It is one thing to drop off or renounce certain things, and quite another to be engrossed with the right thing. Monks renounce much, but they are not occupied with the glorified Lord Jesus Christ. It must be not only ‘forgetting those things which are behind,’ but also reaching out unto the things that are before. It is that which you give yourself to, not what you have abandoned, that colors you and which imparts character to you.
~ James Butler Stoney.
So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And He has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making His appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.
~ paul, The Least of the Apostles, in 2 Corinthians 5
Oh beloved, it is true.
You are the nextborn after the Firstborn of many brethren.
You are a king you know.
You already own everything.
You will reign with Him.
His name will be on your forehead.
You will be able, one day, to look a truly evil man in the eye – and punch out his lights… permanently. You will shatter wrongdoing in this world like an iron rod shatters a cheap clay pot.
You are to become the fully-vested son or daughter of The Most High, with all rank and privilege and responsibility attendant with that same position.
And this is only the beginning. For you will look the Lover of your soul in the eye one day, and give Him the biggest hug you ever wanted to give – for absolutely as long as you want. And He is going to hug you back better than you ever imagined possible.
And this is only the beginning. Then you will get to meet His Father.
And this is only the beginning… Somewhere on the other side (if those could even possibly be the right words) of an eternity of eternities in Him, we will begin to understand how Holy and Wonderful He Really Is.
Can we see it? What if we kept reality like this in front of us? Might truth like this break the silly bond we have built between our circumstances and the Life we now live in Him? What if an infinitely good future were weighed against the silly little bits of suffering we have to go through today?
Don’t believe it? That is the problem.
Join this writer beloved. Let Him give you His mind. He will if you let Him. But you gotta let Him.
