“The marks of Jesus are silently impressed on His true disciples in the normal procedure of life in society as well as in the crises of suffering and martyrdom.” Hebert Hensley Henson,
Retrospect of an unimportant life. (As referenced in chapter seventeen of Glittering Images by Susan Howatch)
The truth will always attract the seekers, those lost souls who are searching for the fulfillment of their thirst and the answer to their stories. We don’t have to stand separate in the world, because it is in the process of being in the world that we show that we truly don’t belong here anymore. We are forever marked, in the blood by which we are set free.
A spiritual giant that has walked in my world spoke some words that I failed to understand in my younger days, when I believed God to be a legalistic and unsatisfied God with me. He told me, “Do you have to tell someone you are a Christian, or do they assume it by your actions, words, and life?” Christ spoke to doubting Thomas, “Touch my wounds so that you would believe.” His marks were clearly visible to the assembled apostles in that Upper Room, so there was no question to who He truly was. All doubt was removed.
Too often in the workplace, in our communities, and in our relationships with others, we leave the question to be asked, instead of walking in a lifestyle that is clearly different from the walk of Christ when He stood upon the shores of Galilee and taught twelve different and very diverse men the truth of the Kingdom they had grown up expecting.
If an outsider, who doesn’t see you in the worship center of your church or witness you speaking “christianeze” at some gathering of ‘Christian’ folk, saw you in your everyday image, would they assume the question to be answered? Whether you carried yourself as if a pilgrim in this world, despite the raging storms?
It strikes me that the story of Peter getting out of the boat to go to Jesus is similar to our journey to Christ. That we must forego the illusions of this world, with all its trappings of instant gratification and peace for the delayed justice of being made righteous and restored with Christ’s return.
We all have our ‘glittering images’, those selves that we show to the world as a whole, that are a pale illusion of the true self. We have this desire not to be close to one another supported and reinforced by the Church today. If the Church viewed our true self, they would have to claim some responsibility under the established behavior God set for all His redeemed children and walk alongside each of us, in our broken and sinful state.
But the Church is offering instant redemption; an illusion of the true process that each of the true followers of Christ have to go through to become what God has purposed for each of us in this broken world. We will have trials, people we love will die or fall by the wayside, children will turn from the teachings of their parents and chart a journey through dark valleys, and we ourselves will fail to achieve the mark on occasion as our old selves, our glittering images, seek to limit the painful interaction with the world that opposes our new birth.
But, it is remarkable, in a way, that the strongest warriors for the kingdom are too often those who have been scarred and wounded. Who have endured personal tragedy and sorrows and embraced the ‘glittering image’, recognizing its danger and limiting its power through the grace and working of the Holy Spirit.
And that reminds me of Paul’s words, those verses in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10, that were spoken to me what seems so long ago in the journey God has asked me to walk; that Paul, like I, rejoice in the trials, tribulations, and tragedies that are experienced in this world of sin and shame……
For it brings us closer to the goal; to be like Christ.
A sign that we are on the journey to our homeland as less and less of the world's tragedies hold any claim to our peace and hope.......
Tuesday, March 11
Monday, March 10
When I get where I'm going.......
"For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body." Romans 8:18–23
"It won't always be this way," I told my son last week as he was emotionally distraught over the events and trials that our family is undergoing. "As God promises us a better future, I pledge to you that this too shall pass." Later, as I was struggling to pray with the Father, I wondered if I had given my son a pipe dream. In a way, I guess I did. As Dr. Larry Crabb says, "There is something seriously wrong with EVERYTHING!"
I have buried my father some ten plus years ago, my step-mother who raised me and has the status of mother in my heart died a year after he did, and I have been to my grandmother's funeral less than three months ago. My family wasn't the best of families; my father married several times and always seemed to end them in infidelity. My birth mother, still alive, and I have a estranged relationship because I am more my step-mother's son than hers. I have been in a cycle before I became an honest child of Christ and the life struggles that I've gone through since receiving the Call have been brutal, painful, and frightening.
I have discovered, in the maturation process, that being a Christian doesn't mean that things become rosy from the moment you give your heart to Christ contrary to the popular church doctrine that seems to fly across the pulpit today. Life is broken, harsh, and in opposition to what our designed purpose is. Mature Christians don't become wealth, wise, and joyful in a life that seems to have their best interests in mind. Death of loved ones still occurs, struggles with the poisons and addictions of this world's current 'ruler' happen with alarming regularity, and happiness is, to borrow a phrase, "a state of mind."
Those momentary glimpses that we have; those happy, content, joyful, and rewarding moments that come in the form of a newborn child, a raise in a job that brings us some fulfillment of our human desire to matter, and in the touch of a loved one are just that….glimpses into a future promised, paid for, and approaching. And it is that most of the "Spiritual" amongst us can point to despite the raging storms that affect even their lives. This is but a taste of the reality of being made perfect in righteousness and truth. It is that sip of water in a desert of no end.
Creation was set against man from the Fall, to work against us in the natural desire of man to control his world. That is why I fail to be alarmed by the incorrect warnings of a global warming…..anybody in Michigan will tell you that it doesn't seem to be a problem here. Ask the folks in Ohio who are digging out from two feet of snow that was dumped on them in the past few days. Now, that isn't to say that I don't agree that we should work a bit more to maintain this world we've been given. I just don't think purchasing offsets to a 'carbon contribution' to this fictional global warming is the way to do it.
The day will come when, as the song goes, "I will shed the sin and struggles I've carried all these years." When we arrive upon the destination all pilgrims of the Christ journey to, we will shed all the dead weight of the world and will see the pain of loved ones lost redeemed in the smiling faces waiting our arrival. And all the joys, temporary happiness, and pleasing things will pale by comparison to the realization of the hope that sustained us in the times of trial, tribulation, sorrow, and pain.
The Heavenly Father, CEO of the biggest adoption agency in the universe, will approve the application made by our Lord Jesus Christ to make the adoption into the family permanent and binding, and we will be given the bodies that were made to be lived in from the dawn of creation.
And that thirst, that each of us have, will be fulfilled. With the floodgates of living water.
"It won't always be this way," I told my son last week as he was emotionally distraught over the events and trials that our family is undergoing. "As God promises us a better future, I pledge to you that this too shall pass." Later, as I was struggling to pray with the Father, I wondered if I had given my son a pipe dream. In a way, I guess I did. As Dr. Larry Crabb says, "There is something seriously wrong with EVERYTHING!"
I have buried my father some ten plus years ago, my step-mother who raised me and has the status of mother in my heart died a year after he did, and I have been to my grandmother's funeral less than three months ago. My family wasn't the best of families; my father married several times and always seemed to end them in infidelity. My birth mother, still alive, and I have a estranged relationship because I am more my step-mother's son than hers. I have been in a cycle before I became an honest child of Christ and the life struggles that I've gone through since receiving the Call have been brutal, painful, and frightening.
I have discovered, in the maturation process, that being a Christian doesn't mean that things become rosy from the moment you give your heart to Christ contrary to the popular church doctrine that seems to fly across the pulpit today. Life is broken, harsh, and in opposition to what our designed purpose is. Mature Christians don't become wealth, wise, and joyful in a life that seems to have their best interests in mind. Death of loved ones still occurs, struggles with the poisons and addictions of this world's current 'ruler' happen with alarming regularity, and happiness is, to borrow a phrase, "a state of mind."
Those momentary glimpses that we have; those happy, content, joyful, and rewarding moments that come in the form of a newborn child, a raise in a job that brings us some fulfillment of our human desire to matter, and in the touch of a loved one are just that….glimpses into a future promised, paid for, and approaching. And it is that most of the "Spiritual" amongst us can point to despite the raging storms that affect even their lives. This is but a taste of the reality of being made perfect in righteousness and truth. It is that sip of water in a desert of no end.
Creation was set against man from the Fall, to work against us in the natural desire of man to control his world. That is why I fail to be alarmed by the incorrect warnings of a global warming…..anybody in Michigan will tell you that it doesn't seem to be a problem here. Ask the folks in Ohio who are digging out from two feet of snow that was dumped on them in the past few days. Now, that isn't to say that I don't agree that we should work a bit more to maintain this world we've been given. I just don't think purchasing offsets to a 'carbon contribution' to this fictional global warming is the way to do it.
The day will come when, as the song goes, "I will shed the sin and struggles I've carried all these years." When we arrive upon the destination all pilgrims of the Christ journey to, we will shed all the dead weight of the world and will see the pain of loved ones lost redeemed in the smiling faces waiting our arrival. And all the joys, temporary happiness, and pleasing things will pale by comparison to the realization of the hope that sustained us in the times of trial, tribulation, sorrow, and pain.
The Heavenly Father, CEO of the biggest adoption agency in the universe, will approve the application made by our Lord Jesus Christ to make the adoption into the family permanent and binding, and we will be given the bodies that were made to be lived in from the dawn of creation.
And that thirst, that each of us have, will be fulfilled. With the floodgates of living water.
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