Greetings Again Friends,

Whenever the name of God is mentioned, it always means “Triune” for He is Trinitarian by nature in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The name of God never means “solitary,” or existing in isolation without His Threeness which makes Him who He IS, and unique among deities. Man is solitary, God is Triune. Man essentially became solitary when Adam rebelled in Eden and took mankind down the self-centered (solitary) path of life. But, in essence, man is a Triune being who bears the Trinitarian image of the Creator God, made in His likeness so fellowship with Him has always been man’s destiny. This Trinitarian roots will never be lost to man, for it is planted deep in the soul of human consciousness replicated in the image if the Triune God. (Gen.1:26-27)

Rublev’s Famous Icon of Holy Trinity (Wiki Commons)

The Malachi Curse

There is a powerful and compelling prophecy in Malachi which speaks of an Elijah to come whose work will be to “turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to the fathers.” Then God warns why Elijah’s work is so gripping as it is decisively critical for mankind, “Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse” (Mal.4:6). That surely is a dire warning we must all pay attention as to what Elijah’s work truly means. Here is a curse God will inflict upon man, it behooves us to listen and understand.

Whenever a relationship is mentioned, like father and son, or father and children, that is basically a Trinitarian statement. Jesus speaks of His relationship as the Son, with God as His Father, saying, “I and My Father are ONE” (John 10:30). That’s a Trinitarian statement. So, the statement “turn the hearts of the father to the children, and the hearts of the children to the fathers,” is fundamentally a Trinitarian statement. Recall Jesus parting words to His disciples: “Go and tell the world about this wonderful Gospel, and unify (baptize) them into the name of the (Triune God) Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” (Matt.28:19, emphasis mine). Baptism inaugurates man into the Triune family of God.

Jesus’ final prayer with His disciples to the Father before He was crucified, was framed in God’s Trinitarian reality:  “That they may be one even as We are one, as You Father, are in Me…”(John 1:7). He inhabits eternity in His Triune Being, and is the Source of the Love which envelopes all of creation, and is expressed to man in His 3-dimensional reality – as a Loving Father, a Son who gives His life to save us, and a friend and advocate in the Spirit. Man has been living in his 1-dimensional reality by the deception the devil placed on him since Adam. But our true potential is to live as “Triune beings” in the Father, Jesus and the Spirit

“I do not pray for these (disciples) alone, but also those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be ONE, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be ONE in Us, that the world may believe that You have sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be ONE just as We are ONE: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in ONE” (John 17: 20-23, emphasis added). Jesus told His disciples, “On that day you will realize that I am in the Father, and you are in Me, and I am in you” (John 14:20). Every word is uttered in its Trinitarian context in who God is in His Triune nature of Love.

Obviously, His prayer was intended to enlighten both the disciples and His followers about His mission, and to bring to reality the will of the Father in Jesus’ purpose in the Gospel. That is, to do the work of the prophesied Immanuel – “God with us”: to join man to the Triune God, so man can himself be Triune with the Father through Christ. (Isa.7:14; Matt.1:23) In true Triune expression, Jesus lived the Triune Life, saying: “I can of Myself do nothing” (John 5:30). And so must we as we also live the “Triune Life” in Jesus. Someone may say he or she is doing something unselfishly, say, for family or community, and even country. But it is still solitarily and self-centered because it’s for his family, his community, his country. Everything about “self” deflects the “Triune Life.” Living the “Triune Life” means the total giving of self to God and His Christ, and thus be empowered in the Spirit in all his activities. Triune means it is for Triune Love and Triune Love alone. It is not for any motive whatsoever that’s outside the ambit of the Trinitarian Love existence of the Father, Son, and Spirit. This takes life back prior to any human motive or desires into preexistence when there was nothing but the Love of the Father and the Son from eternity, and their Love in the Spirit has always been the spring from which all lifeforms, both spirit and material, has originate. (John 17:23-24)  Triune living is devotion to this Source of life and motivation.

God’s Spirit (Love-Rom.5:5) comes to Man in the Gentleness of a Dove

Our relationship with our fellow humans is not determined by how we perceive and determine the acts ought to be, that would be self-righteous, and God calls “filthy rags” (Isa.64:6). But it is by the very move of the Spirit in us, as it was with Jesus when He walked this earth, and as it was and is in the very life of the Father and the Son from eternity. (Acts 10:38; John 17:24b) Remember what He said, “I can of Myself do nothing,” so the Spirit’s move was the move of the Father’s Love in His life from eternity, and made one with us through Him. (John 17:21-22)

Also notice, God’s manifested glory become man’s glory when he is unified to God’s Triune Life in Christ. Primarily, His glory is manifested in the miraculous life we are privileged to live in the power of the Spirit, who is given to be with us “forever.” (John 14:16; 17:5,10-11) This is what brings power to the Christian life, but for most, the Christian life is without the miraculous life or glory that comes from the Triune life of God. Are Christians living “solitary” lives? Is this why they live powerless lives?

“Solitary” One-ness or “Triune” One-ness

It is entirely feasible for man to take this “unity prayer” of Jesus from John 17 and apply it to his “solitary” human perspective toward life. He can use this “unified stance” with a “solitary” foundation to broad-brush everything he does with his family, his community, his nation, and still miss the point of Jesus’ meaning and purpose in His Trinitarian prayer. A father and son relationship can either be lived on a fleshly “solitary” mode, or a divine “Trinitarian” mode. Think of a statement like “unity in diversity” – if it is not lived in the Triune Being of God, it is still a philosophy birthed out of man’s “solitary” thoughts in his fallen, depraved state of being, which inevitably ends in failure and death. The “solitary” life which exists outside without God’s divine goodness is of itself a curse. Human goodness, God calls, “filthy rags” (Isa.64:6). Jesus, in the very depth of His Triune Being with His Father, could not have prayed any other way but in who He IS in His Trinitarian Oneness with His Father.

Though He took our humanity upon Himself, it was not a prayer He prayed through the human 1-dimensional “solitary” worldview, but the 3-dimensional Trinitarian unified worldview with and in His Father and the Spirit as ONE indivisible Triune God. That is the reality Jesus wanted the disciples and His followers to have with the Father, through and in Him. You see, once Jesus has taken man beyond and into the veil and man is made to sit with Him in His “Triune” Being-ness with the Father and the Spirit, everything we see and understand about the world around us changes from a “solitary” view to a Trinitarian divine view. That’s why Jesus had to come. That’s why the Father sent Him. That’s why Paul tells us, “You are complete in Him (Jesus)” (Col.2:10, emphasis added).

So the father and children relationships in Malachi are pictures framed primarily in the Triune relationship of God, before it extends to mankind when we accept this reality in Jesus by the power of the Spirit. The work of the coming Elijah is to stop the curse from befalling man. His work will primarily be unifying of man to God through Christ so man can become a “unified being” (as opposed to a “solitary being”), from a 1-dimensional being, to a 3-dimensional being, in the very heart of the Trinitarian life of God. From this Trinitarian vantage point, man can now extend a hand of relationship to his fellowman, in his relationship with his children, his neighbors, his village, his city, in the Triune way of life in Christ by the Spirit’s move. I shall continue with this theme in the next segment.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to write me in the space provided below, or email me on bulamanriver@gmail.com.

Blessing:

Until we meet again in my next post, may the blessing of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you always. May the Spirit enliven you and make all things concerning you possible in Triune Living as a Bulamanriver.*

Kiang,                                                                                                                                                                  (Your Servant in Christ)          

* Bulamanriver” is the metaphor describing the union of man with the Love of the Triune God flowing in humans, making possible the “Triune Life” – the source of the miraculous life in man. To read the many facets of life of the Bulamanriver, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.

All scriptures are taken from the NIV Version 2011, unless stated otherwise.

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