Operative Opposites
“But many who are first will be last, and the last first. (Matthew 19:30) ”
Fay Jones, the architect for Thorncrown Chapel, often spoke of operative opposites. They are part of what made his designs so extraordinary. To him the term meant walking into a space and encountering the opposite of what you expect. Most church buildings imply separateness. There are few, if any, windows, and if there are, they are often stained glass which obscures the outside world. Our sanctuaries are places we retreat to a holy place and set apart a holy time to be with God. When we finish, we go back out into the world we think isn’t so sacred.
Yet, when you enter Thorncrown, there is nothing but windows. There is very little distinction between the outside and the inside. It is the opposite of what we expect from a church building, and it communicates something surprising. It softly proclaims all of creation is a cathedral, and every moment of your life is holy. Nothing is ordinary or forsaken. There is no need to retreat to find sacredness. Because of Christ, it is everywhere, if we only have eyes to see.
The Lord is a God of operative opposites. We observe this throughout the scriptures and especially in the life of Christ. His birth was not what you would expect for a king. He was born in a manger, in lowliness surrounded by the common. Angels heralded his coming not to the powerful but to lowly shepherds. What followed was a life of service. In every way He was the antithesis of the Caesars and the Herods of the day. He was not the Messiah/King people anticipated.
His teachings were filled with operative opposites. Consider the beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount. Those who mourn, the persecuted, and the poor in spirit are blessed? God’s people were supposed to be the ones putting the sinners under their feet, and they were supposed to be anything but poor and sad. No one imagined being merciful to the Romans was the way to inherit the earth, and they certainly didn’t want their Savior to be a peacemaker. They wanted another hammer of God like their last great messiah figure, Judas Maccabeus.
We could spend hours talking about Jesus’s operative opposites. The first shall be last. Sinners will enter the kingdom before “righteous” men like the Pharisees. The list goes on. To quote a line from a beloved movie, “Inconceivable!”
Likewise, the parables He told defied people’s assumptions. Perhaps the most provocative is the story of the Prodigal Son. It is the account of a son who shamed his father and consequently deserved a life of shame, but the father honored him instead. He gave his son the opposite of what he deserved. But this is only part of the parable’s irony. The good son, the one who never did anything wrong, ended up outside his father’s house. This narrative is powerful in our day, but in the honor/shame culture of the first century world it would be jaw-dropping and subversive.
Everyone was certain the Messiah would crush the pagan Romans and their accomplices, the tax collectors. He would trample them under his feet and prove who was the true King and Lord of All. No one expected Him to die at the hands of Rome. In fact, the Jewish people figured they had a way to identify failed messiahs. If they ended up on a Roman cross, it meant they were liars. It was unthinkable that God would allow finite humans to humiliate Him. No one could comprehend the crushing defeat of the cross would be God’s means of victory for all.
Those who could not accept God’s operative opposites were oblivious to the hand of God. They missed His presence and called Him the Devil! How could they be so blind? God was right there, working so mightily, but they couldn’t recognize Him!
We are often just as oblivious. We see God clearly when He meets our expectations, but we are blind to the God of the operative opposites. He seems very foreign to us, but when we understand His ways, the hand of God, which once seemed so rare or invisible, becomes apparent and relentless. Our opinion of everything changes including ourselves. We might view ourselves as left out or rejected. Those who mourn, who are persecuted, or poor in spirit usually do. Yet, our perception changes as the Lord reveals His ways, and we understand we are chosen and beloved. The glory that was once hidden becomes apparent and all of life becomes a sacred place.
“Then Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked letters from him to the synagogues of Damascus, so that if he found any who were of the Way, whether men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.
As he journeyed he came near Damascus, and suddenly a light shone around him from heaven. Then he fell to the ground, and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?”
And he said, “Who are You, Lord?”
Then the Lord said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. It is hard for you to kick against the goads.” (Acts 9:1–5) ”
Saul thought he was on God’s side. Yet, when he met Christ, his entire paradigm crumbled in an instant. Saul believed he was fighting for God, and he figured he knew who God’s enemies were. It never entered his mind that he was one of them. He reckoned his righteousness gave him great favor with God, but it was exposed as worthless, and those whom he persecuted were revealed as God’s beloved. Can you imagine the blow to Saul’s ego?
We are all a little like Saul, and if we are blessed, we will have our own Road to Damascus where our light is revealed as darkness. When Christ discloses Himself, we realize we aren’t who we thought we were, and our enemies aren’t either. Our concept of God changes forever. This had to occur for Saul to become Paul, and we cannot avoid this same revelation.
Saul didn’t know he was fighting God until God convinced him. Our self-righteousness is virtually impossible for us to see. It looks so good! It makes us think we are God’s champions and condemning others is the Lord’s work. Saul imagined he was worshipping God, but he was really following a god he created in his own image. This zealot was enamored with who he was (a Hebrew of Hebrews, Philippians 3:5) and what he did (according to the Law, blameless, Philippians 3:6). He felt God was, too. He was certain God hated the same people he did. In reality, Saul was clueless about the heart of God. He did not know the Lord at all. When Christ appeared, the frightened Pharisee had to ask who He was. “Who are you, Lord?” (Acts 9:5)
We all go down the road to Damascus in our own way. It is the place our self-righteousness is exposed, and the Lord takes His axe to the good side of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. It is easy to identify with God’s heroes in the scriptures, but it takes a revelation to know His enemies are us, too! They represent the human ego (1), and we all need a Deliverer to rescue us from self that we might know God.
I walked the ego’s path for many years certain I was pursuing God, but I was running from Him! I expected to catch God when I had done enough. I could not comprehend that God was out to destroy my own righteousness rather than increase it. Our own good is an angel of light, and it so easily deceives us. Yet, the true light of Christ exposed my reality as a lie, and Truth set me free. My ego-based paradigm collapsed as Christ showed me who He is…and it is still collapsing from glory to glory. “Not I but Christ,” is something the flesh can never comprehend or accept, but to the Spirit it is truth and life. This is how God transforms us. When Christ reveals Himself, death and resurrection happen all at once. Saul dies and Paul is born.
“It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. (John 6:63) ”
The ego’s expectations of God are always wrong, and this is one of the reasons the flesh cannot perceive or know God. Its nature prevents it from doing so. The flesh finds its measure and life’s measure in finite things. It wants to increase, and it expects God to help it do so! The flesh never expects God to bring it to the end of its own righteousness, and it never expects God to bring it to the end of its desires. The flesh cannot perceive the God who is Spirit. It seeks to drag the Lord down into the realm of the ego and of its own understanding.
“Jesus answered them and said, “Most assuredly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw the signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him.”
Then they said to Him, “What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?”
Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.”
Therefore they said to Him, “What sign will You perform then, that we may see it and believe You? What work will You do? Our fathers ate the manna in the desert; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”
Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” (John 6:26–33) ”
The mind of the flesh was on full display in the day of Christ. People were happy to praise and serve God’s messiah if He gave them what they wanted. In the first part of John chapter six, Jesus fed 5,000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish. They loved him for it and wanted to make Him their king. If you give the ego what it wants, it will follow you. On the second day the people came looking for more miracles and a demonstration of God’s power to turn their lives from bad to good. They assumed this was the primary work the Messiah came to do. Yet, Jesus did not meet their expectations. Instead He offered them the bread of life, the infinite measure of life. This was the great work Christ came to accomplish. On the second day, the same people who wanted Jesus to be their king turned and walked away.
The people in this passage provide a vivid picture of the ego. It eagerly rejoices in the first day messiah. The flesh will serve God, but there is always something to be gained, increase to be had, suffering to be avoided. It is willing to be “used of God,” but there is always ego attached. To the flesh, working for the Lord involves finite gain. God might do extraordinary things, but the ego gets fed at the same time. It’s obtains its finite desires, and its finite measure of worth increases. The flesh can manufacture a relationship with God, but at its core is “What’s in it for me?” Our ego must get a reward whether it is heaven in the next life or worldly gain in this life.
The flesh sees what it wants to see and hears what it wants to hear, and it wants to hear about profit. That is why Jesus was so wildly popular the first day. We still love the Jesus who gives us what we want. Most messages are about the Jesus of the first day, and the ego will gladly call Him king.
We hear so little about the second day Jesus, because He does not appeal to the flesh. Very few messages today offend the ego. (Messages that focus on good and evil do not count! The ego loves such words because they feed its self-righteousness. If you walk away from such teaching focused on other people’s sins, you have not left the realm of the ego!) What offends the ego is taking away its profit and taking away its self-definition. It is the message that self is not the measure of God in our lives and God’s work is not to give us the life we want but to give us Christ. Preach this and the ego walks away.
The flesh views God through the lens of “What’s in it for me?” It needs reward, and it also needs punishment. If there is no reward to be had or judgement to be avoided, the flesh asks, “What is the point?” To the ego self-gratification and self-preservation are always at the center even in serving God. If God does not meet these expectations, the ego loses faith or turns to some other “messiah” to find increase.
There are seasons when the Lord will give us the finite desires of our heart. In fact, our relationship with God often starts in such a season. Yet, if we stay there, we will miss out on what God wants. His desire is always to give us the infinite measure of life. There will come a time when the first day ends, and its end confounds the flesh. It might think it has lost God’s favor, but Infinite Favor, which is beyond the ego’s comprehension, is about to be revealed.
What if I told you following Christ would mean the ego’s loss? Would you follow the God of the operative opposites? At Saul’s conversion, God did not give him a promise to entice his ego. The Sprit was about to tell Saul of the things he must suffer (Acts 9:15-16). Could you imagine such a revelation? If you expected the Lord to tell you about all the wonderful things you would gain, but instead He spoke of decrease and loss, how would you respond?
When I was first starting out in ministry, if someone told me what was about to happen, I wouldn’t trust them. I would have called them the Devil! I was expecting God to give the bread of the first day and all the miracles that go with it. Yet, I was about to meet the God of the operative opposites, and it is the most glorious thing that ever happened to me. I did not understand the Lord was about to take away the things I defined my myself by and measured my life by.
This is what happens when we meet Love on the road to Damascus. The ego doesn’t survive the encounter. This is the work the Messiah seeks to accomplish in our hearts, and the ego cannot comprehend it.
“… and He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again. (2 Corinthians 5:15) ”
Jesus came to take on the ego with its lusts, and like David slayed Goliath, He put the beast to death. Only, it was in a way no one expected. He wrestled with the human ego, and it finally killed Him, nailing Him to a cross. Yet, in His death, though utter loss, He ended the age of self-definition and self-gratification. How majestic are the ways of God! “What’s in it for me?” was the prison in which the ego lived, but Love came to set us free.
“The twenty-four elders fall down before Him who sits on the throne and worship Him who lives forever and ever and cast their crowns before the throne…. (Revelation 4:10) ”
We see a picture of the unfolding new covenant relationship with God in this striking image. To the ego the crowns are the point of relationship with God. It covets the reward and letting go is unthinkable, but to the mind of Christ reward has lost its meaning. It is not the purpose; rather it is something to be delivered back to God. By casting their crowns at the Lord’s feet, the 24 elders were heralding the end of “What’s in it for me?” Indeed, the entire book of Revelation is the story of the ending of the age of the ego and the beginning of the age of the Spirit. The Spirit knows that heaven is not about the hope of the ego’s gain but about being free from it.
What is on the other side of the ego’s loss? It is God’s gain! By freeing us from what we want, God gives us what He wants for us…eternal life. The cross is an exchange, our life with all its finite measures and definitions for God’s life which has no measure. The death and resurrection of Christ is not just about getting to heaven. It is about the two becoming one.
This is the Divine Wisdom that is unfolding in our lives. It we think it is the wisdom of the ego, we will only perceive God when He meets our expectations. He will be someone who visits occasionally. Yet, when we comprehend the love of God, we perceive Him as someone who is unavoidable, one who is always at work to give Himself. We view our lives not as empty but as filled with all the fullness of God.
“When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. (1 Corinthians 13:11) ”
My ego couldn’t see God’s hand, because it didn’t know where it was taking me. I believed I was following the god of my expectations. Yet, the Lord in His great mercy pulled back the veil and let me behold the God of operative opposites. The god who lived to give me what I wanted was not God at all. The true Lord of All takes me to the second day. When we comprehend His delight, we begin to see Him everywhere. The ego may have felt forsaken, but the Spirit sees God’s nearness. We may have envied those who got what they wanted and counted them more blessed that us. Yet, in light of the infinite, this becomes foolishness.
Once we behold heavenly treasure, we do not covet finite treasure, for we realize how rich we are and have always been. We comprehend how full our lives are. The idea they are empty or lacking is only an illusion.
Likewise, the ego views itself as unworthy and needing to become more worthy. It projects its false identity onto others judging them constantly. Yet, when God reveals the righteousness of Christ, the idea of having to do more or become more becomes absurd. We see that we are just as wrong about who we are as the prodigal son was. Our Father’s love defines us and our neighbor. This astonishing revelation has the power to turn our enemies into the beloved and is one of the greatest proofs that the God of operative opposites is at work in our lives. We become like Saul on the road to Damascus, bent on destroying the enemies of God. Yet, Christ intercepts us and reveals that we are really at war with Him!
As God reveals Himself, our opinion gets turned upside down. What we considered as last is first, and what we thought of as ordinary is sacred. While Peter was on a rooftop, God gave a vision of all animals, both clean and unclean (Acts 10:9-16). The Lord put away the distinctions between the common and the sacred, and it was time for Peter to do the same. In this instance, the revelation applied to the gentiles. They were no longer forsaken but beloved.
There was more to see. This vision was unfolding beyond Jew/Gentile distinctions to all of life. This is apparent in Paul’s writings. The good news tore down the walls not just between Jew and Gentile but also between male and female and the rich and the poor (Galatians 3:28).
Is this heavenly vision greater still? Yes! It has no end. It grows until it encompasses all (Colossians 3:11, I Corinthians 15:28). The ego’s view of life is often the opposite of God’s reality. What we perceive as common or ordinary is sacred. Every moment is holy. We should not think of it otherwise, for we live every second together with Christ. The Lord’s work made your life His cathedral and such it is. Are you surprised?
(1) In this article I define the flesh and the ego as basically the same thing. For more on this subject click here.
