Gelassenheit
A
Sermon,
Preached
on the Second Day
In
SANTA
ANNA
June
16, 2008
Let
this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in
the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But
made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a
servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in
fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death,
even the death of the cross. (Php 2:5-8)
Our
lesson tonight, and probably over several more sermons as well, is on
the philosophy or doctrine of Gelassenheit.
Gelassenheit is a term that is probably very strange to the ears of
most people, although it has a long history of usage in the Church,
and is foundational to the Anabaptist understanding of what
Christianity is. We here have used this term for some time, but I
often get questions about the right definition of the word, and I
have to say that it is one of the hardest words to define and to find
a right definition of in all of theology.
I
looked at a modern English/German dictionary and it defined
Gelassenheit as composure.
In
most older English German dictionaries, the term Gelassenheit is
defined as Submission
or Yielding.
Martin
Heidegger, the 20th Century German Philosopher, defined
Gelassenheit as “the willingness or ability to let things be as
they are, in their uncertainty and mystery”.
The
Global Mennonite Encyclopedia comes the closest to having an adequate
definition of the term:
“Gelassenheit,
self-surrender, resignation in God's will (Gottergebenheit),
yieldedness to God's will, self-abandonment, the (passive) opening to
God's willing, including the readiness to suffer for the sake of God,
also peace and calmness of mind, in Dutch devotional literature
leijdzaamheid
(Mennonite
Quarterly Review,
1950, 22, note 17, suggests about 15 possible translations, none
perfectly fitting). Only if man relinquishes his self-will may he
become an instrument of God. The main Biblical locus seems to be
Revelation
13:10,
"Here is the patience [RSV has `endurance'] and faith of the
saints," even though Gelassenheit goes further than patience and
endurance.”
The
term crosses over into so many different areas of life and experience
that it is almost impossible to properly define it outside of some
type of context. For this reason, this series will attempt to look
at Gelassenheit as a practice and not merely as a philosophy or
doctrine. Hans Denck, the German Anabaptist, said, “There
is no other way to blessedness than to lose one's selfwill”.
I have added this to the long definition: “as opposed
to the passive act of mere humility, Gelassenheit is the active
practice of living out the divine command of love”.
Before
we can go any further in examining Gelassenheit, we need to get a
really good idea of the world we are dealing with – that world in
which Gelassenheit must function.
In
any system, quite often the vocabulary or the lexicon of that system
can become so common and can be used so regularly (or irregularly)
that the words themselves will cease to have meaning, or will evolve
new and different meanings than those intended when the words were
first used in that system. In Christianity, the lexicon of the
Christian life are often so misused that the very words themselves
really cease to have any meaning. We hear sayings like “take up
your cross”, “the daily cross”, “die daily”, etc. and it
seems that the words are now become mist without any corporeal
practical reality or meaning. By way of example, nowhere is this
more evident than in the modern apostate “christian” music
business. Once Christian sayings or Biblical quotes are now written
into stupid, shallow, and vapid songs, where they are repeated like
mantras, over and over, until any true meaning or actuality is
stripped from them. Modern “christians” can sing these songs,
and repeat the phrases (like “I take up my cross”) while they
live lives indistinguishable from the world around them. This myth
has permeated the world that Jesus Christ, our perfect obedient and
suffering Savior, was just some good ol' boy who worked as a
carpenter by day and hung around with the sinners and tax collectors
at night. And since the modernist “christian” has accepted this
false view of Christ, and since they have embraced a false view of
who Christ is and what He was sent to do, then they can easily
eviscerate these powerful words and sayings and make them mean
anything – or nothing at all. They do not know what to say about a
Jesus who said this:
“Verily,
verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what
he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also
doeth the Son likewise” (John 5:19).
Our
text for today says that Jesus “made himself of no reputation”.
There are two words that are translated to make up this phrase, and
those two words are literally translated thusly: “He
emptied himself”. Jesus
poured himself out, and by that I mean that He poured His SELF
out. His carnal will, His personal wants and desires, His own way of
looking at things, His personal opinion, His ideas, His facts, etc. -
all of these – were poured out
and considered nothing, and He replaced all these things with the
will of His Father. Jesus Christ emptied Himself.
There is a theological term for this. The word for “emptied”
here is the word kenoō..
The theological term for “emptying oneself” is kenosis.
During the most ancient and
most effective epochs of the Church, there was much teaching and
preaching on this concept of kenosis, but, like in any thing or in
any truth, when some groups and teachers became extreme or unbiblical
in their teaching on the subject, the backlash against those extreme
or unbiblical teachings caused many (in fact most) of the Church to
reject any and all teaching on the subject. Kenosis was dismissed as
mere “mysticism”. When the Catholic sect began to predominate,
the teaching of kenosis was twisted horribly. Catholics were taught
that they must empty themselves of their will and replace it with the
will of “The Universal Church” or of the Bishops, or of the Pope
himself. Since Catholics were not taught, encouraged, or even
allowed (in most cases) to read the Bible in their own language and
to determine God's will for themselves, they were instructed that
only the Church and its Pope could determine God's will. Kenosis as
a substantive teaching, then, was left to those in monasteries.
Again, most of these secluded men or women did not have access to
Bibles to read for themselves, so even their admirable attempts at
“emptying themselves” in their search for an authentic
Christianity or a closer walk with God turned into fanciful mysticism
or even a demonic or paganistic search into the self for God.
Many
Protestants likewise were taught that the out-working of God's will
was only known through the institution called “the Church”, and
kenosis, then, was not an individual act, but was instead an act of
the Church imposing its will on is members, and through them the
society around about them. Some Protestants were taught that any
hint of “emptying” or of humiliation was mere Catholic or New Age
mysticism, and so the entire concept was just thrown out – the baby
along with the bathwater. Later, when there were good teachings on
self-denial, submission, or humiliation, the terminology of the cross
(the daily cross, picking up the cross, etc.) was used in order to
avoid the charge of mysticism. While the teachings in many case were
admirable and biblical, the next step, as I have mentioned, was for
these terms to be overused and watered down, emptied of any real
meaning, and made so ambiguous and amorphous that, for the average
Christian, the words now have no real meaning whatsoever. Today, the
terms “the daily cross”, “picking up the cross”, “carrying
the cross”, etc. are generally inferred to have something to do
with persecution, or of being persecuted for ones beliefs. Even the
most apostate, charismatic, abject worldling in the most worldly
mega-Church in America has been taught that if everyone they come in
contact with doesn't immediately fall on the ground, chatter in
“tongues”, fill out a “decision card”, and make a firm
profession of faith in Christ – then the worldling professor, and
therefore the Church, is being persecuted. The word Persecution
itself is being so watered down that it simply has no real meaning.
I have heard conversations where modern “christians” have claimed
that, because someone at their work rejected the idea of modern
tongues and doesn't believe in the Charismatic “gifts”, that they
now know what persecution is. All of this is to say that the real
meaning of self-emptying, and the real meaning of “the daily
cross”, and the real meaning of humility and humiliation – has
been lost to these generations.
Our
task, then, is to return our minds and hearts to the Words of God,
and to the Word of God, that we might know how God would have us live
and be in this present evil world.
The
Will of the Father
Some
people will be shocked to learn that the will of the Man Jesus
Christ, the will of His carnal flesh, was not always one with the
will of the Father. Jesus Christ took upon Himself the form of a
servant, and subjugated and submitted His will to the will of His
Father. Jesus said, “Father, if thou be willing, remove
this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done”
(Luke 22:42). We have to be very careful here in how we describe
this, because some evil men would love to infer that I am saying
something I am not saying. I am not accusing Jesus of sin, nor am I
saying that there was any schism at all between the Father and the
Son. Jesus was fully God and He was fully man. Jesus suffered in
His flesh just as we do, only Jesus was without sin. Jesus the man
had a will, just as you do, and that carnal will is often the result
of, or is the product of, the carnal senses. We often will things
that are contrary to our well being and to the good of ourselves and
others, because we are severely limited in what we know and what we
can sense. We often will that which is not beneficial to our
spiritual good. The difference is that the will of Jesus the man was
completely and wholly subjected to the will of the Father. Jesus
said, “I only do what I see the Father doing”. “I only say
what I hear the Father saying”. Jesus the man had a will, and he
daily emptied out that will in favor of the will of His Father, and
in doing this, He was without sin. Jesus knew when he took on the
form of man, and the manner of a servant, that he would suffer from
the afflictions of the carnal man. But it is not sinful to have a
will. It is not sinful to have a carnal will that it as times
contrary to the will of the Father. It IS sinful to not empty out
and abrogate or subjugate your our own will in favor of the express
and known will of God. So in willing contrary or differently than
the Father, Jesus did not sin. He actively “made himself
of no reputation”, which means
He actively determined that the will of His Father was supreme, and
submitted Himself to it. And listen, the Bible says “He
thought it not robbery to be equal with God”, so
Jesus was not a “lesser God” or a minor God, or a sub-God. Jesus
was fully and completely God. But in order to perfectly fulfill the
purposes of the Godhead, Jesus humbled Himself and took on the form
of a servant, and completely submitted His will to that of His
father. Jesus the man was subject to temptation, only He was not
tempted. Jesus the man was subject to hunger and thirst, and
afflictions of soul, but He sinned not. I have no doubt that the
carnal man Jesus Christ desired to help and heal everyone with whom
He came in contact, but this was evidently not the will of the
Father. I am certain that Jesus willed to gather all of Jerusalem
under His wings like a mother hen does her chicks, but it was
evidently not the will of the Father that He do that – not to
mention that it was certainly not the will of Jerusalem to be
gathered unto Him. Jesus daily emptied Himself out, and was filled
with the will of His Father. Now, this is God of very God saying to
the Father, “Not my will, but thine be done”.
In
order that God's creation might learn this lesson, God gave us a type
and a “school” where we might learn this great doctrine. In
order that God might teach us the lesson, He had us born as ignorant
babies. He started us out on this planet with no knowledge, no
understanding, no wisdom, and no heart to gain those things. God
gave us parents, and He gave us the concept of parenthood, and
headship, and especially Fatherhood. He commanded His people to
diligently teach the children, and to drill kenosis
into them at a very young age. He commanded fathers to model God to
their children, and to see that the will of the children is utterly
broken and poured out. Children were to be subjected to the parents,
and to submit to them without regard to consequence, so that they
might more easily learn this life of submission. If a child can be
taught to empty himself of his will for his earthly father, and if he
is taught the full perfection and glory of his heavenly Father, how
much easier would it be for the child, as he grows, to empty himself
and submit his will to God? There was a plan here, and God intended
that His people would diligently train and parent their children.
Children were taught absolute submission, to the point where they
(like Christ) absolutely willed the will of their father. God's
command was that we would all be raised up this way “Train
up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not
depart from it” (Prov. 22:6).
Jesus
was not a robot or an automaton. His carnal man had a will, and it
was an act of authority and power over that will that then willed to
submit that will to the will of the Father. This is the lesson of
Christ's incarnation. This is the truth of what His manhood was to
teach us. Likewise we understand that our children are not robots,
but they must be taught by whatever means necessary to willfully
submit their wills to the will of their Father – that they might
learn the divine lesson of Christ's submission.
As
we have mentioned before, this lesson on submission isn't all there
is (or even most of what there is) to the practice of Gelassenheit.
Gelassenheit more perfectly is the act or practice of
Christianity, as opposed to the philosophy, religion, or community of
Christianity. Here is the cutting edge of truth, and here is why
modern Christianity has no claim of heritage or historicity in
ancient Christianity. Christianity as a practice instead of
as a badge of membership or as a birthright is a whole new concept to
some people. Our studies on Type and Antitype lead us to believe
that “Christianity” in the last days will have fallen to the same
errors and apostasies as the religion of the Jews did in the time of
Christ. Whereas the Jews believed that they had become children of
God by their will, or by their blood, or by their culture or
heritage, in like manner modern Christians will say “I was born
into a Christian family”, or “I have always been a Christian”.
The children among us will believe that they are Christians because
they have an affinity for Christian things, and because they live in
a Christian family, or because they have always “believed in
Christ”. These proofs are contrary to, and are in contradiction
with, the proofs that are made available in the Bible. First and
foremost true Christians are known by their practice and not by their
profession. They are known by their fruit, and not by their leaves.
Modern Christianity differs from true Christianity as much as the
candle differs from the sun. Gelassenheit gives us a foundation, or
a framework, by which we can practice Christianity. Gelassenheit is
more than “death to self” or “the daily cross”, or, it is
more than the WORDS that are used to make up those sayings.
Gelassenheit is the actuality and practice of those words. One
professing Christian may say he must die to self, and pick up his
cross and follow Christ – but when you watch him, he operates by
self and he walks and follows his own will. Another
professing Christian may not even recognize that he has died to his
self, or that he has picked up his cross. His actions and practice
of emptying himself daily and of operating according to the will of
God, which is almost always contrary to his own perceived good and
his own carnal desires, betray him as a Christian. He truly is a
Christian, and can be known as one by his fruit. Kenosis and
Gelassenheit are not theological terms to the true Christian, they
are the rules and law of life.
I
hear many Christians talk of warfare with the “world, the flesh,
and the devil”, and yet such warfare is so far from them that they
are obviously repeating rote lessons and not discussing the practice
of a life lived. Gelassenheit is the tools of the warfare that
professors only talk about. The key
to victory over the “world, flesh, and the devil” is to know that
these things work to elevate self, to engender pride, worldliness,
self-appreciation and self-defense, love of carnal things, and
service to the lower nature. All of the world conspires to point our
minds and hearts to the lower nature, and to elevate the self. Mere
mantras do not constitute warfare. Since most professing Christians
were not taught to empty themselves as children, and to give up their
will to the will of their parents, they now see themselves falsely as
engaging in a great warfare against sin and the world, when in fact
they are a part of that world and fight in the world's own army. The
true warfare is mostly and primarily an internal one. The practice
of Christianity – the lowering and humiliating of the self; warfare
against pride; avoiding, escaping, and fleeing from worldliness;
abandoning defensiveness; submission to others and elevating them
above oneself; a distrust of carnal things – all of these things
are the practice of Christianity, and all of these things make up the
battle we are to wage. Only when the child is broken and looks to
his father as a wise and loving leader and caretaker; only when the
will of the child is emptied out, and when his will becomes the will
of the father; when the five senses are subjugated to the word and
command of the father, when spiritual reality is elevated above, and
becomes more real than, the carnal world around us – only then can
we say that the battle was fought. The Bible says that if a child is
trained up in the way he should go, when he is old, he will not
depart from it. Likewise when we learn Christianity as a practice,
and not just as a religion, a philosophy, or as a culture – we will
not depart from that practice when we are old.
Let
this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus – which
is to say, “Exercise
that mind and will that was also the mind and will of Jesus Christ.
Jesus was God, and in no way found it robbery or fraud to be
considered equal to God. And yet this great God emptied Himself, and
took upon Himself the form of a servant, and put on the likeness of
man. Being found as a man, he humbled and lowered Himself, becoming
obedient and agreeing to suffer death, even the death of the cross”.
For
those who incessantly ask, “What would Jesus do”, well... that is
what Jesus would do. Jesus emptied Himself. Gelassenheit has shoe
leather, and I hope to be able to expound on the practice of
Gelassenheit more in future parts.
I
am your servant in Christ Jesus,
Michael
Bunker
Copyright © by BiblicalAgrarianism.com All Right Reserved.
Latest:
Visitation
