Heaven & Earth

A lot of our disagreements originate from a failure to establish a shared understanding of the words we use.  A modern example of this is the word reconciliation.

Oh, we’re able to agree on a definition for the word – however you spin it, reconciliation is about bringing together rather than pulling apart – but the ability to agree on a definition is different from sharing an understanding of the word.

This goes back to the inductive nature of our world view formulation.  There is no such thing as a purely logical or unbiased person – our biases and opinions are much of what it means to be a thinking, free moral agent (we aren’t robots acting out a script).  

It is inductive because the many parts inform and shape our view of the whole, creating the “lens” through which we view the world.

Some of these inputs are logical, factual, historical, scientific.  Some of these inputs are  emotional, experiential, social and relational.  When any of these inputs differ from the inputs of another individual, there is a low probability of sharing an understanding without intentional effort.

Let’s look at an example.

Marxism – the precursor of Communism and Critical Theory (including Critical Race Theory) – presupposes an overly simplified and binary world view wherein a person is either categorized as an oppressor or as the oppressed – neutrality does not exist, and morality is effectively irrelevant.  If a thing could be said to be moral, it would be the endeavor of class and race and influence “reconciliation”.  

In practice, this looks like the “oppressed” rebelling against the “oppressors” and seeking to displace them, reversing their roles until the formerly oppressed are now the oppressors, and the former oppressors are now the oppressed, and then the cycle begins again.

The great and dangerous deception of this view of course is found in the misuse of the word “reconciliation”.  Practical Marxism/Communism/Critical Theory is actually all about creating and reinforcing divisions/separation, and it does so in a way that encourages/requires its subjects to be forever discontented.

And this is precisely what we’re seeing in our own country right now – a great discontentment with perceived injustices with regard to class, race and influence among others.  Many of the proposed “solutions” look like they could be coming directly out of a Marxist brochure and heavily emphasize “reconciling” the gap between the “haves” and the “have-nots”.  As long as you are the “oppressed”, you are the “good guy”, and as long as you are the “oppressor”, you are the “bad guy”.

And again, this is the exact opposite of reconciliation.

Let’s contrast this with a Biblical depiction of reconciliation.

“Therefore from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer.  Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.  Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.  Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.  He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (2 Cor. 5:16-21)

It would appear that many things occurred in the Fall in Genesis 3.  One of the things that happened was a breaking of fellowship with God and His creation (which includes our relationships with each other).  From that time, and even today, our tendency has been to divide, separate, compartmentalize both in our interactions with the world, and our interactions with ourselves – the “inner man”.

In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul is expressing the nature of God’s pursuit of reconciliation with us and all creation.  Paul is also inviting the Church to take an active role as Christ’s ambassadors of reconciliation – to be “co-laborers” with Christ in undoing the curse of the Fall.  

Jesus gave us the same invitation as He was outlining the model prayer.  “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”  We are wrong to think of this as a passive request for God to “do what He will.”  Jesus’ original audience would have recognized this as an interactive request – “may Your Spirit  be glorified in me as I work with you to manifest Your kingdom and will here on earth in the same way that your kingdom and will are manifest in heaven.”  

N.T. Wright makes an excellent observation in his book, The New Testament in its World, 

“Jesus himself was all about the coming together of heaven and earth.  Splitting them apart, as has so often been done, is a sign of our times, more specifically of the Enlightenment’s separation of timeless truths from contingent historical realities, whether by skeptics of by their devout opponents.” (pg. 79)

It is remarkably strange that many modern Christians hold a belief in a remarkably separated heaven and earth, and conduct their lives so as to suggest an ever-widening gap between the two rather than the radical reconciliation of heaven and earth that Jesus lived, taught, and empowered us to live and teach.

So what does Biblical reconciliation mean?  Not Communism.  Not Socialism.  Reconciliation is not a social construct, but rather a spiritual construct.  It’s a spiritual movement – the reconciling of heaven and earth within us, in the inner man.  Then we can live as kingdom ambassadors, honoring all, and worshipping God alone.