HOW WE BELONG TO JESUS
The wisdom of the fathers
HOW WE BELONG TO JESUS
“You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him.” (John 17:2) Here we see that the Father gave us to His Son, that He might share His eternal life with us. This revealing of His life within our inner being is the fundamental blessing of the kingdom of God. "I do not pray for these {the apostles} alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You…that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me…” (John 17:20-23)?
It takes a heart of great faith to have this glorious possibility opened to the mind. Only think of all the ways and degrees in which Christ is one with the Father: one in nature, one in purpose, one in motive and intention; one in character, one in taste and affinity; one in government, one in life and action. And yet, the Son’s infallible prayer is that we, as poor and shortsighted as we have been, are to be so melted into Divine love that we begin to live in the same kind of harmony that He shares with the Father.?
We need to recognize the impossibility of living as an expression of Christ’s heavenly life while we are sill attempting to be an expression of our own life. Jesus could only be an expression of His Father’s life by emptying Himself of His own glory. He chose to become nothing in Himself so that His Father could be all in all. Similarly, by choosing to die to our self-originated form of life so we may live by His Spirit and express His life and glory,?He will reveal Himself through our mortal body. He assures us that everyone who loses their self-life will find His life. (Matt. 16:25) The promise is sure!
(from ""Our Own God" by George D. Watson)