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CHAPTER ONE

NO ORPHAN

As  man moves into unchartered seas, briny oceans of innovation about what he is, where he is going, with whom and why, there is a huge storm which surges and tosses the Ship of Many States, in which there are many saloons, all driven into the surging waters, as if it were a mere toy.

They squabble at various mass meetings, then snugly consider each, only his own, and then erupt in seemingly drunken mutual challenges; but the ship moves on, and the seas toss as they did for Jonah, when he made his wild spiritual spree,  abandoning for a little time, his responsibility as an officer in the work of God, afraid of his duty, or at any rate, dismissing it for an alternative.

All the time, God was there. He did not change His principles, choice of methods, manner of being, because someone for a little time rebelled. Israel similarly, rebelled and insisted on having its to-dos with other nations, yielding here, asserting there, imbibing from their draughts freely, and getting not a little spiritually intoxicated in the process. Tipsiness in living is unwise; our equipment is not only fascinatingly brilliant in techniques, beyond anything man can do, even with the example before him, for he takes bits and pieces, but never makes it all in some way of his own. When  involved in such pursuits, he appears more like a parasite, seeking to make use of what another has provided. It is also immensely sensitive to moral and spiritual misuse.

There is a code for the body, of vast intricacy and staggering intellectual acumen, when you leave ideas unempirical and simply look at the quality of the product, as is normal among men, and rational besides. There is not surprisingly, a code for the other elements of human being: the moral or what is right, or wrong, and the spiritual, what it is for, where it came from, and with what purpose for such an enterprise as this represents: as a product not of nothing, but of what is competent for that creative performance that produces that creative item, the human race

This more overall level of instruction is better than an automatic code, better than DNA; for the latter tells things for which we are not (directly) responsible, what to do (errors in one generation may of course lead to degeneration in some instances, or incite it, in the next). This better-than-automatic-code information meets not the levels of the body, most particularly, but what it is for; not the engineering minutiae, but the immaterial, the spiritual, the elements in the realms of human purpose, self-estimate, understanding, wisdom and destiny. The difference, if you want analogy, is like that between a handbook for your car, for its maintenance, and one for your work, for its performance with the car, to which you may variously respond!

This code-surpassing entity is called the LOGOS in the Bible, in John 1:1, where it is made correlative with Genesis 1:1. In the latter, God speaks and creation is done. In John, the speech has an ultimate, the WORD or logos and this is a living being together with God from the beginning as in Proverbs 8 is the case with wisdom (cf. Proverbs 8). Infinitely intimate, He is God expressed, the Word, and He is the first and the last as in Revelation 2:8-9, just as God is,  and there is no tissue between them, no disjunctive difference in being, for there are three persons in the Godhead, the Father,  Son and Holy Spirit (Isaiah 48:15ff.):the Sender, the Sent and the Spirit of the sending. We are minor creations (lacking ultimacy); our words are limited to writing, speaking. He is not minor: His word is a living Being as is His Spirit.

The Word, who was born into flesh as the Son of God, God being the actual Father in this case, so that the processes of man were superseded by the power of the One who made them (Luke 1:35), it is He who provided the code for DNA (Colossians 1:15ff.). It is seen in this,  that he is the author of all things and this is one of them, most intimate to the life of flesh (John 1:3). This man, the Son of Man as He often  called Himself, is both the Code-Maker and the spiritual cynosure, exhibiting through the format of man, the realities of God (John 14:9, 16:15, 8:58, 17:1-3, Matthew 11:27ff.). His Father sent Him as the living exhibit of Himself in flesh (Hebrews 1:1-3), and from the first God had shown to man through His word and in His words, that He would send through man the deliverer from the devilries which had spiritually seduced him (Genesis 3:15).

Many were the commandments which were literary code for comprehension on the way to the incarnation of God Himself in the final actions of securing redemption for man (Hebrews 1, 9). The moral, spiritual, cultural were all given their ground plan. Man was not left in the dark, as a wisp or vapour, as an orphan (cf. John 14:17-18). In Deuteronomy 7 you see the same intensity, for what people had the Lord so visited as those whom He selected to show forth His praise on this earth! (Deuteronomy 4:6-9, 7:6-11). Israel was so chosen for such a purpose, as part of the method of bringing the Gospel of salvation to the earth (Isaiah 43:1,10).

"The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you
because you were more in number than any other people,
for you were the least of all peoples,
but because the LORD loves you, and because He would keep the oath
He swore to your fathers ... " (Deut. 7:7-8),

and again

"What great nation is there that has God so near to it,
as the LORD our God is to us, for whatever reason we may call upon Him ?
and what great nation is there that has such statutes and righteous judgments
as are in all this law which I set before you this day ?" (Deut. 4:8).

Thus not orphans but instructed was mankind, this from the first by God direct in the garden, from early after the flood by Moses, from all the prophets for some 2000 years, and not like a lost tribe trying to do mathematics without a text, floundering (though this is innate to no small degree, yet needing work to bring it forth in the pre-existing logical domain), but like those instructed was man  Did he not have the LOGOS in writing, till it became flesh and dwelt among us. As to Him, He is before all time, that an invention of God for creation, as He is also above it as above all creation (Romans 8:36, Isaiah 40, 48:15ff.); for when He makes man, and our kind of time with him, He does not evacuate His own person, but instructs.

Orphanages are for those who have lost their parents; we have not lost God, except by wilfulness. The commandments for the mind, the love for the soul, the liberty for the stature of man, the results for wisdom to consider, the glory for humbling and the wonder for marvelling, it is all there: but it needs to be taken, for such is the spirit of man that there is no duress. Punishment there may be, but there is no arm-twisting to get you into the kingdom if you do not want to come. It is essential to the stature of man that this be so^*1, and indeed God is no ogre insisting on GETTING you at all costs, to bend you and blend you till you are a mere robot of rule. Christ, the Logos in flesh, did not weep for Jerusalem because He COULD not bend it to His will, but because He WOULD not, though giving ever so many advices, appeals, evidences, attestations of love, invitations, and on occasion, even incitations, if by any means they might listen.

Israel the nation, like the Gentiles in their innings after her, despite times of drawing near, when it came to the final test, WOULD NOT LISTEN (as in Luke 19:42ff.). Thus it would not perceive that here was the LOGOS at last in PERSON, available, able to do whatever was needed, without limit, with direct access, face to face. Instead they mutinied, mutilated that face, and the nations are not in the least any better, mutilating the psychic face of their children, to whom they still have access, through teaching amiss in millions of cases, and leaving out God as did Israel, in the most heinous and ludicrous fashion, so that it has become a very solemn joke^*2 when they talk about it, and preach their unbelief now more obviously, now more clandestinely, in the schools, universities and colleges: if not all, then increasingly to the hilt.

The Code maker still is there, and unlike the DNA^*3, He does not depreciate over time, nor does His word change, nor do His predictions, all duly coming to pass, nor does His mind, eternal and not subject to the unknown, for to Him on whom all depends, and who depends on nothing, the ultimate, original and eternal who does better things that naturalistic nothing and question begging sumptuousness, there is no change (cf. Psalm 102:25-28). The truth is still there, and unlike His Creation, He does not downgrade^*4. He is the source of all living, the imprinter of code, giver of commandments, the LOGOS of the Father, alive forever, incorruptible to the death (Luke 22:42,  Matthew 4) as in life, inestimable for who will teach the Lord (Isaiah 40:13-15, Colossians 2:9), Lord indeed (Luke 6:46, Philippians 2:1-12) and master (Matthew 23:8-10), showing the glory of God in His own face, countenance and expression. We are not left orphans, but have had the opportunity to face God direct, and by His Spirit have had this word concerning Him for two more millenia, and by His grace now face the end of the present time (Answers to Questions Ch. 5), very closely, when the Code-Maker, Mind-Maker and Spirit-provider for man, having given liberty much scope, comes to deal with the matters arising, for judgment (Acts 17:31), following the display of His glory (Habakkuk 2:14 cf. The Vitality, the Perspicuity ... Ch. 5, *3A ).

Man is not alone. He is not an orphan. He is a run-away, and not only this, he has a way back, a way home, a way to the Code-maker for his body, the mind maker for his intellection and the spirit maker for his being, by which he chooses, evaluates, criticises, opines, reasons and imagines (John 10:10).

NOTES

*1 Thus man is made in the image of God, and since God is not in Himself a physical being, this being a matter of inscribing limitations and laws, and portraying purposes, the image has to be spiritual.

In this, there is provision for NOT being merely a subject, given a code and a casing, but one in whom some measure of autonomy is possible, so that mere order-obedience is not the crucial point first at issue. Important as this is for proper functioning in man, it is not so important that man is forced to obey. He can go on trips to find truth, to escape it, even when it is staring him in the eyes. But God seeks, and for that being made in His own image, He has love (John 3:16), and gives exhortation, appeal and command, while indicating the consequences of not keeping these, or heeding them (as in Leviticus 26), being far from merely an impresario creating a script.

To be sure, He KNOWS the script (Romans 8:30ff.), but it is not made by making man a servile substitute for a spirit, but free to invent and detest what he calls good, and to avoid, evade and even hate the God who made him, to his own detriment, thus becoming the self-made orphan.

Thus positively where the Spirit of God is, there is liberty (II Cor. 3:17), and the one who goes on sinning is merely the servant of sin (John 8:31-36), utter autonomy being an obvious false boast, for neither birth nor death nor disease is under our control, and suicide is merely a foregoing of the issue. Saving your life is thus losing it (Matthew 16:24-27), a misuse of a glorious liberty to disjoin from the very maker and source of it! See Licence for Liberty.

*2

See The Splendour of the Biblical Coverage ... Ch. 3, TMR Ch. 8, Beauty for Ashes Ch. 3,
Government Composite.

*3

See Waiting for Wonder Appendix, Man in Retrospect, in Prospect ... Ch. 2.
 

*4

See also Acme, Alpha and Omega: Jesus Christ, Ch. 8, Sparkling Life ... Ch. 4.