This life is unpredictable. You can never tell what will happen next. Even when you plan things out carefully, there is always a chance that things might not turn the way you expect it to. Not a single person’s life is the same, not even ones from the same womb like twins. It is fascinating to observe our powerlessness in controlling situations, events or even time. This lack of control helps us see our “finiteness” and reminds us that we are “but dust and to dust we will return” (Genesis 3:19). Maybe that is why the bible says “the end of a thing is greater than its beginning” (Ecclesiastes 7:8)? Or “better to go to a house of mourning than a house of feasting” (Ecclesiastes 7:2)? Although this world we live in is beautiful, life in it can be quite hard. The longer you stay on this earth the longer you experience life with its hardships. As Christians, we understand that sin corrupted us and our world which explains the difficulty we go through on this earth. However, even such knowledge does not make it easier to have to go through difficulties. Our saviour himself walked this difficult life, he walked this earth and sacrificed himself on the cross for you and I so that we would no longer live for ourselves but live for God. Because of his sacrifice, we were given a new meaning in life and a hope that is imperishable even while in suffering. Today’s post is a call to continually turn our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith who makes everything bearable.
I often say this “I might be confused about many things in life but one thing I am not confused about is my salvation”. Indeed, many times, I marvel at the communion I share with God, the fact that we have a relationship and I had nothing to do with it! God is so good to us! When I think that He humbled Himself and emptied it to repair a relationship that He did not break in the first place and that would benefit Him no more than it would benefit the one who broke it, I am simply amazed. It is incredible to think that the One to whom offense was made restored and fixed the relationship. The goodness of God is a concept that does not quite make sense to tell you the truth. It is beyond our understanding yet that is what the Father calls us to emulate around us once we have received Him. One of the ways we emulate God’s goodness is by imitating Jesus. Jesus, the son of God was a man who lived this earth in complete dependence on God. Nothing he did was done without the knowledge and consent of his Father. We see Jesus surrendering to the will of God to the point of dying an undeserved death just so that the wrath of God would be satisfied and a broken relationship would be restored. This complete obedience granted him the reward to be seated at the right hand of God, taking his judgement seat (Ephesians 1:20-23). While on the earth, Jesus also revealed God to sinners like you and I. He made God real and tangible. One of the famous teaching of Jesus is called “the sermon on the mount”. In this elaborate teaching, Jesus tackles many themes but essentially, he calls his disciples to “be merciful, just as your Father is merciful” (Luke 6:36). Because it is Jesus himself who says it, we have no excuse since he himself did that for us. “While we were still sinners Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Therefore, Christ does not ask us to do something he has not done himself and that is powerful. Take that to heart when you find doing the right thing difficult.
Many books of the bible encourage us to look to Christ in everything. Part of that looking to Christ is to examine how he lived and obey his commands, not departing from them neither to the left nor to the right. One such books is the book of Proverbs. It is part of the wisdom literature books and essentially, the book calls us to seek wisdom, that is, to seek righteousness. It goes to great length to contrast the righteous with the wicked, the wise with the fool or sometimes the righteous with the fool. The picture the book of Proverbs paints about the wicked which includes the lazy and the fool is so dark you wonder why anyone would love unrighteousness. Yet, we find ourselves loving the things our saviour died on the cross to save us from simply because we look to ourselves, to others or to situations rather than looking at Christ. You see, Paul says in Philippians that “whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things” (Philippians 4:8). Living out this command is to look to Christ because Christ is in the truth, he is in righteousness, he is in purity, he is in love, he is excellence, and he is praiseworthy. It is so interesting that part of us becoming more and more like Christ starts with us thinking more and more like him or rather thinking about things he would be pleased with or the things that reflect who he is. This is a strong command to live by and it is simple enough that any believer in Christ can actually obey it. Thankfully for us, Christ’s death and resurrection did not allow us to remain in our original state of powerlessness and constant defeat over sin. No, because of Christ, not only were we given a new inheritance – that of belonging to the kingdom of light, but we were given power to overcome sin. Moreover, we were given the Holy Spirit who is an advocate, a counselor, a revealer of truth and an evidence, a seal of our new identity. This means, through the Spirit’s help we can now obey the command of Paul to only think what is true and admirable; we can now deny our flesh instead of gratifying its desires; we can now set our minds above where Christ is seated (Colossian 3:1). What we were powerless to do, Christ has made it possible through his sacrifice. This may sound too good to be true or even like a fantasy but that is the truth and that is the way for the Christian to live this life.
I know that what I have said above is not going to be enough or might not seem enough when one is going through “hell” or through the hardships and atrocities of this life. Primarily because when we go through difficulties, not many of us know the Lord and when we do know the Lord, we focus more on the hardships and its effect on ourselves than we focus on him. I wonder, what would happen if we were to forget our situation for a moment and think on the goodness of God or His love for us? How about what he has secured for us like eternal life and victory? What would happen if our minds were “stayed on Him” in the midst of our trial? Can you picture this? God has given us much more than we deserve and He has secured our victory and has given us a hope than cannot be removed. Like Paul, our conviction should be that nothing can and will ever separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus not even hardship or persecution or famine or sword or nakedness and I would add not even sickness, poverty, bankruptcy, [insert your life and death situation], no in all this we are more than conquerors through him who loved us (Romans 8:35-37). As a matter of fact, the bible is very clear that our biggest concern is not what happens to our body or what happens to our career, or what happens to our country. Instead, it is what happens to our soul, what is our stand before a Holy and Just God? Throughout the scriptures, Jesus always made it clear that it was more important for man to be in right standing before God, having their sins forgiven than being healed for example. While being healed is a good thing, the priority and the most important thing should be to flee the wrath of God. When Jesus died on the cross, the wrath of God was poured on him, the punishment we deserved was received by him. Jesus’ righteousness was then transferred to us while our sin was taken by Him. Because of Jesus we were given a new life, that’s why we are born-again because we are born of the spirit. This new life makes us citizen of a country that never perishes, the kingdom of Light. As we start living in this new reality, we start loving the things of the new kingdom we belong to and hating the ones from this world. Our minds are renewed by his word and we are being sanctified daily until Jesus returns and we see him face to face. That is the good news! Jesus Christ died on your behalf and took the wrath of God that was against you on himself so that you could be free.
Unfortunately, many live this evil-filled life without this great knowledge and without knowing that there is a way out of this deadly cycle. Jesus said “the harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” (Matthew 9:37-38). There are many that still have not learned of the imperishable hope that exists in Christ; many that are still tormented by evil; many that are still captive by their own sin. Would you take your disciple-making mandate seriously and share that love of Christ with people around you? Let’s be people with “beautiful feet” (Roman 10:15) for the many that are still living in bondage, not knowing that a saviour came thousand years ago to redeem them. May the Lord increase our love for our neighbours. Amen!
A Word Aptly Spoken 