Abraham, Isaac, David, Jesus, & Aragorn
(Though not necessarily in that order)
A Reply

This is from a friend responding to the "Abraham, Isaac, David, Jesus & Aragorn."

 

Dear Fred

I think this latest writing of yours is brilliant but the last few paragraphs throw up a question in my mind that I would be interested in knowing your views on.  I guess bottom line it brings out the old question of licence.

We know someone who speaks constantly about knowing who he is and stating that all is God in his life no matter what happens or how it looks.  However he can never keep a job for more than a few months (he has a superior attitude "always trying to put right those around him" and thinks he knows it all spiritually and can get very 'super spiritual' at work where practical solutions are being looked for etc)  He is constantly in horrendous debt and takes no responsibility for anything.  He always says this is the way God is taking him.  I cannot agree with this, there has to be a time when we take responsibility for our actions and do not blame everything on God as this guy does.

Would be interested in your comments.

 

Dear _________,

I'm not surprised some of my statements raised the "license" question.

Obviously I don't know the brother you refer to, or any specifics of his life, so I could not comment particularly about him and his apparent problems. I can only answer therefore in generalities.

But I have no cognizance of what you mean by "responsibility." Ye are dead, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. Do we believe this? Where then does "responsibility" lie?

I know no answer except faith. Not faith in our doctrines, or in our mental beliefs, but in God only Himself.

What doctrine would have you up on a mountain killing your son, saying God told you to do it? They'd lock you up and throw away the key. The tabloid press would have a field day. What doctrine would have you turn your wife's maid and your firstborn son out into the desert to die (for all you care, since you do nothing else to insure their survival)? What doctrine would have you marry your half sister? These days that's called incest, and they have laws against it and you can go to jail. Yet Abraham did all that, and we call him the righteousness of God, the example of faith. And none of that mentioned above sounds like "responsible living."

Maybe your friend is just a flake, I don't know, using these precious truths as a mask to hide his fleshly indulgences. I don't know. Or maybe your friend appears as a fool to you, but really portrays the salvation of God in the midst of his constant indebtedness and human frailty.

Where is your faith? What is your faith for your friend?

Or does his behavior so appall you, that you cannot have faith for him? That you cannot see him whole and complete in Christ?

The only answer I know to anything is faith. Faith in God.

I died to personal responsibility the moment I realized I had no ability of any kind whatsoever to produce even one iota of a particle of the fruit of God. If God doesn't do it, it doesn't get done. I quit living a responsible life with my face buried in the pillow of my wingback chair in 1981. I told God that was it, I was finished. Finite. I coudn't attain heaven, couldn't keep myself from hell. If anything was going to get done, He would have to do it, period, no debate, I quit!

Maybe that sounds like dodging the bullet. Maybe that sounds like fleeing responsibility. To me it means I've died and now Another lives my life, and there is no going back on that.

Sure people can use these "truths" in a fleshly way to indulge in fleshly living. That's always been a charge against the Spirit Life. So what?

Should we shy away from freedom simply because it has been misrepresented and by some misused?

Are we about fleshly appearances? Do we think that by our fleshly appearances, with everything neat and tidy, everything "just-so," all "i's" dotted and all "t's" crossed, we'll by those appearances promote the kingdom of God?

Isn't God big enough to protect His own reputation?

When I say you can do anything you want, I speak to spiritual adults. Those who hear these truths and have not yet come to adulthood (adulthood meaning a consciousness of God is ALL in the all, ONE PERSON manifesting Himself in all things), will crash and burn on these truths.

GOOD!

There is only ONE God. One Person. Those who have other gods temporarily will find those gods wanting. Amen. We are put into bondage, not by our own will, that we might understand hope beyond reason.

Hope beyond reason would seem to me to apply to someone hopelessly in debt with no possible relief coming forth, who seems in his humanity to have no ability or consciousness of responsibility toward a resolution of his insoluable problems, but who nevertheless stands on the promise of an inner word spoken in his heart in the silent watches of the night.

Maybe that doesn't apply to the brother you speak of. I have no idea. But it applies to me.

And I am not about license. I'm not looking for a loophole so I can go out and cheat on my wife or pretend I don't have any debts. I died, and the One who rose in me is about Life for others.

I don't say that out of some prideful heart thinking I'm something better than others, but as one who has realized to the uttermost his own absolute weakness and finding in that absolute weakness the invisibile intangible Strength of the Living God.

Finding that abolute weakness in myself, with no ability of any kind to bring forth God's righteousness, with no ability of any kind to be personally "responsible" for ANYTHING, (how are dead people responsible?), in that LOSING my life a new life, unexpected, unknown, yet intimately familiar, arises, maybe discombobulated to the world, and maybe especially to my sometimes almost-too-disapproving-brethren, but nonetheless in the midst of my weakness and failure and seeming indifference to consequences in the flesh, God shines in my MORTAL flesh.

So, here are my views on license.

There is no such thing. There is either living in grace, in the kingdom of God, or in bondage, in the kingdom of the wicked one.

In the kingdom of grace all is free.

Strangely, in the kingdom of bondage everything is also free.

Unto the pure thou wilt shew thyself pure, unto the froward thou wilt shew thyself froward.

Of which freedom are we?

love,
fred