"I and the Father, We are one"
Johns Account 10: 30, Concordant New Testament
Have you ever been persecuted for telling the truth? I would reckon that there are many believers out there, even unbelievers, who have been raked over the coals for simply telling the truth. A lot of times, the world does not want to know the truth as we tell it. So it was with Jesus as He spoke to the Jews who demanded of Him to prove that He was who He claimed to be. Jesus proclaimed that the works which He had done in the name of the Father were a testament to His identity {Johns Account 10:25}. Then, Jesus said something which made the Jews gathered around Him take up stones against Him, He told the truth. Jesus proclaimed "I and the Father, We are One" {Johns Account 10:30}. In the eyes of the Jews gathered that day, Jesus was simply a human street preacher proclaiming Himself to be God. In their eyes, He had committed a capital offense worthy of stoning. His crime? "For an ideal act we are not stoning You, but for blasphemy, and that you, being a man, are making yourself God" {Johns Account 10:33}. So, there we have Jesus, accused of the blasphemy of making Himself God. But Is Jesus really who He proclaims to be? We know from scripture that Jesus was from the beginning {Johns Account 1:1}. We also know that through Him all was created {Johns Account 1:3}. We know that Jesus is in the Father and the Father in Him {Johns Account 14:10}. So it was that Jesus has been condemned for simply telling the truth. Even today, many in the mainstream church have difficulty accepting this truth spoken by Jesus. Instead, they proclaim a theology which speaks to the separation of man and the Father. This is born out of the lie spoken by Satan to Adam and Eve in the garden {Genesis 3:2-6}. The lie was that once the first creation ate of the fruit which God had commanded them not to, that they would "Be like God." In reality, as the created likeness of the Fathers very image, they were ALREADY like God. Likewise, as we were also created by God in His likeness, we share in the identity of the Father.
In whom the God of this eon blinds the apprehensions of the unbelieving so that the illumination of the evangel of the glory of Christ, Who is the image of the invisible God, does not irradiate them.
Paul to the Corinthians (2) 4: 4, Concordant New Testament
Ove the past few years, a group of my friends and I have spoken phrases which, in the day of Jesus, might have been seen as blasphemy. Words such as "Be Jesus" and "Live as Jesus." What blasphemy is this? But, like Jesus who has been persecuted for speaking the truth of His own identity, so it is with me. For I speak the truth of my identity as well. I speak to my identity as being created in the likeness of the Father {Genesis 1:27}. I speak to the truth of my union IN Christ and the Father {Johns Account 14:20}. If for these words I am accused of blasphemy by those who do not know the truth of Jesus, then so be it. While I do not expect stones to be heaved my way, I fully expect to be criticized at some point for my belief in my own identity in Christ Jesus. This is one of the rifts within Christianity today, and why the truth of Jesus is rarely spoken to. Yet there is freedom in knowing who we are in Christ. We are free in the revelation that we are in Him. That we did not choose Jesus, but that the Father chose us {Johns Account 15:16}. The world may see me as simply a man speaking to knowing Christ, but that's not who I am. Who I am...is Jesus.
~Scott~
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