The ultimate goal is the very last thing I asked the Father to do before I started toward the cross. I asked him to make you one with me, and with him.
The Father always answers the Son’s prayers.
I didn’t come to earth just so your sins could be forgiven. I came to bring you into oneness with us. Having given you a new spirit, we then join ourselves to you in a one-spirit, eternal union. You become one with us, just as we are one with one another. As God, the three of us have an eternal union. An eternal fellowship of perfect love. The Father is in the Son and Spirit. The Son is in the Father and Spirit. The Spirit is in the Father and Son.
Now, you become one with us. We live inside you. You live inside us. We are one with you. You are one with us. You are brought into the very heart of our union with one another. Here, there is no space between us. We are one.
This joining is permanent. It cannot be undone. Your behavior, whatever it may be, cannot unmake it. Your doubts cannot undo it. We are one forever. Nothing can separate you from us. Nothing can separate you from our perfect fellowship of love. Everything that the infinitely happy God has, and is, is now yours. Now all things belong to you, and you belong to us. Just as I intended, from before the creation of the world.
You aren’t accustomed to living within such perfect love. You aren’t accustomed to every one of your needs already being met. You aren’t used to experiencing joy that can’t be quenched, peace that transcends difficulties, love that flows out even to those who are unlovely. You aren’t accustomed to reigning with me over all of the universe, for all of eternity.
That’s OK. You’ll become accustomed to it. It’s who we are.
But first, you and we must become one. In that, you have one part to play. You must receive it.
How do you receive what I am offering? It’s very simple.
But I want you to remember that making you one with me is entirely my work. You can’t make it happen. It doesn’t happen by you being good enough. It doesn’t happen by you keeping most of what you imagine are my rules, or performing religious rituals. It doesn’t happen by what you do or don’t eat, how long you do or don’t meditate, what religious services you do or don’t go to, or what prayers you do or don’t say. How are any of those things going to birth a new spirit in you, or join your new spirit to me?
Everything comes as a gift from me. Your very life is a gift from me. Your next breath is a gift from me. All you can do is receive it. That is grace—what I give freely, without your behavior earning a thing. You can’t earn anything by good behavior, so stop trying. At best, it’s getting you nowhere. At worst, it’s deceiving you into thinking you are meriting something from me. That’s a lie. You’re not.
You do have a vital role to play in becoming one with me, however. It is this: you must receive the gift I am offering. I don’t force myself on anyone. You must, of your own free will, choose to receive what I freely offer.
There is another word for this kind of receiving. It is called faith. Faith is simply trust. All true, lasting relationships are built on trust. I have created you with the capacity to choose, and also the capacity to trust. The only way to enter into a relationship with me, into oneness with me, is for your heart to say, “I believe that what you are saying is true. I choose to place my trust in you and everything you have done on my behalf. I choose to receive your gift.”
The good news, really, is very simple. It is summed up by this:
For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes [trusts] in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. (John 3:16)
To become one with me, all you have to do is place your trust in me and what I have done for you. You trust in who I am, God in the flesh. You trust that I died for your sins. And you trust that I rose from the dead on your behalf.
There are no religious rituals required to place your trust in me. We are talking about establishing a relationship, not performing rituals. Such trust can be expressed as simply as this:
Jesus, I recognize that I need your forgiveness, and the life you offer. Thank you for dying for my sins and rising from the dead on my behalf, so that you could give me true life. I receive you by faith as my Savior and Lord. I trust you to forgive my sins, give me a new heart, join yourself to me forever, and come to live within me. Thank you for giving me new life.
It is not the words of a prayer that are vital. It is the faith that they represent.
What if your faith isn’t big enough? What if you have doubts? It’s not even the size of your faith that matters; what matters is the object of your faith—me. Call out to me. I will hear, and respond.
When you do choose to place your trust in me, everything we have discussed so far becomes true for you. Your sins are forgiven. My Spirit does a heart transplant in you. The Father, Son, and Spirit come to live within you. You are forever joined to us. For the first time in your life, you begin to be what you were created to be.
You and we are one.
I’ve said all of this before:
The one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him. (1 Corinthians 6:17)
“In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” (John 14:20)
“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my Spirit within you …” (Ezekiel 36:26)
But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:12-13)
For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not as a result of works, that no one should boast. (Ephesians 2:8, 9)
If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. (Romans 10: 9, 10)
We are made right with God by placing our faith in Jesus Christ. And this is true for everyone who believes, no matter who we are. For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight. He did this through Jesus Christ when he freed us from the penalty of our sins. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood. (Romans 3:22-25)
“My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.” (John 10:27-28)
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