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Eternity's Constancy Today
By John Gavazzoni
In the dimension of eternity, there is a constancy. It is the constancy of the flow of life, and that life is the communion of the Holy Spirit by Whom the Family, which IS God, interactively functions with relational wholeness, with the relational unity which IS Deity's wellness of Being. St. John summed it up: "God is Love." All wellness is relational. Where there is relational purity, there is wellness of Being, and traces to the conjugal, communal, unilateral love of God.
Sin is the opposite of the above. Sin is dysfunctionality, a deviating from the goal of shared love in that communion which is by grace. Sin finally is mankind as a dysfunctional family. I have laid that foundation in order to address a profound misunderstanding of the nature of salvation, particularly as played out in the old theological controversy between Arminianism and Calvinism, but more specifically between the once-saved-always-saved/eternal security camp, and the you-can-lose-your-salvation camp.
As is often the case, both sides begin with presumptions that, in reacting to one another's equally untenable positions, make it impossible to reach a conclusion that takes into account all the teaching of scripture re: the operation of salvation within our eonian existence.
Please note that I said, the operation of salvation, for the experience of salvation is an ongoing Divine operation, not a state acquired by an "act of the will," e.g. "I have chosen (or been chosen) to receive Christ, and therefore, it is settled; I am saved." Or, "I have chosen to receive Christ, and as long as I keep making the right choices, I am saved."
Instead, as is implied by the Greek expression, "Zoe Aionious," (carried over into English as "Eonian Life," or "Aionian Life,") the constancy of eternity, summed up in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ, is present and operative carrying that eternal constancy into the eons, transferring eternal constancy into the eons, so as to become the endurance of the saving faith-life of Christ within humanity today.
Thus accordingly, we experience the operation of the eternal wholeness/well-being of God, operating in us healing our dysfunctionality by Its purity. This process or operation is described as the experience of whoever believETH in the Son. That's King James, for the continuality, continuance, habituality of faith. The "eth" part of believe conveys that tense. Other translations, using up to date English, give the same as "BelievES." Note, NOT "has believED," but "BelievETH"/BelievES. Jonathan Mitchell's Translation of the New Testament, makes this clear by actually expanding the translation of "believes" with the explanation of the very tense in the Greek indicating a present and continuing action.
Not only do we believe IN Christ, but according to the Greek of the New Testament, we are believING INTO Christ. From within Him (for IN Him, were all things created) we are believing further and further into all that He is, all of Him in Whom God has chosen that all fullness should dwell. Thus, to be sure, we are all secure IN Christ, while entering more and more into the wellness of Deity in Him by His faith in us. That's one for the security folks.
BUT to be fair to the you-can-lose-your-salvation folks, the operation of eternal constancy in us as age-enduring/age-pertaining life is constantly given over to death unto resurrection. At the core of the life of Christ in us is that eternal constancy, but its constancy is put to the test by being given over to its arch enemy, death, and thereby the constancy is revealed in resurrection. There is clearly, something of a break in the constancy of that process.
May I dare say that "The Normal Christian Life" is one of intermittent savingness, and lostness. There are times when I have been existentially cut off from the flow of saving life, and in that state, I know that I was truly lost (while being secure in Him). Then that core-eternal constancy within eonian life came to my rescue as resurrection. I'm not totally clear on this, but it seems to me that there can be extended periods of lostness leading to very dramatic resurrection, or very, not so dramatic, brief ones, and/or both operating simultaneously.
We are, you know, "at all times continuously carrying around among the body Jesus' being put to death (or: within [our] body the deadening, or the state of death, which comes from Jesus; or: within the midst of the body the dying associated with Jesus), to the end that the life, also, of Jesus (or: so that also the life which comes from and is Jesus; or: so that Jesus' life) can (may; would) be set in clear light and manifested, within our body (or: in the midst of the body, which is us)!" - Jonathan Mitchell's translation of 2 Cor. 4:10. To draw an analogy from the most recent discoveries of science, we now know that light is at the same time, both a steady beam, but also broken up into sequential "bullets" of light.
Some might protest that I am confusing salvation with fellowship. In my early mentoring I was taught that I couldn't lose my salvation, but I could fall out of fellowship with the Lord. Dumb presumption there, for salvation IS communion, and communion IS salvation.
The biblical picture of salvation that impacts us at the most intuitive level is the picture of salvation as a river, breaking forth in rivers FLOWING out of our innermost being. Salvation is a flow, not a static state of existence. When the river flows, wholeness, wellness of being and pure relational functioning are at work, and we are BEING saved.
As the chorus says, "There is a river that flows from deep within. There is a fountain that saves the soul from sin. Come to that river, there is a vast supply. There is a river, that never shall run dry." Though sometimes God may choose to channel the river around you and leave you dry for a season. Its OK. You're in the One who is the river, and though you have seasons of lostness, He never loses you. He'll never, no never, no never leave you lost.
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