Or, A Life of Glad Giving and Receiving
Scripture: Selected Scriptures
Date: July 20, 2014
Speaker: Sean Higgins
I started this series on the doctrine of the Trinity by saying that it could be the most life-changing and least applicable series you’ve ever heard. Knowing about the eternal Three in One doesn’t lend itself to a list of “Tips for Trinitarians,” but it will shape our entire lives.
What you revere you resemble, either for ruin or for restoration. (G.K. Beale, We Become What We Worship, 16)
That is because God made us as to those who bear His image. From the beginning that has been so. We have considered that the husband and wife relationship was made by God for us to reflect His non-aloneness, that’s why it is better for man not to be alone. We considered how the Personhood of God affects the task of discipleship: it must be personal because the gospel aims to restore fellowship between persons. We even considered one example of theology that rejects the Three in the idolatry of Islam’s strict unitarianism and how that worship results in different priorities and practices.
Tonight I want to take one more broad view. God exalts, desires, and enables communion with men and among men because His triune communion is full of loving joy. His wants and works flow from His nature . God speaks in glorious terms about the blessing of relationship, He wants nothing more in the universe than glory that comes in relationship, and He Himself pursues all that is necessary for relationship.
In the Garden of Eden, what did God share with Adam and Eve? He did say, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food” (Genesis 1:29). He gave them great things but most of all, He shared Himself. They shared relationship together. The Lord walked with them in the cool of the evening. They had something in common, they had communion.
In his book, Of Communion with God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, Each Person Distinctly, in Love, Grace, and Consolation, John Owen accounted communion as:
Communion consists in giving and receiving. (21)
Or in more detail:
Communion is the mutual communication of such good things as wherein the persons holding that communion are delighted, bottomed upon some union between them. (93)
Adam and Eve were “bottomed upon” the direct union between themselves and God as evidenced by meeting and talking with Him.
When the first couple sinned, what did they lose? Vertical and horizontal communion was broken. The serpent tempted them by making them think that they didn’t need God, they could be gods. Their disobedience said in effect, “We will not receive what You give. We will take care of things on our own.” They hid from God and criticized each other. They were alone. That separation was the death God warned about. Their sin didn’t change God’s desire for communion, but it did require Him to do something to fix and restore the relationship.
He did that by making a sacrifice in first garden, and then through His Son sacrificed and buried in another garden. Our communion with God is restored when we receive all that He gives by faith. And faith, as defined by John Calvin, is
a firm and certain knowledge of God’s benevolence toward us, founded upon the truth of the freely given promise in Christ, both revealed to our minds and sealed upon our hearts through the Holy Spirit. (Institutes of the Christian Religion, 1:3.2.7)
Faith accepts what God supplies. Faith receives the Father’s love, the Son’s purchase, and the Spirit’s seal. Faith relates to all three Persons of the Trinity. Faith is that channel of our communion with God.
Human beings were made to share, to give and receive, to hold things in common. That’s life. Families have blood in common; they share fish sticks and road trips and crazy uncles together. Neighbors have geography in common; they share streets and fences and weather. Citizens have laws in common; they share commerce and flags and responsibility for elected officials who go bad. Generations have traditions in common, even if the tradition is to reject the tradition of the previous generation. Communication between us requires a shared vocabulary and grammatical conventions. A community is a people defined by relationships of giving and receiving. God made it this way.
And, again, sin messes it up. The only things wrong with or in the world are sinful or result from sin. Work itself doesn’t stop fellowship; dirt never separates friends. Gender and personality differences don’t, in and of themselves, keep people from communion. Immaturity, like that in a baby growing up, isn’t a problem. Hostility between groups of people also result from sinful pride, sinful desires (see James 4:1-2). One wants something real bad and goes to war to get it. There’s no giving and receiving, no dependence on one another, but proud demanding and taking.
Sin separates. Spiritual death is separation. Eternal death is separation. That means, on the other hand, that life is relationship. Life is communion. That’s what the gospel brings because that’s God’s intention.
All three Persons work to accomplish our communion with Himself.
Carl Henry, in his work, God, Revelation, and Authority, described how God gave up His privacy and gave Himself. Henry’s first thesis was:
Revelation is a divinely initiated activity, God’s free communication by which he alone turns his personal privacy into a deliberate disclosure of his reality. (Vol 2, 17)
The heavens declare His glory; what if He had kept it to Himself? His Word describes in even greater detail His heart and how we can fellowship with Him. He tells us what joy that brings to us and to Him.
He takes initiative to communicate. He enables us to have language in common about His character and His creation.
Jesus gave up His glory in heaven to come and show us what God is like. He took on flesh and dwelt among us as the full revelation of the Godhead (Colossians 2:9; Hebrews 1:3). He confirmed everything His Father said.
He did not wait for us to draw near to Him but He clothed Himself with frail humanity. He became like us, took on our weaknesses, so that He could bring us to God.
Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, (1 Peter 3:18, ESV)
On Jesus’ final night with His disciples, He told them about the time when
you will ask nothing of me. Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full. (John 16:23–24, ESV)
Relating, asking, giving, receiving, all for sake of full joy.
The Son promised that when He returned to heaven that He and His Father would send the Spirit to dwell in the hearts of His people.
I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. (John 14:16–17, ESV)
What more explicit way could God show His desire to fellowship with us than to take up residence in us? The Spirit dwells in us, the down payment on our eternal life with God (Ephesians 1:13-14).
God speaks to us, lived with us, and dwells in us.
All three Persons not only work to accomplish our communion with Himself, but each Person is also said to enjoy communion with us.
The apostle John wrote about the visible, audible, touchable life of Jesus. He witnessed about what he witnessed.
[T]hat which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father… (1 John 1:3, ESV)
The word fellowship is κοινωνία, a sharing of interests, a partnership or participation, a close mutual relationship. The gospel (what John proclaimed) intends to accomplish our communion with God the Father.
What breaks κοινωνία, of course, is sin, and it only gets worse when we lie about it (see 1 John 1:6-10).
1 John 1:3 also names the Son: “indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.” The Son is not only the way to the Father, He is the way to Himself.
Jesus brings us to the Father and it is also true that the Father brings us to the Son.
God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship (κοινωνία) of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. (1 Corinthians 1:9, ESV)
Jesus desires communion with His church, as does a Groom with His Bride. He had the angel of the church in Laodicea write:
Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me. (Revelation 3:20, ESV)
Though sometimes used as an evangelistic appeal, the context of Revelation 3 shows that Jesus is speaking to the church. What illustration would show His intention and His initiation toward communion better than this?
As He told His disciples, He wanted them to be with Him where He is. He went to prepare a place for us (John 14:2-3). He prays for us to be with Him (John 17:24). (See also the giving and receiving in John 17:8 and the unity, read: communion, that believers share with one another and with the Father and Son, John 17:11, 21-23)
Paul closed his second letter to the Corinthians with the following benediction:
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship (κοινωνία) of the Holy Spirit be with you all. (2 Corinthians 13:14, ESV)
Here is a Trinitarian trifecta. Grace could be said to come from any of the Three, so could love and fellowship, as we’ve seen from the previous two points. Yet Paul associated with each Person a particular blessing. For the Spirit he wanted the Christians to have κοινωνία of the Holy Spirit, communion.
In Philippians Paul wrote,
So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation (κοινωνία) in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. (Philippians 2:1–2, ESV)
And of course, that leads to a life of humble, joyful communion and to a unity that serves with the same mind. What we have with God, especially by the Spirit, we share with others.
Do we believe this?
Many saints have no greater burden in their lives than that their hearts do not come clearly and fully up, constantly to delight and rejoice in God—that there is still an indisposedness of spirit unto close walking with him. (Owen, 128)
In other words, we don’t desire or delight in communion because we don’t think God desires it. I believe that we wear this burden because we do not believe in the Trinity.
When we reflect God, it is not a passive thing like an inanimate mirror. This is true because God is not passive. We will want, love, pursue, give, and enjoy communion with God and others. Action reflects His active nature. Relationship reflects His relational character.
So it is our duty to commune in love and no wonder that the early church was “devoted to fellowship” (Acts 2:42). We are made for it and it is our responsibility to pursue relationship.
Why is it that we’re tempted to prioritize tasks over people? Why do the greatest dramas in our lives have to do with people? Isn’t because sin attacks what is important? Doesn’t the evil one go after what he recognizes as a reflection of the true, Triune God?
Fellowship is a powerful thing.
Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? (2 Corinthians 6:14–16a, ESV)
Note: partnership, fellowship, accord, portion, agreement. These are all different words for the same idea. Then continue:
For we are the temple of the living God; as God said,
“I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them,
and I will be their God,
and they shall be my people.
Therefore go out from their midst,
and be separate from them, says the Lord,
and touch no unclean thing;
then I will welcome you,
and I will be a father to you,
and you shall be sons and daughters to me,
says the Lord Almighty.”
(2 Corinthians 6:16–18, ESV)
Allah was Almighty, but He wants slaves. The Trinity is Almighty, and He wants sons and daughters.
Husbands, you shouldn’t be hermits looking for ways to get away. Wives, you shouldn’t be cold, turning your back to make a point. Fathers, you shouldn’t divide the home, you should be an agent who brings everyone together. Moms, you shouldn’t resent the kids, they are there for receiving what you give, even if part of what you need to give is an understanding of how to ask. Don’t be a lone ranger Christian, an amputated part of the Body. Don’t be a truth collector who has no enjoyable communion with others. Maybe you’re made by God to be contra munda, you, by yourself, against everyone else in the world. Probably not.
Let me finish with an illustration. Some of you will remember in The Return of the King when Aragorn arrives in Gondor near the end of the great the Battle of the Pelennor Fields with the forces of Mordor. Three key characters are close to death: Faramir, the Lady Éowyn, and Merry the hobbit. The old songs say that the king will be able to heal.
Before reading what Aragorn does, what do those around the sick desire? To look at beauty restored? To get help with the dishes or taxes? To have someone else to fight instead?
No. What is missing is the warmth of the shared meal, the laughter of friends telling stories, the embraces, the relationship.
So Aragorn comes to friends near death with the rhyme of Gondorian lore about the herb-leaf athelas:
When the Black Breath blows
and death’s shadow grows
and all lights pass,
come athelas! Come athelas!
Life to the dying
In the king’s hand lying!
After speaking to Faramir:
living freshness filled the room, as if the air itself awoke and tingled, sparkling with joy. And then he cast the leaves into the bowls of steaming water that were brought to him, and at once all hearts were lightened. For the fragrance that came to each was like a memory of dewy mornings of unshadowed sun in some land of which the fair world in spring is itself but a fleeting memory. (157)
After speaking to Éowyn:
it seemed to those who stood by that a keen wind blew through the window, and it bore no scent, but was an air wholly fresh and clean and young, as if it had not before been breathed by any living thing and came new-made from snowy mountains high beneath a dome of stars, or from shores of silver far away washed by seas of foam. (160)
And after to Merry:
when the fragrance of athelas stole through the room, like the scent of orchards, and of heather in the sunshine full of bees (161)
From what I could find, Tolkein made it up the word athelas with etymology from another language he made up. I can’t help but think that it belongs with the Greek word alēthēs meaning “truth.” Switch the consonant phonograms: athelas to alethas.
To whatever degree Tolkien intended, or maybe he just wrote better than he knew, the King brings life by the His call of truth. Against the black breath of death, the King brings life that is fresh, fragrant, full of joy and light. The King restores communion. It’s what we were created for. It’s why Christ endured the cross. It’s what the Spirit equips us for. It’s a sweetness we’ll enjoy in eternity because of the Trinity.