Can We Be One With God? with Kyle Worley

the gentleness and love of Christ. And today we're going to be talking about a topic which is very close to my heart in that I I feel like it's one of the most underpreached elements of the Gospel and has perhaps even closer to Krsark because he's readen a whole book about it, which is the topic of union with Christ. And I think your forthcoming book, Kyle is

beautifully titled actually Home with God Union with Christ. Tell us why that title Home with God is an interesting sort of angle on this whole idea of Christian union with Christ. Why why'd you go that direction?

with man. And so I think, from beginning to end, the story of the Bible is the story of home with God. And honestly, I think one of the real treasures of the doctrine of union with Christ is that it shines a light on what I think is the goal of the good news of the Gospel. You know, a lot of times when we think about Christian salvation, we place the emphasis on forgiveness. But forgiveness is not

the goal of salvation. Fellowship is the goal of salvation, and union with Christ is showcasing that.

Jesus's death takes that debt away, and I think we sort of missed the fact often that it's not just that we brought back to you know, we're back in the black, but with zero dollars or pounds or yen in our account, that we are filled up with Jesus's righteousness, and that it's not even just in the sort of computational sense, but that it's actually in the relational sense.

Tell us what did you primarily learn in the course of writing this book sort of for yourself as you were reflecting on what it means for us to be united with Christ if we're follow us with him.

later on. I'm sure I had heard about the wonders of union with Christ prior to the time in which I became aware of it, or I became conscious of it, but I can remember it was actually sitting in a class in seminary with doctor Sinclair Ferguson where it really clicked for me, where it really kind of all came to the surface, so to speak, that the doctrine of union with Christ is not a part of the doctrine of Christian salvation, but is like the foundation of Christian salvation.

And so whenever I was writing this book, I think the thing that occurred to me, and it occurred to me too when I read Sam's book, our mutual friend Sam Alberry, he has a wonderful book coming out. It actually come out before mine. Mine releases in like spring of twenty twenty five. Sam's comes out sometime this fall in twenty twenty four. And it occurred to me while I read Sam's book as well. But it's just the majesty is that God is inviting us not just into

being made righteous, but being in a relationship. I think a lot of times when we think about Christian salvation, there is a little bit of what has God saved us for. We talk a lot about what God has saved us from. God has saved us from sin. God has saved us from death. God has saved us from the kingdom of the Prince of the power of the air Satan. There's a lot of talk about that. There is less talk about what God has saved us for.

And when we think about what God has saved us for, we almost always move towards our response, which is a worship, mission and obedience. And that's certainly true. In Christ Jesus, we have been freed up to participate in God's world, in God's man, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, in God's beloved Son. But it's not just that God has freed us for our response to that. God has freed

us for fellowship with Him delighting love. So I think the thing that I don't know if I learned it, but I certainly was kind of being reoriented by it as I reflected on it is that in Christ Jesus. I am not just the recipient of God's gracious love that forgives. I'm a recipient of God's delighting love that beholds. You know, zeph and Iah three talks about God rejoices over his people and song, he delights over them and dance.

He quiets them by his love. This great truth is that in Christ Jesus the beloved Son, I too, among God's people, are beloved because I'm in the beloved One. And that's a really I think that's understated. When we think about the good News of the Gospel. You know, we talk about much about God's mercy to forgive and less about God's delighting love.

but they're all fundamentally connected. And for me, one of the primary ways in which union christ union with christ Lands is actually in the in the whole area of how God has designed Christian marriage because it's one of the I mean, as we've talked to a number of times on this on this podcast, one of the strangest in our cultural moment today, one of the strangest kind of Christian doctrines is the the teaching that sex only belongs in marriage, and the marriage is between one man

and one woman for life, and that this forges a one flesh union between these two entities. But actually when we when we look at that in the context of scripture, what we find is that it's it's part of how God is teaching us about our union with Christ. And you know Impall's letters to the Ephesians, he describes Christian marriage as being a picture of Jesus' relationship with as people, of that one flesh union, of that sort of head

and body. You and I wouldn't do very well if our head and our body were disunited from each other, you know, seven from one another. And like wh if we are followers of Jesus, we are connected with him as closely as a head with a body like that. I mean, it's just ridiculous to think of them them apart.

we are given a new identity. The way I talk about in the book is in Christ we receive a new me. And there is a lot of attention given to the question of identity in who we are. And that's been true for a long time, but it's been particularly true and kind of this cultural moment of reflection on identity over the last fifteen twenty years, the question of who am I has increased in relevance in this

kind of late modern period. The book talks a lot about how are the doctrine of union with Christ, how our union with Christ are being in Him and with Him and through Him reshapes how we view ourselves and who we are before God and others. I would say one thing that did become clear to me as I

wrote the book that was more of a discovery. And I know you know you've written You've written more books now than there are degrees on a thermometer, So you know that you can start reading, uh, you can start writing a book and discover something along the way. But one of those things, one of the things that I discovered in writing this book was just how emphatic the Bible is not on our individual participation in Christ, but in terms of our incorporated participation in Christ. In Christ Jesus,

we don't just receive a new me. We receive a new we. We're we're now, We're now brought in to the family of God. We become sons and daughters of God because we are in God's beloved Son. And we become brothers and sisters in Christ because we are in Christ Jesus. And this is for all that the Bible has to say about how being in Christ changes me, it has more to say about how being in Christ

now changes we change us collectively. And that was something that I think that given my kind of embeddedness in the global West and a hyper individualistic age, I discovered, you know, I've probably been too emphatic about the identity piece of union with Christ and to understated about the incorporation the new we that God gives us as a new family in Christ. And I was really delighted to discover that. I know that's something you're passionate about as well.

I mean, I think one of the things I've always been encouraged by in your witness has been that you and your family have really decided to have a meaningful

belonging to a group of people. I see that in your life, and I've seen it lived in the way that you travel and the way that you live there and your online presence that you're very committed to this sense of we're not just going to use the body of Christ language as a metaphor, but you've really tried to make it kind of the pitter patter, so to speak, of your ordinary life. And that's been a witness to me. So thank you for that.

Western mindset. It's really easy for us just to miss definitely how much family language there is there, how much of a sense, as you point out, of the we of the it's not just that we are united with Christ individually, but that by virtue of being in Christ, we are one with one another, and that there are ways in which that needs to look real in our lives and not just just in our talk. I'm curious.

So one of the ways in which I think you actually beautifully sort of model what it looks like to be a follower of Jesus in a particular way is in the fact that you and your wife are are foster parents. Are there ways in which I'm just thinking about this, even the sort of concept of home with God and creating a home for people who for one reason or another have been without a home in the

sort of normal, typical biological sense of family. How has your experience as a foster father helped you to understand more of what it means for us to be invited into God's home.

into your life. And there is some language in the New Testament about being about Christ in us, but the overwhelming emphasis in the Bible and the overwhelming emphasis in the New Testament is not God is inviting you to invite Him into your life. It's God is inviting you to surrender your life to live with Him in Christ. That is far and away, it's his house. And so it's definitely focused on, Hey, we're as we reside in Christ. Now, as we take up this dwelling places we receive this

new home with God in Christ. It does affect and I talk about this really in the second half of the book. I talk at length about how this begins to affect the life that we live because now that we live in Christ Jesus, it has incredible bearing on the way that are the household of God. So a local church should uh should live its life and our individual households as kind of whatever that means, whether you know, I'm living with roommates, or I'm living with a spouse,

or I'm living with extended family. Maybe I'm in a multi generational household. Maybe I'm in a maybe I'm just a good native and I'm inviting people in through hospitality, or whether we're having children biologically, or we're adopting children as my family has done, or fostering children as we're

doing now, any of those situations. The doctrine of union with Christ absolutely shapes how we participate in the world through these kind of smaller households like a local church, and then our individual households, principally, because if we have been welcomed by God in Christ, even though we couldn't earn it and we don't deserve it, and it's not just because of grace and mercy and pity, but because of compassion and love and delight, well, then that does

shape the way that we live as a church as a hospitable community, and the way that we exercise that hospitality as individual households. Oftentimes, Christian compassion is grounded in some sort of I need to pay back to God through this kind of theological altruism. God has done so much for me, so now I need to do so much for him. Right Like Gosh, I'm the recipient of great grace, and so as the sipping of great grace.

I should extend great grace. That's not not true. I think that's a part of kind of the chemistry of Christian love and compassion. But it's not the only thing. Because God's love for us is not only the love of grace and mercy. It's the love of delight and fellowship. So this means that Christian hospitality is not just I am going to reflect back the grace that God has given to me. It's no, no, I'm also going to extend to the world the welcome that God has extended to me.

You see, it's not just duty, it's also delight. It's not just forgiveness, it's also fellowship. It's not just I must, it's that I can. It's not just that I will or I should, It's that I want to. And so this is I think, a really beautiful thing. I'll tell you one area that I think this actually kind of getting off of your original question, but certainly relevant to our kind of contemporary conversations. How much conversation has there been in the last let's say, seven to ten years

on the question of justice in a broken world? Significant and for good reason, because we increasingly find ourselves grappling with demonstrations and depictions of injustice. And as we grow in our historical awareness and as we grow in our global awareness, we've increasingly become concerned at a cultural level around the question of justice, what is right and good.

I think the doctrine of union with Christ actually empowers Christians to improvise on justice knowing that the review on our lives is already in We don't have to go out into a world to pursue what is just so that we can prove to that very same world that we are just, or proved ourselves approved to God. In Christ Jesus, God has already declared us righteous, He's already declared us just, and on that foundation we can pursue what is just without having to try to perform justice

in a way that's self serving. I think that's an example of how union with Christ doesn't just shape kind of our theology, doesn't just shape the the way we read the Bible, though I spend significant time talking about

that in the the book. It also shapes the way that we just live in the way of Jesus because we're living in Christ themself, and it produces tremendous power and tremendous freedom in living that life that I think is directly tied to our meditation or reflection on this doctrine specifically.

one another as Christ has welcomed us. But if we sit there and we realize what on earth Paul is saying there, I mean, how has Christ welcomed you and me not only by becoming a human being and living, you know, among us, taking our flesh upon himself, but also by dying in our place and rising from the

dead to bring us into everlasting life with like. The welcome that Christ has extended to us is radical, beyond our wildest imaginings, and that is the model for how we are to welcome one another in the church, regardless of where we come from, or what we look like, or how you know, how naturally sympatica we may be with one another. That there's this extraordinary call to unity,

and I think that expresses itself in Christian fellowship. It expresses itself in ways that are just because if I consider other believers to be members of my own family, and people with whom I have are sort of built in intimacy, I'm going to care about their needs and their suffering and the ways in which they are excluded or sort of pushed down, just as I would care about that for my own children or for my own You know that it takes away that natural human tendency

to kind of them and us people, because in Christ, within the church there is only an Us, and then the them's outside the church are those We're also called to extend Jesus as welcome to and to plead with, to love even our enemies because of the way that

Jesus has loved us when we were his enemies. There's this radical you know, people talk today about, you know, radical acceptance or whatever, and I'm like this, as with so many things in the world today that have grown secular legs, they're actually Christian concepts.

God or to dwelling with God outside of Christ. That on its surface, in a late modern age is offensive. I mean, it is just because it is demonstrating exclusivity, exclusivity of story, exclusivity of belief. It is narrow. But the reality is is that in Christ we find what is simultaneously radically exclusive and radically inclusive. It's radically exclusive because you can only enter into fellowship with God in and through Christ Jesus. But it's radically inclusive and that

anyone can like, anyone can like. It doesn't matter what your sexual orientation is, It doesn't matter what your background is. It doesn't matter what your ethnic or cultural background is, what your socioeconomic class is, it does not matter. Now when you come to him, he will tell you have to surrender everything about you to His identity in his way. And if you do that, if you step into that and you surrender all that you are, then he invites

you in in forgiveness and in fellowship. And that really is good news. And it's good news specifically because it's tied to this new identity and this new body, this new membership, this new incorporation that He gives us in Christ, Jesus by grace through faith. And so I mean, I think that's one of the things that the doctrine of union with Christ holds forth, is that the good news of the gospel that most often people here is God wants to forgive you for being wrong and you were

born wrong. That is a true and essential part of the gospel. But I do find that many people are put off by that because there is not because it's offensive on its surface, even though it is to our sin bent selves, because it's not complimented. But by what the goal of that is. God isn't just giving, He's not just saying I want to forgive you because you are wrong and you were born wrong. That's true, but

it's not the only thing that's true. I don't want to just forgive you because you're wrong and you were born wrong. I want to forgive you so that you can dwell with me, so that you can so that we can live and fellowship together. If we only give part A of the Gospel and we never extend Part B of the Gospel, all we really will end up creating are people who believe that they're forgiven, and then we'll ask what now, and there will be no meaningful

response to it. But the Doctor of youth, Christ doesn't divide, doesn't tear asunder what Christ unites. It says, no, in Christ, you have both forgiveness and fellowship. God isn't just a judge who is saying, okay, you're acquitted. He's a judge that, having cleansed the record, now invites you to a feast in his home. That is the whole picture of salvation. And it's more beautiful because it's more true.

to hell. That it's almost almost like an arbitrary sorting of humanity that God has set up for whatever reason, when actually the Christian message is saying, if you repent and believe and put your trust in Christ, you will be included in Christ, in Jesus, in the Sun, and

therefore you will live with Him forever. Yes, whether there's actually a profound connection between repentance and faith in Jesus and our eternal lestiny, because heaven is shorthand for everlasting relationship with Jesus, and Hell is shorthand for meeting Jesus not as lover and law but as judge.

a commentary on Colossians at the moment. I've just this morning been instead of revisiting its extraordinary passage where Paul is claiming that Jesus is the one who is the image of the invisible God, the one through whom all things were made, the one who has authority of every parent dominion, like the one who there is nothing in all of creation, visible or invisible that Jesus didn't create

in the first place and doesn't kind of rule over. Yes, And once we recognize that that same son of God is also Jesus of Nazareth, who died on a cross and welcomes us into life with it, once we kind of can put those two things together, it starts to make more sense that, Okay, the one who made the universe in the first place, including all of us, is also the one who makes the new heavens and the new Earth. And if we are in him, that's where we're headed. Yes, but if we reject him, why would

we expect to live with him? Forever, like we've almost it's precisely what we've asked for, is being cut off from Him if we've rejected that invitation.

of them end up delivering. And so we can either be in Christ or we can be outside of Him. We can either be in at Him or we can be in Christ. We can be at home with God, or we can be stuck in homeless hearts forever. But that's it. There's not another option. It's those two ways of living in God's world, and whichever way we are left living is the way that we will live forever. And God is inviting us now to life with Him

in Christ. And and I think that's for me. This has really struck me as a more biblical, a more theological, a more practical, honestly, a more humanizing and Gosha, just a more delightful way of living out the Christian story. Because I think again, like I said at the very top of this episode, like beginning to end the Bible as a story of God saying, out of my delighting love, I want to dwell with my people forever.