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JS: Did you notice that we got more responses from our last column than the previous ones? It goes to show you that when you start talking about who's in charge, things get pretty tense. Maybe we can stir things up just as thoroughly if we take the headship discussion to the next highest level and address the "In Christ" idea--the biblical teaching that believers are "in Christ" ... . As you know, some claim the Bible teaches that, not just believers are in Christ, but the whole world. Some disagree. What's your understanding of the issue?

LK: I've really been blessed by the "in Christ" idea, which to me means that everything Christ experienced in His life, death and resurrection, He experienced in behalf of the whole human race. Taking His place as the new Head of humanity, He swept everyone into His train as He lived a perfect life, executed judgment upon our sin in Himself, and ascended to heaven to advocate in our behalf. He carries us upon His heart and in His mind, and continually ministers life and blessing out of Himself to everyone, regardless of their personal orientation toward Him. (Sorry to get so wordy, but the subject inspires me.) Realizing all that gave me a sense of security and assurance I'd never known before.

JS: Wordiness is excusable on a subject of such colossal proportions and monumental implications :) And I affirm all you've said here. When I mentioned the disagreements over the "in Christ" idea, I was reacting to something I read recently. I must say, it made the issue very neat and concise, but I think at the expense of comprehensiveness. It said that believers are "in Christ," nonbelievers are not, period. As with so many theological ideas, it sounded logical until I compared it with scripture--in this case 1 Corinthians 15:22, which says, "For as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive." You and I know that every person, believer or nonbeliever, will be resurrected--Jesus Himself said so (John 5:27-29). It appears from the verse I quoted that this resurrection comes because of Christ's headship of the entire human race. (There's that headship thing again. . ... ....)

LK: I appreciate the way it's explained in the book, The Great Controversy: "Through the provisions of the plan of salvation, all are to be brought forth from their graves...But a distinction is made between the two classes that are brought forth."1 So there are both universal and individual ramifications to the plan of salvation. All of humanity is universally comprehended in what Christ did on the cross, "because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died,"2 in the sense that all have been placed under Christ's redemptive headship (2 Corinthians 5:14). But only those who receive Christ and personally identify with Him are "in Him" experientially, or "by faith." Is that how you see it?

JS: I can't help but see it. There is some sense in which all human beings are "in Christ," simply because they live because Jesus died for them. If Paul wasn't afraid to use that phrase to describe the universal effect of the cross, then neither will I be. On Mars Hill he preached, "In Him we live and move and exist" (Acts 17:28). Even our earthly existence is a gift from God, bestowed out of the riches of His grace to the undeserving. In every unmerited breath we take, we see a metaphor of the gift of eternal life, immortal existence, which is ours if we only receive Jesus. When we welcome Him into our hearts and lives, we are then fully "in Christ" in the eternally-saving sense. I like to say it this way: We live now because of God's choice. We will live in eternity because of our choice to respond to God's choice.

LK: I appreciate that very much, Jen; it's very well said. And while we can never fathom the mystery of exactly how the whole world is in Christ, I'd like to share some ideas that have been helpful to me. First, I don't see any indication in scripture that we were somehow supernaturally "put into" Him at His conception or at any time during His life. I see rather that, as God, He brought His connection with us into His human existence. And as a human, He actually became one with us by stepping into the stream of our fallen humanity and genetically linking Himself to us; He experientially became one with us by identifying with our joys, our sorrows, even our guilt; He representatively became one with us by substituting His obedient life for our failed experiments with sin, dying the equivalent of our eternal death, and "bearing our human form before the Father's throne."3 He has won salvation for everyone who's ever lived; now He seeks to win our disaffected hearts, one heart at a time.

JS: Nobody says it better than you, Leslie. I appreciate your caution not to make "in Christ" some mystical transmigration of one soul into another, but rather a reality that jibes perfectly with the biblical doctrine of substitution. In fact, one of the principle dictionary definitions of "represent" is "to take the place of." The phraseology that the Word of God uses to describe the universal effect of the cross is "for." Jesus died "for us," which means "in behalf of"4 us. It's not quite that He died instead of us, because "instead" demands no qualification on the part of the substitute. It's also not quite that He died as us, because Jesus trod the winepress alone, a solitary Sin-Bearer, enduring what we never could. Having said that, I accept either of these expressions as a partial truth, but I find the most balanced and complete word to be "for." And that's the Word the Bible uses most often. How about that?

LK: Sounds great to me--I'm all "for" it. It's a beautiful truth that never fails to comfort and inspire me. Now if I could just talk some sense into you about this women's ordination issue. It escapes me how a sensible person like you can resist the gravitational pull of my compellingly flawless reasoning. Maybe I should resort to more compelling methods. I know--repeat after me: "Women's ordination, not subordination...women's ordination, not subordination..." Are your eyelids getting heavy yet?

JS: In fact, I had several readers encourage me to do what I could to straighten you out on the issue of women's role. But I knew it was hopeless. Contrary to your gentle temperament and slender frame, you are a very strong woman. To be fair to you, though, I didn't agree with the reasons these people gave. One person (perhaps impulsively) said women were more impulsive. One mentioned that the majority of witches are women--he must have forgotten that the majority of murderers, tyrants, dictators and despots are men. And the list goes on...

LK: I could comment, but I'll step out of character and behave myself. I'll conclude with something I think we can all agree on. While this thought from the book Women in Ministry describes the purpose of husband servant-headship, I think it favorably compares with Christ's servant-headship over the world and the church: "The husband's 'rule' over his wife, even though it grows out of the results of sin, may be regarded as a blessing in preserving the harmony and union of the relationship...This is not to be a 'rule' of tyrannous power, but a servant leadership of protection, care, and love...[it is] a positive blessing designed to lead back as much as possible to the original plan of harmony and union between equal partners."5 Similarly, Christ's redemptive headship over the world is an agape-inspired servant leadership that continually reaches down to fallen humanity, that we may be lifted back up into harmony and union with Him. The One in whom we all "live and move and have our being" hopes we'll recognize Him as the "husband" who has always cared for and loved us.

Now I've gone and waxed wordy again. I'd better sign off. Better put some rocks in your skinny little pockets so you don't get blown away in the Windy City.

JS: Fewer rocks than you would have to carry, but since the wind is already screaming here in Philly at 6:30 AM, I can only imagine Chicago. By the way, my (earthly) husband is driving me to the airport this morning because of the wind storm, thereby saving me from the vicissitudes of long-term parking, shuttle, etc. Isn't he the servant-leader you just described? And isn't servant leadership the witness the world is crying out for, that they might understand that infinite power is constrained by infinite love?

LK: You'd better hang onto Mike pretty tight, Jen, or someone might try to grab him. Now don't say anything else or I'll start theologizing again. You know how compulsive I am. See you, Jenpen.

JS: Yes, compulsively intelligent and interminably curious. Make sure that when you finally reform your ideas about women's ordination, you leave those things intact. Bye-bye, Miss American Feminist Pie.

______________________________________________


Speaking of Headship... JS: Did you notice that we got more responses from our last column than the previous ones? It goes to show you that when you start talking about who's in charge, things get pretty tense. Maybe we can stir things up just as thoroughly if we take the headship discussion to the next highest level and address the "In Christ" idea--the biblical teaching that believers are "in Christ" ... . As you know, some claim the Bible teaches that, not just believers are in Christ, but the whole world. Some disagree. What's your understanding of the issue? LK: I've really been blessed by the "in Christ" idea, which to me means that everything Christ experienced in His life, death and resurrection, He experienced in behalf of the whole human race. Taking His place as the new Head of humanity, He swept everyone into His train as He lived a perfect life, executed judgment upon our sin in Himself, and ascended to heaven to advocate in our behalf. He carries us upon His heart and in His mind, and continually ministers life and blessing out of Himself to everyone, regardless of their personal orientation toward Him. (Sorry to get so wordy, but the subject inspires me.) Realizing all that gave me a sense of security and assurance I'd never known before. JS: Wordiness is excusable on a subject of such colossal proportions and monumental implications :) And I affirm all you've said here. When I mentioned the disagreements over the "in Christ" idea, I was reacting to something I read recently. I must say, it made the issue very neat and concise, but I think at the expense of comprehensiveness. It said that believers are "in Christ," nonbelievers are not, period. As with so many theological ideas, it sounded logical until I compared it with scripture--in this case 1 Corinthians 15:22, which says, "For as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive." You and I know that every person, believer or nonbeliever, will be resurrected--Jesus Himself said so (John 5:27-29). It appears from the verse I quoted that this resurrection comes because of Christ's headship of the entire human race. (There's that headship thing again. . ... ....) LK: I appreciate the way it's explained in the book, The Great Controversy: "Through the provisions of the plan of salvation, all are to be brought forth from their graves...But a distinction is made between the two classes that are brought forth."1 So there are both universal and individual ramifications to the plan of salvation. All of humanity is universally comprehended in what Christ did on the cross, "because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died,"2 in the sense that all have been placed under Christ's redemptive headship (2 Corinthians 5:14). But only those who receive Christ and personally identify with Him are "in Him" experientially, or "by faith." Is that how you see it? JS: I can't help but see it. There is some sense in which all human beings are "in Christ," simply because they live because Jesus died for them. If Paul wasn't afraid to use that phrase to describe the universal effect of the cross, then neither will I be. On Mars Hill he preached, "In Him we live and move and exist" (Acts 17:28). Even our earthly existence is a gift from God, bestowed out of the riches of His grace to the undeserving. In every unmerited breath we take, we see a metaphor of the gift of eternal life, immortal existence, which is ours if we only receive Jesus. When we welcome Him into our hearts and lives, we are then fully "in Christ" in the eternally-saving sense. I like to say it this way: We live now because of God's choice. We will live in eternity because of our choice to respond to God's choice. LK: I appreciate that very much, Jen; it's very well said. And while we can never fathom the mystery of exactly how the whole world is in Christ, I'd like to share some ideas that have been helpful to me. First, I don't see any indication in scripture that we were somehow supernaturally "put into" Him at His conception or at any time during His life. I see rather that, as God, He brought His connection with us into His human existence. And as a human, He actually became one with us by stepping into the stream of our fallen humanity and genetically linking Himself to us; He experientially became one with us by identifying with our joys, our sorrows, even our guilt; He representatively became one with us by substituting His obedient life for our failed experiments with sin, dying the equivalent of our eternal death, and "bearing our human form before the Father's throne."3 He has won salvation for everyone who's ever lived; now He seeks to win our disaffected hearts, one heart at a time. JS: Nobody says it better than you, Leslie. I appreciate your caution not to make "in Christ" some mystical transmigration of one soul into another, but rather a reality that jibes perfectly with the biblical doctrine of substitution. In fact, one of the principle dictionary definitions of "represent" is "to take the place of." The phraseology that the Word of God uses to describe the universal effect of the cross is "for." Jesus died "for us," which means "in behalf of"4 us. It's not quite that He died instead of us, because "instead" demands no qualification on the part of the substitute. It's also not quite that He died as us, because Jesus trod the winepress alone, a solitary Sin-Bearer, enduring what we never could. Having said that, I accept either of these expressions as a partial truth, but I find the most balanced and complete word to be "for." And that's the Word the Bible uses most often. How about that? LK: Sounds great to me--I'm all "for" it. It's a beautiful truth that never fails to comfort and inspire me. Now if I could just talk some sense into you about this women's ordination issue. It escapes me how a sensible person like you can resist the gravitational pull of my compellingly flawless reasoning. Maybe I should resort to more compelling methods. I know--repeat after me: "Women's ordination, not subordination...women's ordination, not subordination..." Are your eyelids getting heavy yet? JS: In fact, I had several readers encourage me to do what I could to straighten you out on the issue of women's role. But I knew it was hopeless. Contrary to your gentle temperament and slender frame, you are a very strong woman. To be fair to you, though, I didn't agree with the reasons these people gave. One person (perhaps impulsively) said women were more impulsive. One mentioned that the majority of witches are women--he must have forgotten that the majority of murderers, tyrants, dictators and despots are men. And the list goes on... LK: I could comment, but I'll step out of character and behave myself. I'll conclude with something I think we can all agree on. While this thought from the book Women in Ministry describes the purpose of husband servant-headship, I think it favorably compares with Christ's servant-headship over the world and the church: "The husband's 'rule' over his wife, even though it grows out of the results of sin, may be regarded as a blessing in preserving the harmony and union of the relationship...This is not to be a 'rule' of tyrannous power, but a servant leadership of protection, care, and love...[it is] a positive blessing designed to lead back as much as possible to the original plan of harmony and union between equal partners."5 Similarly, Christ's redemptive headship over the world is an agape-inspired servant leadership that continually reaches down to fallen humanity, that we may be lifted back up into harmony and union with Him. The One in whom we all "live and move and have our being" hopes we'll recognize Him as the "husband" who has always cared for and loved us. Now I've gone and waxed wordy again. I'd better sign off. Better put some rocks in your skinny little pockets so you don't get blown away in the Windy City. JS: Fewer rocks than you would have to carry, but since the wind is already screaming here in Philly at 6:30 AM, I can only imagine Chicago. By the way, my (earthly) husband is driving me to the airport this morning because of the wind storm, thereby saving me from the vicissitudes of long-term parking, shuttle, etc. Isn't he the servant-leader you just described? And isn't servant leadership the witness the world is crying out for, that they might understand that infinite power is constrained by infinite love? LK: You'd better hang onto Mike pretty tight, Jen, or someone might try to grab him. Now don't say anything else or I'll start theologizing again. You know how compulsive I am. See you, Jenpen. JS: Yes, compulsively intelligent and interminably curious. Make sure that when you finally reform your ideas about women's ordination, you leave those things intact. Bye-bye, Miss American Feminist Pie. ______________________________________________ 1 E.G. White, The Great Controversy, p. 544. 2 I appreciate this clarification on p. 867 of the SDA Bible Commentary, Volume 6: "In taking Adam's place Christ became the head of the human race, and died on the cross as its representative. Thus, in a sense, when he died the entire race died with Him. As He represented all men, so His death stood for the death of all. In Him all men died; He paid in full the claims of the law." 3 E.G. White, Steps to Christ, p. 14. 4 Romans 8:32 and Hebrews 2:9 are examples. 5 Nancy Vyhmeister, Editor, Women in Ministry: Biblical and Historical Perspectives (Berrien Springs, MI: Andrews University Press, 1998), pp. 268-269. (The comparison has its limits; of course we'll never be "equal partners" with Christ in the absolute sense.) Selected Comments: "I still believe that the women's ordination issue is an outgrowth of the feminist movement which is extremely militant. All you have to do is read some of the reader reviews of books that oppose women's ordination (at Amazon.com) to get a feel for how enraged some women are about this subject. I have no doubt that women's ordination will at some point "win the day" in the Adventist church as is has already in other churches, but I'm really not so sure womanhood will be better off for it." -Jack Marti, Tennessee