He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature… 2 Peter 1:4
As a life form, our friend Ivy is a plant–a grape ivy to be exact, growing for many years near our back door. Through circumstances that are not important for purposes of our post, Ivy has memorized all the words and the tune to the Hallelujah chorus from Handel’s Messiah. From the bottom of her roots to the tips of her white flowers, Ivy desires to sing the chorus and really, to sing it better than it has ever been sung before.
However, Ivy has a problem that is immediately apparent–Ivy has no mouth and no vocal cords. You see, the capacity to sing is not indigenous to her species, Cissus Rhombifolia. In fact, you must go up the biological chart two whole levels to get to a life form where the capacity to sing IS indigenous to the species. That is, you must move from plant life, past animal life and come to human life to find the capacity to actually sing.
Isn’t it sad that Ivy’s great desire cannot somehow be fulfilled? Imagine for a moment that you, dear reader, had the ability to give Ivy some of your capacity to sing but in such a way that Ivy would still be Ivy the plant, only now Ivy would be able to do something that was simply impossible before. You may be thinking, why go to all the trouble? It’s only a plant! And think of how many plants there are in the world; why do it for just one plant? Might as well do it for all of them. Now it is beginning to sound like a job it would take God to accomplish–and indeed it would!
Would it make a difference to your opinion if you had planted Ivy; had pruned Ivy’s dead branches after a bad frost; had noticed and sprayed when there was a bug infestation; or had added fertilizer to help Ivy grow and blossom? Would it make a difference to your opinion if you actually knew Ivy, even though Ivy might not be aware of you? Who would give of themselves to re-arrange the “natural” order of things?
Let’s turn to the great desire in your heart, dear reader. You know the one to which I am referring–the desire to change your life from what you feel is an ugly train wreck to something, anything, less ugly and more beautiful. Everything you have tried to accomplish that transformation has failed, and you have grown weary of the wake of destruction you leave behind everywhere you go. What you are lacking is called “holiness“, and here is where your situation becomes as sad as Ivy’s.
Here is the parallel: “holiness” is not indigenous to the human species! Oh, you may know the “words” and the “tune” and may desire it with all your heart but no amount of human effort is going to produce holiness in any of us. Dear reader, you are not the only one who has tried and failed–all of us have also tried and also failed. In this regard, there is no difference at all between the religious insiders and those of us who are religious “outsiders”. Remember this: no amount of human effort or religiosity can gin up holiness, because it simply doesn’t originate in this realm. If your holiness depends upon you, you’re in trouble–but you already know that.
Holiness comes from one source and one source only. Just like in Ivy’s case, you have to go up the biological chart two life forms to get to the capacity of holiness–from human life, past angelic life (lumping all the angels together, they are all created beings) to come to divine life. Holiness is the essence of the divine nature of God himself. The holiness that Jesus has originated from his, and your, Father. Father is the one and only source of all holiness.
Divine life is usually referred to in the Bible as “eternal life”, and sometimes as “abundant life” and “everlasting life”. These descriptions are not wrong, but they tend to focus the attention more to the duration of the life rather than to the species of the life. Jesus was emphatic that his principal message was about the original source of this divine life, and not its duration. “I live because of the Father.” (John 6:57) For just as the Father has life in Himself, even so He gave to the Son also to have life in Himself;…(John 5:26).
Becoming a Christian is not about giving mental assent to a list of beliefs and creeds, and then trying your best to gin up holiness through religiosity for the rest of your life. Instead, it is about the transfer of the divine nature of your heavenly Father into the core of your being, or to use our previous example, changing the natural order by giving Ivy a mouth and a voice to begin singing! Thus Peter said, He (Father) has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature. If you are determined to give mental assent to a belief, this would be a great place to start–you can start by believing Father’s precious and magnificent promises.
Jesus’ conception and birth by Mary are a prophetic illustration of the way this process begins. Mary was informed by the angel that she would conceive and give birth–talk about going against the “natural” order of things! How can this be, she logically asked, since she was sexually a virgin? The answer: the Holy Spirit will overshadow you, and the seed of God will be deposited into you. In Mary’s case, it was a natural birth; but because of the resurrection of Jesus, for you it is a spiritual birth, what Jesus called being born again. In each case, it is Jesus who is living inside of you, “growing” and bringing about the change in our lives each of us so desperately desires.
He said this repeatedly to us: In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. This is the hope we have, that Jesus Christ lives in you–he is the indwelling Christ, and it is his responsibility to cause the divine nature within you to grow and flourish, and not only you but everyone who has ever lived, even if that life was only in the womb. Because his very nature is holiness, it is that divine nature that will eventually produce the holiness that results in a beautiful life! If you were raised to believe that you should contribute to this effort in some kind of a way, here is what you may do: believe in him who Father sent. John 6:29
Dear reader, remember when we asked why go to all that trouble just for Ivy, and why not every plant in the world? Why would Father go to all the trouble he has just for a few people? The logical answer is, he didn’t. The truthful answer is, he created each one of us for this purpose. It was his plan from the beginning to bring about the salvation of every human being he ever created, not just a few. We apologize if we have offended those of our friends who believe that Father is only able to save a few and the rest of mankind ends up in hell. No, Father actually knows Ivy and he knows you, too, dear reader. Sooner or later, he intends to bestow his divine nature upon you. Why wait? Ask him to do so now, and join Ivy in the Hallelujah Chorus!
Blessed are you O Lord our wonderful Father! Your magnificent promises give us hope for living. Thank you that you have the power and the plan and the provisions to pull it off. Only you can change us. Baruch ‘ata!