Monthly Archives: August 2013

“BULAMANRIVER TRINITARIAN BOOK CENTER” – KIANG P LEE

Greetings once more from sunny McKinney in Texas.

In this post, I would like to announce an added feature I will introduce into my Blog and Web Site. It’s a book store called “Bulamanriver Trinitarian Book Center.” In it, you will find books and resources helpful to the Trinitarian Life I have spoken extensively about in my Blog posts.

Bulamanriver Trinitarian Ministry

Purpose of the Book Store: I would like to add this proviso to the purpose and founding principle of the book store. For purpose of transparency, I mention this proviso from the outset, so nothing adversarial may be said about my motive in this matter. Each sale will earn a commission payable to the Bulamanriver Trinitarian Ministry. The proceeds will be used for the sole purpose of promoting the Trinitarian Life to all. The ministry is inter-church focused, as I’m sure we see the common thread and purpose in the principle of participatory union with a God who is Himself Triune and participatory in His loving nature. There is no fragmentation in our acceptance of that message, but it is unifying. Proceeds from this book center will be used to promote further this Trinitarian ministry.

So, this ministry, as we have always espoused, will be dedicated to doing things the Trinitarian way, so people will see we are transparent in practicing what we preach about God and His Loving nature. The last thing on my mind is to see anything done that’s disingenuous to the Trinitarian principle we espouse. So, this project, and all we will do, is and will be an incubator for the experiment and nurture of the Trinitarian Life to all who choose to participate. It is not “solitary” and exclusive, but “Triune” and inclusive. It is not centered on self, but on Christ – in whom, we have new life and centered on the new self in Him. It is hoped, in this unassuming way, we can experiment, experience and see the practical manifestation of God’s Triune Love in motion. Of course, we know all of life is an open field for the Triune Life to be lived and articulated.

Bulamanriver Front Cover, 111614

The book store is only the beginning. At a future stage, we will take this incubatory process to another level. In the development of the Bulamanriver Trinitarian Ministry, I will be asking for assistance in kind, and financial, intellectual, and manpower support, to start a project in the idyllic islands of Fiji. Again, I ask for engagement in an open, Loving, participatory spirit and gesture. The project’s focus will be to build a retreat with the aim of promoting the “Triiune Life” in people. It will be a place for short-stay retreats, where people will come and get soaked into the Trinitarian values and practice, and return with energized mindset to face the challenges of life in true Triune mold. Most of all, to use their gifts to promote this awe-inspiring Gospel to their neighbors.

My hope is that readers will participate in the establishment of this project from scratch in a true participatory and Triune fashion. This bears repeating so no one is in doubt as to the purpose and mission behind it. It will be something anyone can be proudly part of, and be at the ground level of this kind of unique collaborative undertaking. More of the details at a later date when we are ready to take the first baby steps. Participation and transparency, the button words for God’s Triune Love, will be key.

For now, I appreciate your support of this fledgling Ministry through the purchase of books advertised in the “Bulamanriver Trinitarian Book Center.” Every purchase through the Book Center, you are participating and contributing to this Trinitarian Ministry to further man’s understanding of this beautiful understanding and how it is to be lived, not just believed. If there are any book titles that interest you, I would be more than happy to get it listed, to help in this ministry.

My hope is you will accept my invitation in a participatory climate as God is participatory with us in His Love. This book store will come online soon.

Books

A word about the book store. The book store will feature authors whose work on the subject of the Triune nature God have contributed much to our enlightenment of this all-important subject of understanding. My book and blog posts have been attempts to expound on God’s Tri-Personal Being in layman’s terms. I realize this can be at the expense of definition and semantics for this most vital topic. I do apologize for that, and hope that by providing a book store with relevant resources, we can read books by authors such as Thomas F. Torrance, and others, for elucidation and discussion and how this “Triune Life” can be brought to mainstream Christian life. My understanding is owed in no small part to their edifying work. For that I’m deeply grateful to them, and to God for their gifts in articulating this subject.

Be that as it may, I must say, my book and blogs have focused on the practical application of this awe-inspiring truth of the nature of the Triune God, and interaction with His equally Triune Love, in the life of the believer. Let’s be clear, the Triune Life is not such a knotty matter that we need a store house of books to understand it. That’s not my message in the establishment of the book store. It’s not some mystical secret that only the wise and powerful are privileged to have. Jesus came, so from the least to the greatest, can understand and live this “Triune Life” in Him through the power of the Spirit. The “Triune Life” is as simple as that. Books are intended to clear the cobwebs in our understanding of the nature of God. It is understood to its fullest, when it is articulated in its practical application in the way we live with and in the “Triune Life” of God, through Christ and by the power of the Spirit.

The metaphor of the Bula man-river I expound in my book, “Bula man-river – The Miracle of Triune Living,” is to explain this belief in the practical, day-to-day life of the believer. Basically, living the “Triune Life” spontaneously preconditions us to a life of miraculous manifestation, hence, in my book, I begin with my own miracle encounter with Jesus Christ. As the saying goes, you cannot plow a field by turning it over in your mind, but by taking the important second step of putting your hands to the plow. And Jesus said, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God” (Luk.9:62). You can’t put God’s Kingdom off by debating it. In other words, what Jesus is saying is, “Seize the day – apply the principles of Triune Living!” My hope is, together, we will travel on this journey into the miraculous.

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

Blessings

Until my next post, may the blessing of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you today and give you strength for authentic Triune living as a Bula man-river.*

Kiang                                                                                                                                                          (Your Servant in Christ) 

* The “Bula man-river” 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 Bula man-river, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book.  Thank you for your support.

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

Note: Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information

CAN MAN LIVE WITHOUT GOD? – GOD’S “LOVE” IS MAN’S ‘SPIRITUAL GRAVITY’ – BY KIANG P LEE

Greetings once more, friends all over the world!

The Trinitarian Mindset

The most basic and pivotal knowledge man can have is to understand God is Trinitarian. Why is that? Because it is the basis for which God spontaneously and organically connects Himself to man through His Son, and in the power of the Spirit, from man back to God. If God was “solitary” rather than “Trinitarian,” then we have no way of explaining Jesus origin from the Being of God. Neither do we have a way of explaining man’s union with God, for Jesus is the Way to the Triune God. (John 14:6-7; 16:13) Man would be left to his own devices, to superstition, and forsaken and lost without the Spirit who unifies us to the Father through the Son. But it’s God’s interconnected Triune Being, inhabiting eternity and flowing in outgoing Love, that moved God to create mankind, and chose to relate with humans as His children in Love, as He always has in His own Triune Being. Ultimately, man is to co-exist in His Trinitarian likeness for all eternity. (Gen.1:26-27)

Holy Trinity Icon.jpg

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

“Solitary” Vs “Triune”

If God was “solitary” in nature and not “Triune,” He would not be bothered about man. He would be inward and have lived well in solitude. But there is no such God. The God we know in Christ reveals Himself to us emphatically as, “God is Love.” Therefore He is relational and gregariously outgoing in His “Triunity.” (1 John 4:8) All of God’s creation reflects a God who is Triune, and His interconnected Trinitarian culture undergirds all of life. We see a universe and world that exist out of the pouring forth of Loving mercy rooted in God’s unified Being.

Trinitarian LOVE

In this post, I’ll expand on an aspect from my previous editorial about God’s Love more than we have ever realized or imagined. I hope it will help you appreciate more the intimate extension of God’s Loving hands in your life. His Love wraps and caresses all living things and man whom He has made in His likeness. In the divine Triunity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, God inhabits eternity in their Love for each another. Through Jesus, God extends and surrounds you in the same Love. In your journey like a true Bulamanriver,* with the Spirit joining you to the eternal Love-Being of God, you will come to the place whose only purpose is like Christ’s own purpose when He walked this earth, to owe no one anything but the debt of Love. (Rom.13:8; Acts 10:38)

Physical Gravity & Spiritual Gravity

Think of the force of gravity in our physical environment, as the counterpart to God’s Love as the gravitational energy in His spiritual environment (eternity). In other words, what gravity is to our physical realm, Love is to our spiritual environment. Naturally, all our acts in our physical environment has to compensate for our physical gravity. That is what happens as we grow up, we unconsciously adjust to the gravitational force until we live with it intuitively. We take gravity for granted. All our actions also answer to another, equally real gravitational force – the spiritual gravity of Love. We may not realize this, just as we’re not ‘aware’ of our physical gravity, but it does answer to, and affect all our actions – more real than we care to know or admit. Why, because the spiritual gravitational force of Love inhabits eternity, including man’s actions. Our physical gravity inhabits just our physical earthly sphere. God’s spiritual Love-gravity inhabits eternity and tells us how God has always been close to us, and has never left us, since creation. Since God is omniscient, He fills all of time and space, and His presence surrounds us as the air we breathe. (Psa.139:1-18; Job 33:4; John 20:22)

Implied Consequence

Everything, including man’s behavior has this implied gravitational consequence which connects with everything around him. That’s a Trinitarian principle. (See my earlier blog, titled, “The One-man Principle of Implied Consequence,” goto: http://bulamanriver.net/?p=1076). True to the proverb, ‘no man is an island’ we can’t get away from this interconnected Love of God which governs and undergirds all creation. When we are up on a high elevation, we instinctively look for something to hold onto, we dare not challenge gravity. We have this reflexive appreciation of what gravity is capable of doing to us. We can seriously injure ourselves in a fall. He Loves us beyond our knowing. And every evil act against Love, like defying the force of physical gravity bounces back, boomerang-like, to hurt us. By the same token, when we accept His Love, we live uplifitng and abundant lives. Love is the place of abundance and well-being.

This is identical to the spiritual gravity of Love, when evildoers break the spiritual Love-gravity it hurts them, just as surely as breaking physical gravity hurts anyone who disobeys it. We see this happening all over the world today before our very eyes. This spiritual gravity (Love) is real. It’s not a mere empty analogy. Everything we do is connected and carries implied and conditional (good or evil) consequences and their respective spin-off values. All the suffering, pain, sorrows, man’s inhumanity to man, we witness in the world today is the result of man defying the spiritual gravity of God’s Love which we all inhabit. If you like, we’re all inhabitants of God’s country called Love, and governed by its laws. The Bible calls this sphere God’s Kingdom, of which we are all citizens. (Phi.3:20; John 14:2) Evil is confined to this earth and nowhere else in the universe because of man’s fall to evil at the hands of the devil. (Gen.3) But more so Love, for Love exists in all of space and time and the universe, and is the spiritual gravitational force governing human relationships. Love is the Triune template of the Tri-Personal God in which all of life derives its existence.

The Difference

Here’s the difference, we don’t learn to live within Love’s spiritual gravity, as we do within our physical gravity, because the spiritual gravitational effect (Love) does not immediately penalize us like physical gravity. The Bible tells us this, “When evil people are not punished right away, (like physical gravity) it makes others want to do evil, too.” (Eccl.8:11, emphasis added) You see, all our acts are interrelated like God in His Triunity, is interconnected and ONE as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. On the physical level, we learn very quickly that we need a chair to break our fall when we sit, but we fail to equate breaking Love’s spiritual gravity with the same presence of mind and innate urgency. So, we’re frivolous when it comes to evil, let alone investigate its causal outcome. Thus, we suffer all its problematic consequences of living a vicious life in this meaningless bubble. (Eccl.1:2) Why, because man does not understand what Love truly IS. It is not defined by our “solitary” human narrative of it.

The only reality in life is God’s Triune Love, and everything else is fleeting. Evil, like a meaningless bubble, pops and disappears in God’s sphere of Love. His Love surrounds and caresses us, and all we have to do is embrace Him. (You can read more on this aspect of God’s Love in my Book, “Bula man-river – The Miracle of Triune Living. See the links above on how to obtain a copy).

File:Construction workers not wearing fall protection equipment.jpgGod’s Love is Real Like Physical Gravity Which Governs Human Relationships (Pic: Wiki Commons)

Understanding Love

Love is the spindle from which all of life rotates, and take its cue. We fail to understand this difference – if we are observant of what’s happening in the world around us, especially in human relations, we’ll see that this spiritual gravity is more real than the physical one. Both are real, both unseen. One is physical, the other is spiritual. Like physical gravity, Love is no respecter of persons. In a manner of speaking, you are your own judge. Your own actions, your heart, will be the judge of your life. That’s why people feel guilt when they do wrong, they have judged themselves. We ought not to judge anyone. (Matt.7:1-5) I judge no one, my calling, as it ought to be with every other human, is to owe no man anything except the debt of Love (Rom.13:8) On the other hand, placing blame on others does not work. To blame is like taking a fall due to your own misjudgment, then blaming someone pushed you over when there’s no one around but you. It’s all a question of understanding the reality of physical and spiritual gravity which govern our actions.

We Live in a Parallel Universe

If we don’t believe this parallel reality – our parallel physical/spiritual universe, if you like – it does not alter the fact it’s at work despite our opinion in the matter. It’s like insisting the world is flat, when our consciousness has yet to arrive at the reality of how our planet exist. We have come to survive ‘unawares’ in the universe of our physical gravity, why do we think it untenable we’re also living ‘unawares’ in our parallel spiritual gravity and universe. (You can read more on this aspect of God’s Love in my Book, “Bula man-river – The Miracle of Triune Living.” See the links above on how to obtain a copy).

Love Always Comes Through

But how can we Love as God does in His Triunity, when, in Adam we stand condemned in our fallen, depraved, state of being. The law says, “The one who sins is the one who shall die.” (Ezek. 18:20) All have sinned. (Rom.3:23) All will be called to give account of their lives before God. (Rom.14:12) And right here we see our magnificent God and Father who inhabits eternity in His Love, comes through for us. He cannot and will not leave man to his fate. Why, Because we are inhabiting His universe of Love. Because He is Love, and inhabits eternity in His Triune Being of Love. In His Love, He gives us His Son to atone for our evil and wicked ways, so we don’t have to stand condemned and judged. In place of our fallen and depraved state of being, He gives us Himself in the Spirit to live life in a Loving and abundant state of being. All our guilt is removed, and we’re given a new birth in His Love (Spirit) to lead and change us forever. (2 Cor.5:1-5)  “For God so Loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16) Eternal life will be given to any whose life will be composed of Love as God IS. This is how we learn to live like we owe each other nothing but the debt of Love in the Spirit’s power.

File:Love What is It.JPG

Our Human Narrative of Love is Not God’s Love (Wiki Commons)

Love Will Always Be A ‘Mind Thing’

God’s spiritual gravity, God’s Love, is only made effective through the process of the mind, human thoughts, thought forms, and decision-making and actions in good deeds. The Bible says, “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Eph.2:10). That’s the paramount difference between these two gravitational forces. One is innate, physical, and mindless. The other requires the mind and our decision-making process to live within Love’s gravitational force. What does that tell us? It tells us first and foremost, Love is the continuous exercise of the mind of God. God, as the Father, Son, and Spirit, are not androids who thoughtlessly live and behave like machines. They have minds, and they have eternally decided to be ONE in their Triunity, for “God is Love” (1 John 4:8). When God tells man “Owe no man anything except the debt to Love,” it is only by the continuous exercise of our minds can we live within Love’s gravity. (Rom.13:8, KJV) Love is a ‘mind thing.’ It’s in the human mind that the Spirit comes to us so we can be connected to His eternal Being of Love. (Rom.5:5) It is by and through the Spirit that we are guaranteed our adoption in eternity and God’s Loving presence. (Eph. 1:13-14; 2 Cor. 1:21-22) That is why, among all God’s creation, only humans have minds, because humans are made in God’s own image with the potential to inherit eternity in His Love.

At creation, God or Love ‘decided’ and said, “Let US make man in OUR image, after OUR likeness, and let them have dominion…” (Gen.1:26-27). THEY made us to have minds so we can Love as THEY do in THEIR Triunity. The Hebrew “Elohim” is God in the plural. He wants this so much for us that He said, “If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” (Luke 11:13). The Spirit is the divine deposit and God’s guarantee of man’s immortality in His eternal Kingdom of Love. If I were to surmise life in one word, it would be: life is all about making choices. Love is about making the choice to live within Love’s gravitational force and influence in the Spirit. It is an exercise of the mind which produces all things good. (1 Cor.13; Acts 10:38) We are told to embrace God and His Love in our minds and our thoughts. (2 Cor.10:5) Our earth is the only place in the universe where Love can be birthed, lived, and exercised, because humans are made with God’s mind with the capacity to Love. We can learn to make the choice to Love as God does in His Triunity. Sadly, evil too is birthed in the mind, but evil exists in a bubble under God’s sanction, which, in His divine purpose and time will be brought to nothing. Jesus made this plain in His parable of the weeds. ‘Weeds’ is metaphor for evil and sin will be removed forever according to God’s sovereignty and timetable. (Isa.45:7; Rev.21:1-7; Matt.13:24-30)

2012 Photo Contest - Landscape Category (7944730248).jpg

The Entire Creation and Life Is Sustained In His Love (Wiki Commons)

God Fills Eternity In His Love

You see, God fills all of existence in His Love, where there’s no room for evil to take hold, let alone exist. The devil wants us to think otherwise by getting more people to follow his evil ways and thereby obscure His Love. But evil can’t be sustained on an ongoing basis, for it has its own seed of self-destruction. God fills all time, space, and eternity in His Triune existence. That is why Jesus, in His eternal deity in the Triune Being of God, bore the fullness of our humanity in Himself, taking on His human form through Mary. He lived a perfect, sinless and Loving life for us, and in so doing, He embraced humanity’s eternity in Himself when He was crucified, resurrected, and ascended to heaven. He unified man in His divine/human Self with the Triune God for eternity in Love. To this very moment, Jesus continues to mediate on man’s behalf through His glorified humanity, for our eternal inheritance. Hence, we read Paul saying, “And I pray that you, being rooted and established in Love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the Love of Christ, and to know this Love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen! ” (Eph.3:18-21, emphasis added).

Yes, this Love, in all its height, depth, length and breadth, expresses God’s fullness which encompasses all of life and eternity where no evil can enter. (Rev.21:8) “Yours, Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, Lord, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all” (1 Chron.29:11). This tells us simply that God inhabits all of space and time (eternity) in His Love. The prophet Daniel speaks of man’s eternal future in God’s presence in this way, “Those who are wise will shine as bright as the sky, and those who lead many to righteousness will shine like the stars forever (eternity)” (Dan.12:3). Yes, God created mankind to be His very children He can Love into eternity.

I hope you have found this post helpful. My sincerest wish is that we can come to see God who encompasses eternity in His holy Love and goodness, is the very essence of Himself with which He seeks and desires to embrace humanity and all creation. With that end in mind, let us never cease to be grateful in our hearts for the Father, Jesus, and the Spirit, ONE God, who is constantly at work in us, and will never leave or fail us in Their Love.

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 my next post, may the blessing of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you today and give you strength for authentic Triune living as a Bula man-river.* I Love you all in the only way I know best and how – by the Love of Christ, who died and saved me, and now eternally flows in me through the power of the Spirit as the Bula man-river.*

Kiang                                                                                                                                                          (Your Servant in Christ) 

* The “Bula man-river” 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 Bula man-river, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book. Thank you for your support.

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

Note: Any information obtained from this website that is used for publication should be acknowledged by citing the website address, date of acquisition and information pertinent to original authorship. For general guidelines regarding web citations see The Guide for Citing Electronic Information .

EVIL AND LIES, LOVE AND TRUTH, IN THE WORLD – BY KIANG P LEE

Greetings once more, Friends everywhere!

I sincerely hope my last post have made clear the meaning of the metaphor I use in the title of my Book, “Bula man-river.” I also hope you can see yourself as an authentic Christian believer through the union you have with the Triune God, which, as a Bula man-river, is the very ground where you make your stand in life.

In this post, I hope to answer the question of good and evil in the world, how they affect us personally, and our understanding of them. It is my hope we will come to see that God, who encompasses eternity in His holy Love and goodness, is the very essence of Himself with which He desires to embrace humanity and all creation. With that end in mind, let’s begin. Think about this quote which a mother gave her incarcerated son,

                “A lie will die, but truth never dies, but lives forever”

Spoken glibly you might say, but its far-reaching hands extends out to touch us all without fail. A lie has its beginning in evil, while truth is centered in Love. Evil doers are living a lie that will die, while those who live by Love will shine as the stars in the heavens for all eternity. The antithesis of Love is evil. This tells us that knowledge can be categorized into two broad way of life – Love and evil! The knowledge that emanates from Love is eternal, while knowledge which stems from evil is temporary and will die. Man is given a mind with the abilities to choose which way to follow. The Bible tells us God is Love and Truth. (1 John 4:8; John 14:6) The Bible also tells us that Satan is the father of lies and evil. (John 8:44) God inhabits eternity with His Love. Therefore, Love is eternal. Evil is based upon lies that cannot be sustained in a world dominated by God’s Love. Love and truth are God’s signatures of eternity. Love inhabits eternity, as does Truth.

File:Love What is It.JPGGod is Love, and Love is God – 1 John 4:8 (Wiki Commons)

Living the Way of Love, or the Way of Evil

If Love inhabits all of time and space eternally, then evil exists in a vacuum. Like a bubble with a lease on ‘life,’ it pops and is gone forever. Solomon said it this way. It is temporary and cannot be sustained on an ongoing basis. “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.” (Eccl.1:2) Another translation this passage saying, “Utterly meaningless, all is meaningless.” A life without meaning is a lie, and becomes a passing, fleeting experience, which has no correlation with the eternity God inhabits. Solomon goes on to say, “There is no remembrance of former things…” (Eccl.1:11) Every vain, meaningless (evil) act is a bubble which has no real life. All things that people pursue in life can either exist in this meaningless bubble, or it lives in God’s eternal Loving purpose which expands forever into eternity. Evil will not exist as a viable option in God’s eternal Love environment. All lies evaporate and perish in the prism of Love’s eternal life-force.  So we read Solomon’s answer to his search for meaning in life, “Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter: fear God and keep His commandments. For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil” (Eccl.12:13-14). All who live by Love are living the truth which brings the element of eternity to his or her actions and behavior.

Love

If these two ways are so contrasting with eternally far-reaching consequences, it behooves us to take a closer look and consider their origin, and how they affect us day-to-day, so we can be secure in His Love eternally. It makes us aware that all knowledge can be separated into two categories, and we are forced to make a choice as to which way to follow. Whether intentional or unintentional, they influence our choices in life. What is Love, what is its beginning? The Bible says, “God is Love” (1John 4:8). God has eternally existed in Love. So Love, read it as a noun and verb, has no beginning. Love has always been there, when nothing else was. It has eternally existed for “God is Love.” On the other hand evil and fear has a beginning, as we shall see later. Love is relational. Therefore we see God reveals Himself as Triune in these Bible passages: Matthew 28:19; John 14:26; 15:26; 2 Corinthians 13:14; 1 Peter 1:2. The reason God is Love is because He is Triune, and He is Triune because He is Love. He is relational in His Triunity, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God is ONE, but He is not “solitary,” He is “Trinitarian.” Triune means to live in interdependent Love. God is not made of Love, He IS Love. God is eternally ONE in His Triunity, therefore, in their Triune Love, they inhabit eternity. This is vital for our “solitary” human understanding – Love inhabits eternity, because the Three Persons of the Trinity, have always existed in their nature of Love. This is not our human narrative of love that’s conjured in our “solitary,” self-absorbed, expression man inherited from the devil.

Evil

How did evil come about?  How did it originate? We have established God is eternal and fills all eternity with His divine Love. So anything that exists in antithesis to Love has to have a beginning, and is temporal and fleeting in nature. Nothing will challenge the all-embracing God who fills all things seen and unseen. The Bible tells us that evil started with angelic beings. Angels are created beings, like humans, only made and composed of spirit. Some have become fallen angels, and led man away with them. From this, we realize anything that proceeds from things created, including angels and man, without the seed of Love, are temporal and will come to an end and cease to exist. The things that will abide are those that align with God’s Love, for the very fabric of all life is Love or God. That is why Jesus Christ is the only pathway to eternity. Only Jesus, who Himself is God with the Father and the Spirit, who is Love, can take man to the eternal end from which He Himself originate as God. So Paul affirms this wonderful truth with these short but telling words, “We are complete in Him, who is the Head of all principality and power” (Col.2:10).

Lucifer

The Bible tells us that all evil started with the archangel Lucifer. So we see evil has a beginning, Love does not. Love (God) has always existed from eternity, and fills all eternity. Love is the foundation of all life and existence. When we understand this concept that true life can only come from the Divine Triune Love, we will understand that everything that stands hostile to Love is temporary and carries the seed of self-destruction and will die like all things that’s has a beginning.  Lucifer was created in Love by God. The meaning of his name tells us a lot about God and His Love: Lucifer means, “morning star” and “bringer of dawn” (light). (wikipedia.com) So, he was made an archangel of light to reflect God and His Love. Then at some point in time, for reasons known only to him, he opposed all God stood for, and said, “I will ascend to the tops of the clouds. I will ascend to the heavens. I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly.” (Isa.14:12-14, emphasis throughout). If Lucifer can’t live in harmony with God as the other holy angels, then the only other way is to live in conflict with God and His Love, which is the way of fear and evil!

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Lucifer fallen Morning Star from Milton’s Paradise Lost (Wiki Commons)

How can anyone displace, what for eternity, has been the essence of life and the bulwark for all goodness inhabiting and filling all eternity in God (Love)? Lucifer, somehow, became blinded to this Truth. So, here we find the birthplace of evil with the seed of its own death and destruction implanted in it. It is now inflicted upon man by the devil’s deception of Adam in Eden. (Gen.3) The light of God’s Love in Lucifer went out, and darkness (evil) filled the void. Lucifer brought darkness to mankind. God changed his name from Lucifer to Satan, which means “adversary.” Satan became the author of the “solitary” life in opposition to God’s “Trinitarian” life. The “solitary” life has its underpinning in fear and evil, not Love and interdependence (Triune). As the adversary of God, he promotes the “solitary” life in man, and channeling his spirit of evil, rebellion and strife, greed and avarice, distrust and fear, self-centeredness and jealousy, resulting in lack and broken dreams, depression and heartaches, sorrows, and ultimately, death. 

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Adam & Eve Tempted by Devil To Follow Human Self-Determination of “Good and Evil”/Right and Wrong (Wiki Commons)

Holy Angels

With the fallen angels, there are innumerably more good angels who have remained faithful to God and His purpose in man. They exist as holy angels within the realm of God’s Love. They come to our aid as God’s servants to help and protect us from fallen angels who have become demons. Jesus said,“I tell you, whoever publicly acknowledges me before others, the Son of Man will also acknowledge before the angels of God. But whoever disowns me before others will be disowned before the angels of God” (Luke 12:8-9). As humans and believers, we need not be afraid, for we all have guardian angels over us. In my Book, I give an account of angelic protection that save me, my wife, and two friends, from certain death. They are the most powerful bodyguards, and not for sale, yet priceless.

All Will Be Called to Account

Evil exists because the adversary of God continues to oppose all His Ways of Love and Truth. Evil derives its life from fallen angels who tremble before God because of the certain judgment to come against them and their evil deeds. (James 2:19) All who follow their evil ways will be brought before God’s judgment seat where they will be called to give account. Jesus made us understand why God allows evil in the world in the parable of the weed, where in the end, evil will once and for all be expunged and destroyed forever. (Matt.13:24-30) So, in this parable we see that even though evil exist, it does so at God’s (Love) sovereign will. When we read the following, “I form the light (Love) and create darkness (evil), I bring prosperity (Love) and create disaster (evil); I, the LORD, do all these things” (Isa.45:7, emphasis added), it must be seen in the context of God who inhabits eternity, and in that context, allows all to happen according to His sovereign, Loving purpose.The only place in the universe where evil is confined is upon our earth. (Jude 6) Good and evil proves the existence of God and the devil. It is because of His Love for mankind that He has shown the patience against the enemy, so man can come to and see the light of His Love and change from the dark ways of the enemy, and instead follow His Son. (2 Pet.3:9; 1 Pet.3:19-20) All this is happening in the wake of the holy angels who come to our side to help lead us to God.

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Gravity is Real as God’s Love is Real (Wiki Commons)

Physical Gravity

This is not some goofy ‘religious’ stuff – it bears scientific relevance. Sometimes we think science and God are opposing factions, when it is one and the same. All of creation and the universe reflect God’s interconnected Trinitarain Being. The obvious conundrum seems to be that man cannot help explore things except from his “solitary” tunnel-vision perspective which he inherited from the devil. And the universe continues to endure on God’s Trinitarian, interrelated and unified, impetus. Man has to be reborn and see all things from God’s Trinitarian perspective – the Way He has created everything. (John 3:3) Let me clarify God’s Love by a true and life-like analogy. Think of the force of gravity in our physical environment, as the counterpart to God’s Love as the gravitational energy in His spiritual environment (eternity). In other words, what gravity is to our physical environment, Love is to our spiritual environment.

Spiritual Gravity

Naturally, all our acts in our physical environment has to compensate for our physical gravity. That is what happens as we grow up, we unconsciously correct ourselves to the gravitational force until we live with it intuitively. We take gravity for granted. All our actions also answer to another, equally real gravitational force – the spiritual gravity of Love. We may not realize this, but it does answer to, and affect all our actions more real than we care to know or admit. Why, because the spiritual gravitational force of Love inhabits eternity, including man’s actions. Everything, including man’s behavior has this implied consequence which connects with everything around him. True to the proverb, ‘no man is an island’ we can’t get away from this interconnected Love of God which governs all creation. And every evil act against Love, like defying the force of physical gravity, bounces back to hurt us. When we are up on a high elevation, we instinctively look for something to hold onto, we dare not challenge gravity. We’re aware of what gravity is capable of doing to us. We can seriously hurt ourselves in a fall, and probably get ourselves killed.

This is identical to the spiritual gravity of Love, when evildoers break the spiritual Love gravity it hurts them, just as surely as breaking physical gravity hurts anyone who disobeys it. We see this happening all over the world today before our very eyes. This spiritual gravity is real. It’s not merely an empty analogy. Everything in the created universe is connected and carries implied and conditional (good or evil) consequences and respective spinoff values. All the suffering, pain, sorrows, man’s inhumanity to man, we witness in the world today is the result of man defying the spiritual gravity of God’s Love which we all inhabit. Evil is confined to this earth and nowhere else in the universe. But more so Love, for Love exists in all of space and time and the universe, and is the spiritual gravitational force governing human relationships.

The Difference

Here’s the difference, we don’t learn to live within Love’s spiritual gravity, as we do within our physical gravity, because the spiritual gravitational effect (Love) does not immediately penalize us like the physical one. The Bible tells us this, “When evil people are not punished right away, (like physical gravity) it makes others want to do evil, too.” (Eccl.8:11, emphasis added) On the physical level, we learn very quickly that we need a chair to break our fall when we sit, but we fail to equate breaking Love’s spiritual gravity with the same presence of mind and innate urgency. So, we’re frivolous when it comes to evil, let alone investigate it. Thus, we suffer all its problematic consequences, living life in a bubble. Why, because man does not understand what Love truly IS. It is not defined by our “solitary” human narrative of it. The only reality in life is God’s Triune Love, and everything else is fleeting, and like a bubble, pops and disappears.

Understanding Love

Love is the spindle from which all of life rotates, and take its cue. We don’t understand this difference – if we are observant of what’s happening in the world around us, especially in human relations, we’ll see that the spiritual gravity is more real than the physical one. Both are real, both unseen. One is physical, the other is spiritual. Like physical gravity, Love is no respecter of persons. In a manner of speaking, you are your own judge. Your own actions, your heart, will be the judge of your life. That’s why people feel guilt when they do wrong, they have judged themselves. We ought not to judge anyone. (Matt.7:1-5) I judge no one, my calling, as it ought to be with every other human, is to owe no man anything except the debt of Love (Rom.13:8) But how can we Love when in Adam we stand condemned in our depraved, fallen state of being. The law says, “The one who sins is the one who shall die.” (Ezek. 18:20) All have sinned. (Rom.3:23) All will be called to give account of their lives before God. (Rom.14:12)

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The Good Samaritan Love – Luke 10:25-37 (Wiki Commons)

Love Always Come Through

And right here, we see our magnificent God and Father who inhabits eternity in His Love, come through for us. He cannot and will not leave man to his fate. Why, because He is Love, and inhabits eternity in His Triune Being of Love. In His Love, He gives us His Son to atone for our evil and wicked ways, so we don’t have to stand condemned and judged. We can have all our guilt removed, and be given a new birth in His Love (Spirit) to lead and change us forever. (2 Cor.5:1-5)  “For God so Loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16) Eternal life will be given to any whose life will be composed of Love as God IS. This is how we learn to live like we owe each other nothing but the debt of Love in the Spirit’s power.

Love Will Always Be A ‘Mind Thing’

God’s spiritual gravity, God’s Love, is only made effective through the process of the mind, human thoughts, thought forms, and decision-making. That’s the paramount difference between these two gravitational forces. One is innate, physical, and mindless. The other requires the mind and our decision-making process to live within Love’s gravitational force. What does that tell us? It tells us first and foremost, Love is the continuous exercise of the mind of God. God, as the Father, Son, and Spirit, are not androids that thoughtlessly live and behave like machines. They have minds, and they have eternally decided to be ONE, for God is Love. (1 John 4:8) When God tells man “Owe no man anything except the debt to Love,” it is the exercise of our minds. (Rom.13:8, KJV) Love is a ‘mind thing.’ It’s in the human mind that the Spirit comes to us so we can be connected to His eternal Being of Love. (Rom.5:5) That is why, among all God’s creation, only humans have minds, because humans are made in God’s own image.

At creation, God or Love ‘decided’ and said, “Let US make man in OUR image, after OUR likeness, and let them have dominion…” (Gen.1:26-27). He made us to have minds so we can Love as He does in His Triunity. If I were to surmise life in one word, it would be: life is all about making choices. Love is about making choices with our minds. We are always making choices within the gravitational force of Love in the Spirit. It is an exercise of the mind which produces all things good. (1 Cor.13) Our earth is the only place in the universe where Love can be birthed, lived, and exercised, because humans are made with God’s mind capable of Loving. We can learn to make a choice to Love as God does. Sadly, evil too is birthed in the mind, but as we saw, it exists in a bubble under God’s sanction, which, in His divine purpose and time will be brought to nothing. (Isa.45:7; Rev.21:1-7)

The Second Adam – Jesus

When Adam came on the scene in Eden, Satan deceived and convinced him to follow his evil ways which has since brought suffering, deprivation, pain and death upon mankind. (Gen.3) But because God inhabits eternity in His sovereign eternal Love, He was left with no option but to respond in His Love, answering this evil perpetrated upon man, by spontaneously promising from the beginning, to send the second Adam, His Son. Jesus would come, and have come, as mankind’s Savior to bring man out of the jaws of evil and death, and put him back on the path to Love and immortality. (1Cor.15:45) The second Adam, Jesus, the Son of God, was the only human who bore the full expression of God’s Love and the only human qualified to bring man back to God’s habitation of Love and eternity.

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Jesus, the Second Adam, Depicted With Disciples at Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci (Wiki Commons)

You see, God fills all of existence in His Love, where there’s no room for evil to take hold, let alone exist. God fills all time and space as we know it in His Triune existence. That is why Jesus, in His eternal deity in the Triune Being of God, bore the fullness of our humanity in Himself, taking on His human form through Mary, and lived a perfect, sinless and Loving life for us. In so doing, He embraced humanity’s eternity in Himself when He was crucified, resurrected, and ascended. He unified man in His divine/human Self with the Triune God for eternity in Love. Hence, we read Paul said this, “And I pray that you, being rooted and established in Love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the Love of Christ, and to know this Love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen! ” (Eph.3:18-21, emphasis added).

Yes, this Love, in all its height, depth, length and breadth, expresses God’s fullness which encompasses all of life and eternity where no evil can exist. “Yours, Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, Lord, is the kingdom; you are exalted as head over all” (1 Chron.29:11). This tells us simply that God inhabits all of space and time (eternity) in His Love. The prophet Daniel speaks of man’s eternal future in God presence in this way, “Those who are wise will shine as bright as the sky, and those who lead many to righteousness will shine like the stars forever (eternity)” (Dan.12:3). Yes, God created mankind to be His very children He can Love into eternity. I hope you have found this post helpful, and adds a little to make your faith even more faithful.

Blessing

Until my next post, may the blessing of the God who ceaselessly expresses Himself in His dependable Triune Love, be with you today and give you strength for authentic Triune living as a Bula man-river.*

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

Kiang                                                                                                                                                          (Your Servant in Christ)

* The “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 Bula man-river, go to my website www.bulamanriver.com where you can order a copy of my Book. Remember, when you purchase my book all the proceeds go towards Jesus Christ’s work of dispensing the Gospel. Thank you for your support.

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

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