|
|
|
|
|
|
AN INTERACTIVE SUMMARY OF THE BROTHERS OF CHRIST
The following paragraphs are presented as a summary of The Brothers of Christ. The review questions are designed to facilitate a clear comprehension of the thesis statements contained in that document. Click on the answer of your choice to determine the level of progress you are making in understanding the major points presented in this summary. For your convenience a link to the entire document is provided at the end of this lesson.
When we discuss predestination we are not implying that some people are destined to be saved and others lost. The truth is, God wants all people to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.
But the idea of the elect, the chosen, appears too often in the Bible to be ignored. We conclude from this that God’s Israel, those who are chosen to be a royal priesthood, a holy nation, indeed were so appointed at the time God created the heavens and the earth. God has accomplished many purposes by bringing forth Israel, His Church of the Old and New Testaments.
This is not to say a member of the elect cannot be deceived or actually remove himself or herself from God’s purposes. The New Testament includes several severe warnings, including the whole book of Hebrews. A member of the elect will be removed from Christ if he or she does not bear the fruit of Christ’s image. Jesus stated this and no amount of hedging by today’s ministers of the Gospel is going to change what the Lord has said.
God desires that all be saved (although some will refuse to obey God), and is creating a governing priesthood who will assist every person who calls to the Lord for help, that he or she might learn the righteous ways of the Lord.
Let us think for a moment about the term "salvation."
The traditional understanding is that to be saved is to go to Heaven when we die. This interpretation of salvation is not found in either the Old Testament or the New Testament.
The primary meaning of "saved" is to not be destroyed in the Day of God’s wrath.
But what are we saved to?
We are rescued from the clutches of Satan that we might enter the plan of redemption, of salvation; that we might enter the Kingdom, the rule, of God.
God has created us that He might find joy in us. He cannot find joy in us when we bear the image of Satan in our behavior, just as a human parent cannot find joy in his or her child when the son or daughter renounces the values and ways of the parent.
We are so self-centered we view salvation as God’s way of making us happy, of bringing us to a kind of fairy land where we will have all we desire. This concept is nearly totally unscriptural.
Review Question#1. Please click on the answer you think is correct.
Identify the primary meaning of "saved":
a. to go to Heaven when we die.
b. to not be destroyed in the Day of God’s wrath.
The Divine salvation has as its purpose the removal of God’s children from union with Satan, from the image and behavior of Satan, and the bringing of them into union with God through Christ, into the image and behavior of God.
God created man in His image. Man is not in God’s image when he is finding survival and security in the world; when he is obeying the lusts and passions of his flesh and soul; or when he is acting according to his self-will instead of according to God’s guidance.
God cannot find joy in His children when they are disobedient.
Therefore God is creating a called-out people, a church, a governing priesthood, that they might be able to train the members of the nations who have asked God to save them. God’s eternal Kingdom is described in the final two chapters of the Book of Revelation, and consists of the saved nations and of God’s priests who will govern them.
The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. (Revelation 21;24)
No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever. (Revelation 22:3-5)
God’s servants will govern for eternity the nations of those who are saved.
We understand, therefore, when we employ the term "saved," or "salvation," we are not referring to being transported to Paradise, we are speaking of being received into eternal life in the Kingdom of God. We are signifying that the human being has been accepted into the program of deliverance from sin and self-will.
Review Question #2. Please click on the answer you think is correct.
According to the final two chapters of the Book of Revelation God’s eternal Kingdom consists of:
a. saved nations and God’s priests who will govern them.
b. people who live in mansions and walk on streets of gold.
And we know in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. (Romans 8:28,29)
What an astonishing passage! Not only is it astonishing, it is a defining passage. It sets forth the goal of God’s working in us.
Notice nothing is said about going to Heaven!
"Called according to his purpose." The idea of called, of chosen, appears, as I have said, too many times in the Bible to be ignored.
The calling depends on God’s foreknowledge. In some manner unknown to us, God knew His elect from the beginning of the world.
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love He predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— To the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. (Ephesians 1:3-6)
"Chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight."
"He also predestined us to be conformed."
Nothing is said about being predestined to be saved. Nothing is said about being predestined to go to Heaven.
The members of God’s royal priesthood, the brothers of the Lord Jesus, have been predestined to be conformed.
To be conformed is to be changed until we are similar to someone else.
We have been predestined to be conformed to the likeness of God’s Son: first, in inner appearance and behavior; then, in outer appearance at His return to earth.
In other words, we are to be made in God’s image—the original Divine fiat.
After we have received the blood atonement, have repented, and have been baptized in water. we still are not in the image of Christ.
After we have been baptized with the Holy Spirit and have spoken in tongues, we still are not in the image of Christ, in the image of God. Pentecostal, Charismatic people still seek survival and security in the world spirit; still yield to the lusts and passions of the soul and body, to the sinful nature; still live in their self-will instead of the Person and will of God. For the most part, we are not in God’s image. We are not bringing to God the perfect joy He is seeking.
Receiving Christ as our Savior, and being baptized in water and with the Holy Spirit, brings us to the beginning of the plan of salvation. From that point forward we are to be conformed each day to the way in which Jesus Christ thinks, speaks, and acts. This conformation to the image of Christ is, for the elect, what salvation actually is.
Review Question #3. Please click on the answer you think is correct.
To what have the members of God’s royal priesthood, the brothers of the Lord Jesus been "predestined"?
b. to be saved and to go to Heaven.
To open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me. (Acts 25:18)
The reason we are turned from the power of Satan to God is that our sins may be forgiven and we may gain a place among those who are set aside as holy by faith in Christ. Can you see that nothing is said about going to Heaven to make our eternal residence there? The goal is to be forgiven that we may join the ranks of those who have holy fellowship with Christ and the Father.
Why are we made similar to God’s Son in our behavior? It is so Christ may be the Firstborn among many brothers.
Christ was not created by God, He was born of God. It is true also that the members of God’s elect are not created by God, they are born of God in their inward nature. The new creation in us has actually been born of God. Otherwise we would not be true brothers of Christ.
A father may create a piece of furniture. This is not the same thing as giving birth to a son. The furniture can never be part of the father no matter how much work he puts into forming it.
Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— Children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God. (John 1:12,13)
We genuinely have been born of God just as Christ has been born of God. Christ is the First of many brothers to be born of God.
Does Jesus Christ remain Lord of all? Indeed He does. Are we diminishing His glory and authority? Not at all! We merely are teaching what the Scripture states clearly. We have a higher destiny than we may have imagined!
But are we really born of God? Yes, in our inward nature we really are born of God. Our body will be redeemed by adoption if we sow to the Holy Spirit during our lifetime. But the inner man has truly been born of the Divine Seed. Otherwise we would not truly be Christ’s brothers. To be Christ’s brothers we have to have the same Father.
For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God. (I Peter 1:23)
Perhaps the clearest exposition of what man is, in particular man as the brother of Jesus Christ, is found in the second chapter of the Book of Hebrews.
But there is a place where someone has testified: "What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him? You made him a little lower than the angels; you crowned him with glory and honor and put everything under his feet." In putting everything under him, God left nothing that is not subject to him. Yet at present we do not see everything subject to him. (Hebrews 2:6-8)
According to the eternal Scriptures, God has put all the works of His hands under the feet of man. The reason the Lord Jesus has authority over all the works of God is that He is Man, not because He is God. The Scripture cannot be broken in any manner.
Review Question #4. Please click on the answer you think is correct.
To be Christ’s brothers we have:
b. to go to Heaven where He is.
In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering. Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers. (Hebrews 2:10,11)
Christ and we are of the same family. We have been born of woman, then have been born again of God, and one day will be declared to be a son of God on the basis of being raised from the dead. Therefore Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers.
How utterly marvelous!
I think the Scripture lifts us to the place where we are genuine brothers of the Lord, and at the same time exalts Christ as the One in whom dwells all the Fullness of the Father.
The Bible certainly makes a distinction between Christ and the Father. Christ always is the obedient Son of God, and our perfect Example. If Christ were one of three Gods, or one of three Expressions of the one God, He could not be our example. We never would truly be His brothers. He always would be different in kind from us. In this instance, we never could really be members of the Bride of the Lamb. In God’s economy, like always marries like. God does not approve of mixtures.
I think the Scriptures will bear out that once we have been born of God, Christ is not different in kind from us. He certainly is exalted above us in majesty and authority; He was from the beginning and created all things; God has made Him Lord and Christ. But He is not different in kind. If He is, then the second chapter of the Book of Hebrews does not mean what it is stating.
We are not bringing Christ down. We are bringing the other sons of God up to the Throne, where they are seated with Christ in the heavenlies.
And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, (Ephesians 2:6)
Review Question#5. Please click on the answer you think is correct.
Once we have been born of God:
a. the next step is to wait until we die so we can go to Heaven.
b. Christ is no longer different in kind from us.
Return to Interactive Summary Study Series Main Page
PROCEED TO LESSON FOURTEEN
Source Document:
Copyright © 2002 Trumpet Ministries, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers.
|
Copyright © 1997-2001 by Trumpet Ministries, Inc. / The Word of Righteousness Author of the "Words of Righteousness" - Dr. Robert B. Thompson Web Page design by True Word Designs
ANSWER GUIDE
Return to Segment One
Incorrect, try #2 again. Return to Segment Two
Return to Segment Three
Return to Segment Four
Return to Segment Five
