Super-Salvation
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. John 10:10 NASB
Abundantly – I know plastic. I know tinsel. I know paper maché. I’m not sure I know “abundantly.” I can’t think of any sustained period in my life where I would have exclaimed, “Oh, my, this is life abundantly.” I know what it means to suffer. I know what it means to be frustrated, disappointed, annoyed, perplexed, sorrowful, even (maybe) glimpses of joy, peace, satisfaction. But I’m not sure any of these are abundantly. That word leaves me wondering what I have done wrong. In fact, the whole word group in Greek leaves me somewhere in the dust.
Perisseuo, in this verse perisson, “means ‘to be present overabundantly or to excess,’ censoriously ‘to be superfluous,’ and of persons ‘to be superior or superabounding.’ Transitively the sense is ‘to make overrich,’ ‘to provide superabundantly.’”[1] But even my greatest moments of exuberance are tinged with something else—regret, temporality, unworthiness, angst. The rabbis don’t help much. They take this word as a sign of material blessings in the Messianic age. Can I wait for that? Is the real fulfillment of life only sometime later? No wonder Kierkegaard gave up on religion. And Paul? He’s not much help either. All he does is make it worse by adding hyperbole—hyperperisseuo, hyperekperissou, hyperekperissos. Like pouring gasoline on the fire. Burns hotter and faster, but I’m watching from a distance. Makes me feel even more left out in the cold.
I get the part about the thief. Steal, kill, destroy. Actually, that’s what I’ve done to myself. I stole that innocence I once had when I listened to my own justifications. I killed my sense of harmony and worthiness when I started comparing myself to “successful” others. I ended up destroyed. I didn’t need some outside spiritual beast to attack me. I laid siege and wasted away all on my own. That’s part of the problem There’s really no one else to blame here. But now that I’ve lost my innocence, my inner peace and my willingness to keep going, what does the rest of this verse really mean to me? There’s no geographical solution. Wherever I go, that’s where I am. There’s no psychological solution. I carry around the enemy inside me. I can’t fight and win. I’m already defeated (oh yes, and he knows this). In fact, when I seriously think about it, I’m the all-around loser here.
That’s why the verse isn’t self-help. There is no self-help for my condition. DOA. If life in any form is going to happen here, it will have to come from somewhere else. “I came” is not about me. “Abundantly” isn’t my word. It’s his. Whatever abundantly means, I won’t be giving anyone the definition. I think this is a case of unintended explanation. We thought we were going to get a definition, but instead we were directed to look at another person’s life. Maybe “abundantly” can only be seen, not thought. Maybe I only know what he means when I see what kind of life he lived. And maybe that scares me even more.
I’ll have to revise all those superlatives that imply physical, material and spiritual gains. I don’t think abundantly has much to do with that direction. It seems to me that when I look at the exemplar of “abundantly,” I see only one consistent action—alignment with the Father. All the rest seems to be just the ordinary craziness that I so desperate want to escape. Maybe this is a word I can’t really understand looking in from the outside. Maybe I’ll have to get burned first.
Topical Index: abundantly, perisson, perisseuo, John 10:10
[1] Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (p. 828). Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.
We are deceived. We think we are the end-all-be-all; our own source (just because we find ourselves able to choose!) and the cat’s meow, too. All that is pure self-inflicted illusion, but try telling anybody that! Even yourself! Only experience can convince us, and only the experience of our own bottoms can give us the correct motivation for change, for only that bottom can direct us away from ourselves, which is our problem. Abundance? Even daily bread – much less the next breath in our bodies – we won’t even pay any attention, much less go looking for these things, as long as we think we somehow already ‘have’ them or can obtain them for ourselves.
Living “soberly in this present world”? That requires being present in the present, out of addictive choices that attempt to avoid the pain of separation that is always there in that present. To live that pain ( which will always be in that present for us fractured folks) is the prerequisite for change, but it is also only in the present that the experience of that pain (the bottom of the truth of my fracture) can motivate me to fix that separation.
Abundance? That would only be found through the looking glass of illusion lost for 100% of us starting out on this planet. Perhaps the old revivals (so many of them straight temperance meetings) were on to something, for they preached sin until everybody was sobered up on the floor and feeling their pain in real time before they started praising God for His salvation, for the reception of the abundance of that salvation requires our sobriety, too. Maybe it isn’t just alcohol that we need a temperance meeting for, though. We are all subject to the intoxication of illusion that is generated by the belief that there can be something for nothing – the entire world runs on this illusion! Only after we become convinced that we have nothing, however – clutched in our tight little fists of self will – will we begin to want something. Abundance cannot fit in a closed fist.
Abundance is not having or owning but giving what we have. Look at the lesson of the widow tithing. She gave all while when we have we give only what we owe or are due.
Many years ago I was asked what am I thankful for. I responded the privilege to have another breath. Somehow studies, knowledge and promotions had deprived me of this view.
I believe today as then it is this crippling lifestyle, this self righteous and justified right in life that make as blind or dead and it is in these that Yeshua has come to restore the simplicity of live. Living it fully in the moment…
Seems as long as abundance is looked @as an equation of weighing up our perceptions to define ‘plenty’ we have enormous opportunity to fail. To sustain the solid ephemeral of abundance we must do away with fabrications or find ourselves as an opponent of truth.
I have found abundance fleeting but when His Spirit patiently waiting catches me out being genuine to the simplicity of His will…I think I have touched abundance. I have not grasped abundance firmly to my bosom though.
He dwells with me in those moments though & I am grateful.
I too quickly forget how I stumbled upon genuiness that is in agreement with the Father because often my false life gets in the way of the multitudes of moments God wants me to be in, for Him & with Him.
I have little knowledge about the Hebrew language but do wonder if abundance is more about what happens to a person in the moments they are Echad with the Father. Out of the abundance of the heart….His Heart being formed in us?
Blessings
FJ
alignment with the Father…..abundance…….sounds like a new dimension…..sounds KINGDOMLY
WHAT IF . . .
What if Yeshua actually meant John 14:23.
Sounds pretty abundant to me.
I think we need a lighter touch on today’s message. The key to understanding abundant living is tied to one word–gratitude. I believe some of the people who have already commented have touched upon this. If you can say, at this very moment, “He is my God, and I am His,” you have access to life, and that abundantly. Imagine how the Son must have said these words. Don’t you think He said them with passion? Don’t you think he was looking his disciples right in the eyes? Don’t you think He was a Man on fire? Be thankful. You’ll be amazed at how life opens up for you.
Well said Thomas, though perhaps we need a brighter touch rather than a lighter touch:)
The may be one of those word discussions that depends upon whether the definition is exposed to be ‘relative’ or absolute. If we view the definition of this word ‘abundantly’ in John 10:10 as relative— thus in proportion to…the first half of the verse… then ‘abundantly’ is a minute description. For the gift of eternal life has not been stolen or destroyed from anyone who chooses to accept this gift which makes us a part of God’s Kingdom.
I agree Thomas, “The key to understanding abundant living is tied to one word–gratitude.” For gratitude is necessary to walk in God’s Kingdom, now and eternally.
Some versions say “MORE abundantly”. Nevertheless, in context, a comparison is implied and evident. The thief ONLY kills and steals and destroys. Messiah offers a better life. Messiah may give AND take away, but the thief only kills, steals, and destroys. He imparts NO LIFE AT ALL! It’s still a life where the thief is present and doing his thing, but it’s a better life with Messiah in it than not. Even with all the distess of this life, if compared to life without knowing Him, receiving and living by the Ruach HaKodesh, Whom He gives to whomever asks, and obeying and following Him, life is MORE abundant than otherwise?
I believe your teaching on Psalm 23 can assist in embracing John 10:10 especially in understanding of the Good Shepherd of our soul.