One morning on her way to work, my wife came across a horrible accident. A man’s body was lying in the street. He was obviously dead. People were late for work. Cars were honking. Some were yelling, “Let me through!” And all at once, a woman jumped out of her car, ran to the body, turned around, and began screaming at all those commuters: “He was somebody’s baby! He was somebody’s baby...”

Surprisingly, that changes things, doesn’t it?

And surprisingly, everybody is somebody’s baby -- a good for nothing baby.

Babies really are good for nothing; they’re just good.

And Jesus is God’s baby. . . We would’ve missed Him; Mary did not.

John 1:1-18: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made [ginomai] through him, and without him was not any thing made. That which has been made was life in him... He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who took him, he gave “exousia” [ek: out of + ousias: being, “a piece of beingness” ] to become [ginomai] children of God, those believing in his name, who were born not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among [in] us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only [monogenes (mono+ginomai): only begotten] Son from the Father, full of grace and truth... No one has ever seen God; the only [monogenes: only begotten] God, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known [exegeomai: to exegete]."

So, a teenage peasant girl named Mary knew God better than anyone had known Him ever before, and better than any theologian has known Him since.

Jesus is God’s baby, who is God; good for nothing, just Good.

Why would God become a baby?

About 30 years ago, I bent down to give my four-year-old daughter a good night kiss. I was utterly stressed — expectations, responsibilities, loneliness -- particularly at Christmas, everyone wants something from the pastor. Becky didn’t know and didn’t care how the sermon had gone. She just grabbed my head, pulled it down, held it to her chest and said, “I’ll be the big mommy and you be the little baby.” For a few moments I was. My blood pressure dropped. My pulse moderated. And she patted my head saying, “I love you, little baby.”

Best Christmas present ever! Mary must’ve said something like that to the Uncreated Creator. Perhaps God became a baby so that you would love Him when He’s good for nothing, just Good. And that’s Life.

During the message, I shared a picture of two infants in one incubator. They were twins, and one was not expected to live until a nurse broke protocol and put both babies in one incubator. One sister put her arm over the back of the other sister, the dying sister…and her pulse stabilized, her temperature went up, and the two went on to become healthy young adults. In 1996, the picture appeared in an article titled “The Rescuing Hug.” It changed the way doctors cared for babies in the United States of America.

Christmas means that God became a baby, because He always is . . . a baby — hypostatic union, “the same yesterday today and forever,” fully God and fully baby.

Maybe we could also become babies, for in reality, we already are. Everybody is somebody’s baby; good for nothing, just Good.

I am this thing I didn’t create (a baby), covered in this thing that I think I did create (a “grown-up” man).

Jesus didn’t tell His followers to become like children because they were actually “grown up,” but because they thought they were grown, were trying to be grown up, and that imaginary “grown up” kept each of them from connecting with one another and with God; it kept them from Life.

Life is the rescuing hug. Life is the self that you did not create, communing with another self that did not create itself. Life is a Divine Communion: at least two persons and one “ousias,” one substance called Love. Life is knowing God (John 17:3). It’s “being with” Jesus (Mark 3:14), fully God and fully baby; good for nothing, just Good.

A group of refugees were fleeing the Nazis over the Pyrenees Mountains in World War II. With them was a Jewish baby. An exhausted old man gave up and told the rest to go on without him. The guide said to him, “You’re not dead yet. With your last bit of strength, you must carry the baby until you die.” Three times with three old men, it happened that night. And in the morning, they all arrived in Spain, every one of them, alive. Perhaps everything is good because of, and for, the baby. “All things were created through Him and for Him,” writes Paul.

Everybody is God’s baby — Adam is begotten with a breath, a spirit, from God. And Adam held his breath. The last Adam surrendered His breath on the tree, and now His Spirit teaches us to breathe God in the Kingdom of God... begotten of God.

Everybody is God’s “begotten” baby (John 1:3,12), and Jesus is God’s “only begotten” (John 1:14,18). He must be born in us or us in Him, as if we actually are His body. And so, of course, “In Him was made Life.”

I have a friend who went to prison and spent a long time in solitary confinement. He said it was hell. He realized what we must all realize: There is no prison worse than the prison of one’s own self-righteous, insecure, lonely ego. The grown-up man, the successful self, that he thought he had created was destroyed. “One day it popped; it died,” he said. “I walked around the prison yard in perfect peace for two hours.” Someone cursed him, and he blessed them simply because he wanted to. He went back to his cell, curled up in his bunk (fetal position), and wept. And then, Jesus showed up. He placed his hand on my friend’s back — in my mind’s eye, I picture two infants and the rescuing hug. He stroked my friend’s back and said, “Stop trying. I’m doing this.”

He must’ve been saying to my friend what He says and will say to each of us: “Stop trying to save yourself, create yourself, and justify yourself. That’s what I’m doing and have done, for I know who you are. I love you as I love myself, for you are myself, my bride, my body, my temple, my home. I am enough. I am your life. I am doing it . . . all around you; I am stripping you of your illusions. And I am doing it within you, even as you. Someone just cursed us, and we blessed them. We were good for nothing, just Good.”

“I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” says Jesus. Life is not a program that you can do. Life is a person with whom you must constantly commune. “Abide in me” says Jesus. And where is He? John 1:18: He is on the lap and in the bosom of the Father, held tightly to His chest, like Mary held Him tightly to hers.

With the faith that you’ve got, which is the “exousia” that you’ve been given, picture yourself in Him and on the Father’s lap. To imagine what is true is called “faith.” Don’t promise anything, vow anything, or intend anything; just be something. Be the beloved: good for nothing, just good.

Then pick Him up and adore Him. You can’t earn Him or deserve Him. He’s good for nothing, just good — actually, the Good that everything is for. Worship Him.

Let Him hold you. You hold Him. And then, hold someone else; let the one that God has made in you, touch the one that God has made in another. Give someone a rescuing hug.

Everybody is somebody’s baby. Everybody is God’s baby. Jesus is God’s baby. You are God’s baby. He wants to be your baby, even as you have always been His. He calls Himself “the Son of Man.”

Love is God returning to God through us. Truth is God returning to God through our relationships. Beauty is God returning to God through all created things, as if the Cosmos is God’s baby. The entire creation will wake up and worship the Lord (Revelation 5:13), for it will all be filled with the Only Begotten, who is the Life.

And it’s all good for nothing. You can’t pay for it, and you can’t pay for anything with it. It’s all good for nothing, just Good. Merry Christmas.

And if you’re tempted to think that your particular life is inconsequential, you need to know: It all happens by means of the “rescuing hug.”

What is the will of God for me? I ask that question all the time. In the Old Testament, the will of God is very practical, applicable, and comprehensible. It’s often called “The Law.” In the New Testament, not so much: Love, pick up a cross, eat my body, and drink my blood.

Recently, praying for some very specific guidance, my wife said, “I just heard the Lord say, ‘Read 1 Thessalonians 5.’” It was some confusing stuff about the end of the world, sin, and faith. But then, verse 18 caught my attention: “This is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” What is?

Verse 15, “See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. [Does God do this?] Rejoice always, pray constantly, give thanks in all circumstances [literally “in everything”], for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

I doubt that I’ll reform the criminal justice system; pretending to be happy makes me sad; praying constantly seems impractical; and yet, I can make myself say “Thank you” with perhaps a mustard seed of faith.

“Thank you,” for what? Ephesians 5:20, “always and for everything.” 1 Timothy 4:4, “For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is sanctified [made holy, the seventh day is holy] with the Word of God and prayer.”

“Give thanks always and for everything in everything, this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

Try it. Close your eyes, and for half a minute just thank God for everything that pops into your head.

If you really thanked God always and for everything in everything, wouldn’t you come to believe that nothing happened to you by chance and everything was a gift, for God was telling a story -- a good story, the Gospel according to you... which would be your life? But who actually does that? You tried for half a minute, correct? How did it go?

1. Did you thank God for good things? If so, did you earn any of those good things? If you earned those things, did you earn yourself who earned those good things? How can you thank God for your dinner if you believe that you earned that dinner?

If you think you own things because you earned those things, you don’t own them; they own you. But when you thank God for a thing, it transforms that thing from an idol into a temple — a way to worship God who freely gives all things to you. “All things are yours,” wrote Paul.

2. Did you thank God for “bad” things? How about sex, drugs, and alcohol? Jesus said, “As often as you drink of this cup, do it in remembrance of me.” And He gave thanks. Maybe He meant every cup of alcohol: “Do this with me, so it won’t be an idol, so it won’t have you, but you’ll have it together with me — communion.”

Maybe people, cars, houses, food, and wine become holy with just a word that rides out on your tongue: “eucharisteo,” thank you. “Everything... is sanctified by the Word of God and prayer, when received with thanksgiving,” wrote Paul. It must be the Good Decision: Thanksgiving.

3. Did you thank God for your good decisions? If you don’t thank God for Good Decisions, you must think that you made those Good Decisions — like Faith, Hope, and Love. God is Love. Did you make God? Maybe you don’t make Good Decisions, but with Good Decisions, God in Christ Jesus is making you. Did you thank God for your Righteousness? If not, you must be self-righteous. Jesus is our Righteousness (1 Cor. 1:30).

4. Did you thank God for your bad decisions? If “God created everything” (Eph. 3:9), and “everything created by God is good” (Eph. 4:4), I don’t know that we can actually thank God for bad “things” or bad “decisions,” for they must be no “things” and no “decisions.”

Every lie is an absence of Truth. Every disobedience is an absence of Love. Every sin is an absence of Faith in Love, that is Righteousness. If you actually thank God for a nothing, it becomes a something — like Hope. And once we actually see a “bad decision,” we hope that it becomes a “good decision” — that’s repentance.

Recently, I was feeling very sad that I was so sad and did not “rejoice always” until an idea popped into my head. I prayed, “Thank you that I’m poor in spirt.” And suddenly, I felt rather blessed. I prayed, “Thank you that I’m sad; I’m mourning.” And I felt comforted by one who knows all about sad and glad; I was glad to be sad. I prayed, “Thank you that I’m meek.” I felt like a lamb . . . and then, a lion. I prayed, “Thank you that I (the unrighteous) am hungry and thirsty for righteousness,” and I was satisfied... But often I’m confused.

5. Did you thank God for the confusion? I often feel like a field of wheat and weeds (tares), Good Decisions and bad decisions, and I can’t sort them out. That’s how I felt when my wife said, “Read 1 Thessalonians 5.”

So, what’s the will of God in Christ Jesus for you? It must be that you would say, “Thank you” and keep walking. Which direction? I’m not sure it matters if you say, “Thank you,” and actually mean it, for that is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Say, “Thank you,” and He can straighten the path under your feet. Say, “Thank you,” and turn the page.

Paul seemed to actually believe that you are a story being told, and when “it is finished,” you will turn around and see that “everything is good,” including every page of your story: Good and couldn’t be better. We all hope this and even teach this to our children. We read fairy tales to them. They all end with this idea: “…And they all lived happily ever after.” And yet, each fairy tale contains at least one very confusing and terrifying page like: “They were too late. Snow White had already taken a bite of the apple and was lying lifeless on the floor.” Why would I read that to my daughter? Well, one day she might bite the apple. And now she really needs to know that she’s not the author of the story; the Father of our Prince IS. She learns that by turning the page.

If we think we’re the author of our own story, we’ll seize control of the plot, stop reading, and be stuck on one page in space and time. The devil keeps us in lifelong bondage through “the fear of death,” not death. The fear of death keeps us from turning the page.

If you weren’t always trying to save your life, perhaps you could live your life?

If I wasn’t always worried about myself, perhaps I could be myself?

6. How about the tree in the middle of the Garden? Did you thank God for that tree, the cross?

That’s the Plot hanging on that tree. And this is a rather confusing page of our story. Just look.

This is the worst thing that we have ever done. And this is the best thing that has ever been done. Maybe this is the only thing that has ever been done? This is the Word of God in and by whom all things are created and sustained. In this is Love, and Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. This is the Plot to every story and your story.

Once you trust the Plot, you can enjoy every moment in every story. Dumbo, Sleeping Beauty, The Lion King: They were each terrifying the first time through, and then the kids started saying, “Read it again. Read it again!” Heaven is all creation constantly thanking God and enjoying every moment.

7. Did you thank God for the tree and your old “me”? I don’t think you can thank God for sin because sin is refusing to thank God. But you can thank God that you have sinned, for that is how He reveals His glory and gives it to you, making you just who it is that you actually are.

8. Did you thank God for your false self, so you can thank Him for your true self? The Cross destroys the illusion that I can create me, save me, and justify me (the weeds). And it reveals the truth that I am created, saved, and justified in Him (the wheat, the fruit).

If you feel responsible for yourself, you’ll never be able to bear the weight of your own glory — Jesus gives His glory to you (Rev. 21:9-11). Your glory is Jesus. You cannot bear the burden of Love, for you are the burden that Love bears. God is love, and you are the creation of Love filled with Love, the Uncreated Creator. The only appropriate response is “Thank you . . . Thank you for the thank you. Thank you. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah, etc., etc., etc.”

That got deep! But my point is simple: Say, “Thank you.”

But who actually thanks God “always and for everything in everything”?

On the night that the Plot was betrayed by all of us, He took bread, and when He had given thanks [eucharisto], He broke it and said, “This is my body, given to you.” And having given thanks [eucahristo], He took the cup, saying, “This is the covenant in my blood. Drink of it all of you.”

That is “giving thanks always and for everything in everything,” including you.

Who does that? The Will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

Say, “Thank you.” And never stop. . . Wake up, Sleeping Beauty.

The Gospel is simple. In a Word, it’s “God is Salvation,” which in Hebrew forms a name, which is translated into English as “Jesus.” The Gospel is simple, but the lies that we have believed about the Gospel are as complex as Hell. In this series, we’ve looked at seven foundational truths in reference to the Gospel, along with seven lies. This is the eighth and the last (the eschatos).

“Eschatology” is an English word defined as “the study of the last things or end times.” It comes from two Greek words, eschatos meaning “ultimate” or “last” and logos meaning “logic, meaning, or Word.”

“In the beginning” God spoke a Word who is the Beginning and the End and the Way in between. He is the Light of the World. So, the Cosmos is like a womb in Jesus into which God the Father speaks Jesus. Creation happens in six days of chronological time. But the seventh day is different. It is the End and the Beginning and the Way in between. It’s eternal. It’s not endless time (there is no such thing) but endful, beginning-full, way-full, meaningful, not burdensome, boring, or tiresome time. It’s God’s Promised Rest (Sabbath). We encounter it at the cross. “He appeared once and for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.” A believer’s body exists in temporality with eternity enthroned in the temple of the soul.

“What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Cor. 2:9). Inconceivable, but simple.

Eschatology is that which is #1 truly real (“it is finished”); # 2 entirely good (“everything is good”); #3 fully alive (“the Good” and “the Life”). Life is a communion of sacrifice in freedom called Love.

The Jews were commanded to work six days and rest on the seventh, and then start over. But at the end of “Tabernacles” they were commanded to celebrate an eighth day, which symbolized an endless seventh, for it was itself the end and the beginning, the Sabbath of sabbaths. Jesus called Himself “the Lord of the Sabbath.” And yet, He kept being accused of violating the Sabbath.

Until that night, the beginning of the sixth day, Friday, it seemed as if all His work was play. Every day was a holy day (holiday), and every step was to the tune of some music we just couldn’t hear. A healthy body is coordinated when each member surrenders to the logic coming from the head. A happy body dances when every member freely surrenders to the logic in the music that fills the air. And when many people hear the same music, they can all be coordinated in a perfect freedom that we call a dance. Jesus is the Lord of the Dance. As long as you’re practicing dance steps, you’re not really dancing, for as long as you are focused on yourself, you can’t lose yourself in the music and find yourself dancing. The Dance is Love.

When I think of heaven, that is, Eschatology, I often think of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dancing cheek to cheek and singing “I’m in heaven” in that old movie from the 1930’s: “Top Hat.”

If Heaven is Reality Himself where “everything is good” and “it is finished”… If Scripture is true, if God in Christ Jesus will be “all in all”… if the voice from the throne isn’t lying, and so “these words are trustworthy and true: ‘Behold I make all things new’”… THEN we’re all going to the Dance, for the Dance is filling all things, and it’s all happening through a door—“The End of the Ages.”

Seventeen years ago, I was defrocked for saying just that and refusing to publicly confess that there was a group of people that God did not want to save and a group of people that couldn’t be saved by God. Pastors would pull me aside and say, “What about ‘free will,’” and “It seems like you’re not taking evil very seriously.” Perhaps that thing we sometimes call “free will” (my will apart from God’s Will) is actually bad will, or no will, which is actually evil. It may also be the definition of time — chronological time, the second law of thermodynamics, the reason that everything dies. A lie can only function on the timeline.

In the 18th century, many began to believe that chronological time is all that there ever “is, was, or ever shall be.” That’s not the view of Scripture or the early church; however, they did debate “The Millennium.” Revelation 20 speaks of the Devil bound by a chain, held in the hands of a nondescript angel, and cast into the abyss, while some of the dead come to life and reign on earth for a thousand years (a millennium). “Never forget that with the Lord, a day is as a thousand years (a millennium) and a thousand years as one day,” says Scripture.

For most of history, most of the church has said that that day, that millennium, is now. For Jesus conquered the devil, has been given all authority, given that authority to us, and faith is the death of death, the second death, which is the resurrection. It is losing your life and finding it, dancing. In the first century, in his epistle, Barnabas pictures the six days of creation as six ages and the seventh day as the Millennium, when the church reigns on earth through faith, hope, and love while waiting for the eighth day -- the endless seventh, when there is no more space and time for the Devil.

“There is an immeasurable greatness of power in us that believe,” wrote Paul from prison — prison! So, “Yes, we find this hard to believe.”

In the 19th century, much of the church was focused on “post-millennialism.” It’s the belief that the Millennium begins when the church gets it’s “act together” and then ends when Christ returns. We save the world for Christ.

In the 20th century, much of the church was focused on “pre-millennialism.” It’s the belief that the Millennium begins when Jesus comes back, but not as He did in the past, choosing to be last but now choosing to be first and making us part of his government. That’s how it begins, and then it ends with the Great White Throne Judgement. So, Jesus saves the world for us…that is, some of us.

There are many varieties of “Pre” and “Post,” but at least for most, eternity is just endless temporality. So, there is no End. And there is no Door between temporality and eternity. And so, you don’t need to “lose your psyche to find it,” and “free will” determines God’s Will, as if we could be our own uncreated creators.

Seventeen years ago, they would say, “Peter, what about ‘free will,’” and “It seems that you’re not taking evil very seriously.’” And yet, I had never taken evil so seriously.

I had spent almost 14 years praying for a friend who had been raised in a coven and wed to Satan. I know this sounds insane, but I would often bind him with a chain, which was just a Word, and cast him into the Abyss. So maybe this is the Millennium, and I’m a little angel holding a chain.

We discovered that we could ask God to flood the room with eternal fire or love, and it would have the same effect: comfort us and burn the evil one. Once, we asked Jesus, “Why don’t you just throw him into the Lake of Fire?” And He answered, “I am. All the time.”

And this was the strangest thing. It was as if Jesus had already conquered, and so the entire battle was all about conquering my friend’s heart with the Gospel of Relentless Love. All the “power” of the devil was a lie in two forms: God doesn’t want to save you, and God can’t save you. That is, God is not salvation; God is not Jesus.

So, when I was told to confess those two things or lose everything, I recognized the voice, and Jesus in me made a choice. And when people said, “Don’t you take evil seriously?” I wanted to reply, “Don’t you take Jesus seriously?”

Jesus had descended into our friend’s every moment, and when in prayer she would see Him there, it would destroy the work of the Devil and make her space and time new.

Look at the tree in the middle of the garden? Was a greater evil ever committed than the evil committed when we took Jesus’ life on the tree in the garden. And was a greater good ever done than the good that God did when He gave His life on the tree in the garden? “Since I have turned the greatest possible harm into good,” said Jesus to Julian of Norwich, “it is my will that you should know from this, that I shall turn all lesser evil into good.” Jesus is the Good where there once was evil. He is the Rhythm of the Dance who will weave all our stories together in a great symphony of praise in which the last is first and the first is last, and we will all see that our only enemy has been a lie. Jesus is the light shining in the darkness.

Ephesians 5:8-13, “At one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord... anything exposed by the light... is light. Therefore, it says, ‘Awake oh sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.’” Perhaps we’ve already died and been asleep ever since God put Adam to sleep in the garden? But we’ll wake and say, ‘There’s no place like home, no place like home.’”

The Kingdom really is “at hand.” So, where’s the door?

When I think of Heaven, I think of J.C. -- John Coffey, in the movie “The Green Mile.” He’s a scapegoat framed for murder. He’s a giant with a tender heart. He heals people by taking their pain and giving them his life. He heals his guard who is to give the order to have him executed. His guard wants to help him escape, but J.C. chooses to die. As a last wish, he watches Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dance cheek to cheek and sing “I’m in Heaven.” He watches, and all the guards watch him. He’s already dancing.

“What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him.” Next line, which I never hear quoted: “These things God has revealed to us.” What things? 1 Corinthians 2:2, “Jesus Christ and him crucified.” He is the Eschatos Adam; He is the last man. He is our Eschatology. He is the rhythm of the Dance. He is the Logic of Love.

When one person loves in a world that doesn’t love, it looks like a naked man nailed to a tree.

When two people love in a world that doesn’t love, it looks like marriage and new life.

When all people love in a world that once upon a time did not love, everyone is home, and everyone is grateful. All work is play, and every movement is the Dance of Love in the image and likeness of God our Father.

Believe it, and even if you’re last -- especially if you’re last -- you’re the first; you’re the Door. You’re the gate that opens to the New Jerusalem coming down.

Jesus wins. Even when He loses -- especially when he loses -- he wins. He’s the Eschatos Man.

“Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth,” said God to Adam on the sixth day of Creation. Imagine if my wife and I didn’t catch His “drift,” so to speak, and used our “knowledge” (scientific and technological knowledge) to “create” a life on our honeymoon night. At best, we’d create a monster — an animated corpse.

In 1987, my father had emergency open heart surgery. I hopped on a plane and arrived at the hospital just after he had come out of that surgery. What I found was more horrifying than Frankenstein’s monster. The motions of life were being imposed upon his body by machines external to his body as if he were an animated corpse; he was on “life support.”

I wondered where he was and if he was. Watching him come off of life support was one of the greatest experiences of my life. All the parts of his body began to miraculously do what they had been forced to do by the machines, as if each part suddenly and freely chose to be Dan Hiett. He opened his eyes, smiled, and said, “I love you.” It made me wonder, “What is Life?”

It only takes a little reflection to realize that “the survival of the fittest” doesn’t explain life but rather the limitations of individual lives, that is, death. It’s something far more miraculous that would explain why one cell would sacrifice for a body full of cells, or why one member of a body would bleed its life into another member of that body, or one man would sacrifice his life for an enemy whom he called “friend.” That’s “the sacrifice of the Fittest.”

Your life is literally a communion of sacrifice in freedom. And that’s where we ended our message last time. The Iron Giant chose to be “Super Man”; the fittest chose to be a vessel of mercy for humanity chose to be vessels of wrath. he chose to sacrifice himself for all that had made him their enemy; he was their scapegoat. Pieces of his body rained down all over the earth. People treasured those pieces (his grace created faith), then those pieces came to life and drew all of humanity to his wounded head, which smiled like my dad smiled when he came off of “life support.”

I wept like a baby in the theater, not just because the Iron Giant was a living person, but because all who loved him (freely chose him) were no longer monsters but living persons, and not just individual persons but the body of one person — the Super Man, the “Eschatos Adam.” I wept because I realized that the Bible had said this all along: We are predestined for freedom; we will all freely choose to be who we truly are — The Eschatos Adam.

1 Corinthians 15:25, “For he (Jesus) must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death... When all things are subjected to him (God), then the Son himself will also be subjected to him (God) who put all things in subjection under him (Jesus)...”

In the fourth century, Gregory of Nyssa argued that Paul must be referring to the subjection of Christ to His Father in us, His body. He subjects us to the Father from the inside out and in perfect freedom.

Next verse, 1 Corinthian 15:28b, “...that God may be all in all.” It’s so clear, and Paul says it over and over again. And yet over and over again, people say, “That can’t be, for God has given us ‘free will.’”

What is “free will”? A will… free from what? And free to what?

The only thing free from everything would be nothing (“chaos”) or the Uncaused Cause. Free “from” and free “to”: We all want to be free to will whatever we want to will, but then find ourselves alone and unable to want what we have willed, for all that any of us really want is love — but love requires the existence of other free wills, that is, “persons” who might not will what we have willed.

Was Adam created with a free will?

Perhaps you’ve never met a fully created Adam. The first one could choose one thing over another thing, but he couldn’t choose the Good in freedom, for he didn’t know what it was. He found out what it was by taking the Good, which is evil. Which made him hide from the Good, which is bondage to evil. So, will he ever choose the Good in freedom? It’s actually everything our Father has been working for since the dawn of time: “Free Will” in Adam.

“Free will” is so hard to talk about because it’s really not mentioned as such in the Bible.

God says “choose” in the Old Testament. But no one seems to be able to choose the Good, unless they’re of “the house of Joshua” (Hebrew for ‘Jesus’) or have had heart surgery (“the circumcision of the heart”). In the New Testament, we discover that apart from the Grace of God in Jesus, we’re all “dead in our trespasses and the uncircumcision of our flesh.”

Some English Bibles do mention “freewill offerings.” It’s one word in Hebrew, and it refers to a sacrifice, which is so weird, for who freely chooses to sacrifice? Actually, the Temple (Tabernacle) was to be built with “freewill offerings,” but Solomon and Herod built the stone temple with “forced labor.” Jesus said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”

Because of our theory of penal substitution and absurd notions of justice, we actually think that in the temple, our Father was venting His anger toward us by torturing sheep and goats, drinking their blood, and consuming them with fire. That’s monstrous. The Temple was to be a national barbecue full of feasting, but . . . also blood rituals. The rituals were all about choosing life by surrendering life, for the life was in the blood, and for the nation to live, the life must flow from the throne and then back to the throne like a river. From outside-in that still looks rather monstrous....

On the Day of Atonement, the High Priest would take the blood of sacrifice behind the veil and sprinkle it on the “Atonement Seat” on top of the Ark between the cherubim to make “atonement” for the sins of the people. But it didn’t work, for then the High Priest was to confess the sins of the people over a goat — the Scapegoat — who would then bear “all the iniquities of the people” into the wilderness.

Isaiah describes the Messiah as the Scapegoat. And at the end of Isaiah, He comes in from the wilderness and freely chooses to sacrifice Himself. He tramples the winepress alone, making blood that’s wine and wine that’s blood.

The old stone temple operating under the law reminds me of my dad’s body on “life support.” And the church on Pentecost reminds me of my dad’s body, rising from the dead and smiling at me. “Destroy this temple and I will rebuild it in three days,” said Jesus, the Scapegoat.

Like Isaiah, John describes Jesus as the Scapegoat . . . and as God, as if God were saying, “Blame the goat. I am the Goat. Now you have no one to blame but me. And you are the wilderness into which I have descended.” In the wilderness, John the Baptist cries, “Behold the lamb (In Hebrew, “lamb” can refer to goat or sheep, and Jesus is both, for He fulfills all the law) that takes away the sin of the world.”

What’s the sin of the world? It goes back to that tree, which is also the atonement seat on the holy mountain and in the Sanctuary of your soul.

When we took knowledge from the tree, we took the Life from the tree and began to call it our own. We are the wilderness into which the Life has descended like a Seed and in which He is entombed in death. But when He rises from the dead, He draws us back to the tree, where we see that what was taken has always been given — it’s fore-given from the foundation of the world. And the one forgiven much, loves much. “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His son to be the hilasmon [atonement on the Atonement Seat] for our sins.”

Jesus is “the Life” returning to the Tree, like blood to the heart, and bringing us with Him.

Do we have free will? God is Free Will, and His Will is Jesus. God is Love; Love is Free Will; Free Will is Jesus. I am His Body... and Bride.

If I think love is a law (knowledge of Good and evil), I crucify the Christ; I rape my husband, and everything dies. I have created a monster, and together, we all create a beast: religion and politics.

If I see that Love is the Life, who has always given Himself to me, I freely surrender myself: my empty self, my proud, and shameful self — I surrender myself to Him, and I bear the fruit of His Spirit in me.

You can’t make Love, but when you surrender to Love, you will give birth to Love, and Love will fulfill the law in you — you will give birth to the true you and an entire new creation. And when this happens, you won’t be proud, you will be forever grateful. Free Will in you is Love in you, which is God in you, making you and all of us in His image from the inside out. Through you, He is being fruitful and multiplying and filling the earth.

We are saved by Free Will from “free will” for Free Will.

1 Corinthians 15:58, “Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”

Free will has us. We are the Free Will of God. We are His Creation.

Having known the evil, we will forever choose the Good in freedom.

You have been predestined for absolute Freedom. That’s Eternal Life.

Many years ago, I attended a public-school program involving one of my children. It was held at a Catholic retreat center. During the program, and to the left of the children as they were performing, I noticed something hanging on the wall that had been covered with a sheet. I thought, “What are they protecting our children from? What could be so bad?” After the program, I snuck a peek under the sheet and was surprised to find a depiction of Jesus nailed to a tree — the crucifix.

I was outraged that they would see the tree as evil. And yet, I’ve had to rethink that a bit.

“What do most people see when they look at the Cross?” I think the Lord asked me that question. At youth group, we would say, “God is Love, but He is also justice. And His justice demands payment for sin. Jesus was punished so you won’t have to be punished as long as you accept the payment plan. That’s called faith, and you can do it right now by raising your hand and praying this prayer.” I think most folks today, look at the tree and think, “God nailed Jesus to that tree. I’m not so sure that I trust God, but I better pretend that I do.”

I think the Lord then asked me another question: “What do you think most people — common people, oppressed people — saw when they looked at the cross in the first century?” I imagine that they heard the story, looked at the tree, and thought, “We nailed God to that tree, and he let us! He’s one of us, and I like him. I think I trust him.”

In Matthew 12, Jesus delivers a man trapped in his own personal hell. The Pharisees see this and don’t like this — the fact that Jesus saved this man. Jesus warns them of “blasphemy against the Spirit” and then says, “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad, for the tree (not ‘a tree’) is known by its fruit.” What tree is Jesus talking about?

The Bible is one amazing tree story. In the Beginning, there are two trees in one spot, or one tree that functions as two, in “the middle of the garden” on the Holy Mountain (Ez. 28:14). In the End, there is one tree — the Tree of Life — in the middle of the garden city of New Jerusalem on the Holy Mountain. And in the middle — between B.C. and A.D. — there is a tree in the garden of Calvary on the Holy Mountain. On that tree hangs the Judgment of God.

If you take the fruit from the tree in one way, you gain knowledge of Good and evil and dying you die. But, if you receive the fruit from the tree in another way, you live. And although you know about the evil, you freely choose the Good — who is the Life.

In the fourth century, St. Ephrem pictured the Tree of Knowledge as containing the Tree of Life, just like the Holy of Holies contained the Judgment of God. So, when we pierced our Lord’s flesh, we tore the veil of the temple (Hebrews 10:20), His life poured out, and God began filling all things with Himself. Just think: Even before we took His life on the tree, He gave (fore-gave) His life at supper saying, “This is my body broken for you. This is the covenant in my blood.”

So, maybe Jesus was talking about that tree? In both Hebrew and Greek, there is a word that can be translated as both “wood” and “tree.” So, what do you see when you look at “The Tree”? “A tree is known by its fruit,” said Jesus.

Why did Jesus have to die on a tree? And if it’s salvation, how does it work? The answer to that question is called an “Atonement Theory.” It is our judgment of the Judgment.

Most people seem to think that there is only one: The Theory of the Penal Substitutionary Atonement. It wasn’t fully developed until Luther and Calvin did so during the Reformation. However, it began with Augustine who defined justice (retribution) as the opposite of Relentless Love (Grace). Simply stated: The “justice” of God demands “satisfaction” through “punishment,” but the Grace of God was pleased to punish Jesus in the place of some so that they wouldn’t have to be punished… as long as they accepted the payment plan (Arminians), or God chose them to accept the payment plan (Calvinists). Grace is for some, and not for all, in order that some would be grateful for salvation and in awe of God’s “justice.” Whatever the case, God killed Jesus so that He wouldn’t have to endlessly kill you. Maybe it isn’t the world that makes the tree evil, but the church?

Jesus does make “atonement.” It means “at-one-ment.”

Jesus is a “substitute.” He’s actually the only “tute.” He’s the only one that ever gets anything done; He’s the Word of God!

And Jesus is “punished.” That’s the “penal” part. But pay close attention to Scripture, and you’ll see that all the punishment of God is the discipline of Love — God is Love. Hebrews 10:8: If we’re not disciplined, we’re not sons.

There are a few problems with the Theory of the Penal Substitutionary Atonement:

1. God said, “The day you eat of it, dying you will die.” That’s the punishment, the discipline, and the law. Jesus didn’t come to abolish the law but to fulfill the law. He didn’t die so that you wouldn’t have to die, but so that you wouldn’t die alone, and you wouldn’t stay dead.

2. God said to Moses (Deut. 24:16), “Each one shall be put to death for his own sin” (No subs!) It’s true that “the sins of the fathers are visited on the sons;” we all suffer the pain of the iniquity of others. But “Everyone shall die for his own iniquity” (Jer. 31:30, Ez. 18:4).

3. It doesn’t work. “If Christ has not been raised from the dead... you are still in your sins (1 Cor. 15:17). See? It’s not the death of Christ that atones for sin; it must be the life of Christ rising in you that atones for sin in you which is the absence of Faith in you.

4. And it doesn’t produce fruit in me (remember, you’ll know a tree by its fruit). It doesn’t make me love God. It makes me pretend to love God, while terrified of God and secretly loathing God . . . like some sort of “whitewashed tomb.” And I don’t love my neighbor; it makes me compete with my neighbor, hoping that they’ll be last so that I might be first. It doesn’t produce fruit in me but the works of the flesh in me — the very thing that I need to be saved from: my own judgments.

According to theologians, there were many “theories” of the atonement long before the Theory of the Penal Substitutionary Atonement, but I don’t think those that advocated for those theories called them “theories.” I think they called them “The Gospel.” And I think they’re all true.

But my favorite is “The Recapitulation Theory of the Atonement” attributed to Irenaeus, disciple of Polycarp, disciple of John, disciple of Jesus. “Recapitulate” is an English translation of a Latin translation of a Greek word in Ephesians 1:10 that is often just translated as “unite.” Paul states that the “plan for the fullness of time” is to “unite [anakephalaiosasthe: bring together under one wounded head] all things in Christ Jesus.”

In 1999, I took my four kids to see “The Iron Giant.” The Iron Giant is a giant metal robot that falls to earth, hits his head, develops amnesia, and befriends a fatherless boy named Hogarth. Hogarth tells him, “You are who you chose to be.” Hogarth knows the Giant for the Giant knows Hogarth; they’re friends. A government agent named Manly thinks he knows the Iron Giant, for he knows all about machines and guns. Manly chooses to be what all people choose to be: a vessel of wrath.

He launches a nuke at the Giant’s “current location,” having forgotten that the Giant is “with us.” “When that nuke comes down, all these people will die,” says Hogarth. “You stay. I go,” says the Giant. He launches himself into the sky to intercept the nuke as he chooses to be “Super Man” (Eschatos Man, The Last Adam); he chooses to be a vessel of Mercy. The Nuke explodes and pieces of the Iron Giant rain down all over the earth.

“What a beautiful picture of the atonement,” I thought. God doesn’t kill Jesus the Giant in order to feel better about us. We kill Jesus the Giant, and then we feel better about Him. And yet, the author did include it in the story, just as He included Himself, for the author is Jesus the Giant. “When I’m lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself,” said Jesus.

Hogarth puts a broken piece of the giant in a box by his bed. One night, as a homing beacon is heard, the broken piece begins to move. Hogarth wakes and opens the window, saying, “See you later.” We then see pieces from all over the world — legs, hands — pieces of the Giant, representing friends of the Giant, moving toward a wounded head on a glacier in Greenland. Then, all at once, the eyes open and the Giant smiles.

And at that, I just utterly lost it; I couldn’t stop weeping. I think I suddenly realized: The Giant is not a Robot; the Giant is alive. The Atonement is not a theory that we can apply; Jesus is the atonement, and He applies us to Himself. The Atonement is “The Life” we took from the tree and placed in our stomachs like a seed. The Atonement is the objective Grace of God, rising from the subjective tomb that has become a womb, that is your soul. The Atonement is Jesus who will make us one, even as He is one. For on the night that He was betrayed by all of us, He took the bread and broke it saying, “This is my body given to you.” And He took the cup saying, “This is the covenant in my blood. Drink of it all of you. And do it in re-member-ance of me.”

Jesus didn’t have to die on the Cross. Jesus wanted to die on the Cross. . . NOT that we could make ourselves like Him, but that He might actually make us Himself. And now, when I look to the tree, I find fruit in me, a fountain of tears that have turned into joy. I know the tree . . . by its fruit in me.

If you’ve made the tree bad, look again; He will make you good.

There’s a war in Europe, one in the Middle East, and an election in just a few days. “IF the tribulation is imminent, and IF there is a pre-tribulation rapture, I fear I may not be ready.” Someone recently shared that thought with me, and I suspect it may have haunted all of us at some point.

So, what are we so afraid of? The Judgment(s) of God.

While researching for my commentary on the Revelation, I purchased another commentary that included a map of “The End Times.” It reminds me of the game, “Chutes and Ladders.” In the center of the map, and before all hell breaks loose, there is one amazing ladder called “The Rapture.” If you’re “raptured,” you avoid tribulation (So, “in this world you will” NOT “have tribulation”), and you will leave all the lost sheep behind, as well as avoid the Judgment of God.

On the map, there are several judgments, like “The Judgment of the Sheep and the Goats.” If you’ve visited a sick person, you’re a sheep; if you haven’t, you’re a goat. Jesus said something like this in front of the temple, where the Jews had sacrificed sheep and goats for a thousand years, and just before He sacrificed Himself. The next day, He said to Caiaphas, “From now on, you will see the Son of Man... coming on the clouds of heaven.”

John the Baptist warned of “The Judgment of the Wheat and the Chaff.” There is no wheat without chaff or chaff without wheat. The chaff is the outer casing of the wheat; it’s “the outer wheat.”

Jesus warned of “The Judgment of the Wheat and the Tares.” Tares were weeds that looked like wheat. You can’t pull up one without the other; you have to wait for “the judgment at the end of the age.” Oddly enough, according to Paul, “the end of the ages” has already come upon those of us who believe. Well, tares are “false wheat.”

To the far right on the map is the Great White Throne of Judgment. “The dead” are judged by their “works” recorded in “books.” “The living” have already been judged by a Lamb who has written names in another book — so they’re saved, but not by their judgments, but rather the Judgment of the Lamb.

Wouldn’t you like some more “knowledge of Good and evil,” so you can follow the map and avoid all those crazy judgments? According to John — the writer of both the Revelation and the Gospel — there’s only one judgment.

John 3:19, “And this is the judgment: the light...”

My dad issued all sorts of “judgments” growing up. And, for the most part, I trusted (had faith in) his judgments, for I knew that his judgment (singular) was good and life; it was always love. That judgment of grace created faith in me in him.

John 5:22, “The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son.”

John 8:15, “I judge no one,” said Jesus, the Son.

John 8:26, “I have much to Judge,” said Jesus, the Judgment of the Father

He’s like the Judge who judges by not judging, for He is “The Judgment” (The Light).

John 12:31, “Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out. And I when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself. He said this to show by what kind of death he would die (It was on a tree in a garden on the Holy Mountain).”

John 16:15, “All that the Father has is mine; therefore, I said that He (His Holy Spirit) will take what is mine and declare it to you (The Judgment is His . . . !)

John 19:41 “Now in the place where He was crucified there was a garden.”

He cried, “Father, forgive them. They don’t know... It is finished.” And “delivered up His spirit.”

That’s “The Judgment;” that’s the Light of the world on that tree. That’s the Word of the Father, who creates, sustains, and holds all things together. That’s reality. That’s the heart of God from “the bosom of the Father,” hanging on a tree in the garden of the sanctuary of your soul. That’s the place where you make judgments or, to be more accurate, the place where the Judgment of God makes you. Your name is Adam.

The cross reveals that we’ve all judged the judge and His judgment, been infected by a lie, and for as long as we remember, have been creating a fortress that is a prison, that we often refer to as “the ego,” what Scripture would call the “old man, false self, flesh, or body of sin and death.” The line between good and evil passes not between people but “through every human heart.”

There is one judgment, and the judgment is one, and yet each one of us is two. And each one of us tends to think that each one of us is one and God is two. When Adam took the fruit, he judged the judge and created another judge — a false judge.

Many in the early church argued that because God is one, He will make all of Adam one, and so of course, He will judge all and save all, for that’s His judgment: “God is Salvation”: Jesus. In the fifth century and under the authority of Rome, Augustine argued that God is Mercy (Relentless Love) and the very opposite of that, what he called “justice” (by that, he meant “retribution”).

Justice is not people getting what they deserve, for what do people have that they did not receive?

Justice is not you getting what you deserve. Justice is God getting what God deserves, which is you in love with Him, having been created in His image . . . Isn’t that His judgment?

God exiled Adam to live in His own judgments. Yet, God went with Adam as a seed, and God brought him back to the Holy Mountain that he could see that even as he had taken the Life of the Good (the Judgment of God) on the tree, God had given and fore-given the Good, which is his Life, which is the Judgment of God from the foundation of the world. And so, Adam began to worship: He judged the judgment with “just judgment” (John 7:24); he said, “Surely this man (Adam) is the Son of God.”

Many years ago, at a conference in Canada, I heard the Lord audibly. He said, “Peter, you don’t love my bride very much, do you?” I suddenly knew that I had gone into the ministry because I hated the church (“They” had “crucified” my dad.) I erupted in a fountain of tears, strangely aware that they were not my tears; they were the Lord’s tears for me — a sinner. And strangest of all, there was absolutely no condemnation, as if I had not known what I was doing.

That night, the Lord literally held me to the floor and revealed that He had always been everywhere loving me; everything good in me was Him, my best friend, in me. I heard Him say, “Stop doubting my love for you.” It felt as if fire was coursing through my veins. I, literally, could not stop praising God; the fountain of tears had turned into a fountain of ecstatic joy. It was absolute “Rapture.”

He's not done with me yet, but that day, He separated wheat from tares and the chaff from the grain. He walked my sin into the fire (He’s the sin offering), and He spoke my praise to God (He is the burnt offering.) He is the Consuming and Eternal Fire. At one point, I thought, “If He shows me more, I’ll die. And that would be awesome!” It would be the death of death, which is Eternal Life — the Judgment and Commandment of God (John 12:50).

I had judged the Judgment, and it was sin. And now, the Judgment was judging me, and it was Grace. And then, the Judgment was conceived in me, and I began giving birth to the Judgment: Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, The Good, The Faith. “I began giving birth . . . ” After all, I am the Bride of Christ — the one that I had not loved very much. And so are you; so is all of Adam.

No one “deserves” God, and yet God deserves all. Never hide from the Judgment of God. It is the Rapture; “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself,” said Jesus, the Judgment of God.