Together

“All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he [the Spirit] will take what is mine and declare it to you” (John 16:15, ESV).

From the Father, to Jesus, to the Spirit, to us.

Why?

Trinity! God wants all of himself to participate, each one of his persons in unity, together! No mere pecking order, this is every one of himself, together, involved. Love! God is love and never does anything alone! Include! Us! Together! One in being, mind, heart, One-in-Three-and-Three-in-One!

This is the God who invites us into his life.

Why?

By the Spirit we are united to Jesus Christ before the Father.

By the Spirit united to Jesus Christ. The Son of Man, God incarnate, in his glorified human body in the heavenly spiritual realm (Phil. 3:21). By the Spirit we are raised with him, seated in the heavenly places (Eph. 2:6; Col. 3:1). He is our life in a very real, ontological way, not in mere metaphor (Col. 3:3-4). By the Spirit, this is where we are! It is by the Spirit we see Jesus, it is by the Spirit we are continually “alivened”/living/abiding in him (1 Cor. 6:17; 2 Cor. 4; Rom. 8). It is by the Spirit we have the spiritual eyes to see, spiritual ears to hear, spiritual mind to understand, spiritual tongue to speak, spiritual-physical body as instrument of the living Lord what no mere flesh can see, hear, understand, etc. (1 Cor. 2:9, 16). This is faith! (Heb. 11:6) This is the Spirit’s work! It is the Spirit that is the real bond knitting our ensouled bodies to the Incarnate, Risen Lord and bringing his life into us.

United to Jesus Christ before the Father. The man Jesus, Risen Lord, is our mediator. Calvin, Irenaeus and many early church fathers recognized from the very beginning, in the Garden of Eden, we needed a mediator. Even unfallen, finite bodies need the Eternal Word as our mediator. We can only come before the Father in Christ Jesus (Eph. 3:12). It is as our Head and the perfect human, that we humans-in-Christ can come before the Holy God. It is Christ who reveals the Father in a way we embodied souls can understand and see and hear the Almighty, Thrice-Holy, Immortal, Invisible, Dwelling in Inapproachable Light God (Jn. 14:6; 2 Cor. 4:6; 1 Tim. 6:16). In Jesus by the Spirit we see God. God! The One who was Moses’ desire, the psalmist’s one thing, the one who is All in All (Exo. 33:18; Ps. 27:4). Let the weight, weight of glory sink in!

Let grace, grace seep over. By his design, through the Spirit who connects-unites us to Jesus the Son of Man before YHWH.

No mere theology, this hues every day with brilliant colors:

All of God, all three persons, include us in him. This is his loving, personal, interactive, including, other-honoring nature—this changes our access to God, our participation in him. This changes the way we honor, love, relate to others because we are like God.

We are now even in our physical bodies seated with our King, our Head, Jesus. This changes our future hope for our physical bodies. This changes the way we interact and see our physical world; we see with spiritual eyes for a physical future kingdom.

Every day, we interact and are dependent on all three of the Persons of the Trinity. We never relate to the Father apart from Jesus or the Spirit; never Jesus without the Father and the Spirit; never the Spirit without being lifted to the Father and Son as well.

Even as I am washing dishes, walking in the neighborhood, speaking with someone, falling asleep I am in the heavenly places. I am in Jesus the Son of man and he is in me by the Spirit by the Father’s pleasure and before the Father’s face.

Together. Always. All the time. All three, with me. 

And we could go on. What would you add? How does this change your daily life?

NOTES

“Ensouled bodies” and “embodied souls” are terms I believe Karl Barth coined.

Thank you to Julie Canlis’ Calvin’s Ladder for some insights.