We Are Others...

We are Others

34:10

We are people of God. We are according to the faith of God’s elect. We are

a people who have fully embraced God's revelation of Himself and His will

for His people in Christ Jesus. We are the people purposed for the plan of

salvation. We are the people who have the knowledge of the truth. We are

the people that desire all to become God's vessels of grace and mercy for

everyone and anyone who calls on the name of the Lord. We are God’s

people, and this is not a hard truth to comprehend. Why? Because we

believe that God is, and always has been. That He condescended from the

fullness of His spiritualness to step all the way down to humanity to show us

Himself in the form that He created us. He came in His Son’s generation,

who was always with Him in eternity, that we may be a chosen generation,

peculiarly called from the sureness of the darkness of death to the certainty

of the light of life. Now please understand the depth of this identification as

we consider something of even greater height – you ready? It was even

before the Son of God was sent for us that God the Father had, according to

His foreknowledge, His pre-arrangement, His predestination, that namely us,

would love Him, whom he foreknew, and what would follow is our being found

to be fit to be conformed to the likeness of His Son. God termed us the

“elect”. That's a very controversial subject. What goes into that elect is a

faith, a wisdom, such a knowledge of the word of God that problems within

the people in whom the love of God is not yet, or may never be perfected,

results in divisiveness. God does not think like man. God is finite in no

meaning of the word. God is necessary, and our God is the first cause in all

things. But He is not all things. He cannot be sin. He cannot be evil. He

cannot be absent. And God is not bound. And this is why we who are people

of God have free choice to come to know the pursuit of reason with God and

to come to the truth of understanding that which appears controversial to the

human mind. This shows there is coextensive in the will of God - His order

to determine who's elect and His omniscient knowledge of our free choice,

they run together. This is that great power given us at creation. There's not

one more powerful in the way God does things over the other. God's

sovereignty does not outreach our free choice as it affects us. But eternity

exists within God, and that means that God can look into the eternities future,

the times past, and the thoughts and motives of the heart as present with

Him. We experience present consequences based upon past decisions,

choices, but have no sight into the next moment...except by faith. That is

why we are chosen...our faith. Faith is that given by God to allow us to

glimpse in part into what He already knows. We are held responsible for our

choices. God knows what choices everyone will make. Our choice of

accepting the Lord or rejecting the Lord, that is determining our eternal

destination. God has always projected Himself before all men that He exists.

As we know in reasoning with the word, God has always shared that He is

there. And if man would reach out and pursue that light, God will give more

light until eventually it accumulates to that gospel that brings that person to

the knowledge and understanding of his or her lost condition and his or her

need for Christ. It's not a case of if we see God or not, the bible tells us all

man sees God, but the bible also tells us it's man's choice to accept or to

reject Him. We are responsible for our decision to accept or reject the Lord.

But at the same time, God has in His foreknowledge accepted us according

to the choice, obviously that we've made to accept or reject Him too. So as

a people we either choose God or we suppress the truth and walk away from

Him. Choosing God makes us others.

We must be always mindful of ourselves of who He's called us to be in Him.

We can begin to see our point of recognition in events when God called a

man to leave his own country, his very kindred, his father’s house to include

a man chosen to lead a people into a wilderness. We are to be the “on earth”

living example of what a people are like when they follow God’s way. And

now we know there is that people beyond the elect; there is the election. The

election is not a people of nationality. We are a people of nature having

commonality in Jesus Christ – set apart for his services - under one head

agreeing in the same manners and customs and governed by the same laws.

We are a holy nation because we are consecrated and devoted to God

reborn and sanctified by His holy spirit...peculiar. We are inspirationally

different. We are a people that should be separate, not because we are self-

righteous or think we deserve eternal life, but because following God’s

teachings causes us to be different from those who do not follow them. If

this is our faith, our greatest separation must be from the sinful conduct of

the world. God does have a people favored. We embrace every word of

God and we have a singular faith that is objective and is exclusively based

on Jesus. Because of Christ, we have the living hope that every promise of

God will come to pass and so we live with eager anticipation and confident

expectation of the fulfillment of every word of God. We abide in undeserved

grace sufficient for every occasion. And we who know something of God’s

grace as believers, appropriately seek to “see” God’s grace at work in others.

This does not mean that we compromise with sin, but it does mean we reflect

the character of Christ in dealing with those we witness to by sharing the

truth.

God is composing His people to convey the truth that the new heaven and

the new earth will include all peoples, tongues, kindreds, nations – diversities

of one mind. This challenges us to take seriously our own practices,

programs, prejudices, and preferences. We are a people who come to all

with justness and grace. We build relationships for heaven. We come to

know our sisters and brothers now who will be in the family of God. God’s

people are dependent. We continually trust God with every part of our lives.

We acknowledge that He has all the power, and we trust Him to work

according to His will. This is the revelation of our faith no matter our

circumstances. And it is by our circumstances that our faith increases. We

thrive in the creation of God. Creation gives us the example that can be

followed by those who believe in Jesus because His people can trust in the

Creator and Sustainer of all things. We thrive spiritually because we are

following His command to keep the Sabbath holy in obedience to Him.

Once we were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not

obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy. Because we have this mercy,

we have this distinctiveness from Christ as a family related by blood. Read

these texts; Ephesians 3:14, 15; Hebrews 2:17; Colossians 1:20; Colossians

1:2; and Ephesians 2:13. The people of God are truly blood kith and kin. We

share the same Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth

receives its name. We share the same elder brother, Christ, whose blood

shed on the cross has reconciled us to the heavenly Father. And we share

a union with our spiritual others, brothers and sisters in Christ, who are

reconciled to each other by the same blood of the cross. We are the peopled

family that forms the centerpiece of God’s work in creation. We are that fruit

multiplied. From the beginning God formulated His agenda in terms of a

family. We are the people serving as the purpose of God’s intent that our

faith would be indeed the perfection and completion of the former.

We are to be the substance of that grace of faith that the faithful hoped for, and the

evidence of the eye of the mind that the reality of those things that cannot be

discerned by the eye of the body are the firm assent of the soul to the divine

revelation, as set to its seal that God is true. Under the sovereign decree of

an all-wise God, the family is the vehicle by which His triune likeness will be

disseminated to the entire universe made new. We are the family of God in

Christ. Divine image is not a speculation. We see perfectly in Christ the

image and the glory of God. It is by this example of Christ whereby we

divinely understand the must need death of self. From the unspeakable

riches of equality with God to the most impoverished death in antiquity, from

heights unsearchable to depths unimaginable, from one polar extreme to

another, this is the measure of the self-emptying death of Christ. It is history’s

most perfect expression of sacrificial love. It is also the clearest revelation of

what it means to manifest the image of God. In Jesus we see the likeness of

the heavenly Father. On the cross we behold a picture of what God is like,

and hence of what families created in his image are meant to be like. It is a

picture of infinite love. God the Son emptied himself, to humble himself, to

take on the form of a slave, and to submit to a slave’s death. This portrait is

harmonical with what we know of Christ and God. The Godhead is other-

oriented. Each Person is plurality-in-unity. As the people of God, bearing

His image, we must be found capable of this kind of love. Prepared to lay

out ourselves with all possible concern for another to convert them from the

error of their way to save a soul from death. We are others who strive for the

salvation of the whole man. Though our sins may be still, they will be

pardoned, our service of conversion will prevent a multitude of sins not just

in the others to whom we are sent, but many also may be prevented in others

that they may have an influence upon. We are a people who examine

ourselves. Our concern for sinners must be stronger than our condemnation

of sin. God abominates sin. It represents a personal affront. It diminishes his

glory in the world and effaces the radiance of men and women created in his

image. But God is love. He elects out of the multitude a chosen people to

give glory to His image. Noah, Abraham, but God has a last time people

called to fidelity to His covenant and the manifestation of His character

throughout the world. Still to come, the ultimate unveiling of God’s Israel.

From time immemorial it was God’s intention to carve out a new family whose

hearts would be purged of the defect of sin and filled with the law of love, an

impulse empowered by the indwelling Spirit of God himself. Creation eagerly

awaits the emergence of this family! Isaiah prophesied of this Israel as the

servant of the Lord.

Isaiah 42:6; 49:6

We are to be the arrival of the indwelling presence of God signaled by the

prophets, the glory of God’s image inscribed on human hearts, the

displacement of sin by the internal law of love. Christ, whose own self-

emptying death on the cross represented the expression of divine love, now

comes to reside in us. It is absolutely essential to acknowledge that the

indwelling love of Christ is bestowed within a plurality of human hearts. This

is not to suggest that Christ does not indwell hearts individually. He most

certainly does, but not hearts isolated from other hearts. Ultimately, it is a

family of hearts that Christ comes to indwell. By vanquishing our sin in these

two respects - paying sin’s penalty and purging sin’s power - Christ fits us for

the family of God. Costly to him and priceless to us is our induction into the

body of Christ. Because of Jesus Christ, single human beings, individuals

can be saved from the wrath of God and assured seats in a heavenly eternity.

While this reality is not to be diminished in any way but rather prized with

full-throated praise, we do not view God’s work through the individualistic lens

of our day. The Godhead is spiritual unity. And by one spirit are we all

baptized into one body. And above all, within the people of God purposed

by election in and by Christ, the larger dimensions of God’s plans for creation

receive breathtaking definition.

God is wholly other. Completely different than all other things. The essential

of all holiness. We must relate to him by his self-revelation in the person of

Christ Jesus, and through the bible. The angels cry holy, holy, holy. In Christ

there is none other. How do we identify with none other name? God elected

Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. When an individual is elected, it means his

descendants are also elected. The God of this people of Israel chose our

fathers, and exalted the people when they dwelt as strangers in the land of

Egypt, and with a high arm brought he them out of it. God has declared His

as “mine elect”. This is very important to understand the “others” of God. In

the same sense, God has chosen Jesus Christ, His elect, the seed of

Abraham, so that the people who have relation with Him, who belong to Him,

also become the elect or chosen “people of God”. Jesus Christ being God’s

chosen one has fulfilled God’s choice of Abraham. Jesus is the fulfillment of

the true Israel. But we must remember this truth – they are not all Israel,

which are of Israel. Though God can call a person, if that person is not

faithful to God his or her calling can be abrogated. The purpose of God’s

calling is for service, not for salvation. The one called has a choice. The

calling and election must be made sure. In Christ unity transcends all other

human unity and it binds God’s people together. The people of God are

those chosen by him to fulfill his purpose, and this sense of being called and

chosen brings a strong sense of solidarity to us. We cannot be defined apart

from Christ who is the source of our life. The term “people of God” makes a

definite claim that faithful believers all, regardless are the true Israel of God.

There is a biblical theme of the people of God concerning the continuity that

God’s people will be made up of all mankind. God gives exceptional

attention to His people throughout biblical history. Israel was to demonstrate

unswerving, exclusive loyalty to the Lord. Second, Israel was to remember

that she had been chosen for a special relationship without any merit of her

own. Third, Israel, as the people of God, was to remember her past life of

slavery and use this to promote a proper worship of God. Fourth, Israel was

not to repeat the social oppression that she experienced in Egypt, but rather

establish a familial cooperative spirit based upon justice and righteousness.

We learn how the fracturing of Israel into two peoples was not just a rejection

of God but an opportunity for the world to begin to impose error to bring about

disregard for the truth of God. During the period of Israel’s decline we are

introduced to an important dimension in our understanding of the people of

God. The people of God are not simply those of physical Israel; or even the

majority of Israel. The true or real people of God are the few, the “remnant”,

the children of Israel who live for God in faithfulness to his covenant.

Remnant thought attributes to God His involvement in the world,

acknowledging His transcendence and immanence, bringing together the

themes of judgment and salvation. At its heart, however, lay the conviction

that even when Israel or Judah were at their worst, there was always a small

group of faithful believers who held on to true religion. The people as a whole

might have failed spectacularly, but there were still some who could provide

a bridge to forgiveness and restoration. It was these people, the true people

of God, the “others” as it were, in whom God would work his resolution for

the end of history and the vindication of God’s justice. The faithful ones are

described as “the people that know their God”. At this last time, another

element is added to the dimension of the people of God. God’s people in our

day would not only be from among the elect, we will be the remnant of the

elect. God’s people would be a new people unlike any generation called to

purpose. God’s plan for Israel would not rest alone in the humanity of the

faithful remnant, but in God’s action to inaugurate a new people whose

ascent is unto God. We will be purified, illumined, and perfected in the

likeness of Christ. Spiritual senses will mirror the divine image of the

heavenly Jerusalem. Flooded with all these intellectual lights, our mind turns

into a house of God that is inhabited by the divine Wisdom. Our mind, then,

becomes a son, a daughter, a bride, and a friend of God. It becomes a coheir

of Christ. It also becomes a temple of the Holy Spirit, which is founded on

faith, raised through hope, and dedicated to God through holiness of mind

and body. It is the most sincere love of Christ that brings this about, a love

which is poured forth in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who is given to us.

Now God can be contemplated, not only outside ourselves and inside

ourselves, but also above ourselves: outside ourselves through his vestiges;

inside ourselves through his image; and above ourselves by means of the

light that is positioned above our mind. This is the light of the eternal truth

itself, since our mind itself is shaped immediately by truth itself. “He Who Is”

is our unity. And we will be in the last time constantly under the gaze of this

purest Being who is supremely One. Our God will be most present.

The fracture and division within relational units is this world’s most besetting

darkness. A striking unity pervades the family of God. We are others not of

the world but called to shine radiantly, transforming the surroundings as

beacons of light. Our oneness with others is to develop a common bond in

Christ in a faith relationship. The last time people of God are considered as

the remnant people of God. These profess exceptional allegiance to God and

His kingdom, even in the face of the dragon’s beast and its image’s deception

and oppression. The “people of God” are not ethnically defined: they come

from “every nation, tribe, people and language.” The people are elected “in

Christ” to be a holy “people of God.” We are called for the service of God in

order to proclaim the wonderful deeds of the Lord and to herald the dire

warnings for the soon coming of Christ. We are a mixed society comprising

the called of God. Thus, faith in Christ and sincerity to biblical truth are the

hallmarks of the “people of God.” God’s election of the chosen is based upon

his grace, the election of grace, because they respond to the gospel call in

obedient faith that is absolutely necessary. As the people of God, we are

others and we need to live lives that are separate from sin. We must not

forget to remain a separate and distinct people of God. We must not have

fellowship with the sinful practices of the world around us. We must come

out and away from sin and live holy lives in the fear of God. Let us continue

to preach and teach against sin and worldliness and encourage our families

to live pure and holy lives.

Now let us come to the point of why we are others. There is an agenda that

God has for His last time people. Why is it that we have not ceased to sin?

Why hasn’t our message been effectual when it comes to being God’s

witnesses in the world? Have we chosen our own agenda, rather than

following God’s? We think that what God wants is more people in the church,

and that his goal is to build up the church with ever greater numbers in the

last day. Could it be that we are not understanding the communal calling

and the communal task. Is God’s goal about numbers or at most is that a

by-product of God’s work in the world? It is important to have a strong and

vibrant church for the assembling of those who want truth, but if we set out

to achieve that with numbers, then we will not reach that goal, for that is not

the goal that God has set before us. Remember the scripture - for it is written,

rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest

not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an

husband. Let us understand the present case in reading II Timothy 3. The

strength of delusion will approach the very elect. Few will find the strait gate.

Many who tasted the good word and been enlightened will fall away. The

election purposed by God will stand.

What then is the goal of God’s people? T o be the people of faith who display

the love of God in the life for the world to see. And the LORD said unto

Gideon, the people that are with thee are too many for me to give the

Midianites into their hands, lest Israel vaunt themselves against me, saying,

Mine own hand hath saved me. Now therefore go to, proclaim in the ears of

the people, saying, Whosoever is fearful and afraid, let him return and depart

early from mount Gilead. And there returned of the people twenty and two

thousand; and there remained ten thousand. And the LORD said unto

Gideon, The people are yet too many; bring them down unto the water, and

I will try them for thee there: and it shall be, that of whom I say unto thee,

This shall go with thee, the same shall go with thee; and of whomsoever I

say unto thee, This shall not go with thee, the same shall not go. So he

brought down the people unto the water: and the LORD said unto Gideon,

Every one that lappeth of the water with his tongue, as a dog lappeth, him

shalt thou set by himself; likewise every one that boweth down upon his

knees to drink. And the number of them that lapped, putting their hand to

their mouth, were three hundred men: but all the rest of the people bowed

down upon their knees to drink water. And the LORD said unto Gideon, By

the three hundred men that lapped will I save you, and deliver the Midianites

into thine hand: and let all the other people go every man unto his place.

Acknowledging God’s sovereign rule in our lives and obeying him in

everything that we do will not show in numbers. The whole of our faith is in

Christ. There are to be 144000 who are the revelation of God, showing in

relationship of love and obedience, truth and faith, the full stature of Jesus.

These will show the individual commitment through the communal tasks of

God’s people rooted to Christ to be members of his body. As others than the

world we will reveal that God is not distant and impersonal; we reveal a God

who is relational. Relational in that God calls us His sons, His daughters,

His friends. We are others as individuals, but never alone. We are different

and diverse people who have various gifts from God. We eschew superficial,

hypocritical, harsh, unforgiving, and self-righteous judgment. Through the

guidance of the Holy Spirit we discernably speak the truth in love while

prayerfully and gently confronting erring brothers or sisters in Christ. God’s

people hold a special bond with each other and whose relationships are filled

with temperateness and regard. God created us with a need for community

and a desire for connection. God is gathering a people who walk beside

each other in life, helping to strengthen and encourage one another. As iron

sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another. We counsel one another

even as somethings are hard sayings. Therefore, as God’s chosen people,

holy and dearly loved, clothe with compassion, kindness, humbleness,

gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any

of us have a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgives us.

And over all these virtues put on love, which binds us all together in perfect

unity. We can have this experience of friendship because of Jesus.

Love in the last time will not be comfortable. But it is the primary way we

show others that we belong to Jesus Christ. We must keep focus on the

revelation of Jesus Christ. This uncertain world is descending into chaos.

Many will lose their witness. No sacrifice of truth is to be made. Conflict will

bring pain to close relationships. Our comfort comes not in explaining God’s

purposes but in trusting them. We have this consolation – the final judgment

is near.