The God of One
And He will redeem Israel from all his iniquities. Psalm 130:8 NASB
His – How will God rescue you? How will you be delivered? Careful, now. Both of these questions already lead you in the wrong direction. Most of the time, we have the answers to the wrong questions. We want to say, “The Lord saves me,” or “Yeshua’s death pardoned me.” But the psalmist pushes us to acknowledge God’s corporate plan. I am included but we are the focus.
When YHWH redeems, who is affected? Israel. Not all the individuals who make up the nation. Not collective “personal” salvation. Israel is redeemed from his iniquity. The Hebrew word awon (bent, twisted, out of alignment behavior) adds the suffix (awono-tav) to modify the noun “iniquities” so that it reads “his iniquities.” The feminine plural noun is attached to a masculine, singular pronoun. All of Israel’s twisted disobedience, all of its misalignment, all of its bent behavior is treated as one act of rebellion. And you and I are included in that corporate act. True redemption comes when the body is saved.
In the flowering age of Greek thinking, the individual rises to prominence. The government of the West is preoccupied with individual rights and personal freedoms. Unfortunately, the Church follows the culture and the age of personal salvation dawns in step with a world of myopic self-concern. The result is personal benefits evangelism and assemblies that are little more than mutual toleration societies. Paul’s pleas for unity fall on the deaf ears of private spiritual experience. The truth is this: we aren’t connected. We really don’t care what happens to those “others” as long as our salvation is assured. We are not about to ask God to abandon us if it means the rescue of our brothers. In modern religion it is still every man for himself.
The psalmist won’t allow this. He delivers the death blow to personal salvation. I am Israel. Not that I myself constitute what God calls Israel but rather that there is no deliverance without my intimate identification with all Israel. My God is the God of Israel, and He is not my God without Israel. He rescues Israel or He doesn’t rescue at all.
So who are you? Careful. How would you answer that question in the plural?
Topical Index: Israel, iniquities, awon, corporate, Psalm 130:8
Great concepts, Skip!
The truth is this: we aren’t connected. We really don’t care what happens to those “others” as long as our salvation is assured.
Unfortunately this is the reality in this world. It’s as if this idea is not in the Bible;
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.
It would appear the self-proclaimed Believers of this world are too busy condemning one segment of the population or another to grasp the larger vision of Christ who is the Head of the Body.
As Jesus confessed, it is not he that does the works, but the Spirit of God in him. WE have to meet the Spirit at least halfway.
Come now, and let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.
If you be willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land:
But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured with the sword: for the mouth of the LORD has spoken it.
Isaiah 1
To me, this is perhaps the most important idea in the Scripture. It is the object and goal of my Faith in Christ, seeking that oneness and unity of the Faith in God. It is active in the life Today while trying to overcome. God knows those who try with a loving, honest, sincere heart, even though they are not yet perfected in the Faith.
Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will eat with him, and he with me.
To him that OVERCOMES will I grant to SIT WITH ME IN MY THRONE, even as I ALSO OVERCAME, and AM SET DOWN with my Father in his throne.
He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says unto the churches.
Revelation 3
I find when I give God the benefit of all my doubts, I get benefits in return. Knowing and understanding it is God who does the works, in a real sense, everyday is the 7th Day of rest for me in this world.
Yes, Ray. I am us. You are we.
And the best current example of this is what WE have done for Irene. By the way, that bit seems to be going viral. I just had a conversation with a man in South Africa who tells me that the story is ALL over the news there and is spreading around the world. Now for Irene to become the spokesperson for the tragedy of the camps so that the world knows the corruption of the current government. No more political correctness.
And it is only possible to redeem His world when WE work together.
Careful now. One plus one equals two. Two is more than one. One is less than two. Two plus one equals three which are made up of three individual ones, and three is two more than one. One sheep is not a flock, but each flock of sheep are made up of individual sheep. The body is made up of parts. Each member of the body is not the entire body but contributes to the whole. Each member of the family is made up of people. Each individual person born into the family makes up the family unit. When mom marries dad, because the marriage covenant they each become a plurality in unity or what our Bible says to be: “one flesh.” Their individual identity is now incorporated into each other through blood-covenant union, and they now live for each other. The world is made up of individual people. Some are Chinese. Some are from South America. Some live in New Jersey. Who did Christ die for? ~ He died for all. ~
How do we, or any man know this? 2 Corinthians 5.15, one verse found among many in the Book God wrote. God wrote His Book using individual men. There were many who contributed to this book over a period of years. Moses was a man. But he was only one man. Abraham was an man. But he was not the only one. Our Bible tells the story of many men and women also. All the people, both men and women, have individual names, and each story or testimony or witness of each individual is different and diverse, but each have one thing in common and that one thing is a relationship with YHWH, the eternal I AM.
God has given unto us a Son. The Bible says “God SO loved the world..” The world contains many people. People are all different and diverse. God loves diversity. There is unity in diversity but we are each and all created in the image of our Elohim but every nation of the earth is descended from one man and shares one blood. There is One Redeemer and One Savior and One Man who was crucified, buried and has physically risen from the tomb. This has been attested to and eye-witnessed by many individuals. Never before had this happened, but then again, neither had a “virgin-birth” occurred either.
This One Man was different than any before Him. He was the only begotten Son of God. Fully God and fully Man. The God-Man. As much God as if He were not God at all and yet as much man as if He were not God at all. This Man, the man Christ Jesus was (and is) God’s Gift to the world. The world is made up of many people and I am one.
Our Bible states “Christ died for sinners.” Who has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God? Our Bible states “all have sinned..” Does “all” include me too? Am I included in “all?” Did He die for me, (also)? “If” I am a sinner..? No. “Since” I am a sinner, for I (too) have sinned and am no longer worthy to be called (what?) “a” son? One of many, one such as I, one who is delighted to “bow the knee” and openly, freely, fully, gladly confess Jesus Christ is LORD to the glory of God the Father.
In lovingkindness Jesus came
My soul in mercy to reclaim,
And from the depths of sin and shame
Through grace He lifted me.
From sinking sand He lifted me,
With tender hand He lifted me,
From shades of night to plains of light,
O praise His Name, He lifted me!
He called me long before I heard,
Before my sinful heart was stirred,
But when I took Him at His word,
Forgiv’n, He lifted me.
From sinking sand He lifted me,
With tender hand He lifted me,
From shades of night to plains of light,
O praise His Name, He lifted me!
His brow was pierced with many a thorn,
His hands by cruel nails were torn,
When from my guilt and grief, forlorn,
In love He lifted me.
From sinking sand He lifted me,
With tender hand He lifted me,
From shades of night to plains of light,
O praise His Name, He lifted me!
Now on a higher plane I dwell,
And with my soul – I know ’tis well;
Yet how or why I cannot tell
He should have lifted me.
From sinking sand He lifted me,
With tender hand He lifted me,
From shades of night to plains of light,
O praise His Name, He lifted me!
Charles H. Gabriel (1905)
A bit too Greek for me 🙂
I do agree “self”-centeredness is eccentric or off-center, but I really don’t think “being Greek (or Gentile) is the problem, as Christ died for all, “both” Jew and Greek. Again, “all have sinned” includes “all.”
Yes, He did, but how we understand our obedience to Him does depend on a Greek or Hebrew worldview.
I might also agree, “it’s not about me,” (or him or her), but it is about “us,” for we are the family of God. Salvation is both personal and corporate as is worship.
In other words, how can anyone say they love God who they have not seen, but do not show love to the people they can see?
If you only love those who love you, you are no different than the sinners, Jesus says
It’s hard to do that with each and every person we encounter on our path in life friend and stranger . It becomes much easier and automatic with the Practice of the Faith.
When I came alive to God suddenly, unexpectedly on February 1, 1975, it was so powerful to me, I was believing the Kingdom of Heaven would reveal itself all over the world within 3 years. That was my wishful thinking. I had to learn Patience, abandon my own preconceived notions, and get with God’s Plan. As if anyone knows anything God does not already know.
There is nothing new under the Sun the Preacher says. While the face of the economy has changed all around us over the Millena, as a people, we have not changed much Spiritually.
As Prime Minister Trudeau said, we are materially rich, but Spiritually poor.
Wow, this post reminds me of the first of this week’s double Torah portion, B’Har. The counting of the Shemitah years that lead to the Yovel (Jubilee) is a reflection of the counting of the Omer to Shavuot. The spring festivals deal with the individuals/families that make up the “body”, while the fall feasts deal with the nation (Israel) and the world.
As you stated, “I am included but WE are the focus”. This seems to be the very same message in the moedim (feast days). We must complete the cycle. We can’t “settle” in the spring festivals, we must push on to the fall feasts or we will never arrive at Sukkot (the wedding feast).
If we only focus on ourselves as individuals, we are not like Yeshua or Moses (for Moses also was willing to sacrifice himself for the nation – Ex. 32:32). They both placed the nation (Israel) before themselves. How many of us can say this? We truly are our “brother’s keeper”. How else would we become “one”?
Thank you for the reminder. I AM my brother’s keeper. And WE ALL got a taste of what that means – and what is does – with the success of our work for Irene. I just heard that her story now ran in the biggest newspaper in Toronto.
Bravo, K Gallaghar! My husband and I were just discussing this week’s parashat and the relevance of Skip’s post to what is written and the spirit that is expressed within it. Wow, how sweet it is to BE One in the body of Messiah with you and all Israel who are feasting on the word of YHVH in this week’s portion.
“The God of One”
Hmmm
Or
Two of a Kind
Psalm 130
From the depths I have cried out to you, O Lord;
Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplication.
If you, Lord, were to mark iniquities, who, O Lord, shall stand?
But with you is forgiveness, that you may be revered. I trust in the Lord;
My soul trusts in his word.
My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen wait for the dawn.
More than watchmen wait for the dawn, let Israel hope in the Lord.
For with the Lord there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption.
And he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities.
All Along The Watchtower
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YanjY9CsPDQ
“There must be some way out of here” said the joker to the thief
“There’s too much confusion”, I can’t get no relief
Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth
None of them along the line know what any of it is worth.
“No reason to get excited”, the thief he kindly spoke
“There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke
But you and I, we’ve been through that, and this is not our fate
So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late”.
All along the watchtower, princes kept the view
While all the women came and went, barefoot servants, too.
Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl
Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl.
Bob Dylan
Hi Skip,
Salvation begins with me, knowing well Whom I bless/worship, Who purchased my redemption, Whom I serve-Elohim YHWH of Israel!
I am part of Israel, and Israel is part of me, inseparable, as in a Body, of followers who walk in His ways.
We’re not connected, being unwilling to let go of individual mindsets, for example, very clearly, ABBA YHWH is restoring the Hebrew language, and revealing the Hebraic mindset of His Word for some 20+ years now, when the Hebrew Roots assemblies began sprouting all around the globe, yet not everyone is embracing that, presumably that it is not relevant to salvation, BUT, would hang on to misinterpret Paul’s epistles to the scattered Tribes. That is so sad.
Except two agree, can they walk together?
I am Israel!! And I am all for Hebraic mindset. 🙂 HalleluYAH!
I am you, we are Him. Thank you for being mine. His eyes look through ours into another becoming a part of the whole from the beginning to the end. Thought and vision are effecting the heart core of a corporate body trying to breathe. Deep intercession from the heart of the One who sees all things, knows all pain and feels every lonely cry must have our agreement and partnership of sharing in them, crying for them somehow allowing our redeemed hearts to be a proxy for light healing the soil of life.
Is this what we are running from? Our hearts are weapons in the hands of a King. I command my heart to trust Him, bow down and become Him!