Jesus Is Our All In All

August 20, 2014

Jesus Is Our All In All

For ‘In him we live and move and have our being’

Acts 17:28a (NRSV)

Just as I started to write this, Dennis Jernigan’s song, You Are My All In All, began to play on my iPod: “You are my strength when I am weak, You are the treasure that I seek, You are my all in all . . .” I think I can hear Saint Paul giving Dennis a “Yes and Amen” because Jernigan’s lyrics certainly parallel Paul’s comments at Areopagus (Mars Hill) in Athens. (Acts 17) Although Jernigan’s praise song has some catchy lyrics, Paul was pointing to something quite deeper in his comments to the philosophers of Athens. Paul was pointing to the almost incomprehensible foundation of Christianity. The very core of our faith is a personal relationship between mere mortal human beings and the eternal God, Creator of all that exists, and revealed in Christ Jesus.

All religions share three basic elements. They all have an intellectual element that is their doctrines and beliefs. All religions have a sacramental element that provides for their manner of worship and sacrifice. All religions have a personal element that determines the relationship between the individual and their god. The uniqueness of our Christian faith is that Jesus stands at the center of all three of these elements.

John’s Gospel affirms that Jesus, the Word and God, stands at the center of all we believe about God: “In the beginning the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him. The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone. So the Word became human and made his home among us” (John 1:1-4, 14).

Saint Augustine rightly observed that it is Jesus alone who baptizes, confirms, forgives and heals. Jesus is the host, and the meal itself, in the sacrament of Holy Communion, and thus Jesus is the very heart of worship. Jesus is all of our beliefs about God, he is the very substance of our worship and he is our relationship with God the Father Almighty because, “In him we live and move and have our being.”

Sē’lah

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(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com. The BLOG is also available on Amazon Kindle, by subscription.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188.