“Simplicity is truth’s most becoming garb,” says Jordan. “It
doesn’t have to get all complicated. Every time Paul talks about an
inheritance, he never puts an ‘s’ on that word one time. As far as Paul’s
concerned there’s only one inheritance. That one inheritance is distributed
based upon the capacity; there’s what he calls ‘the reward of the inheritance.’
“There are various positions, stations, responsibilities in
the inheritance but it’s still just the one inheritance.
“The issue of reigning with Christ is not the elitist,
political reigning that you’re so familiar with; like what Jesus talks about in
Mark 10 where you reign like the Gentiles, just having power and being in
control and being boss.
“You look at our government today. Some of you older people
can remember when we had what we’re called 'statesmen.' You don’t have any of
those today.
“I get such a kick out of these guys when they talk about ‘gridlock.’
The president says, ‘I can’t get the Republicans to do anything,' and the
Republicans say, ‘We can’t get anything done because of the Democrats.’ All
they mean is the other guy won’t capitulate to do what I want. That’s all they’re
talking about: ‘We want to reign.’
“So instead of seeing people lead your nation who are
grateful for the privilege to serve, you have people who are grabbers of power
and want the power to force people to do what they want done. Jesus said, ‘That’s
not the way my kingdom works; that’s not the way ruling for God works.’
“You see, having God’s life is to have a life that always
just instinctively lives for the benefit of others, never for itself. The Father
finds all His pleasure in His Son. When you exalt the Son, who do you exalt? The
Father.
*****
“In our situation we’ve been given the same kind of mandate
that Adam had, only to do it in the heavenly realm.
“What He gave man on the earth is the example; the visible
representation of what our function in the heavens is going to be. We’re going
to be in a different dimension but the purpose, the activity, the mandate there
is the same as the mandate here. We’re to go there and have dominion just as
Adam was to have dominion here. We’re going to do it through the same kind of
procedure—the discovering of wisdom, knowledge and understanding and the
application of it.
“Colossians 1:9 says, ‘For this cause we also, since the day
we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be
filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual
understanding.’
“Look at chapter two verse two: That their hearts might be
comforted, being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full
assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgement of the mystery of God, and
of the Father, and of Christ;
[3] In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
[3] In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
“You see, our job is do just like Adam. God had hidden all
these treasures in creation and Adam was to go out and harness that. Our
privilege is to find the wisdom, understanding, knowledge that’s hidden in
Christ; to harness that and then to put it on display.
“That’s what that thing is in Ephesians 2:7: ‘That in the
ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his
kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.’
“That’s the exceeding riches where you take that peach and
wind up with peach a la mode. What we’re doing is digging out all that hidden
wisdom and riches God has put there in Christ and you just develop this
entrepreneurial reigning of a servant. It’s sonship service.
*****
“It’s always fascinated me how the Book of Mark starts out. The only
one of the synoptic gospels that starts out saying Jesus is the Son of God is
the one that’s going to present Him as the servant.
“So what you’re going to see in Mark is the sonship service
that the Messiah accomplishes. What is that? That’s simply the service that the
Son, an adult in the family, understands the Father’s will and is out carrying
on the Father’s business. Not doing His own will; doing the Father’s will.
“And everything He does (‘The words that I speak unto you I
speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.’)
He’s just extracting out of the wisdom, knowledge and understanding God has put
there and developing the capacity to do that.
“His plan was for Adam to go out among the trees and
discover that and then to extract it out of creation to develop technologies
that give Him the opportunity to take creation and make it work.
“An entrepreneur is somebody who takes something and makes
new things out of it that add value to what’s already there.”
(To be continued tomorrow . . . )
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