Loving Like God

John 2:1-4.

Without a doubt, John Eldridge is a very gifted writer, and more often than not even a very insightful writer, but where the first of Jesus’ miracles is concerned he seems to have missed it on at least two very important counts. The first count has to do with the timing of the wedding wine, and the second has to do with Jesus motivation, which for John Eldridge is “Extravagant Generosity.”

Having just read “Beautiful Outlaw” for the fourth time, I find myself needing to respond to a missing element, a very important missing element in Chapter Six – “Extravagant Generosity.”

Sometime later in the ministry of Jesus, after many miracles, there came a time when some Gentiles wanted to meet Jesus. On that occasion He replied, “Now is the hour for the Son of Man to be glorified,” John 12:20-50.

Not long after that He held up a cup at the end of the last supper – a wedding supper – “This is my blood of the new covenant,” Luke 20:22.

In the Old Testament, this cup is better defined as the “cup of his espousals,” Song of Songs 3:11.

All this to say that Jesus’ first miracle turns out to be a preview of His last and greatest miracle. What was needed was not only more wine, but new wine, and a new and everlasting Spirit – poured out without measure – a cup of life without limit and without end. The Spirit of everlasting life was and is in that Wine – that Blood.

Was it Extravagant? Yes certainly it was extravagant.

Was it Generous? This is a bit more problematic. This is the blood by which He purchased an everlasting Bride of His own choosing. The price was certainly extravagant, but the extravagance was and is the measure of His love for us – His desire for us.  His generosity was the measure of how much He wanted us.

It is that desire for us, that desirability in us with which we must finally come into agreement.  We must agree with His assessment of who we are to Him – how important we are to Him.  This is our new and unshakable identity in and from Him.  In that moment every identity crisis of our lives comes to an end. His “Generous Extravagance” is the eternal end of our every identity crisis!  His love for us is our new and everlasting identity!

It is this miracle of our transformed identity that we will visit in our exploration of the next level.

Love!

• By Jay Ferris, originally posted Jan. 2013

“Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.”  Isaiah 53:4, 5.

It is difficult to think about passionate human intimacy without this passage coming to mind. At first glance it can appear that it is physical healing that we need, but on closer examination and experience we quickly discover that it is healing of a much deeper nature that is needed.

Where this matter of healing is concerned we are much more inclined to think in terms of hospitals, doctors and nurses, but Jesus didn’t come that we might have any of those things more abundantly. He came that we might have “life, and life more abundantly.” In the first instance, it is “life” that we need to get, not a doctor or a nurse or a clinic.

That said, and on deeper reflection, we can appreciate that the flesh and blood intimacy attendant to the practice of medicine changes venues in Christ to the practice of life and relationship. The physical intimacy that sickness brings to the fore is a picture of the spiritual intimacy that “iniquity” brings to the fore. We are on Jesus triage team. All the arrangements are made in and by the Spirit, but this only means that the intimacy required for healing is even deeper. Like medics, we practice relational intimacy in the battlefield, Colossians 1:24.

Our passage from Isaiah strongly suggest that there is a lot of room for misunderstanding where the love of God is concerned – “we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted…”

But even in his time, Isaiah understood that “… he was pierced for our transgression… crushed for our iniquities… punished for our peace… and wounded for our healing.”

Love!

• By Jay Ferris, originally posted January 2013.

For more on this subject, see “Is There No Balm in Gilead”