As I have said before I want to make 2008 a year of the human race awakening to our oneness. Kevin does a good job of teaching this very connectedness and yet recognizing our uniqueness in the following article that he recently wrote.
We live in a world saturated with differences. Gender differences. Political differences. Nationality differences. Religious differences. Economic differences. Sexual differences. Differences in taste of food, music, and art. Differences in hair color, skin color, eye color. Tomorrow is different from today, which is different from yesterday.
Difference demonstrates distance by fostering a sense of otherness, and this otherness produces two effects. First, difference highlights individuality by separating every this from every that. Our differences make each individual absolutely unique, inimitably special. You are you, and there is only one you. Each moment holds distinctive value never to undergo replication. Everything is idiosyncratically its own.
Second, otherness can result in feelings of isolation. Realizing that you are unmatched may cause an existential crisis packed with loneliness and frustration. How can anyone possibly appreciate you and what you are going through if there is one and only you? The pressure of difference can feel overwhelming.
The situation becomes more complex when we bring God into the mix. God, it would appear, is totally "other" than us. God resides far beyond our comprehension, which in an ironic turn might mean that we are beyond his. Otherness works in both directions. Martin Buber describes the inherent differences between humanity and God in terms of a basic word pair that he calls "I-You."
Is it possible to bridge the gap between I and You, between Me and what is not-Me, between human and divine? Maybe we can imagine ways of making connections between our person-to-person relationships. Through conversations and dialogue, we can hear empathy, sense understanding, and recognize likeness. However when it comes to God, mutual comprehension might be too much to expect. God, it would appear, is always totally other, remote, dwelling in inapproachable light. Yet, perhaps our capacity to comprehend our human likeness-while-remaining-distinct with one another provides a window in appreciating the divine-human union.
The testimony of the Biblical witness regularly asserts difference between God and humanity. The Psalm wonders, "What is man that you are mindful of him? You have made him a little lower than elohim and crowned him with glory and honor." Although the Psalm affirms a difference, -a little lower, not much, just a little lower than God-this is not the final word.
Throughout the New Testament, we see declarations intimating that God through Christ was closing the distance. Nonetheless, humanity and God wouldn’t collapse into an undifferentiated identification of one with the other. Instead, the new union would result in a fresh integration-one that would recognize difference while transcending it at the same time.
In the Revelation, John portrays the consummated integration by employing and modifying imagery drawn from the ancient Hebrew tradition. "Behold! The tabernacle of God is with men, and God himself shall dwell with them and he will be their God and they shall be his people" (Revelation 21:3). A difference remains (God and humanity), but the difference does not amount to distance as it did when characterized by the tabernacle of flesh.
The high priest after the order of Melchizedek has entered into the most holy place, having obtained eternal redemption thereby creating a new and living way through which we have access to God. Subsequently, God is not roped off from humanity. Instead, God dwells with all of us.
The apostle Paul described the kosmic, world-changing transformation that was occurring in his day. He anticipated the consummation of the kingdom of God through the process of death and resurrection of the body of Christ — the firstfruits ekklesia (church) in conjunction with Jesus at the head. At the zenith, the perfected integration of God with us would be complete. "Now when all things are made subject to him, then the son himself will be subject to him who put all things under him that God may be all in all" (1Corinthians 15:28).
"All in all" is Paul’s mysterious phrase. He uses it specifically in 1Corinthians 15 and Ephesians 1 while hinting at it elsewhere (such as Ephesians 4 and Colossians 1). A captivating expression, Paul understands God becoming all in all as the culmination of God’s creative purpose. At minimum, God being all in all points to the process of divine-human integration. It represents the fullness of God in the fullness of humanity. All of God in all of humanity.
This integration respects the particular differences of God and people, while affirming the plenary completeness of God with us. Jesus expresses our life with God (and God’s life with us) like this: "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him (John 16:23). German theologian Jürgen Moltmann describes the divine-human relationship as "not just community with God; it is participation in the eternal . . . life in God as well."
God, then, is more than other. He is the holy one in your midst. Isaiah’s breathtaking vision foreshadows it. When approaching the throne, seraphim cry out, "All the earth is filled with his glory!" However, as creatures in a world-order of sin and death, they covered their faces, unable to look upon God. Today, we behold the glory of God with unveiled faces, seeing what is eternal, having been transformed into the glory of God being fully known in the love that is God (1Corinthians 13:13 and 2Corinthians 3:18).
So, in agape love we find connection with one another and with God. In this way, the New Creation is fully alive being home to a house not made with hands. Each one retains individual identity while expressing the fullness of God in a unique way. Because God is all in all, God is the ultimate representation of the Other and of the Self, just as the Other and the Self represent God. Søren Kierkegaard describes the result of the loving allness of God; namely inclusion in the divine fellowship. In This Sickness Unto Death, he stressed, "Out of love, God becomes man. . . he shows what it is to be a man of humble station so that no one should feel himself excluded."
