by Roel Velema
Christ is ALL in ALL in the believer through union in the spirit (1 Cor. 6:17). So in Him, in Christ, we move and have our being (Acts 17:28). This frees is forever from the necessity and possibility to move without Him. The Lord stresses this continually in order not to despair about our temporary and visible lives (cp. 2 Cor. 1:8), and lift up our situations to the level of the Spirit. What is the impossible situation here below, is in the land of resurrection and ascension, in our spirit, where He is ALL in ALL, the normal Christian life.
“You have said, ‘Seek my face.’ My heart says to you, ‘Your face, LORD, do I seek’“ (Ps. 27:8). When His ALL speaks from Spirit-spirit to soul, while “fire is set to the course of nature” (James 3:6), His faith substantiates “that God raises the dead” (2 Cor. 1:9).
God’s way is always in the sea (cp. Ps. 77:19). Caught between the army of Pharaoh and the sea, the sea proves to be way out through resurrection. Jesus went to Calvary, “his departure [Gr. ‘exodus’], which He was about to accomplish at Jerusalem” (Luke 9:31). Calvary is our way out, our opened sea, our exodus. How lengthy the evening shadow may be, we don’t look at the appearances which have no power. We see the exodus, the way out, which was there all the time.
In Him we move and in Him He moves everything and everyone. In ourselves we cannot move people one inch unto fullness. Others may criticize us, misunderstand us, reject us, but in Him, they are powerless against His initiated prayer (cp. Ezek. 36:37a) as us. We rejoice in the God who raises the dead and therefore our movement in Him is always a sacrificial move because the new life is contained in a new heart marked by the cross.
The impossible situation is a call to ask: “Lord, what are You up to?”, ready by faith to lay down our lives and stand in the breach on behalf of others. The mark of a mature Christian is the non-dualistic grasp of union in spirit, expressed in intercession, i.e. to stand in the gap for others, “filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church” (Col. 1:24).