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Articles
Blurred Vision
by Gordon Enger
“For this reason I, Paul, the
prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles--surely
you have heard about the administration of God’s grace that was given
to me for you, that is, the mystery made known to me by revelation,
as I have already written briefly. In reading this, then,
you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery
of Christ, which was not made known to men in other generations
as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God’s
holy apostles and prophets. This mystery is that through
the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members
together of one body, and sharers together in the promise
in Christ Jesus.” (Ephesians 3:1-6)
If we understand the Bible to be one book with one gospel
message, one Savior, one Shepherd, and one main character,
it would seem that the main thrust of the Scripture would be
evident to all who read its pages. It is easy for us to see
in the Abrahamic covenant that there are two aspects to the
covenant. God looked upon Abram and saw something special about
him. He saw in Abram a desire to be obedient. God told Abram
to leave his family, friends, and homeland to go to a land
which would be shown to him at a future time. As a part of
this command to go, God issued the following covenantal statement: “I
will make you into a great nation and I will bless you.” This
is the top line of the covenant. This is a promise of future
blessings. There was a second aspect of the covenant as well. “ All
peoples on earth will be blessed by you.” This is the
bottom line responsibility of the covenantal agreement.
God told Abram, as well as Isaac and Jacob later, that he
would bless Abram and his descendants forever, but it would
be their responsibility to bless all peoples on earth. This
is the “great commission.” Christ simply showed
the disciples, using the Old Testament scrolls, how the great
commission given to Abram in Genesis chapter 12 could be clearly
seen with their spiritually opened eyes. “Then he
opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.” (Luke
24:45) Christ went on to say’ “This is what
is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on
the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will
be preached in his name to all nations (peoples), beginning
at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.
With your eyes opened to the fact that it has always been
God’s plan to reach all peoples on earth, the Scriptures
will come alive with stories showing that this is a fact. Stories
in which we have only seen the top line blessing. Let me show
you some examples.
We all know about Daniel in the lion’s den. The moral
of the story is that if we follow God with every aspect of
our lives, he will take care of us. And that is precisely what
happened to Daniel. The order was given to pray to no other
god but the king. Anyone who violated the decree would be thrown
in with the lions. Daniel, being a God-fearing man, continued
to pray to God in his usual manner. He did it openly, in front
of the window where everyone could see. Sure enough, he was
caught in the act and quickly dispatched to the lion’s
den.
As we all know, God sent angels to shut the mouths of the
lions and Daniel made it through the night unscathed. In the
morning when the king ran to look into the den, there was Daniel
without a scratch or a bruise. God blessed Daniel by preserving
his life. And that is as far as we go in the story. We concentrate
on the top line blessing and completely miss the bottom line
result of the message going to all peoples. The rest of the
story is this: The king issued a decree that was to go to every
part of the kingdom, to all nations, peoples, and men of every
language. The decree said, “I issue a decree that
in every part of my kingdom people must fear and reverence
the God of Daniel. For he is the living God and he endures
forever; his kingdom will not be destroyed, his dominion will
never end. He rescues and he saves; he performs signs and wonders
in the heavens and on the earth. He has rescued Daniel from
the power of the lions.” (Daniel 6:26, 27)
In the story of David and Goliath, we only see that we wimps
can win. We only see the top line blessing. Goliath faced off
with the whole army of Israel and challenged anyone who would
be foolish enough, to come and fight with him. Of course, there
were no takers. It doesn’t take too much sense to realize
that a 5-foot man is no match for someone over eight feet tall.
The army had its back against the wall, but there was no one
with a death wish to take up the challenge of Goliath. That
is, until the young shepherd boy David came along. He had enough
faith in God to know this would not be an impossible task.
We all know that David stepped forward to volunteer for this
hazardous duty. He collected five smooth stones for his sling
and proceeded to approach the dreaded giant, who simply sneered
at David. Undaunted, David flung a rock from his sling in the
direction of Goliath. The rock flew true and straight, hitting
the behemoth smack in the middle of the forehead, and sent
him sprawling to the ground, dead as a hammer. In jubilation,
the army of Israel pursued the Philistine army which fled in
defeat and despair. As far as we are concerned, that is the
end of the story.
That is only the top line blessing. Read further to get to
the bottom line. “David said to the Philistines, “You
come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come
against you in the name of the Lord Almighty, the God of the
armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the Lord will
hand you over to me and I’ll strike you down and cut
off your head, Today I will give the carcasses of the Philistine
army to the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth, and
the whole world (all peoples) will know that there
is a God in Israel.” (I Samuel 17:45, 46)
One more story will be sufficient for you to see the plan
of God to reach all peoples. Let’s go back to the story
of the plagues in Egypt just prior to the Passover. Moses,
as we know, was instructed by God to go to Pharaoh to secure
the release of Israel. God hardened Pharaoh’s heart so
that at every turn he rebuffed Moses and refused to let the
people go. As the plagues came and went, Israel was preserved
while Egypt suffered mightily. It was obvious that there was
something special about the God of Israel as opposed to the
gods of the Egyptians. Israel’s God always prevailed.
Suppose you were living in Egypt at the time. It wouldn’t
take you long to see that there was something different about
Israel’s God. You might start to waver in the faith you
had in the gods of Egypt. By the time the 10 th plague came,
you probably would be thinking it would be better for you to
follow after Israel’s God and give up on your god. Of
course, we all know that would be the prudent thing to do.
In the story of the plagues, we only see the top line blessing
of God on Israel. While it was dark in the Egyptians houses,
theirs had light, etc. What we have missed in the story because
of our top line blessing mentality is that “ Many
other people went up with them.” (Exodus 12:38)
There was a large contingent of Egyptians who came to believe
in the God of Israel and left with them in the exodus. God
has always been interested in blessing all peoples.
Less than two months had passed when Moses went to the mountain
to get the word of God. While he was gone, the people grew
anxious and gave up on Moses. They went to Aaron and convinced
him to make a golden calf for them. Aaron asked everyone to
donate their earrings and other gold items which were thrown
into the fire and poof, a golden calf materialized. God, seeing
what the people below were doing, sent Moses down to straighten
out the situation. God told Moses he would destroy the Israelites
and start over again with him.
“But Moses sought the favor of the Lord his God. “O
Lord,” he said, “why should your anger burn against
your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power
and a mighty hand? Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It
was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them
in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth’?
Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster
on your people. Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and
Israel, to whom you swore by your own self; I will make your
descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will
give your descendants all this land I promised them, and
it will be their inheritance forever.” (Exodus
32:11-13
For the sake of his own name, God relented and spared the
people. If he had killed the people, the world would have been
able to say that the God of Israel was not a good God to follow.
Because of the bottom line of the covenant to bless all peoples
on the face of the earth, God could not destroy Israel. Something
happened that day to change the way people saw God’s
plan.
God in his righteousness needed to judge Israel, but for the
sake of his name, he couldn’t. This presented a dilemma.
In the Bible we are told that to whom much is given, much is
required. The converse of this would be, to whom less is given,
less is required. God blinded their spiritual eyes so they
would not be held to as high a standard as when there is a
clear vision.
In Ezekiel 20:13, 14, God is reviewing the calf incident.
He says, “Yet the people of Israel rebelled against
me in the desert. They did not follow my decrees but rejected
my laws--although the man who obeys them will live by them--and
they utterly desecrated my Sabbaths. So I said I would pour
out my wrath on them and destroy them in the desert. But for
the sake of my name I did what would keep
it from being profaned in the eyes of the nations in whose
sight I had brought them out.”
God said he did what would keep his name from being profaned
in the eyes of the nations, the bottom line of the covenant.
What is the "what" that he did? He blinded their eyes to the
bottom line of the covenant so he would not have to judge them.
Paul said this mystery, that Gentiles are heirs with Israel,
was not made known to men in other generations even though
it is evident and profusely spread through Scripture. Their
spiritual eyes were blinded so God would not have to judge
them and thus profane his name among the nations.
God knew of their future disobedience when he spoke to Moses
just prior to his death. “And the Lord said to Moses: “You
are going to rest with your fathers, and these people will
soon prostitute themselves to the foreign gods of the land
they are entering. They will forsake me and break the covenant
I made with them.” (Deuteronomy 31:16) Disobedience
leads to blindness, otherwise God would have to resort to judgment.
Paul continues to tell us that even though men were blinded
in the past, it is now time to “make plain to everyone
the administration of this mystery.” Now it can be revealed
plainly because we have the power of the Holy Spirit to obey.
Obedience increases insight. Proverbs 1:23 tells us, “If
you had responded to my rebuke (obedience), I would have poured
out my heart to you and made my thoughts (insight) known to
you.
Why did Christ speak in parables? “The knowledge
of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to
you, but not to them. Whoever has will be given more, and
he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what
he has will be taken from him. This is why I speak to them
in parables: Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing,
they do not hear or understand.” (Matthew 13:11-13)
If he spoke plainly to people he knew would disobey, they
would have to be judged. The disciples wanted to obey and
thus he could enlighten them to his truths.
Whoever has what will have abundance of what? Restated, this
verse could look like this. Whoever has an obedient heart more
insight will be given, and he will have an abundance of insight.
Whoever does not have an obedient heart, even the insight he
has will be taken from him. John quotes Christ as saying, “Whoever
has my commands and obeys them, he is the
one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father,
and I too will love him and show myself to him.” (John
14:21) Obedience to God’s commands lead to insight. More
obedience leads to more insight. The blinders will be removed
form your eyes and you will see clearly God’s plan for
the redemption of all peoples. As you see God’s redemptive
plan more clearly, it would behoove you to be obedient to his
directives in that matter. |
