BETHANY (1)
LIBERTY AND LOVE #94
The Christian heart should never be burdened when it comes to considering whether or not we are accepted by God. And it never will be if we keep in mind that Christ has done all that was and is necessary to reconcile us to God. He is the reason for all that we have and all that we are. We are pleasing to God because he pleased God and we are in a right relationship with him. This speaks only to faithful Christians who love the Lord and serve him. But if we do, we may be certain that God accepts us on the merits of Christ.
We are saved to the uttermost—as completely as that word can encompass—by the work of Christ. This doctrine is at the center of everything that we have and are in the Lord Jesus Christ. We are connected to God through faith in Christ and we live by faith.
Bethany, that significant town that, at first glance, perhaps, seems so insignificant, to which we are prone to give little thought, relates to the fullness of God’s desire. To understand this desire, we must look to the purpose for which God created man, and this can be most clearly seen from remembering that which he had at the commencement of creation: a spiritual relationship of perfection, and a manifestation of his presence. The emphasis of God’s relationship with his people, from his perspective—which should be ours—is fellowship. Communion with his creatures is what has always been at the heart of God. Much can be learned of this by observing the Lord’s association with Bethany.
Jesus was rejected by men and despised (Isa. 53). He came unto his own and his own did not receive Him (John 1:10). But there was one place where He was received. “Now it came to pass, as they went, that he entered into a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, which also sat at Jesus' feet, and heard his word. But Martha was cumbered about much serving, and came to him, and said...” (Luke 10:38).
To learn of the church, and the way it pertains to God’s purposes in his people, we should learn the lesson of Bethany. The difference between Bethany and the world is that he was received and welcomed in the Bethany house, but he was rejected at Jerusalem. Jerusalem, the place of religious order and work, the place where the scholars worked and spent their time. Jesus was much more comfortable in Bethany than he was there.
Bethany was close geographically to Jerusalem (it was a community near the Mount of Olives about two miles east of Jerusalem). But it was far away metaphorically, for in Bethany Jesus had friends—mainly Mary, Martha, and Lazarus (Luke 10:38-42; John 12:1-8). It is almost as though there was a direct spirit of adoration here, for this is also the place where he was anointed at Simon the leper’s house. So Bethany was special to Jesus, because Jesus was special to Bethany. And this is the reason the real church of Christ is so special to him—because he is special to them.
“And a certain woman named Martha received him.” The house of God is always the place where He is received. Among the words that open John’s Gospel are these: “He came unto His own and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God.”
That is the essence of the church; this is the point we must come to if we are to understand the nature of the church. I have heard much teaching concerning the “nature of the church” but have found the teaching superficial and much of it patently false. The nature of the church is that Christ is received. Christianity is not an “it” or an “institution” or a set of programs, ideas or teachings. It is Christ. This is a world that rejects Christ; but the church is the place where he is received. The church glorifies God by proclaiming to the world that there is a place of acceptance for Jesus. He does have his people. The church honors Christ by receiving him. Does not the church proclaim that Christ will conquer the world that rejects him? That even in the evil age of the earth, he has a foothold?
Paul speaks of the Second Coming of Christ as the time when Jesus will be glorified in his saints. That is the nature of the church. That is the purpose of the assembly of believers on a local level. It is the representation of Christ. In a world where the glory of the Lord is rejected, there is a place where his glory is received and honored and his glory is important.
This is the reason the devil hates the real church, the body of Christ, so much. The devil is the ruler of this world, as the Scriptures declare, and the church is a thorn in his side because it stands as a declaration of rejection of him and an acceptance of the Lord. In the “enemy territory” of the earth, the Lord has an embassy, and the devil would have that assembly of Jesus divided and obsessed with peripheral concerns rather than with living and growing in their fellowship with Jesus.
Dewayne Dunaway
