Holy Kiss

Do you know this old hymn?

O soul, are you weary and troubled?
No light in the darkness you see?
There’s light for a look at the Savior,
And life more abundant and free!

Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace

Through death into life everlasting
He passed, and we follow Him there;
O’er us sin no more hath dominion—
For more than conqu’rors we are!

His Word shall not fail you—He promised;
Believe Him, and all will be well:
Then go to a world that is dying,
His perfect salvation to tell!

I hear that refrain in my head often…Turn your eyes upon Jesus.

This is the 300th post on alancetotheheart!  Less than 2 years ago this journey began.  I can say that God has shown me (and you) so much along the way.  My “theology” has changed.  I was just emerging from the cocoon of one reality and stepping into another.  I went from peeking into the Kingdom of Heaven to dancing in the Kingdom of Heaven.  Old paradigms and doctrines like Penal Substitution make no sense anymore.  I often wonder “how did I think that way?”  Jesus has been our guide.  The goodness of God, His very glory has drawn us into an intimate and intoxicating embrace that has filled us with His joy and transformed us into His love.  We can never be the same again.

If you start from the beginning and read every post you will see this thread of His goodness, His glory compelling me to find more, seek more, realize more, get more and share more of His amazingness.  The natural progression of revelation has always been following the light of Jesus so you should see a “transforming and renewing of my mind” as we traveled on this “way” called Jesus.  It is time to put this together and share the journey with as many as possible.  It is time to bound the brick breaking, boundary shattering revelation of an infinitely good God and call it a book.  OK, that is a huge paradox of giant insignificance to assume finite pages could capture infinite Grace… but isn’t that the paradigm of the Kingdom?  So I will start by building some roadmaps for the journey and sharing those over the next few months.  I believe many of you would benefit from taking the journey in retrospection with me.

But lets not burn rubber just yet.  Want to get really messed up in the glory of God?  OK let me see if I can push you over the edge so you fall into the arms of Awesome to find yourself face to face with Love Himself.  It is time to turn our eyes upon Jesus.

Let me give you a few signposts of remembrance.  First all of God is revealed in Jesus.  That is why He came to Earth.  He reveals the Father and reveals who we are in the Father:

Heb 1:3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,  (ESVST)

He is done with the “sin thing” and is resting (sitting) while He holds up the universe which is in Him and we are in Him and He is in us so the universe that is upheld is in us?!?!?!?  This is why Paul calls it a mystery.  Jesus is the mystery of completeness.  He is the mystery of perfection.  He is the mystery of our very nature as intended from the beginning.

Mankind was lost, hiding and separating themselves from God.  He has never ever separated Himself from us.  He has always been reaching out and pleading with us to just turn around.  Like a married couple in a fight, the newlywed wife turns from the husband in shame or guilt or unworthiness or rebellion or abuse or hurt or pain or whatever other “not from God” expression/experience and shows him her back.  Jesus says just turn around.  That is our “repentance.”  We turn around and gaze at the one who took away all the junk and put it in the grave for good.

Col 1:13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins (ESVST)

We are in a new dominion.  We have moved out of a fallen kingdom and into His Kingdom.  Yay!!!!  We are all in Christ.  Every person on the planet past and present and future is in Jesus.  He took all of mankind to the cross and to the grave and then resurrected all of us into our new creation.  Just like seeds planted in the ground we sprouted into the tree we were meant to be in Jesus.

Col 1:15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities — all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. 19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.  21 And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, 22 he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him,  (ESVST)

Before time itself you were in Jesus.  You were born from God.  You didn’t choose Him, He chose you.  Before the very foundation of the Earth God had already “born” you to be the person you are today.  He patterned you and formed you to be agents of His goodness.  We get to be His children of glory.  We get to be His body on this Earth.  We get to be like Jesus.  We were born into Adam but were first born from God.  We died in Adam like the seed of a great Kingdom tree but were brought back to life in the resurrection of Jesus.  It all happened 2000 years ago.  We were hostile to God IN OUR MINDS.  Now we are stepping into the revelation of who He is as revealed in Jesus and who we are in Jesus.

Jn 3:3 Jesus answered him, “ Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” (ESV)

This word again is actually better translated as: (a) from above, from heaven, (b) from the beginning, from their origin (source), from of old.  We are from Him.  Our Father is our Father.  We didn’t pick our parents, they picked us.  God is our Father and has always been our Father from the beginning.

God has always known this about us.  We are having our minds renewed to believe and understand this by revelation and glory moments of His goodness and love.  Paul understood.

Gal 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith OF the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. (KJV, emphasis mine)

Even our faith is found in His faith in US.  Come on!  Jesus is hanging on the cross, being killed by mankind, not raising a finger of defense and He is forgiving us.  Hanging there on the cross He has great faith in us.  He made us.  He designed us.  We were meant for Him.  We were meant to live in His embrace of intimate ecstasy.

This is what Jesus is trying to explain to Nicodemus but he can’t understand:

John 3:4 Nicodemus said to him, “ How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother ‘s womb and be born?” 5 Jesus answered, “ Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. (ESVST)

I asked God “if all has been accomplished and all is done and all is finished….then why Your Holy Spirit like in the Acts churches?”  Jesus told me very clearly…“He is my KISS for you.”  I was blown away.  We are “born of the Spirit” in God from the beginning.  When we “turn our eyes upon Jesus” and embrace Him, He kisses us and His Spirit lingers.  We are forever in an embrace with our creator.  We are, and have always been, joined to Him.  We are His children and His vessel.  We are in Him and He is in us.  The entire universe is in God and God is in us.  As we see the love of God expressed in Jesus on a cross our eyes are opened to His glory in us, His fullness in us, His Grace living in us.  That is amazing!

“So brother, are you saying we are all saved?”

We will all be in the presence of Love Himself when we step from this world into the next.  There is no place where God is not.  Hell is the same place as Heaven, in God.  In His undiluted love and grace and mercy and joy and peace and goodness, in His intense burning love for us some people will still reject Him.  That won’t be fun for them.  Listen, be need to understand that Hell is a greater problem “now” instead of “then.”  I’ve met many people who will be in the arms of Jesus when they die but are not being saved now.  They are Christians that still have so many hurts and hangups and reoccurring sins and so much more junk from the devil and they are blaming God for the whole thing instead of letting Jesus do what He came to do…save us.  So, no not everyone is being saved.  Seems to me they don’t want to be.  Oh yeah, Paul said this:

1Ti 4:10 For to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe. (ESVST)

So I say we all turn our eyes upon Jesus and willingly accept His embrace.  Let Him give you a Holy Kiss and step into the Kingdom of Heaven.  I know it frustrates you to see the “it is too good to be true” and not feel ripped off.  That is a normal reaction.  Just fall into His arms and let Him pour out His love into those wounds and hurts.  Let Him “kiss your boo boos.”  That may sound childish but guess what…”unless we have the faith of a child….”

Yay God!

Lance