So, continuing from the last episode, the big bomb I dropped is this: most Christians submit their theology to their personal experience, rather than interpreting their experience through proper theology. What does that mean?
If I don’t experience a miraculous healing, then it is, admittedly, more difficult to believe in miraculous healings. That’s a logical result of living with rational minds. If you’ve never seen a pink elephant, never saw a National Geographic episode showing pink elephants, never saw a photo on Google of a pink elephant, then you may be led to believe there is no such thing as pink elephants.
This is natural logic, and is commendable in many circumstances, but not in the life of the Spirit. You think God is logical? No way!
He sent Gideon out against an army of 160,000 enemies with 300 men carrying lamps and jugs. Are you serious?
He sent Moses, an 80 year old man with a stick, to rescue a million people from the most despotic ruler in the world. Oh yeah, and He announced it to Moses through a bush that was on fire but not getting burned up!
He sent a baby in manger to redeem all of humankind from the wrath of God against sin.
If you’re honest with yourself, you have to admit that the more stories you read in the Bible about how God accomplishes things, the more you realize He rarely does things that are logical by human standards. That’s why it’s often dangerous to try to nail God down to a particular modus operandi. That’s where strange theologies come from, like handling snakes!
We must not trust our experience or our logic while living close to Jesus, we must only trust in His word. Anything else will get us into big trouble. His infallible word is the only thing that is reliable, more reliable, even, than what you see with your eyes. There is a whole universe surrounding us that does not obey the laws of physics. It is THAT world that is the authority, not the things we see, touch and feel.
In 2 Kings 6, Elijah is surrounded by the Syrian army because the king of Syria discovered it was Elijah spoiling all his plans against Israel. When the army surrounded Elijah and his servant in the sleepy little town of Dothan, his servant was petrified. But Elijah prayed “O Lord, I pray, open his eyes that he may see” (2 Kings 6:17). God opened the servant’s spiritual eyes to see the angel armies surrounding the Syrian army, which is why Elijah could truthfully say “There are more with us than there are with them” (v. 16).
If Elijah had trusted his physical experience he would have been a dead man!
The spiritual realm is the prime mover. The entire universe was created from the mind and will and words of God. Everything in the physical universe is built upon the foundation of spiritual reality. Therefore, “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 6:12).
The real battle, always, is in the spiritual realm. That’s why the gifts of the Spirit are spiritual gifts, and the fruits of the Spirit are spiritual fruits. Those are the weapons we need in order to fight in the spiritual realm.
Romans 8 has a powerful description of the difference between living according to the flesh and living according to the Spirit:
“For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.”
I believe this passage primarily compares believers to unbelievers, but the same principle applies to Christians who live according to only their physical experiences and logic. Paul says “Those who are in the flesh cannot please God,” and it is obvious that Christians can live in the flesh. Paul urges us in Galatians 5:16 to “walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.” And in verse 25 “If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.”
If it were not possible to be indwelt by the Spirit yet walk in the flesh, then these admonitions would be pointless. He is urging us as Christians, with the Holy Spirit living inside us, that we ought to focus on living in the Spirit because it’s plainly obvious that it’s possible to walk in the flesh even after being born again. Just look around. You know people that will bear this out.
So, back to sozo. Sozo is a rich, broad concept that allows us, not by our own power, but by the power of the Holy Spirit working within us, through the gifts and fruits of the Spirit, to walk a life worthy of God. We can’t do it on our own. It’s not our power. We are not the source of anything good. It’s God’s power working in and through us, and it is for the purpose of bringing His kingdom to earth.
Sozo brings healing:
“Wherever He entered villages, or cities, or countryside, they were laying the sick in the market places, and imploring Him that they might just touch the fringe of His cloak; and as many as touched it were being cured [sozo]” (Mark 6:56). (See also Mark 5:23, 5:34, 10:52, Luke 8:48, 17:19, Acts 4:9, 14:9 for “sozo” used for physical healing).
Deliverance from demons:
“Those who had seen it reported to them how the man who was demon-possessed had been made well [sozo]” (Luke 8:36).
Security/safety:
The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed, and will bring me safely [sozo] to His heavenly kingdom” (2 Timothy 4:18).
Recovery from sickness:
The disciples then said to Him, “Lord, if he [Lazarus] has fallen asleep, he will recover [sozo]” (John 11:12). The disciples here thought Lazarus was only sick and sleeping. In this instance, sozo means recovering from sickness.
Sozo also refers, many, many times, to salvation itself.
So, I trust that I have at least begun to answer the question, which was:
What is included in our atonement package, or perhaps more accurately, in the process of our reconciliation to God?
It’s a lot. It’s huge. It’s something so huge that we ought to spend our entire lives stepping into it more and more deeply. God never intended to only provide us eternal life then remove us from earth. He intends for us to reach to the uttermost parts of the earth with his gospel. And this is where I will wrap it up:
I have heard from many sources that the term “gospel” is a superlative in the Greek language. The term’s etymology comes from “good news” but it really means “almost too good to be true news.” Just getting to heaven is really, really great news. But it’s so much more than that! We are to live an abundant life here on earth, full of the love and glory of God:
“But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18).
We are not to be content just surviving until the rapture or until we die, but we are to continue to become more and more Christ-like throughout our lives, and thus display to the world around us the love and hope that is in Christ Jesus our Lord!
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