him we both have access by one spirit unto the Father.”

We cannot afford to see Christ only as that one man who died on the cross and came back to life. Christ is a whole that includes many individuals of the same spirit. Think about spirit for a moment. What is spirit? Spirit is what we get from God. It is the part of us that is not the flesh. It is the part of us that makes us living, thinking individuals. Do not make the mistake to think that the spirit of faith in Christ is different from the spirit of Christ. If you have faith, it is because Christ has faith. His spirit in you is his faith in you. Christ has faith because God has faith. The nature of God is passed to us through his son. Can you be one with Christ apart from Christ? That is an impossibility. You have the spirit of the one who said, I and my Father are one. 1 Corinthians 12:12 “For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ.”

I wrote earlier that when we drink water, we are hydrated. The human body, according to science is seventy percent water. That is like saying that when we drink water, we are one with the water and the water is one with us. The water can be found in each member of the body. That pretty much says that the water is both the body and the member. Is any part of that formula out of place? I think not. 1 Corinthians 12:18 “But now hath God set the members every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased him.”