My Mum came up with an interesting question yesterday about the following passage from John 10:17:
The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again.
It's a curious translation. It prompted my Mum to ask if Jesus had to earn God's love through his obedience, even though the Father and Jesus are "one"? What role does obedience have in obtaining or experiencing God's love? I don't know where NIV derived their definite article, "the". So firstly, the Greek does not say "only because of this one reason".
Further, I feel prompted to add that God is love, he can't not love us. Anything in us unlikable or unlovable is not fundamentally who we are. If you switch out "God" for "Perfect Love", we can't have "Perfect Love" who doesn't love you perfectly!
But my own perspective is moving away from some kind of spatial transmission from the outside in, but rather a deeper awakening of that already resident and divine perfection. As a "fundamentally" impatient person, I recently dared to dream and affirm myself that I had glimpsed patience there. And now I know that I was right! Underneath the impatience there really, really is patience, and I was able to practice it despite feelings of frustration (mindfulness practice helps me here a lot, seeing rather than living inside the feeling). The patience wasn't beamed in from somewhere else, but rather awakened according to releasing some more of that extraordinary and exquisite design we all share, that us spirituals call "divine" or "of God".
So the Father just loves Jesus, not because he specifically did A, B or C. The obedience is instrumental in the experience and awakening of the love and perfection already at work (or dormant) within.
The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again.
It's a curious translation. It prompted my Mum to ask if Jesus had to earn God's love through his obedience, even though the Father and Jesus are "one"? What role does obedience have in obtaining or experiencing God's love? I don't know where NIV derived their definite article, "the". So firstly, the Greek does not say "only because of this one reason".
Further, I feel prompted to add that God is love, he can't not love us. Anything in us unlikable or unlovable is not fundamentally who we are. If you switch out "God" for "Perfect Love", we can't have "Perfect Love" who doesn't love you perfectly!
But my own perspective is moving away from some kind of spatial transmission from the outside in, but rather a deeper awakening of that already resident and divine perfection. As a "fundamentally" impatient person, I recently dared to dream and affirm myself that I had glimpsed patience there. And now I know that I was right! Underneath the impatience there really, really is patience, and I was able to practice it despite feelings of frustration (mindfulness practice helps me here a lot, seeing rather than living inside the feeling). The patience wasn't beamed in from somewhere else, but rather awakened according to releasing some more of that extraordinary and exquisite design we all share, that us spirituals call "divine" or "of God".
So the Father just loves Jesus, not because he specifically did A, B or C. The obedience is instrumental in the experience and awakening of the love and perfection already at work (or dormant) within.
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