Gods_Kingdom - Regarding your "all chiefs and no Indians" remark, I would appreciate your comments on the following extract from an article I wrote some years ago.
The Society teach that not everyone who puts faith in Jesus is declared righteous to the same extent. It describes the majority of believers as having only, “a degree of righteousness” credited to them, as having a “relatively righteous standing” before God, and of being counted as righteous “compared to mankind in general.” (See The Watchtower, 1 December 1985, p.17).
Bible writers know of no such half-hearted generosity on God’s part. Either we are forgiven or we are not. Either we are declared righteous in God’s eyes or we are not. Being righteous compared to mankind in general will not reconcile us to God. That would leave us like the man on the roof mentioned earlier, closer to the stars than his neighbours, but still light years removed from his goal. Indeed the very notion of having a “relatively righteous standing” before God is nonsensical. It is comparable to describing a woman as being relatively pregnant. If we have “a degree of righteousness” credited to us then we are still marred by a degree of sin, which God must condemn and punish, and therefore we remain alienated from him.
Jesus did not just bear some of our sins: He bore all of them. The “great crowd” of Revelation 7 are said to have,“washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb,” not relatively clean compared to mankind in general. The “sheep” of Jesus’ parable at Matt. 25:31-46 are referred to as the “righteous ones” who depart “into everlasting life”, not as the relatively righteous who qualify for a second chance.
The Bible uses the analogy of adoption to illustrate the relationship with God that Jesus’ death makes possible. It is one of the first things that John tells us in his gospel. “As many as did receive him, to them he gave authority to become God’s children, because they were exercising faith (“believing”; Interlinear) in his name, and they were born, not from blood, or from a fleshly will or from man’s will, but from God.” (Jhn.1:12,13)
When God accepts us and declares us righteous, He does so in full knowledge of all our weaknesses and limitations. Unlike human friendship God’s love is never fickle or capricious, it is loyal and unchanging. Although sadly it is not always so, the best human illustration of this kind of unconditional acceptance is the relationship between a parent and child. A good parent will never disown their offspring. Their love, forgiveness, comfort and protection is not dependant on how well the child performs, it is inherent in the nature of the relationship. Even when a child goes seriously astray like the prodigal son of Jesus’ parable, the good father remains ready to joyfully welcome him home and restore him without reservation.
This is the way that God loves and accepts those who put faith in his Son. Without Jesus we are, at best like slaves, always trying desperately to be good enough to merit the master’s approval. Always uncertain, even on a good day, if tomorrow’s mistake will result in our rejection. But a son, on the other hand, is assured of his father’s love. He works because he in turn loves his father, and wants to please him. It is this difference that Paul describes at Romans 8:15, “You did not receive a spirit of slavery causing fear again, but you received a spirit of adoption as sons by which spirit we cry out Abba, Father.”
There are, by the Bible’s reckoning, only two sorts of people. Everybody begins as the same sort; children of Adam or, “in Adam”. In this state they are, under “condemnation” (Rom.5:18), “alienated” from, and “enemies” of God (Col.1:21), “children of wrath” (Eph. 2:3), under the “authority of darkness” (Col.1:13), walking in “accord with the flesh” (Rom.8:4), “slaves of sin” (Rom.6:17), and “dead in their trespasses” (Eph.2:1&5).
This is not the Bible’s description of an especially depraved person but of the normal human condition from God’s perspective. It matters not at all that we may not feel guilty or under condemnation, God’s inspired word says emphatically that we are.
The other sort of person is, “in Christ”. These are, “declared righteous” (Rom.5:1), “reconciled to God” (Rom.5:10), “born of God” (1 Jhn.5:1) or “born again” (Jhn.3:3), “beloved children” of God (Eph.5:1), “transferred into the kingdom of the Son of God’s love” (Col.1:13), indwelled by “God’s Spirit” (Rom.8:9), part of a “new creation” (2 Cor.5:17), and “alive together with the Christ” (Eph.2:5).
The difference between these two groups is not that the latter are more worthy, or that they try harder to be good, nor that they naturally have more interest in spiritual matters or an ability to read and understand the Bible. It is simply that they have put faith in God’s provision for their salvation. They have humbly abandoned their attempts to earn His favour and trusted in Jesus as their Saviour. For someone to feel that these blessings could not apply to them because they are not worthy is for that person to miss the point of the good news. Nobody is good enough, that is exactly the point at which the gospel begins.
We cannot pick and choose which of the above descriptions of those who belong to God apply to us, and which ones do not. We cannot for example be reconciled to God, but not be a “new creation”. (see 2 Cor.5:16-19) We cannot be “beloved children” of God, but not be “born of God”. We cannot draw a line between calling God “Father”, and calling him, “Abba, Father”. If we have not been adopted then we are not His children, He is not our Father, and we have no right to call Him such at all. If we are His children then we are also joint heirs with Christ. If we are “in harmony with the Spirit” then “God’s Spirit truly dwells” in us, but if we do not have the Holy Spirit then we do “not belong to” Christ. (See Rom.8:9-17) Only if we are “led by the Spirit” can we produce the “fruitage of the Spirit”. But again, if we are, then we can cry out “Abba Father” and we are adopted as sons of God and joint heirs with Christ. (See Gal.4:6,7;5:16-24)
The teaching that God’s promise of adoption as sons applies only to a small minority of those who put faith in Jesus is an especially pernicious doctrine. Being “anointed” or “born again”, is not simply a technical label that distinguishes a person as having a heavenly calling as opposed to an earthly one. It is a description of the life that can be enjoyed by all who have been forgiven and reconciled with God. It has to do, not with where God wants us to spend eternity, but whether or not we are reconciled to him now, and therefore have any eternity to look forward to at all.
It is clear from his first letter that John did not view being born again as something that applied only to a few Christians. He says that, “Everyone believing that Jesus is the Christ has been born from God.” (1 Jhn.5:1) And later in the same letter he wrote, “See what sort of love the Father has given us that we should be called children of God, and such we are.” (1 Jhn.3:1)
