Love is the Fulfilling of the Law

ON GOD; Part LXXI

 I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.

John 10:10

While this may seem as odd place to begin our discussion on this Easter Day or Resurrection Sunday as it is called by some in an effort to distance themselves from the Easter Bunny and other worldly distractions, it is really more of the reality of the Life, the death and the Resurrection of the Master than are those doctrinal and dogmatic pronouncements of the churches. There is a reason for the the incarnation of the Christ among men and this is, in His own words above, the greater part of that reason although this is missed in the illusion that Life is being what we experience here today and now in this world. The Life that the Master speaks of here is that Eternal Life that we are shown in the Resurrection of the Lord and we should remember that when He said to us that “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father” (John 14:12) He was speaking of ALL of His works including this act of the Resurrection. We should understand that the ideas within each of these sayings is the same and concerns “He that believeth on me” which we understand as to follow Him and to keep His words and here we should remind ourselves of the depth of the idea of “believeth on” as it is expressed for us by Vincent who says:

Believe on (pisteuou>sin eijv). The present participle, believing, indicates the present and continuous activity of faith. The word is used by John, sometimes with the dative case simply meaning to believe a person or thing; i.e., to believe that they are true or speak the truth. Thus, to believe the Scripture (2:22); believe me (4:21); believe Moses, his writings, my words (4:46). At other times with a preposition, eijv, into, which is rendered believe in, or believe on. So here, 6:29; 8:30; 1 John 5:10. See the two contrasted in 6:29, 30; 8:30, 31; 1 John 5:10. To believe in, or on, is more than mere acceptance of a statement. It is so to accept a statement or a person as to rest upon them, to trust them practically; to draw upon and avail one’s self of all that is offered to him in them. Hence to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ is not merely to believe the facts of His historic life or of His saving energy as facts, but to accept Him as Savior, Teacher, Sympathizer, Judge; to rest the soul upon Him for present and future salvation, and to accept and adopt His precepts and example as binding upon the life.⁴

We have especially focused upon the last part, to accept and adopt His precepts and example as binding upon the life⁴ as the crux of this saying and as the intended message of both the Master and the Apostle John. We have also moulded our own understanding of the principal of believing in and believing on the Master and these are briefly stated as to follow Him and to keep His words; we see ALL of these ideas as synonymous. Back in In the Words of Jesus part 60 we set forth our own understanding of these ideas as based upon the scriptures that we were discussing at that time:

Let us rearrange these words to fit the general and the specific message of the Master. Our work is to believe on Him that was sent by God to show us the way to the Kingdom of God. In this belief we have conviction and trust in the Master and what He says; we have firm persuasion that His way is the way and, focused on Him whom we trust, we turn away from the world of men and follow the path of the Christ; the path that He just told us leads to life everlasting. So we have here the active act of believing and this is the work of God because in following the One whom we trust, we do as He says to do. We should see that this is not merely an act of believing that He is the Christ; it is an active belief that carries with it all the same criteria that we discussed in previous posts concerning attaining to the Kingdom of God. In short, to have the proper understanding of this idea that “this is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent” we need to look at the entirety of Jesus’ sayings. No one verse or saying should be ever taken out of the context of the whole of His teaching. To truly believe, to truly have faith, to be a Son of God to be in the Kingdom are all the same. If we believe, we follow and we are sons; if we believe, we do His works we are striving toward the strait gate; if we believe and we follow then He is truly our Shepherd. We seek what He seeks, we do what He would have us do and in this all we shall be in His Presence.

The verse at the head of today’s essay is from the Master’s dissertation on His being the Shepherd and it is here that we find the unity with that other saying that is cited above regarding believing on Him and doing these same works as He does. We discuss these ideas on the Master as the Shepherd early on in our posts starting in In the Words of Jesus part 20 but the main of our focus there is on the Twenty Third Psalm. The understanding is however the same; If He is our shepherd then we follow Him and when we lose sight of Him we are Lost. This is Life in the world for so many who have lost sight of the Christ Within or have never found Him. So the Master is speaking in both of these instances to those who believe on Him, who follow Him and who keep His words; for these aspirants and disciples He is Truly the Shepherd. So we can understand this, let us look at the entirety of the saying of which we give just a small part above; the Master says:

“Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber. But he that entereth in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the porter openeth; and the sheep hear his voice: and he calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out. And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him: for they know his voice. And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him: for they know not the voice of strangers. This parable spake Jesus unto them: but they understood not what things they were which he spake unto them. Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you , I am the door of the sheep. All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out , and find pasture. The thief cometh not, but for to steal , and to kill , and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep” (John 10:1-11).

Can we see in the entirety of this saying the deep Truths that are contained:

• First let us understand that this is Truly a parable and the further reality is that the Master’s repetition of the His story is as much as parable as the first part if not even more so.
• Second we should see that the idea of the shepherd is selected by the Master and spoken to a people who are very much familiar with the whole concept of a shepherd and his sheep. These people know that the sheep follow their own shepherd, his voice and his way.
• Third we should see the thief and the robber as being the ways of the world. This idea is seen in the church as Jesus warning of and speaking of Satan and, from the perspective that Satan and the devil are the powers that are in this world of men, this is a Truth. The Master tells us here that He is the door and when seen in the Light of the strait gate and the narrow way we have that Truth for each man as an individual; the strait gate is one’s entry into His Kingdom and this is Christ and this is the Christ Within. The broad way encompasses ALL else, all other efforts in Life, and we need to understand here that although there may be those who can and do afflict a man and can be said to have “climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber“, this saying is more in tune with a man’s own efforts in the world as he goes every which way but to the door that leads to his own salvation.
• Fourth we should try to understand that when the man in form, the personality consciousness, hears and recognizes the shepherd who is the Christ and the Christ Within, then he will follow that voice and no longer heed the call of the stranger, the lower self in the world.

This is the first part of the parable of which the apostle tells us that “ they understood not what things they were which he spake unto them“; John then tells us that the Master speaks again of the same theme in a different way:

• First the Master affirms that He is the door and again we should see this as the Christ and the Christ Within as the entry way to the Kingdom of God, the strait gate and the narrow way to His Presence which we will find within as He told us saying: “the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21).
• Second He affirms that the world and the ways of the world were before His presence with them, the thieves and the robbers, but the sheep do not hear them. This revealst that the sheep are represented by those who have heard and recognized the voice of the shepherd, the Christ and the Christ Within.
• Third He is telling us that if any man hears the voice and becomes as a sheep following his shepherd then he will be saved, he will find his way to the sheepfold and will then be able to go in and out without the fear of falling again into the hands of the thieves and the robbers. He is safe in the fold and in the pasture.
• Next the Master tells us that those thieves and those robbers, the ways of the world, come only to steal, to kill and to destroy and we should see that from a spiritual perspective this is exactly what the ways of the world will do to the man in form.

We come now to the saying at the top of our page: “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly” and here, in the context of what we have just read, is the reality of this abundance; it is not in the ways of the world which the whole of this parable tells us that we must escape from, it is in hearing the voice of the shepherd and then following Him. This is Life and this is Life “more abundantly” and it is this for which the Master says “I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep“. We should see as the sheep His disciples and aspirants to discipleship. It is for these that follow Him and believeth on Him and keep His words that He gave His Life and it is for them that He will “take it again“. Can we understand this away from the doctrines that paint it otherwise? Can we see that the Life more abundantly is not Life in this world of things and pleasures but Life in His Kingdom which we find by following the shepherd?

The Master goes on speaking after telling this parable twice to the Jews and to His disciples. This is a continuation of the theme but not necessarily of the parables above; the context here is changed to include others that are apart from those above that we purport to be the world and the ways of the world, the thieves and the robbers. We now have what we can see as a substitute shepherd and in this we should see the leaders, the Pharisees and other rulers of that day and the self proclaimed teachers of our day as well. While this is not the same as the parables above, it is a parable nonetheless:

“But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming , and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep. The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep. I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep. And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd. Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down , and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father” (John 10:12-18).

What do we see here? how shall we discern these sayings?

• First we have the hireling which, as we say above, is reference to those who the Master sees as leading the people astray or rather more to the Master’s words, those who allow the people to go astray. Speaking again of the sheep we can see this reference to those who hear the voice of a shepherd and believe that he is the shepherd and find out only too late that they have been left by the hireling as prey for the wolves who in this story can be seen as the thieves and the robbers. These sheep hear the voice and heed it but they are scattered, they do not find the strait gate nor the narrow way because of the inability of the hireling to lead them properly and to Love them as would the True Shepherd.
• Secondly, here again the Master is affirming that He is the “good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine“. This again is the Christ and the Christ Within who the “Father knoweth” and who “know…the Father” and here again the Master tells us that  “I lay down my life for the sheep“. Can we take this occasion to look at this a bit differently, to look at this as we did in the last few posts? Can we understand that idea that “I lay down my life for the sheep” as a twofold idea? that in the first is the death of the Master and then also as the death of the Life of the flesh, of the personality of a man, in favor of the Life of the Soul, the Christ Within, who is the reality of  the disciple and the aspirant? Remember, this is a parable.
• The third point here is the idea of “other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd“. This is a much misunderstood message and one that is ensconced in the doctrines and the dogmas that claim the Christ to Christians only and to believers in one of the many and varied ways of the churches; this is one of the greater illusions. We have discussed this saying before and have noted that this saying is not germane to the topic which the Master is speaking on (In the Words of Jesus parts 20 and 246) and is, in our understanding, a statement of the universality of the Christ and His teachings under and through any religion or theology.
• Last is the message of the death and the resurrection of the Christ and the understanding to us that this is also for us in the realm of those “greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father“. In these several words is the crux of the whole idea that we have been presenting since Good Friday, the idea that the death and the resurrection of the Master are for us a sign of what it is that we, as Souls in form, MUST DO. “Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again” is for us saying that when we give up this worldly Life in favor of the Life of the Christ Within we do not die physically but rather the Life of the Christ Within takes over the personality Life and consciousness and lives through it; we “take it again” as disciples of the Lord. From His perspective His teaching is of the unimportance of the form Life in relation to the spiritual Life and, since He was already functioning in the Fullness of God on Earth which we can see as His experience, He took on the suffering and the physical agony of His death to teach us that our Life is not in this body and personality but it is in the Spirit and in the Soul which resurrected the body on the Earth.

Can we see that the True Resurrection of the Master was done as an example and as a teaching for the world to follow in His way. Not to the physical death but to the death of the Personality Self. Can we see also that the resurrection is not that doctrinal and illusory idea of bodies coming out of graves and from wherever else and reconstituting but that it is in reality the body and the personality taking on Soul Consciousness and living then as a disciple of the Lord, keeping His words and doing those “greater works“.

His last words in this section are to affirm that this is a voluntary and a willful act for both the Master and for us as we must all be able to say with Him that: “No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father” This is the resurrection away from the doctrine and the dogma and the illusion and, of course, this is not the last word on this as there is endless depth in the sayings of the Master for which we have only scratched the surface and we likely did not do a complete job at that.

 Happy Easter

 

Note on the Quote of the Day