Hi John.
I re-read this proposed addition to the Father and Son book* today (“Promotion”) This was really good, John. I think you covered it all, and then some. 🙂
It’s a blessed and peaceful place to love and be satisfied with what God made us – it’s a blessing to learn what that is! Reminds me that if we don’t know who we are, we can make a mess – so it’s important to know our place, and who we are.
Christianity promotes this “promotion” idea: look for a bigger place, more people, a higher position, win the world, etc. If one has been in Christianity, you can see the influence this has had on people, and where it takes them, because it appeals to the flesh and it promotes envy. If not overcome it will ruin lives (for example, I think of one particular brother… looking to be what he was not – it took him away. He could have happily been your helper, and a good one, had he been content to be who he was.) Looking back, I believe every young man wanting to please God, who is in Christianity, is tempted with this “promotion” idea. The institution demands it. This is just another reason that we must come out.
Thank God for the truth that you get to us day in and day out. Without it, I could have easily have been one of those people looking for a promotion, just like you have described. What can I say but “thank you Lord!”
Thanks for getting this into simple and direct words like this. I really enjoyed it.
Gary
Promotion
Plants are never promoted to act as animals; animals are never promoted to act as humans; humans are never promoted to act as angels; angels are never promoted to act as cherubs; and cherubs, such as Satan, are never promoted to act as the Son of God, sitting at God’s right hand. Only plants can be plants and only the Son of God can sit at the Father’s right hand.
On earth, if God has ordained for a child to one day become a pastor, and then that child grows up and becomes a pastor, it is not that he has been promoted; it is only that he has become who he was ordained by God to be. That child can grow in wisdom and strength, and he can receive spiritual gifts, but he can never become more than what God ordained him from the beginning to be. We may say that when a child who is ordained to be come a pastor, or prophet, or helper, actually becomes a pastor, prophet, or helper, such a child has grown into himself, as he has existed in God’s mind all along.
When the Son of God returned to heaven and sat down at God’s right hand, he was only doing what he had been created to do. He was ordained to sit at the Father’s right hand before the world began. That glorification of the Son to sit at the Father’s right hand was not a promotion for him. It had been his appointed place before the world began, and it is his unshakable place forever. In spite of the fact that Satan had never seen a promotion given to any creature in God’s kingdom, he expected a promotion to sit and reign with God over all creation. That expectation reveals his lack of the knowledge of God, for that office was far beyond what cherubs were created to do or be. Just as one may grow in knowledge only within the limits of knowledge that pertains to his own kind of life, so he can function only within the limits of his kind of life.
In expectation of being promoted to sit at God’s right hand, Satan labored to attain to that supremely high office, and God used his efforts to accomplish His purposes. Ministers on earth who are like Satan also labor for promotions, and they envy one another and compete with one another for them. But religions that offer the promotions they seek only promote envy and discontent. God’s way promotes thankfulness and peace. And as Satan learned, or will learn, it is madness to envy the position to which someone else is ordained. If anyone has been ordained by God to a position, no one can keep him from it, and if he has not been ordained for it, he cannot truly occupy it at all; he can only want to. Satan’s son, like their father, are not thankful, and they are always looking for a promotion, but only within man-made religious institutions can they one. Such a system has no part with God’s kind of life.
Moses’ cousin Korah is a perfect example of how a son of Satan thinks and behaves. Though greatly blessed to work among the most holy things in the tabernacle, Korah and those with him envied Aaron and his priesthood. To obtain the priesthood, Korah persuaded most of Israel to rebel against Moses and Aaron, telling them that Moses had promoted himself and Aaron to the offices they held. Moses’ humble response to this attempted coup d’etat was that they should all meet before the tabernacle and let God declare who was ordained to the priesthood and who was not.
Numbers 16
- Now Korah, the son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi, and Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, and On, the son of Peleth, sons of Reuben, took men
- and rose up before Moses, with certain of the children of Israel, two hundred and fifty princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown.
- And they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and they said to them, “You take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them. Why then do you lift yourselves up above the congregation of the Lord?”
- And when Moses heard it, he fell on his face.
- And he spoke to Korah and to all his company, saying, “Even tomorrow the Lord will show who are His, and who is holy, and He will cause him to come near unto Him. He will cause the one whom He has chosen to approach Him.
- This do. Take you censers, Korah, and all his company,
- and put fire in it, and put incense in them before the Lord tomorrow. And it shall be that the man whom the Lord chooses, he shall be holy. You take too much upon you, you sons of Levi.”
- And Moses said unto Korah, “Hear, I pray you, you sons of Levi!
- Does it seem but a small thing to you, that the God of Israel has separated you from the congregation of Israel, to bring you near to Himself to do the service of the tabernacle of the Lord, and to stand before the congregation to minister unto them?
- And he has brought you near to him, and all your brothers, the sons of Levi, with you! And do you seek the priesthood also?
- This is the reason that both you and all your company are gathered together against the Lord! And what is Aaron, that you murmur against him?”
Only Moses could be Moses. Only Aaron could be Aaron. And only Korah and his fellow Kohathites could do the work of the tabernacle appointed for them. Everyone who was thankful for their place occupied it with joy, and everyone who was not thankful grew discontent with the ordination of God. To envy someone in a higher position is to condemn God for making the mistake of giving that position to a less deserving creature. It is, in truth, to consider oneself to be wiser than God, who places “the members, each one, in the body as He pleases” (1Cor. 12:18).
*To read the complete on-line version of Pastor John’s book, The Father and Son, click on the link below.
http://www.goingtojesus.com/text/books/fatherandson.pdf