God's Mysteries Revealed

God’s mysteries and His nature are unveiled only in Jesus. Are we looking for revelation and insight in the right place? - Romans 16:25.

We hear claims today about discovering new revelations of God by accessing the “spirit world” through visions, dreams, and other subjective personal experiences. Many Christians are seeking insights into things beyond what is recorded in the New Testament. For example, one popular “prophet” decodes the future from baseball scores and the number of the leading horse in the Kentucky Derby.

And why not use sports statistics? The Charismatic Movement of today is characterized by mysticism, Gnostic ideas, and trips to the Third Heaven rather than the serious study of Scripture or the real presence of the Spirit of God.

[Cross - Photo by Luis Georg Müller (Mannheim) on Unsplash]

Perhaps ever since the authentic Apostles testified of all that they had seen and heard Jesus do and say, God has been holding back information from His people. Must we now find and create new ways to access the truth?

• “The former treatise I made, O Theophilus, concerning all that Jesus began both to do and to teach, until the day in which he was received up, after that he gave commandment through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen, to whom he also showed himself alive after his passion by many proofs, appearing to them by the space of forty days, and speaking the things concerning the kingdom of God” – (Acts 1:1-3).

• “Of the men, therefore, that have accompanied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and went out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day that he was received up from us, of these must one become a witness with us of his resurrection” – (Acts 1:21-22).

The Bible refers to “the mysteries” of God, His unexpected ways of doing things that differ radically from human wisdom and expectations, truths hidden from men in times past. Did not Jesus declare that not everyone could understand “the mysteries of the kingdom”?

Nevertheless, God reveals the deep and hidden things to whomever He pleases, and what once was hidden is now revealed in God’s Son, especially in Christ's Death and Resurrection. God did not disclose the true understanding of His redemptive plans until the appropriate time:

• “Now, to him who is able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which has been kept in silence through times everlasting, but now is manifested, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, is made known unto all the nations for the obedience of faith; to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory for ever. Amen” - (Romans 16:25-27).

• “When the fullness of the time came, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, that he might redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons” - (Galatians 4:4-5).

God revealed many truths through “the types and shadows” of the Levitical system with its animal sacrifices and sacred calendar. However, that earlier word was partial and incomplete. The full and final word of God has arrived in Jesus of Nazareth:

• “In many parts and many ways of old, God spoke to the Fathers in the prophets. Upon the last of these days, He has spoken to us in a Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the ages” - (Hebrews 1:1-2).

• “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten from a Father, full of grace and truth” - (John 1:14).

The revelation of who and what God is has been available to everyone since the Death and Resurrection of Jesus and the outpouring of the Spirit on the Day of Pentecost. The Creator of all Things is not withholding that knowledge until the birth of a future generation or the arrival of a company of “spiritual forerunners” with special insight from the “spirit world.”

NOW MADE KNOWN

The prophets foretold the salvation that would be revealed by the Messiah. They did not comprehend the details of the promise, though they passed it on to us:

• “Concerning which salvation, the prophets sought and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come for you, searching what time or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ, which was in them, did point to, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glories that should follow them. To whom it was revealed, that not for themselves, but for you they ministered these things, which now have been announced to you through those who preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent forth from heaven, into which things angels desire to look” - (1 Peter 1:10-12).

The mystery previously concealed was revealed in Jesus, and not until the appointed season. The Law and the Prophets were vital parts of God’s redemptive plan. However, the full knowledge of His mysteries remained hidden until the arrival of the Nazarene, the Messiah of Israel, beginning with his proclamation of the Kingdom of God:

• “Now, when he heard that John was betrayed, he withdrew into Galilee. And leaving Nazareth, he came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the borders of Zebulun and Naphtali, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through Isaiah the prophet, saying, The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, toward the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations. The people who sat in darkness saw a great light, and to those who sat in the region and shadow of death, to them did light spring up. From that time began Jesus to preach, and to say, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” – (Matthew 4:12-17, Isaiah 9:1-2).

The rituals of the Mosaic Legislation have been fulfilled in the ‘Logos’ (λογος), “the Word made flesh.” Consequently, many of the forms and rituals of the old order have been relegated to the status of “shadows and types.” Returning to those outmoded forms would mean bondage under “elemental things,” regression to an older and incomplete stage of Salvation History - (Galatians 4:8-11, Ephesians 6:8-12, Colossians 2:16-17).

Likewise, there is nothing to be gained from consulting seers and clairvoyants, mystics, dreams, visions, or angelic powers when the full revelation of God has been made in Jesus Christ. What would be the point of doing so when the fullness of the Divine nature is manifested for all men to see in the Son of God?

• “And Jesus is the head of the body, the assembly, who is the beginning, firstborn from among the dead, in order that he might become in all things preeminent, because in him was all the fullness well pleased to dwell” - (Colossians 1:18-19).

• “Be taking heed, lest there be anyone taking you as their spoil, through means of their philosophy, and an empty deceit, according to the instruction of men, according to the first principles of the world, and not according to Christ. Because in him dwells all the fullness of the Divine Nature bodily. And you are filled full in him, who is the head of all principality and authority” – (Colossians 2:8-10).

God’s mysteries are unveiled in Jesus, and nowhere else. They are available to everyone who hears and embraces the Word of the Cross. He is the place where the glory and presence of God are found, the true and final expression of God.

And so, as Christ declared, “he who has seen me has seen the Father!” Moses gave the Law, but “grace and truth came to be in Jesus.” No man can come to the Father, except through him.

There is, therefore, no justification for seeking deeper understandings of God from secret knowledge or mystical experiences. By God’s grace and His written Word, believers will see the glory and fullness of the God of Israel in “the face of Jesus Christ.”

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SEE ALSO:

• Stand Fast in the Tradition - (To avoid deception and apostasy, believers must cling to the apostolic traditions, lest they drift away)

• Famine in the Land - (The contemporary church suffers from a famine for hearing the words of God, but it is a self-inflicted wound)

• Ignoring Scripture - (Was the Apostle Paul serious when he exhorted Timothy to only appoint elders and ministers who were above reproach?)

• Les Mystères de Dieu Révélés - (Les mystères de Dieu et Sa nature ne sont dévoilés qu'en Jésus. Cherchons-nous la révélation et la perspicacité au bon endroit? - Romains 16:25)