THE LAW OF CIRCULARITY !!!

THE LAW OF CIRCULARITY

The Bible, which is full of the missionary spirit, does not teach that there are several ways of salvation, one way by faith, another by works, another by ignorance, and another by innocence. Neither does it teach the God-dishonoring doctrine of fatalism. While it shows every other door of hope closed against the race, it throws wide open the one, only door, and proclaims that whosoever will may enter into life; and it shows that all who do not now see or appreciate the blessed privilege of entering shall in due time be brought to a full knowledge and appreciation. The ONLY WAY, by which any and all of the condemned race may come to God, is not by meritorious works, neither by ignorance, nor by innocence, but by a living faith in the precious blood of Christ, which takes away the sin of the world (I Pet. 1:19; Jn. 1:29). This is the Gospel, the good tidings of great joy, "which shall be unto all people ."

Suppose we now look at these things just as God tells us of them, and leave the clearing of His character to Himself. Let us inquire, What has become of this one hundred and sixty billions of people who have lived upon this planet? Whatever may be their present condition, it cannot be their full reward; for Peter says, "The Lord knows how to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished" (II Pet. 2:9); and He will do so. But the thought that so many of our fellow creatures should at any time be lost from lack of having had the knowledge which is necessary to salvation would be sad indeed to all who have a spark of love or compassion. Then, too, there are numerous Scriptures which it seems impossible to harmonize with all this. Let us see: In the light of the past and the present as the only opportunities, laying aside all hope through a restoration in the coming age and ages, how shall we understand the statements, "God is love," and "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish" (I Din. 4:8; Din. 3:16)? Would it not seem that if God truly loved the world so much He might have made provision, not only that believers might be saved, but that all might hear in order to believe?

Again, when we read, "That was the true light that lights every man that comes into the world" (Jn. 1:9), our observation says, Not so; every man has not been enlightened; we cannot see that our Lord has lighted more than a few of earth's billions. Even in this comparatively enlightened day, millions of heathen give no evidence of such enlightenment; neither do many now living on our street; neither did the Sodomites, nor multitudes of others in past generations and ages.

We read that Jesus Christ, by the grace of God, tasted death " for every man " (Heb. 2:9). But if He tasted death for the one hundred and sixty billions, and from any cause that sacrifice becomes efficacious to only five billion, was not the redemption comparatively a failure ? And in that case, is not the apostle's statement too broad? When again we read, "Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people " (Lk. 2:10), and looking about us, see that it is only to a "little flock" that it has been good tidings, and not to all people, we would be compelled to wonder whether the angels had not over-stated the goodness and breadth of their message, and overrated the importance of the work to be accomplished by the Christ whom they announced.

Another statement is, "There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all " (I Tim. 2:5-6). A ransom for ALL? Then why should not all involved have some benefit, from Christ's death? Why should not ALL come to a knowledge of the truth, that they may believe? Without the KEY, how dark, how inconsistent these statements appear; but when we find the KEY to God's plan, these texts all declare with one voice, "God is love." This key is found in the latter part of the text last quoted - "Who gave Himself a ransom for all, TO BE TESTIFIED IN DUE TIME." Ah, God has a "due time" for everything! He could have testified it to these in their past lifetime; but since He did not, it proves that their "due time" must be the future . For those who will be of the Church, the body of Christ, the firstfruits of His redemption, the present is the "due time" to hear and receive; and whosoever now has an ear to hear, let him hear and heed, and he will be blessed accordingly. Though Jesus paid our ransom before we were born, it was not our "due time" to hear of it for long years afterward, and only the appreciation of it, quickened by the Holy Spirit, brought responsibility; and this, only to the extent of our ability and appreciation. The same principle applies to all: in God's due time it will be testified to an, and all will then have the glorious opportunity to believe and be blessed by it. The prevailing opinion is that death ends all opportunity; but there is no Scripture which so teaches; and all the above, and many more Scriptures, would be meaningless, or worse, if death ends all hope for the ignorant masses of the world.

Nothing is more evident in the Word of God than the fact that man had his beginning in God. Every son of Adam, born as he is in trespasses and sins, enters into this world shrouded by the darkness of the carnal mind and imprisoned by the power of the carnal nature. But it was not always so! Everything everywhere Outside of Christ belongs to the realm of death, and because it belongs to the realm of death, it likewise belongs to the realm of darkness. Before ever man touched this dreadful realm the record states: "In the beginning WAS the Word, and the Word WAS with God, and the Word WAS God. In Him WAS life; and the life WAS the light of men" (Jn. 1:1,4). Was! It is a wonderful fact that in Him IS life, and His life IS the fight of every man who believes, but, wonder of wonders, in that long ago beginning Christ was then the life and His life was then the light of men. It was into this realm outside of Christ, the realm of outer darkness, that Adam was banished when he partook of that strange tree of the knowledge of good and evil. There he died, as God had warned, and we all died in him. Thus death passed upon all men, for all have sinned. Has mankind not fully proved throughout the centuries that he is in truth the son of Adam? Which of all God's commandments have we not broken, justifying ourselves in having done so even as Adam seemed to do.

Oh, sweet mystery of the ages, that a second Adam should stand upon the earth and declare, "The thief comes not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come THAT THEY MIGHT HAVE LIFE, and that they might have it more abundantly. For the bread of God is He which comes down from heaven, and gives life unto the world. I am that bread of life. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: the bread that I will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world" (Jn. 10:10; 6:33, 48,51). 

No greater revelation can break upon any man's consciousness than this simple truth that there is only one life in the universe, and that one life is Jesus Christ. May God make this truth real to your heart! When a man comes to Christ, he comes not only to the life that is the light of men, but to the same life that in the beginning was the light of men. What we have received in Christ's opening again of Paradise is a return, a restoration, a renewing, a redemption, a reconciliation, a resurrection. The prefix "re" means back again-anew and all the words with this prefix speak of something that left its place and has now made its circuit and come back to the point of its beginning. 

Let me give you now a Scripture that shows the hand of God in this and the extensive scope of both the departure from, and the returning unto, God. I quote from Ps. 90:1-3. "Lord, You have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever You have formed the earth or the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God. You turn man to destruction; and say return you children of men." You could never read this word "return" here, if you had not first read that man had been "turned" away to destruction. In this passage the word "destruction" has this meaning in the original: a complete collapse, crumbling man to a contrite condition.

Here is the picture: For the magnificent purpose God had in mind He made all the provision necessary before the foundation of the world. He made provision for a Lamb to be slain (Rev. 13:8). He made provision for a company of people to be chosen in Christ, to be holy and without blame before Him in love, as a firstfruit of His redemption in the earth (Eph. 1:45,10). Then He brought into Eden a poisonous serpent, a murderer, a MANSLAYER (Gen. 3: 1). Having prepared all this HE THEN BROUGHT MAN INTO THE GARDEN. Having brought man into the Garden, GOD PUT HIM INTO THE PATHWAY OF A COMPLETE COLLAPSE. It was Godwho turned man to destruction, set him on this downward course, sent him into outer darkness, and made him subject to vanity. 

God our Father has never once blamed man for the fall, but takes the responsibility for it Himself when He says, "For the creation was subjected to frailty - to futility, condemned to frustration - not because of some intentional fault on its part , BUT BY THE WILL OF HIM WHO SO SUBJECTED IT. YET WITH THE HOPE that creation itself WILL BE SET FREE from its bondage to decay and corruption and gain an entrance into the glorious freedom of God's children" (Rom. 8:20-21, Amplified). Man did not volunteer for this time of travail, but the plan of God included this process, so God turned man into this route, this experience, and it will also be the sovereign work of a sovereign God who shall BRING BACK INTO HIMSELF the whole of His creation.

After turning man to destruction God then says, "RETURN TO ME, children of men." In verse four of Psalm ninety, the writer makes the statement that in God's sight a thousand years is as a day when it is passed. But in verse thirteen the Psalmist exclaims, "Return, O LORD, HOW LONG?" In the beginning of the Psalm the writer is joyful in the knowledge that though the Lord has turned man to destruction, yet God has also given the command to return, and what if it does take a thousand years or more, it is but a day in God's sight. But by the time the writer reaches the position of the thirteenth verse, he begins to cry out, saying, "O Lord, HOW LONG is all this going to take? HOW LONG before our full return to You?" A thousand years had become an unbearably long time. Surely this is the cry from the hearts of men today! This is the crying, groaning, and travailing we find the creation passing through in the eighth chapter of Romans, waiting for the manifestation of the Sons of God.

There was a day when Paul, standing in the center of the Areopagus (Mars Hill Auditorium) declared to the philosophers of Athens, "The God who produced and formed the world and all things in it, made from one common origin, one source all nations of men to settle on the face of the earth, having definitely determined their allotted periods of time and the fixed boundaries of their habitation - their settlements, lands, abodes; SO THAT THEY SHOULD SEEK GOD, IN THE HOPE THAT THEY MIGHT FEEL AFTER HIM AND FIND HIM, although He is not far from each one of us. For in Him we live and move and have our being; as even some of your own poets have said, FOR WE ARE ALSO HIS OFFSPRING" (Acts 17:24-28, Amplified).

Oh, yes, He turned us to destruction, but planted deep in the subconsciousness of every man the secret command to return, which is revealed in that inner desire, yearning, craving, seeking, feeling, compulsion which is never satisfied until man does find himself home in God once more. All the religiousness of men, from the witch doctor in the jungle to the modernist in the pulpit in America, is the manifestation of this FEELING AFTER GOD, IF HAPLY THEY MIGHT FIND HIM. While mankind in general is still lost in the hellish darkness of sin and death, yet there is a firstfruit company whose hearts have been charged by the inward call to return, and with the Shulamite maiden in the Song of Solomon share this blessed experience: "By night on my bed I sought Him whom my soul loves; I sought Him, but I found Him not. I will arise now, and go about the city in the streets, and in the broadways I will seek Him whom my soul loves: I sought Him but I found Him not. The watchmen that go about the city found me: to whom I said, Saw   Him whom my soul loves? It was but a little that I passed from them, but I FOUND HIM WHOM MY SOUL LOVES AND WOULD NOT LET HIM GO" (S. of S. 3:1-4). As the Spirit has witnessed through the prophet, "And yea shall seek Me, and find Me, when yea shall search for Me with all your heart" (Jer. 29:13).

Mankind is yet groping about in the dense darkness of the carnal mind, knowing not that HE is standing right there in the shadows, were their eyes opened to see. Yet He has appointed a day - Oh glorious day! - when His light shall shine forth and the plan shall be completed as the apostle says, "For God has allowed us to know the secret of His plan, and it is this: He purposed long ago in His sovereign will that all human history should be consummated in Christ, that everything that exists in Heaven or earth should find its perfection and fulfillment in Him . In Christ we have been given an inheritance, since we were destined for this, by the One who works out all His purposes according to the design of His own will" (Eph. 1:9-11, Phillips).

The very laws of physics and mathematics establish with indisputable certainty the absolute inevitability of the creation's return back to God. Psalm nineteen was long a source of amusement to Bible critics. In speaking of the sun, the Psalmist says: "His going forth is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of it: and there is nothing hid from the heat there of' (Ps. 19:6). It was claimed that the writer of this verse, obviously believed in the ancient notion of the sun's revolving about the earth. This charge is most unjust, since we still use words and phrases of the same sort, simply because from our natural viewpoint the sun does rise in the morning, move across the sky, and set in the evening. The whole science of nautical and engineering astronomy is based on the assumption, made purely for convenience, that the earth is the center of a great celestial sphere, moving along the surface of which in ordered paths are the sun, moon, planets and stars. And as far as any practical usage is concerned, this is so. On this assumption, courses can be plotted, positions determined, and scores of other applications made.

But the words of the Psalmist have a deeper, more scientific meaning than that. It is now concluded by the leading astronomers that the sun, with the entire solar system, actually does move through space at the tremendous speed of 600,000 miles per hour in such a gigantic orbit that it requires over two million centuries to complete it, but complete it it shall, returning again and again, as the ages roll onward, to the point of its beginning. Furthermore, it is believed that our galaxy is also moving with respect to other galaxies. The sun's circuit IS from one end of the heavens to the other! Who can accuse the Holy Spirit of ignorance of modern astronomy?

The entire universe is an infinite sphere and each galaxies solar system, star and planet within it moves continuously and harmoniously in circular motion; thus, all worlds and suns have circles for their pathway. This principle has been referred to by scientists as the "law of circularity." Science is beginning to tell us that in the highest development of physics and mathematics the old theory of straight lines of infinite length has to be changed and modified to satisfy all the data of electro-dynamics, light, and some of the new electrical phenomena. There is no such thing in the universe as an absolutely straight line of infinite length. All straight lines will be found to be portions of immense circles. This law of circularity runs through all nature. If you were to leave planet earth traveling steadily in one direction, the day would surely come, be it in some distant age millions or billions of years hence, when you would arrive back at the precise point of departure, having completed the circuit - home again! Someone has said (a scientist) that if we were to build a telescope that could see into infinity, we would one day be looking at the back of our heads!

This great law of circularity by which all things in God's creation are seen to RETURN to the place of their BEGINNING, in its spiritual significance, is expressed in Rom. 11:36: "For FROM HIM and THROUGH HIM and TO HIM are all things - for all things originate with Him and come from Him; all things live through Him, and all things center in and tend to CONSUMMATE AND TO END IN HIM. To Him be glory forever! Amen" (Amplified). All manifestations of nature discernible to the senses confirm this law of circularity. "The sun also arises, and the sun goes down, and hastes to its place where he arose. The wind goes toward the south, and turns about unto the north; it whirls about continually, and the wind returns again according to his circuits . All the rivers run i into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again" (Eccl. 1:5-7).

Today, scientists tell us that there is just so much water in the earth. There has always been that amount and there always will be. We should understand that neither water, nor anything else, can be destroyed. Its form can be changed, but it eventually will return to its original form. The writer of Ecclesiastes tells us that water is taken from the oceans in the form of moisture by the sun. Then the winds in their circuits carry that moisture as clouds over the land. There through certain actions of cold and heat, according to the laws of God, that moisture falls to the earth in the form of rain or snow or hail. Creeks and rivers are formed that carry this water back into the oceans, thus completing the circuit or cycle. Water may be frozen, but under the right condition it will return to water. It may be heated and converted into steam, but the steam will eventually condense, becoming water again. Water sinking into the ground is either evaporated, or taken up by plants and evaporated, or perhaps finds its way to underground streams. In any event it eventually finds its way back to the sea, and the circuit continues on, unseen, unheard, almost unknown, but it is by the law of God.

Ray Prinzing has written,

"We have known what it is to take the downward journey, picking up the debris of the flesh and self, until we come to the bottom, a filthy pool. But there is another river, much more invisible, spiritualized, we might say, and that is the one which forms by the DRAWING OF THE SON, lifting us up out of the 'dead sea' and raising us again into the heavenlies, to bring us back to the height of the mount of God. Of this glorious river we read, 'There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God' (Ps. 46:4). Some are still on the low road, taking the downward path in self, sin, wayward rebellion. And some, praise God, are already being irresistibly drawn upward, to take that HIGH WAY back to Father's house. 

"What is true in the cycles of our own life, is also true concerning God's dealings with His whole creation. That which was turned away from Him, to run an erratic and wild course of self-will, shall eventually come meekly and submissively back to its Source, our Creator. Thus we need this perspective, to view from the vantage point of God's great purpose to BECOME ALL IN ALL, for without this purpose there would be no rhyme nor reason to any unfolding event. We often say that the 'way UP is DOWN,' bit to always have to go down, without a way up, would bring forth a hopeless frustration that would surely end in defeat. But, in God's law of circularity, there is a place in our going down process, God knows when and where, we come to a curve and begin that upward way"

We read in Isa. 40:22, "God sits upon the circle of the earth." While the word for "circle" in the Hebrew denotes the sphericity of the earth, it may also indicate the cycles of nature. These cycles are the continual goings and comings of the seasons, days, months, years, etc., which were ordained of God in the beginning. Everything in nature moves in cycles: winter and summer, seedtime and harvest; generation after generation, all show the might and wisdom of God. Even electricity must have a circuit. A battery has a positive and a negative to complete the circuit. SO IT IS WITH GOD IS WORK. In the spiritual realm God is the positive, and Satan is the negative. It is therefore reasonable to conclude that man, the highest of God's creation, came out of God, was then lowered into the world of vanity, darkness, and death, but will return to God, thus completing the cycle, not in part, but in full. Even Jesus came out of God, and descended into the depths of man's fall, then arose and returned to God.

The King James version of Rom. 11:36 begins, "For of Him..." This word "of" comes from the Greek word "ek" literally meaning OUT OF. This clearly places God as the one Source of all things, and hence the Amplified's beautiful rendering, "For all things originate with Him and come from Him." Col. 1: 16 says, "For it was IN HIM that all things were created, in heaven and on earth, things seen and things unseen, whether thrones, dominions, rulers or authorities" (Amplified).

The law of circularity requires that EVEN AS ALL THINGS BEGAN IN CHRIST, ALL SHALL END IN CHRIST. "I am ALPHA and OMEGA, the beginning and the end , the first and the last ," says the Lord (Rev. 22:13). Only the glorious mind of Christ can reveal to our hearts what that means! Through a glass darkly I can see that He was the FIRST - "before all things." Can I also believe that HE IS THE LAST? If He is the BEGINNING, can my feeble mind dare to comprehend what it signifies when He says that He is also the END? All that existed IN CHRIST before the ages began, shall RETURN INTO HIM AGAIN that He may be the FIRST and the LAST, the BEGINNING and the END. All that came out of Him, lowered into the realm of the negative, completes its circuit and returns once more to its former estate - IN GOD! The first Adam had power to take ALL with him into death, without their knowledge, or consent: therefore, the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, gathers up the same number in His redemptive work and man who came out of God shall return, that the circle may be unbroken.

To quote Ray Prinzing once more:

"When we understand the glorious truth that our God is both the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the Ending, then we realize that no matter how vast the cycle and circuit, the end is secure, for all things return unto Him again. To read only a portion of God's Word, the facts are too few to rightly calculate the CURVE of God's plan. And while HE does, gloriously, illumine a specific verse or sentence to speak to our hearts for that day, we also need the full sweep of the Book to gain an overall view of His purpose, and then understand the tremendous victory which is ours in Christ."

Long milleniums ago Adam was banished from the Paradise of God and its life-giving tree. But God has provided a way by which His banished may return! Some glad morning, when the unfolding plan of God is complete, all who once stood "in Adam" in the Garden will again be gathered together and their eyes will behold with endless joy that heaven blest Eden in which walked Adam, the son of God. But even now there is a remnant, the election of grace, the firstfruits of His redemption who in spirit have entered those once-closed portals and have partaken of the fruit of the tree of life! In the power of the Christ, the last Adam, though the firstfruits of Christ's redemption still move about in a world which is under the curse, where the traces of sin are visible on all hands, these have found their way, by faith, to the bosom of the Father, and are now at home again in God! The mighty transformation that has come and is coming to our lives shall be experienced ultimately by ALL MEN, God's own law of circularity secures it, and none can resist it, praise His glorious name!

 

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by J. Preston Eby