Saturday, December 23, 2023

HANGING WITH JESUS

 

WHO CAN BE SAVED?

With the difficulty of understanding salvation, the disciples asked Jesus, “Who then can be saved?” (Mat 19:25).

But you thought that salvation is easy! That all you need to do is walk to the front of the church, confess your sins, and ask for prayer. Indeed, that is the beginning of salvation.

We have been taught that salvation is like a new birthday, and many Christians celebrate that day like the holy day that it is. However, the ‘beginning’ was well before your beginning, “God has from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth” (2 Thes 2:13). You came later but you were chosen in the “beginning,” ‘arche’ in the Greek — in ancient times at the origin of mankind.

Your beginning was the beginning of Adam. He was the first of your kind. That refers to the origin of life, “God said, ‘Let us make man in our Image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the Earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the Earth’” (Gen 1:26).

Right then was your beginning! Your kind was chosen to prevail over all the other kinds; not that humans are the strongest of the species, but the weaker kind who requires God to watch over them. Right then, when Adam was created in the Image of God, Adam’s kind alone were chosen to be in His Image. That ‘Image’ is ‘Selem’ in the Hebrew, literally a ‘shadow’ or ‘phantom’ (Strong 2006). That ‘Shadow’ of God is not material but a Spirit of a very different substance; indeed the same Substance as God; that is until sin. That Image is what theologians call the ‘soul’ and philosophers the ‘psyche.’

Jesus is the Image of God as well. The person ‘Jesus’ is the material Image and the Holy Ghost his spiritual Image, ‘Pneuma’ in the Greek — “like a rushing mighty wind” (Acts 2:2).

When Jesus was baptized, Luke saw the Image of God converge on Jesus and remain there… “the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon Him” (Luke 3:22).

The human soul originally had the invisible Substance of God within a vessel that had the form of a man. The content of that shape was the Spirit of God, and its shape was as a full-grown man. God made the shape and imbued within it His own Spirit, Then, he enclosed His Image that he called ‘Adam’ in material — the ground (‘Adam’ in the Hebrew). Hence, the invisible being was God Himself and the visible image just the Earth, and it is now known that the body of a human has the same substances in the same proportions as the earth (ground) itself.

God did that! He made for Himself an Image and as the ‘Son of Man’ (Adam), Jesus is the both the spiritual Image of God and the material image of Adam.

Adam was created ‘saved’ in that He was already in Paradise! His state was one of glorification.

Moses was “glorified” (Lev 10:3) — made heavy (ibid), not in the sense of weight, but significance (dominion). Moses was given dominion over his people and God’s people became his people. “When Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone; and they were afraid to come nigh him” (Exod 34:30).

The glow that Moses had was the Spirit of God shining forth. Moses was given dominion over the tribe, and the Hebrews followed a man who was glorified. What did Moses do to be glorified? Certainly not get fat and gain weight; however, God got into his soul. Therefore, glorification is indeed ‘weighty’ in that God imbues the soul of the Christian!

Of course, Moses was not Christ, but within him was the ‘Shadow’ of Christ. God gave Moses the Law, and he became the ‘Law.’ What Moses decreed was God Himself decreeing it! Paul wrote that “The law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very Image of the things” (Heb 10:1).

Of course, Jesus was the ‘Image’ of those things, and the Law was the ‘Shadow,’ or Holy Spirit of God, speaking in written words. When He fulfilled the Law, the Law was no longer just Spirit but concrete. It was written on stone originally indicating that it was the foundation — the ‘Cornerstone,’ Jesus (Isa 26:16).

Now back to “Who can be saved?” It is as if asking, “Who can be glorified?” Adam was originally glorified when he was generated in the Image of God.

Moses was glorified when God regenerated him from a common, murderous man, and gave him dominion over the Hebrew kind. Jesus was glorified when He died and was raised from the dead as He regained the ‘Shadow’ of God that He had given up at the crucifixion (John 7:39).

Who can be saved? Our kind beginning with Adam, one sinful man with Moses, the Hebrew kind because of God in Moses (Deut 14:2), and Christ’s kind (1 Pet 2:9), the ‘whosoever believes in Him’ (John 3:16). Therefore, ‘whosoever’ (anyone can be saved). What must anyone do? Adam did nothing. He was generated glorious and was made immortal. He should never have perished!

Moses did nothing to be glorified but listen to God. The Hebrews did nothing but those who followed Moses all the way over 40 years were saved.

Jesus died and was made glorious. He did nothing as He was nailed to the Cross. In all cases, it was the Spirit of God in them that was doing all those good things!

Then, after the physical image of Jesus rested in the tomb, His Holy Ghost did much work. Possibly first, the Holy Ghost cast Satan and sin into Hell, then that same day, the Holy Ghost saved Dismus, the repentant thief, from perishing. The Holy Ghost vacating the body of Jesus persuaded Longinus, the centurion, that Jesus was God in the flesh.

Jesus did very little in the flesh because even when He walked among men, it was the Holy Spirit of God that did all those good things. When Jesus lost virtue to heal, it was not His flesh that became weak, but His Spirit. It was God in Spirit that healed.

When Jesus defeated Satan and cast sin into Hell, he “healed the nations” (Rev 22:2). It was “finished,” so He said (John 19:30).

It originated with Adam in the beginning and was finished with the “Last Adam” — the “Quickening Spirit,” (1 Cor 15:45) that made mankind alive again — Jesus regenerated whosoever desired to be glorified.

Who, therefore, can be saved? “Whosoever believes in Him (Jesus) should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). The key word therein is “believes” (Greek; pisteuo) — “any” who are “committed to” Jesus (ibid).

Everybody was selected as ‘sons of man’ but there is a threshing. Of all who were elected, those who are committed to Jesus are selected.

Another question that the disciples should have asked but did not is How committed? Is walking to the altar enough commitment or should it be a lifelong commitment? You should know the answer to that. Someone who comes to Jesus may be sincere, but is he committed? Time will tell. They must “endure to the end to be saved” (Mat 10:22).

Endure what? Temptation: 

They on the rock are they, which, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no root, which for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away. (Luke 8:13)

 Who then? Those whose ‘seed’ takes root and endures temptation, not just for awhile, but to the end of their lives. Born again is the planting of the seed that grows into the whole Image of God when Jesus comes for the harvest of the ‘crop’ and glorifies them — regenerating them back to the Image of God and providing for them new incorruptible flesh (1 Cor 15:52).

So, you should be saved, and you can be saved, but it is any who are committed. How committed are you? Many are not committed enough to hang with Jesus!



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