Let Him Go On

If we let Him go on like this, all men will believe in Him.... (John 11:48)

How very interesting. Out of the mouth of unbelievers God elicits truth at times.

These men who were so hardening their hearts against the strongest evidences of the beauty of God's character were confessing that the words and actions of Jesus were exerting an overwhelming influence to draw people to Himself with love and compassion. They even seemed to imply that if He were not resisted and prevented from continuing His activities that even they might succumb to His drawing and come to believe in Him. They felt that their only choice – if they did not want to end up believing themselves – was to take decisive action to silence His voice before it was too late.

This is a classic example of what is termed the unpardonable sin. In actuality there is no sin that God cannot forgive; but a person who finally is able to silence the voice of God in their hearts by destroying their own capacity to respond to Him removes all ability for repentance. After destroying their own capacity to ever want to believe in the goodness of God as Jesus presented it, a person then feels free to believe whatever they want about Him and they ultimately fall hopelessly into the deceptions of Satan, immersed in what they have chosen to embrace permanently.

But what inspires me in these words from some of Jesus' fiercest opponents is the fact that if I choose to let Jesus go on like this that I can finally come into fuller belief myself. I have spent years searching for real belief – saving faith as it is sometimes called. I determined some time ago to understand this phrase, not just to be able to make logical sense of what it actually means but far more importantly to enter into it fully with my whole heart. That is the reason I am immersing myself in these accounts about Jesus recorded in the book of John, and now I am seeing it better from a most unusual place.

I remember many years ago hearing a quotation that puzzled me a great deal. It was something about 'drawing warmth from the coldness of others'. I often reflected on what this might mean since it seemed to be such an oxymoron. Now I see again how it might apply from this verse. From the coldness of these men's hearts emerges a truth that can actually warm my own heart, the fact that I can choose the opposite of what they chose to do, to let Jesus continue His work of grace in my own life, to let Him go on like He has been doing so that belief can take even deeper root in my own soul.

How exciting to realize that all I need to do is to keep letting Jesus do what Jesus wants to do in order to increase faith and see more people believe on Him along with me. Instead of fighting against the quiet promptings of the Holy Spirit within, I can choose to let Him continue by agreeing with Him and letting Him reshape me into His image. I tried very hard for many years to reform my own life into conformity to God's laws but all of those attempts ended in failure. But the problem was not with the law of God for that is simply a description of what God is like. The problem was in understanding that it is not through trying that one is transformed but through the renewing of the mind. And that can only happen by letting Jesus continue to do what He wants to do within me.

Will the world around me come to a crisis like these men suggested if I allow Jesus to go on like this? Well, their assumptions of the outcome may or may not have been accurate, but the real isue was their fear of losing control. They wanted to stay in charge of not only their own lives and destiny but of everyone around them as well. They accurately perceived that if Jesus continued to draw all men unto Himself that reality as they knew it would collapse and they were unwilling to allow that to continue.

But again, I see good news in these words, for I see that evil men resistant of God's drawing love will not always be able to suppress the glory and goodness of God from accomplishing its intended purpose of drawing all to Him. While all will not ultimately come to Him, it is impossible to prevent God from drawing us. Only by steeling the heart and making it impregnable through repeated rejections of His love and beauty can one finally remove themselves from the power of His drawing. But no one will ever be able to stop the inexorable power of the love which never ends, the fire which can never be extinguished any more than they can destroy gravity. Sooner or later the fire of God's passion will either cleanse a person of sin from within or it will consume the person totally because of their choice to cling to sin in preference to clinging to God.

I read in the end of the Bible that Babylon finally falls never to come into power again. My church prides itself in proclaiming this message of a fallen Babylon, yet I fear that many who preach this still do not really grasp the significance of what it means. Babylon represents the counterfeit systems of beliefs about God that infiltrates what all of us have been raised to believe about Him. All of us have been infected to some extent or another by lies about God that cause us to malfunction and to be afraid of Him. This is Satan's studied purpose, to keep fear and confusion about God in our hearts while maintaining that we have the truth and have no need of challenging our own ideas.

God declares that in the end of time Babylon will finally completely fall. That tells me that the false system based on lies about God that has so effectively and repeatedly silenced the voice of God and His activities in so many hearts cannot accomplish its goal of silencing Him completely. When it all comes out in the wash it will be seen that love ultimately cannot be suppressed but will always come out on top. It is those who determine to prevent Jesus from drawing everyone to Himself that will be seen to be fools as the complex labyrinth of false ideas about God finally collapse under the light of the glorious truth about Him that will finally fill the whole earth. (Revelation 18:1-5)

Because God is so good and is fiercely protective of our freedom to choose for ourselves which power will dominate our lives, He allows each one to decide how we will respond to His drawing love for our affections. Many choose to silence His drawing and seek to prevent others from responding like these men chose to do. But love itself cannot be stopped anymore than gravity can be eliminated. Sooner or later gravity will bring things back to earth unless they go so far away that they are captured by another gravity of their choosing.

I see in these words an invitation by God to let Him go on as He has been doing and allow Him to draw me through the attraction of His glory into an intimate relationship of passion and thus to be transformed by His grace and love and peace as I continue to choose to give Him access to my own heart. I can learn from the tragic choice of these men that there is a better way to live. I am encouraged and reminded that I can make a different choice than they did and can ask God to keep on doing what He longs to do within me, drawing me to His heart and awakening responsive love deep in my soul as His acts of love and mercy change me and transform me.

Jesus, I choose right now to let You go on like this so that not only I but many around me will come to believe in You so the kingdom of fear will finally collapse. Fill me with Your presence today and replace my desires with Your plans and Your disposition and Your character. Do this for Your name's sake, Amen.