8.2 The Grace to Come
© 2016 Christ Revealed Bible Institute
Therefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ (1 Peter 1:13). What is God actually saying in this verse?
| Transliteration | English | Root Form | Phonetic |
| Dio anazōsamenoi | Therefore having girded up | anazónnumi | an-ad-zone'-noo-mee |
| tas osphyas tēs dianoias hymōn | the loins of the mind of you | osphus dianoia | os-foos‘ dee-an'-oy-ah |
| nēphontes | being sober-minded | néphó | nay'-fo |
| teleiōs elpisate epi | fully set hope upon | teleiós elpizó | tel-i'-oce el-pid'-zo |
| tēn pheromenēn hymin charin | the being brought to you grace | pheró charis | fer'-o khar'-ece |
| en apokalypsei Iēsou Christou | in the revelation of Jesus Christ. | en apokalupsis | en ap-ok-al'-oop-sis |
Gird Up
Anazónnumi (having girded up): to gird up; I gird up, I brace up (with a view to active exertion); a metaphor from the girding of the flowing tunic, to prevent its hampering one in active work.
The thought in Peter’s mind was the intensity of this mission, stated earlier, the proving of our faith in the revelation of Jesus Christ, that we would allow nothing to hinder our faith in One whom we do not see.
Osphus (the loins): the loin, that is, the reproductive organs.
Dianoia (mind): the mind, disposition, thought; understanding, intellect, mind, insight. From dia (through or all the way across) and nous (mind).
Knowing Life
Dianoia can mean the full reasoning powers of the human mind and was used for that among the Greeks. The New Testament, however, presents an additional meaning. And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life (1 John 5:20).
The dianoia (understanding) Jesus gives us is to know God. And we are immediately back in the garden, facing two trees, two ways of “knowing” God, knowing God by intellectual ideas OR by entering into intimate relations with LIFE. Is dianoia mental understanding or is it knowing life?
The Proof of God
What is ruling Peter’s mind as he writes this verse in his epistle? May I suggest the greatest thing Peter just wrote.
That the genuineness of your faith… may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory (1 Peter 1:7-8).
Peter was not speaking of any “revelation” as mental understanding, but of the very PROOF of God.
Peter’s injunction to us, to prepare fully the reproductive capacities of this mind we have received from the Son of God in us, the mind of Christ, is so that we might not just “know about” this grace of which he was speaking, but to receive it.
Set Your Hope
Néphó (be sober-minded): to be sober, to abstain from wine; I am calm, I am vigilant.
Peter is adding vigilance to this action he is requiring of all Christians. That ACTION is – set your hope upon.
Teleiós (fully): perfectly, completely, without wavering.
Hope is clearly defined for us in Romans 8:24-25. It means that this grace of which Peter was speaking was not something he or any of the apostles or any Christians in the New Testament had ever experienced. Hope is the expectation of something coming to us that is not yet experienced; Peter was referring to a grace of which he was ignorant.
The Gift of God
Let’s paraphrase from the Greek the first part of this verse. Prepare the reproduction capacities of the mind of Christ in you by which you receive into yourself the very knowledge of God, be vigilant and ready, and to the full extent, perfectly set, place, and rest your expectation in God, that He does what He says, upon SOMETHING yet to come.
That something is a grace never before known. Grace means gift; God gives only one gift – Himself. Yet inside the gift to us of God Himself in Person, walking together as one person with us, is found the fulfillment and experience, not only of every Word God speaks, but of the essence and being of Father Himself.
A Carried to Us Grace
Grace is God enablement to reveal God. However, Peter was not speaking of just any grace, or of grace in general. Peter defined and qualified this grace that you and I, in obedience to the gospel, are expecting any day now, a grace actually arising right now within you and me. First, this is a phero grace, a carried to us grace, and second, it is a grace found entirely inside of the apocalypse.
Pheró (being brought): to bear, carry, bring forth; I carry, I bear, I bring; I conduct, I lead; I make publicly known.
Love hopes all for all; Love bears all for all (1 Corinthians 13).
Carried by Someone
There cannot be any “carried to us” grace that is not carried fully by Someone. Thus we see the first picture through which we must look to know anything that is God, a Man on His face in the mud under a cross He cannot carry, a Father who carries all that we are through all things, utterly together with us.
The word is not “at” the revelation of Jesus Christ, but “IN,” that is, entirely and completely IN the season of removing all blindness from our eyes that we might see Christ Jesus as He IS – already walking this earth entirely in His body. In that day you shall KNOW (1 John 14:20). Today is that day; today is the day of this very GRACE.
The Measure of Grace
I have laid out this verse in this way because I have the same purpose as Peter – to focus us with all intensity upon the reality of this never-before-known grace being carried to us by Jesus Himself right now.
We understand that just as God has set levels of knowing God into His patterns, so He has set a measure of grace to attend each level. God does this because He is kind, because He cannot force any knowing of Himself upon anyone. Grace is God in you – but only that measure you desire. That’s why Peter used the metaphor of the loins – sexual desire, the most intense and focused joining together.
To Walk AS IF
The grace of the outer court is to know peace with God, the forgiveness of sins, and hope for the future. The grace of the Holy Place is the grace that brings us near to God, and prepares us to receive the final measure of grace. The grace of the Holiest of All, then, is the grace to walk as if we are already incorruptible and immortal.
We can call this grace the grace of walking in all the reality of the resurrection before it happens. The grace to walk AS IF God and us are already one together. The grace to walk AS IF sin and death no longer exist. The grace to walk AS IF we are already fully glorified in God.
God Is Symmorphic
Now, for us to know this grace of living now in all resurrection life, I want to merge two thoughts. First, we refer back to what we learned about God in His Personal Being in Symmorphy II: Essence. God is not triune; God is symmorphic.
The difference is subtle, but critical for us. If God is three equal Gods living together in full sufficiency in Themselves, then they are, as our brethren see Them, far away from us. There is no place for us inside such a Thing, nor any place for all the many verses that place this God inside of us. But when we begin with one God, the Father, as Paul does, then we see in such a God a reason for all He is and does.
God Seen and Known
A Symmorphic God is a personal God, the Father, who, in Himself, cannot be seen or known. This Father can be seen and known only through other Persons, through His Spirit and through His Son.
We can understand a God who is Spirit revealing Himself through His Holy Spirit – but a Son? And God calls this Son a Man! A Man seated at His right hand. Jesus inside of God, God revealed through Him, shares all the qualities that are Father, Father in Him, without beginning or end, all here now, yet God calls this same Jesus – human.
The Spirit reveals God by form, but the Son reveals God by heart.
The Picture of God
And then Mark gives us the clearest picture in the entire universe of Father just being Himself – He took little children into His arms, laid His hands on them, and blessed them (Mark 10:16). Father may be many things, but in each quality that is Father, this picture comes first.
But then, in Symmorphy II: Essence, we learned also about the Ekenosis, about a Jesus who calls forth an invisible God into visibility – and in appearance as a Man. Thus these two words, symmorphy and ekenosis, describe a God who is always in Himself flowing out of Himself to become Himself in and as you and me.
A Two-Way Street
Yet symmorphy is always a two-way street, for you and I are constantly, in ourselves, being carried as ourselves into this Father that we might be ourselves entirely inside of all that He is. Know that I am in the Father and you in Me and I in you.
A Triune God we cannot know or even hardly approach. A Symmorphic God lives in us and we in Him, and we call Him Father, in the same way that Jesus calls Him Father.
We must have this entire picture in order, then, to place Peter’s claim, that as we see Jesus as He is, He comes to us with a special kind of grace, a phero grace, a CARRIED to us grace, Jesus Himself calling God into us now as Father’s appearance.
A Dynamic Bath
Let’s take that picture and merge it with the wondrous understanding of the nature of a Personal Spirit Word that we have gained in the last two sessions, this Someone who carries this grace into us.
We live inside of and drink into ourselves a constant dynamic bath of electrical Spirit power, Spirit that is segmented into the distinction of sounds/ink that forms Words. Those Words written constantly upon all that we are by Spirit power are the Ekenosis of God. This constant connection of God with man, we call Him Jesus. It is the Father who is inside of this dynamic bath of Personal Power Code who reveals Himself now through us, His image.
For Father
Do you see what I am doing? My entire effort seems to be nothing more than an attempt to know the meaning of three verses – Romans 8:29, John 14:20, and Ephesians 3:19. Those three verses are the Father’s entrance into being known by His creation; our entrance into Father, then, is Galatians 2:20.
And here is what I am driving at, the understanding we must embrace as Peter said – gird up the loins of your “knowing God” mind. This grace is not for us, this grace, being carried to us right now by Jesus, is entirely for FATHER!
It Is Father
It is Father who is determined to be seen and known by His creation. It is Father who takes little children into His arms and blesses them. It is Father who sings and dances with precious brethren, delighting in laughter with each one, carrying the sorrows of all.
This carried to us grace is for Father, that Father might win the desire of His heart. It is only as we KNOW the intensity and determination of our Father, as Peter commanded us, can we know the full experience of walking in this grace, living AS IF Father IS revealing Himself through us right now AS WE ARE.
Resurrection Life
In the next lesson, we will go back into the womb, for there we will discover how this Personal Spirit Word writing us as Father revealed every moment actually produces a many-membered Body, you and me glued together by what every joint supplies.
Resurrection life is incorruptible and immortal life, that is God Himself.
For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, and has given Him authority… (John 5:26-27a). – even so the Son gives life to whom He will (John 5:21b). The grace to be who we are, Father revealed.