The Sterile Mule of Religion

Mule:The sterile hybrid offspring of a male donkey and a female

horse, characterized by long ears and a short mane.

Religion : the sterile hybrid offspring of the "Tree of the

Knowledge of Good and Evil" and the stubborn belief

that we are "more than God in a branch form".

Jesus did not lay

down His glory to teach us religion, but came to show us how

incarnation works in us. Chris Welch

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NB

Breakdown of "more than God in a branch form"

In Him we live and move and have our being.

The mystery of the gospel and the mystery of sin is tied up with how, whether saved or unsaved , our life is in God. Outside of Him there is nothing. He is the Author of life.

Rather like a computer virus that has to be "contained" by a security programme in a computer,

the Bible calls sin "that which leads astray" or leads to "transgression....literally crossing over a line that should not be crossed." But the mystery of sin is that it is God's life, but turned in on itself, self for self, self for selfish ends.

This is just like a computer virus which

uses the same software code, but has a totally destructive agenda.

In this way the virus is operating "more than" the original operating system.

This is what we mean by cancer cells in the body. They are body cells, but they are operating "more than" the body's own programming. Huge lumps of destructive matter build up to stifle the body's normal function.

God's Life in Adam in the beginning was unfolding perfectly. Had he not accepted the viral idea that he could in some way be "more than " God operating in him and through him...that there was a delusive false "separate extra existence to be had", wherein he could be like unto God, operating somehow extra to God's life in Him, the life which Adam had, contained all that was necessary for him to reach full maturity. But Adam saw something that wasn't there....something "more than" God going on.

All we are to be is containers of God's life. Branches of God's vine. Not just branches of His trunk. Branches in His vine. And a vine is both trunk and branches.

Religion starts from the lie that the devil sowed, and without dismantling the lie, breaking it right down to assess the real problem, instead it superimposes its own solution on the phony infrastructure. This would be like "working with" the odd twisted malformations of a huge cancerous tumour, rather than seeking to break it down, or reverse the cell multiplication.

This is why after being born again, or getting to know God, perhaps being baptised in the Holy Spirit, when we thought this must surely be the whole solution God was saying:

On the contrary....I want you all to Seek first the Kingdom of God and My righteousness.....

then all these other things will be added unto you.

We all replied : I thought that verse was only relevant before we found your salvation?

He replied : But you have hardly begun!

We had to see life reduced to an Xray. We had to reassess everything. If we got into ministry early, this possibly only served to compound the problem. Though saying that, Jesus still threw his own disciples in at the deep end. Now we had not only our lives to reassess, but also our idea of ministry.

We had to "see" our lives as God going on......not our "clever viral additions", where we were seeing "more than " God. Our clever programmes. Our children's programmes. Our charity programmes.Our ways of running God's services for Him. Our ways of "singing ourselves" into God's Presence.......all built on our notion that there was some separation there first????

The same has been going on in the way we

run relationships

run families

run business

run relaxation....or don't

everything........

everything!

When we confine ourselves to just God going on....in us ,through us....

yes to the Pride of Life it looks insufficient

not gaudy enough,

not impressive enough

not busy enough.

But the "pride of life" measures itself by cancerous tumours.

By odd excrescences, that might look "interesting", "exciting"

but ARE VERY DEAD, or HAVE TO BE ALL DISMANTLED ANYWAY.

God's stuff has reproductive life within itself. So it may look slow compared to the clever ideas,the automated programmes, the gee whizz busy - ness of it all....

but has anyone ever totalled up the power of

2 x 2 x 2 x2 etc....?

I did on my profile page for Facebook communication. This is the phrase I put on there:

1 communicates to 2, who in turn communicate to 2, and so on 20 times.....congratulations you have just touched 1, 048 , 576 lives with your one life!

Other Christian programmes have already broken down because the pastor committed adultery and the congregation found out! Remember, not every congregation finds out !!! Or clever ideas for your family have already broken down, because in order to achieve them both of you went out to work, never saw each other, or were too exhausted,
so you fell to temptation when another came by with understanding.....
so now, you too are divorced.
Running two houses and families is exhausting
and filled with friction.....

and really, your life never needed to have this huge cancerous growth sticking right out of it.
You were building "more than God".