Happy Saturday!
Welcome to your Saturday coffee! May our Heavenly Father help us to refresh and refocus how we are living our daily lives. Father, it's so easy to get caught up in the small, material things of this world that will not last forever. Father, my bills, my aches, my illness, my check engine light, it can build up into a pile that covers me. And I lose sight of you and the things you value, things that will last forever. Heavenly Father, in the name of Jesus and by the guiding comfort of the Spirit, help me to see what has eternal value in my life, and what is only temporary. Amen.
Your Morning Song: "Heart of the Father" by Ryan Ellis
Your Morning Scripture: John 3:16
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
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In the past we've talked about the term "highway hypnosis" and how, like driving long distances, our bible reading over the days, weeks, months, and years can become unfocused, more simply skimming than sincerely searching, and we're left with a sense of having missed something. This is not something to mourn and lament about ourselves. Let's just be honest and admit it, feel God's comforting call to be more deeply intentional with our reading, and refocus.
As before with this analogy, let's turn to a very familiar verse and consider a part of it that we have not likely given the attention we could have. In the past I've pointed out the need to recognize patterns in scripture as helping us to gain a more thorough understanding of what we're reading. Look at the words being used. In 2 Samuel 11 and 12 look for the word "sent," (David's sending vs. the Lord's sending). In Psalm 23 and in this verse above from John 3, look at the pronouns and who is doing what (God/He does and we benefit from His action, not He from ours). This is a very helpful way to metaphorically splash your face with some cold water to wake yourself up. Refresh and refocus.
Here's another way. Do you know what certain words and/or phrases mean? Do you consider their meaning and their implication?
Eternal Life.
By believing in Jesus, the Son of God, we have eternal life. But what does this phrase mean? For many of us we think of this promised eternal life as something that has not started yet. It is something ahead of us. Something without substance. Something vague that quickly becomes the sort of churchy language that is little more than meaningless sounds.
It is actually quite simple and very much practical. This life we are promised is freedom from the penalty of sin, the death that should have led to our eternal separation from God. But instead this life we are promised is the exact opposite of that. It is the close, intimate relationship with God, this life, that is without end, everlasting, eternal.
Our Heavenly Father loves us. And so we have an eternity to be in close, intimate, wonder-full, perfectly satisfying relationship with Him. And here's the thing we too often forget, or get wrong.
It has already started.
We are God's children now. We can pray to Him and He will listen to us, now. We can sing to Him and praise Him and thank Him and be rewarded with His delight, right now. For all of those who are God's children, we are living in the promised eternal life, right now. And though there is more to come, the promise not yet fulfilled in full, it is already begun. Let's daily live our lives with a heart and a hunger for that which is eternal instead of what is only temporary.
The stresses and struggles of our daily living in the world will not last. Our obedience to God's Word, our hunger to do His Will, and our love shown to each other will last forever.
We are children who live in the already and the not yet promise of their Heavenly Father. Let's not miss what lasts forever because we can't see past what is only temporary.
