The Bible is not a painting to be looked at, but a window to be looked through, and through that window we see Jesus. We read the Bible because it is the best God-given window through which we get a clear view of Jesus – who is God’s ultimate self-disclosure. We read the Bible to learn about the failure of the old and the beauty of the new, brought about by Jesus, who said “Follow me.” The gospel in one world is simply Jesus. It’s all about Jesus!
Jesus’ followers believe that reconciliation is at the heart of the gospel. They fought hard to help broken relationships, with God and with each other, come back together again. This means that our kingdom warfare is not against other people, but for other people. We fight against any power whether political, societal, or spiritual that divides rather than unite, or that promotes hate rather than love. And we do this in ways that treat people not as the enemy but victims of the true enemy.
Loving Our Enemies
When we love our enemies hate and aggression and a culture of violence is put on hold for a moment. Offering everyone who experiences it a moment of light and an opportunity to wake up to reality. Reconciliation leading to reunion. God turning enemies into his friends and even family which is the heart of the gospel. We are all victims of poor choices made by others, and we are all victimizers of other’s because of our own poor choices. The circle of life is the cycle of sin. We need something to break the cycle and take away our shame. Through Jesus, God is calling us back to himself.
Early Jesus-followers knew that the gospel is about running toward Someone. God is not angry with us. He wants us to come home – not so we can receive some punishment he has waiting for us, but so we can escape the punishment we are already inflicting on ourselves by creating distance between us and the love of God.
We are told in the Bible that we have been raised with Christ and to set our hearts and minds on things above, not on earthy things. Our life is now hidden with Christ in God. That doesn’t mean we ignore what is going on in the world around us. Quite the contrary. To set our minds on things above means that we put Jesus first, his mind first, his perspective first. Jesus teaches us how to look at the world around us with a fresh sense of compassion, empathy, and involvement. While the death of Jesus inaugurated the new covenant, it is the ongoing life of Jesus that infuses us with life now, which lasts forever.
God revealed through Jesus
The Bible begins at, well, the beginning with “Love” as God’s motivating force for creation. Love is, as it were, God’s divine DNA. We are the result and the expression of God’s love life. God reveals himself to us definitively through Christ. God somehow gives birth to himself, the God within God, he who is in the “bosom” of the Father. It is as though God opened up his chest to show us his heart and out walked a person! That person is Jesus. “Christ is the visible image of the invisible God.” Jesus is the way to God because Jesus is God. When we look at the person of Jesus we can see that he is God with us. God is for us, God on our corner, and God on our side.
The Kingdom of God
As followers of Jesus, we are the people of God and according to the Bible we belong to the Kingdom of God. In the gospels, we get a glimpse of what the Kingdom of God would look like if the followers of Jesus would fully embrace it. This kingdom is not a physical place or plot of land. The Kingdom of God is a way of living with Jesus our King. A way of being a part of what he is doing in the world, no matter where we live. The word kingdom refers to a realm of relationship with God and others that is in harmony with God’s will and God’s way. This kingdom living isn’t always easy, but it is the most satisfying way to be in this world. It resonates with who and how we were made to be.
Jesus showed that he wouldn’t let us separate love for God from love for one another. He knew that just loving God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength without an equal commitment to love our neighbour as we love ourselves could lead to expressions of religious piety that ignore the hurting people around us. Or worse, actually hurt people around us. For followers of Jesus, simply loving others as Jesus does is our highest form of worship and central ceremony of our religion
Living Stones
When we read the opening chapters of the Bible and see the world God created before we humans had a chance to mess it up. There are no special places where Adam and Eve need to go to meet with God. No special rituals they need to participate in to make God appear or to receive his favour. No special leaders needed to mediate between them and God. There is just God and humanity living together in naked intimacy.
Those who have put their trust in Christ and made Jesus Christ Lord of their life can once again enjoy intimacy with God as we have become “living stones” that make up the structure of God’s new temple. Where we act as priest to one another and make spiritual sacrifices in how we serve and love one another. Jesus promised us that when he left, his followers would become like the body of Christ. Share in the same experience – the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and God’s personal presence. The early church spoke of us together making up one organic, relational, and revolutionary “body of Christ” that was in fact one unified temple of God.