Colossians 2:9-10

“For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.”

Isn’t this a stunning correlation? I absolutely love the ESV’s translation here, using the same idea of being ‘filled’ with something to describe Jesus’ oneness with God. His being of God. Then, our own fullness in Christ.

Christ was God in man form. All of God dwelled inside the man. Now, as followers and believers in Jesus, we now experience a filling of our own. We are filled by Christ in the Holy Spirit.

How could that not give you chills?

I’ve been thinking this morning about our access to God. I take it for granted. Praying openly without thinking about how incredible it is that I am able to simple speak to God. That I’m not immediately swallowed up because of my sin.

There is a Catholic notion of the tabernacle. It’s a space where the Catholic church places the eucharist—what Catholics believe to be the actually body of Christ used during communion. The tabernacle can only be accessed by a priest and it is treated as holy ground. This is a concept borrowed from the Jewish concept of the same name.

God commanded Moses, in excruciating detail, just how to build the tabernacle. Once a year could the high priest enter into holiest of grounds. It’s even said that a rope would be tied to the ankle of the priest who went in, just in case he was struck dead for some reason, they would be able to drag his body out, since no one else would be able to enter.

But the Catholic sect of Christianity seems to have a corporate denial of the complete message of the Gospel. The tabernacle is among the traditions eradicated because of the fulfilling work of Christ. We are all priests and we all have full access to God, to the holiest places, because of Christ.

Christ became the true high priest, he entered the holiest of places, bore all the wrath due to mankind, not with the blood of animals, but with his own all sufficient blood and once and for all removed the curtain that kept us out. Not to mention, by drenching us in his own blood, we are now protected from the wrath that would lash out and destroy us should we approach on our own.

Hebrews 9:11-12

When Christ appeared as a high priest… through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.

Placing anything between us and God is an absolute neglect of what God has done in Christ to bring us to himself. This is among the paramount messages of the Gospel. To deny this would be like insisting to send word of your child’s birth by messenger pigeon, rather than email.

It’s an incredible thing that we can approach God. And it’s almost just as dumbfounding when Christians will not exercise this incredible privilege.

In John Piper’s Fifty Reasons Jesus Came to Die, he goes on something of a rant on all the ways we’re able to botch our reception of the Gospel. I found it more than interesting.

For example, salvation is not good news if it only saves from hell and not for God. Forgiveness is not good news if it only gives relief from guilt and doesn’t open the way to God. Justification is not good news if it only makes us legally acceptable to God but doesn’t bring fellowship with God. Redemption is not good news if it only liberates us from bondage but doesn’t bring us to God. Adoption is not good news if it only puts us in the Father’s family but not in his arms.

In Romans 8:32, we’re promised to be given “all things”. We know from elsewhere in scripture that this means “all good things”. I think what trips up a lot of Christians when pondering this verse is the difference between perceived good and actual good.

After all, Christians in lots of different places of the word go without bank accounts, cars, safety—even food. How could that be reconciled, except by differentiating between what we think we need and what we actually need.

John Piper comments like this:

What then does it mean that because of Christ’s death for us God will certainly with him graciously give us “all things”? It means that he will give us all things that are good for us. All things that we really need in order to be conformed to the image of his Son (Romans 8:29). All things we need in order to attain everlasting joy.

Sometimes what we would define as “good” for us or our spiritual walk is not so. Sometimes an even greater good is not having those things, in the interest of what we might learn, or how we might rely on God for what we do not have. Even safety and food. Some of the most basic needs.

Romans 5:7-8:

“For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

John Piper responds:

I have heard it said, “God didn’t die for frogs. So he was responding to our value as humans.” This turns grace on its head. We are worse off than frogs. They have not sinned. They have not rebelled and treated God with the contempt of being inconsequential in their lives. God did not have to die for frogs. They aren’t bad enough. We are. Our debt is so great, only a divine sacrifice could pay it.

I respond:

God didn’t have to die for frogs. They aren’t bad enough. Dang.

Few truths about God’s behavior and feelings are as encouraging as the ones that reveal the unity of love for the believer by the Trinity. And it’s not so often that we’ll read it written in such a powerful way as in John Piper’s Fifty Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die:

Jesus did not wrestle his angry Father to the floor of heaven and take a whip out of his hand. He did not force him to be merciful to humanity. His death was not the begrudging consent of God to be lenient to sinners. No, what Jesus did when he suffered and died was the Father’s idea.

Thanks to Jesus, we are now at ease before every part of Trinity, and each independently—if that distinction is even reasonable. God the Father, Jesus the Son and the Holy Spirit all share the same affection for the believer.

I was reading in Mark this morning and something interesting caught my attention. Jesus has just healed again. This time, a deaf man with a speech impediment. After healing the man, Jesus charges him to “tell no one.” (Mark 7:36) Immediately after this, the word tells us what happens next:

“But the more he charged them [not to tell anyone what he’s done], the more zealously they proclaimed it.”

Zealous. That’s a mighty descriptive word. With fervor they spread the word of what he’d done, in spite of his charge not to. I don’t know why this is exactly, but it is an interesting contrast from today.

The Gospel is now complete. All that will be revealed to us about Jesus in this lifetime has been revealed in the Gospel. The recounting of the Gospel in scripture ends with a charge to go out and zealously proclaim to the world what the Lord has done. Yet now, the church rarely does it.

If this is not a perplexing reversal, I don’t know what is.