Weekly Musing - Pat

It happened to me.

A new perspective on a passage of Scripture that freed God from my box of certainty. The words “one” and “all” jumped from the page into my heart and mind and with them came questions and a new way to see.

“There is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all” Ephesians 4:4-6 NASB 1995.

What if the “one body” is the body of Christ? The one “Spirit” is Holy Spirit? What if the one hope is Jesus? What if He is our “calling” and our calling enables us to call Him Lord?

What if there is only one faith - His? What if it’s not what we believe about God, BUT what He believes about us? What if our faith does not invent God, but it is His faith that defines us? What if Jesus is what God believes about us? What if Christ’s life in us enables us to live AS Him in this world?

What if “one baptism” is His? What if we were all baptized in His baptism? What if when we are baptized we are simply participating in His? What if the words Jesus heard are spoken to us, “you are my beloved child in whom I am well pleased”?

What if “all” really means all? What if the birth, life, crucifixion, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus was for all people for all time (past, present and future)? What if no one will ever be left out? What if the incarnation really worked for all?

What if it’s true there is ONE God and Father of ALL who is over ALL and through ALL and IN ALL? Might it empower us to live free from the cruelty of “us vs. them”?

“What man among you, if he has a hundred sheep and has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open pasture and go after the one which is lost until he finds it? When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost!’” Luke 15:4-6 NASB 1995.

“I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me. The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me” John 17:20-23 NASB 1995.

A new way to see. I have chosen to let God WOW me! By seeing mystery over certainty and letting Holy Spirit reveal more of His goodness, power and love. To journey on in discovering who He is, and to let the faith of Jesus define who I am for He is my Life!