26. Designed by Christ

I want to give you a picture of how I now see myself out from the ruling verse of the Bible.

Inside the Purpose of Synergeoing all with Father, I am called out from God’s Knowing, seized in God’s Determination as already Symmorphosed, as sharing the same form with Jesus as the Image and revelation of Father together with many Brethren, already completed, already the fulness of Father revealed in Glory.

I am, to put it mildly, designed by Christ.

And that, of course, means, that I am designed by Word – the Word become flesh.

In scrolling through YouTube, I noticed a video of a presentation by Carl Sagan, an atheist Jew, that is, an overwhelmingly religious man, a man who KNOWS!!! The title was something along the lines of Carl Sagan explaining that the facts of the universe prove to us that the universe was NOT designed for humans. You will not find me listening to such a thing, even though I know pretty much the arguments he would use.

In complete contrast, David looked at those exact same facts and saw God and heard God speaking to him through the facts of the universe.

No one ever believes what they see. Carl Sagan saw only what he first believed. David also saw what he first believed. Carl Sagan saw only not God and therefore not man. David saw only God and therefore himself sharing God’s heart.

Carl Sagan, and other religulous atheist Jews like him, have overwhelmingly strong foreheads and their arguments dominate the world in which we live, causing everyone to imagine that not-God is “scientific” reality. And the world being built for us out from this thinking is becoming very beastly indeed.

Yet they are the Goliath, and we are the David. And God has set their foreheads against our five little stones from the brook – Jesus creates me. Jesus sustains me. Jesus sets me free. Jesus wins my heart. Jesus connects me with Father.

The huge question, then, is – What do we SEE?

Carl Sagan and those like him, GIANTS in appearance in this world, see not-God everywhere they look, and thus enforce upon all who are wowed by their power the description of a universe designed entirely by not-God, that is, by death. We are shepherd-hearted children who don’t know any better than to see God everywhere we look and to live out from the confidence of Christ our only life by every Word that God speaks.

And where did David’s little stone hit the giant? Right in the forehead, that is, right in the hard center of all human rebellion against God.

This, then, is our first picture, the present setting in which God has placed us that He might prove Jesus faithful and true through our weakness and in the very face of all raging accusation. It is inside of this first picture, Revelation 12:1-5, that we see ourselves designed by every Word that is Jesus.

But why pictures? Word itself is metaphor, the embodiment of God’s ideas in a form that can pass from God to us and thus to design us by that same Word that God is. And, as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. Thus every picture God gives us by which to know Him is the thing that aligns all of God’s words inside of us in ways that we are able to understand, to seize hold of, to live by, and by which to see all things.

You see, we are talking about God as Word becoming flesh, revealing Himself inside of His universe, through us. We are talking about story, and the very best stories are those that weave pictures out of words.

Some of the greatest works of literature I have on my shelves are the books written for little children that catch your breath and your heart with wondrous delight in the unfolding pictures created by the simplest layout of words.

~~~

Before we go any further, however, we must underline again that being designed by Christ is not any kind of human achievement. It is not something I “do” to myself. This is why it is so wonderful that our Salvation is a Person. You see, this morning, I am feeling a failure in several directions at once; I feel confused and very small. I don’t feel like writing. Yet, I am still able to sink into Jesus Himself carrying me. I don’t have to be or do anything. He carries all that I am inside Himself, and I rest utterly inside of Him in spite of all my inability.

Jesus carries me.

Then, resting here in my extreme vulnerability, I discover something incredible. I discover that I am still able to speak good grace into these many things that are overwhelming to me. I discover that I am still able to know that, regardless of my feelings, rivers of living water ARE flowing out from me to you because I believe in Jesus.

I discover what it means to be designed by Word, carried in weakness against the face of all opposition.

We can be because God says. We can believe because God is. To be designed by Christ means that we are, regardless, and we are tucked in deep inside of our Father.

~~~

Let’s start as Paul did, with the picture of our synergeoing with God. Picture a mighty tornado continuously twirling with great power, yet often delicate and precise in its working. Then picture a small little whirlwind, dancing across the dust, kicking up a leaf or two. Then merge these two energeoings together into synergeoing. Yet the little whirlwind is not lost in the mighty tornado. Rather, with God and us, this picture takes on an incredible form. The huge tornado tones itself down to the capacity of the little whirlwind that is me, yet without ever losing its great power. And my little whirlwind is caught in the capacity of that great tornado without ever losing its tiny expression. This is what symmorphy with God looks like in its action.

However, this synergeoing of God and me together in every moment is always focused. Certainly, God energeoes mightily inside of me, as Paul said, causing me to be His visible expression. But the effect of my synergeoing with God is always outward, towards all things, turning each individual action or circumstance or particle or person towards the end result of goodness. In this mighty synergeoing together, God’s great power twirls in perfect harmony with my little dance without ever losing His great power and my little swirl reaches out to include all that mighty energeoing without ever losing its human delight.

This is the end result, true now in substance, yes, but the final reality in which God wants to live with me and me with God, working all things together to the effect of pure and intrinsic goodness. This is the pattern or purpose into which we are called.

Now, consider through this incredible picture of the complete union of a mighty tornado with a tiny whirlwind and then call it by two little human words, the words of our design – pro-thesis and synergeoing, God’s purpose through Christ to synergeo with us all things good.

Next is my being called out from God’s Pro-knowing. This is the action of Jesus creating me every moment. Jesus creates my every moment by calling me in that moment out from God’s Pro-Knowing. Nothing is “static” in God; everything is mighty swirling power, yet that power exists only inside of incomprehensibly perfect rest.

Picture a fountain of water springing up inside of you – that’s how Jesus wants us to picture Father. I think, for the most part, this is the only way God wants us to envision Him directly and personally when it comes to the imagination of our minds. I grew up in paradise; everything on the west slope of the Cascades is always green, every shade of green, and well-watered. You could not walk half-a-mile without crossing a stream of water running year-round. Bubbling springs coming out of the ground were common.

Picture that bubbling spring of water; place it just beneath your own heart such that, as the water bubbles, it is constantly bathing and entering your heart. That is literally God in you. Yet it is also that part of you inside of God being called into your being by Jesus in every present moment. That fountain of water springing up is utterly God in you and utterly you in God coming into the moment. It is Father.

Yet as Father, that Spring of water is just the “tip” of the proverbial iceberg. No God is not ice, so we will not think of an iceberg. Rather, we think of a well of God beneath that Spring bubbling constantly around and into our hearts as being a Well of infinity, depths unplumbed, reaches beyond knowledge. And every part of that infinite Well of Father beneath the Spring of our hearts is filled with incredible things of wonder and goodness, of adventure and excitement, of peace and joy, of music and color, of rest and mighty working.

And the place in me where that upwelling Spring of God flows into me we call Christ Jesus, the One living in our hearts calling us out from our place inside that infinite Well that is Father.

Father is entering into me through Jesus inexhaustibly, unstoppably, never slowing down, never too much. Father is my source. I am coming out of Father, out from His VAST and inexhaustible knowledge as that Spring bubbling up in me in every moment, in every particle of myself, and through every circumstance Father and I share together.

Take this entire picture of bubbling goodness, of Father becoming me through Jesus, of continuous fountains, of my living and pulsating heart, drinking Father into itself, and with it all the depths of God beneath, and reduce it down to two little human words, the words of our design – called and pro-knowing. Jesus calls and summons me out from my Father’s Pro-Knowing every moment.

Then we come to the big one – pro-determination. Picture the largest bulldozer made by man. I looked it up on Google and found a picture of a bulldozer claiming to be the largest one made, but I will not insert the actual picture here. Rather, you picture that bulldozer in your mind. But as you do, place yourself in front of the blade, with your back tightly up against it. There is no space between your back and that unstoppable blade; in fact picture yourself as utterly welded together with it. Remember that the bond of that welding is always stronger than the steel of the blade itself.

God has your back, God is behind you, moving you forward with all the determination an infinite God is capable of being. Look to your right and left, the extent of God-at-your-back is beyond your sight. Look above you and beneath of you; the extent of God-at-your-back is beyond your sight. Let’s bring in Paul’s other grandiose claim, that we are to know together the width and depth, the height and length of ALL the fullness of God filling us full.

You see, we think of this picture of God in a similar way to that Spring bubbling up inside of us. Pro-Knowing and Pro-Determination are always together.

Think of that mighty blade at your back, God’s determination, God seizing you utterly in His grip, think of anything that might stand before you. What could? Everything must give way to that mighty force, yet it is only and always goodness, never forcing anyone, BUT – never losing either. That Determination is none other than the Love of God.

You know, I have fought against God’s Determination innumerable times and with great ferocity and mighty cries of self-agony. I always lost. That’s all I can say. I always lost. And every single time I lost, I humbled myself, said, “Yes, Lord,” and Father and I together went merrily on our way.

I have shared with you the path through which I began to write this present season of Christ our Life. Nonetheless, I have not placed this one thing into its place. Before I ever heard Joel Osteen say, “Speak what God says you are,” I had completely and utterly given up on my ever being able to stop God’s determination towards me. I no longer fought against that bulldozer blade at my back.

Now, I see myself entirely and only as one with it. In a recent letter I used the actual name of Prophet Brother C. When I had finished that letter and closed the word document, I felt a great horror seize me. I knew something was wrong, that presenting that brother in that way was NOT what I should do. I did not think it was the letter (The Anointing), but I had no need to “surrender” to God’s leading. I was and am utterly surrendered. For that reason, when I opened it again to record it into audio, I simply changed the name to “Prophet Brother C,” and, in that I found the opposition gone, and realized that I was free to continue with that letter, one which some have shared was of great help to them.

But now that I KNOW that I am coming every moment out of God’s Pro-Knowing of me, now that I KNOW that I am always set utterly free of God on the one hand, yet inflexibly seized in His determination on the other, I just rest against the knowledge that I am welded to inflexible determination, a determination that is so far greater than all the screams and wails of darkness hurled against it, that they are nothing but splats against that mighty blade.

Nothing ever stands in the way of Father and me together. No weapon formed can set itself against us. No hardness of forehead can intimidate us, regardless of the limitations of my human frame, limitations that are utterly compatible with the Determination of Love.

Now take that entire picture of being welded, fused together with, the mighty and endless bulldozer blade at your back, the determination that is the Love of God, now utterly part of you, existing as it is without in any way making you to be something beyond your God-designed limitations. Take that entire picture and reduce it down to two little human words, words of our design – pro-determination and love. The Pro-Determination of Love is my very back, stretching beyond me in all directions to infinity, moving me to LOVE you and to love all.

Indeed, we have just exactly this picture with Jesus on the cross, utterly weak and naked in His humanity including being terribly confused in His mind – yet speaking the words of His design – Father forgive them. You cannot ever defeat Love. All screams against love are just a waste of time and energy; they cannot ever prevail, they cannot ever keep Love from loving them through you.

The key to everything is next – symmorphosed. Here is God, infinite, divine, unknowable, all-carrying, omnipotent. Here is me, finite, human, very limited, incapable, and powerless.

How could we possibly be one Pperson together without God losing His God-ness and me losing my me-ness. How can God as God conform Himself to me as me? How can I as me, be conformed with God as God? How can Father and I be one in union, two in communion, and one in expression?

It’s impossible. It’s simply downright impossible.

His name is Jesus, and this Jesus whom we love, who lives inside our hearts, continuously causes the impossible to be our only reality. God’s will and my will are the same, yet in being the same, neither of us are violated in the integrity of our persons.

Two, sharing together the same form, the same mind, the same body, the same Sspirit, the same will, the same joy, the same sorrow, the same frustration, the same adventure, the same dance, the same faith, the same form, two together as one in all ways and in every moment. Always two and always one.

Freedom, absolute freedom. I am always free of God, and God is always free of me. Commitment, absolute commitment. I am utterly committed to God, and God is utterly committed to me. And deep inside this perfect union of absolute freedom and absolute commitment, Father and I share something together that cannot be known or even imagined by anyone elsewhere. We share the sweetest and most intimate of communion and fellowship. Father and I share Hheart together.

His name is Jesus.

Yes, symmorphy is simply unreal. Who could conceive of such a thing? Who could dream up such a reality, let alone make it happen? Never in all the writing of the Bible did a mightier thing happen in the human mind than that moment where two Greek word parts came together in Paul’s mind, sym and morph, to share form together. There is no way Paul could have known the depths inside that incredible word that had to imprint itself upon the page in spite of the fact that it had not existed in human language before.

You know something. Yes, Adam was drawn to the tree of life in the garden and, since Adam was not deceived, we know that his mind perceived everything related to his decision. But there is no way that the concept of symmorphy ever showed itself to Adam’s mind. Symmorphy was utterly hidden from him.

And symmorphy has been hidden from the Church until now, though it has sat quietly upon the page for nearly 2000 years.

The fake oneness of universalism is not symmorphy. Symmorphy is the secret of Jesus and me, a secret we share together, the Jesus Secret. One in union, two in communion, and one in expression. Perfect freedom and perfect commitment. Sharing Hheart with God.

Yet take all this wonder of utter impossibility, of truly inconceivable nonsense to the created mind, and reduce it down to two simple human words, the words of our design – symmorphosed and koinonia (fellowship-communion). I am symmorphosed with Jesus as one Pperson together, sharing the same form, sharing sweet communion.

To what end? Yes, God’s purpose revealed through Jesus is to synergeo with us in turning God’s universe into life and goodness as God intended from the beginning. That is it’s action, but what is its appearance or expression? Thus we have the word, image, the express image of God’s Person.

To find God’s picture for us in order for us to know this word, we look to one place only, we look to the gospels. – He that has seen Me has seen the Father.

Picture a baby, a powerless human infant wrapped in cloth and lying in the hay set for the animals in a barn. A boy working in his father’s woodshop, the shavings curling out from his plane. A youth tending his uncle’s sheep in the fields, thinking about David thinking about him.  A young man without pretense or power or place. A young man of thirty welcoming eager and often foolish teenagers into his company. A man drawing little children into his arms to bless them. A man touching the weary with tenderness and regard. A man who could do nothing of himself. A man who took the lowest place. A man who stooped to wash the feet of others. A man who stumbled under a cross he could not carry. A man who hung, bloody, bruised, and naked upon a cross of wood. A man who, in his confusion and distress, spoke the words of his design to the worst people on earth – Father forgive them.

WHAT GOD LOOKS LIKE!!!!!

The express image of God’s Person.

The Greek words used by the writer of Hebrews in Hebrews 1:3 do not contain the Greek “icon” that Paul used in Romans 8:29. What we find instead is a definition of what God means by the word “image.” Here is the phrase – the charaktēr of His hypostaseōs, best translated as “the exact expression [in appearance] of His substance.

Read through the large paragraph above again, starting with “Picture a baby.” But as you read it, think one thing – “I am considering the EXACT expression of the substance that is God in Himself, the true appearance of God in creation, that is, inside the entire realm of heaven/earth.”

Then think of all the ways that the false human mind in Christianity has tried to turn every one of these EXACT expressions of God Substance into the form of the highest angel of heaven, outward and arrogant superman superiority. Not a dirty barn, but a manger made out of gold – and so on. Not a man of weakness, but a heavenly form of lights and perfections blasting thunderbolts out of his fingertips.

Then, consider the entirety of that description of God (excluding the miracles, it wasn’t the miracles that revealed God, but the gentle touch of kindness and respect), and reduce it all down to two little human words, the words of our design – image and substance. I am the express image of the substance of God. My Father reveals Himself through me and through my outward expression; I am a human; I am God-Revealed.

Yet we are certainly not at an end. We haven’t even finished Romans 8:28-30 in considering how we are Designed by Christ, let alone anything further.

Consider the next phrase – firstborn of many brethren.

I want to talk about “many brethren,” but I do want to reach outside of Romans 8:29 to bring in the words “members of one another.” When I think of “many brethren,” I think only of “members of one another.”

Picture a flock of birds, whether swallows or, better yet, the Australian bungies. And if you have not watched that video yet, you must, for having this picture of the bungies in your mind will help you so much towards comprehending your own DESIGN. (I find that PBS now requires payment of a fee to watch The Gathering Swarms, but here is a short video of budgies that expresses the wonder of a flock of birds - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyfCMrqitWI

Consider that in a flock of birds, no matter how tightly it moves, no bird ever hits another bird. The birds always give one another space, for they are members of one another, each distinct, each holding the other in full respect, all moving together as one.

So you are flying free as a bird, yet you are flying with many brethren. You want to be together because you are members of one another. You know that together you are mighty, whereas if you were on your own you would be a “sitting duck.” Yet at the same time, flying together in the heavens absolutely thrills you. You can be yourself best inside the mighty togetherness of the flock. Your fellow bird flexes towards you, you instantly give him space, and as you do, the bird on the other side of you instantly gives you space, for you care for one another.

As you fly together, so you express beauty and movement and form. As you fly together, so you find food and drink, and so you are safe from all predators. In the video The Gathering Swarms, the budgies are drinking in the presence of a hawk. Some fly together against the hawk, keeping it at bay while others drink from the pools of living water. Then, once they have drunk, they fly up to face against the hawk while the others drop down to drink. And so all drink, and all remain safe.

Yet take all this great image of liberty and togetherness and reduce it down to two little human words, the words of our design – many brethren, or, instead members and allelon, members of one another. We together, coming out of the same womb as Jesus, the express image of God’s Person, that is, out from God’s Pro-Knowing; so we, members of one another, reveal God as He is through us together.

And all of this is already true, already complete. Yet our discovery of what is already true will never end. This is what it means to be designed by Christ.

Yet in all of this, I haven’t touched on the one picture God gives us that means the most to me, personally, the picture of our design. I am a letter of Christ.

It is fully made visible that you ARE a letter of Christ, with us under your service, having [already] been written, not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God – not on tablets of stone, but inside tablets of hearts of flesh (2 Corinthians 3:3).

I am a letter of Christ.

The words that are Christ Jesus, the all-speaking of God, are the entirety of my design and makeup. I am constructed of words, Spirit words, words of life and power.

I am designed by and out from Christ. The word “of” means “continuously coming out of.” The word “of” places what follows into the genitive inflection, genitive as meaning “source.”

I am Spirit Words generated by Christ. Christ Jesus is my source. Everything I am is continuously coming out from Jesus alive inside my heart.

I am designed by Christ.