There are moments that come to us in our lives that spark a deeper level of reflection, meditation and perspective. Death of someone that is or was close to us is one of those moments.
Is there a much greater reminder of our fleeting time here on earth than that? I'd be hard pressed to come up with it.
This life on earth is described as a mist and a vapor- "yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes." - James 4:14
Today I have been reflecting more deeply again on my life - before and after I was born again on March 31st, 2013.
"If any man be in Christ he's a new creation, old things have passed away and behold all things have become new" - 2 Corinthians 5:17
God inspired Paul to write this passage not only for the church in Corinth in the 1st century, but for all believers who would follow after. I am struck by the reality of this truth - which is also a promise. The reality that God - knowing everything horrible and evil and rebellious and sinful that I would ever do, would preemptively send His Son to willingly die for me while I was in that horrible condition so that I could be completely redeemed (made new).
"While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" - Romans 5:8.
I will often take the scriptures and make them personal - an exercise that often helps me really internally own and understand more of the realness and vastness of God's perfect and Holy nature, and His designs for me.
So now today, I can do this by turning back the clock a bit. I can pretty much pick any decade from the 1980's to the 2000's in my life, and find nearly the same sin and rebellion at work 'in my members':
I hated the idea of God -
I cursed His name, using Jesus Christ as a swear word- [profaning His name almost daily]-
I mocked Christians, calling the 'Jesus thing' a crutch and something weak people clung to because they couldn't handle the harsh reality of our existence on the planet.
I blamed any god or God that might be out there, for the pain and traumas I endured for so long. I put Him on trial, and I was the moral judge putting Him on the witness stand to answer for my accusations- which I believed were legit. I sometimes went back and forth about believing in any 'superior being' and ultimately did stay in what I called a proud atheistic state.
Yes, I was that guy. A pre-Christian man Paul described this way in Ephesians 2 - "And I was dead in my trespasses and sins in which I once walked; following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air the spirit that's now at work in the sons of disobedience among whom I once lived; in the passions of my flesh; carrying out the desires of the body and mind and I was by nature a child of wrath, like the rest of mankind".
All manner of sin took hold of me, and I was helpless against it. Pornography, adultery, stealing, lying, idolatry, blasphemy. I can't sugar coat it. By rejecting God for 3 decades, I came under a new master, and darkness was my nature. I was by that very nature God's enemy.
And in that state - being completely lost and undeserving and unrepentant... God pursued me. God radically loved me. God never quit on me like I did on Him.
I was 39 years old when I was born again. Had I not lived that long, I would have died into eternal separation from God- eternal torment. A death never ending without hope, without love, without mercy, without Jesus.
BUT GOD
Two of the greatest words in the entire Bible.
Ephesians 2:4-5 "BUT GOD BEING RICH IN MERCY, BECAUSE OF THE GREAT LOVE WITH WHICH HE LOVED US; EVEN WHEN WE WERE DEAD IN OUR TRESPASSES MADE US ALIVE TOGETHER WITH CHRIST"
Even as I sit here now - I struggle to find the words to express what is going on inside of me. I genuinely hope that the reader will fix their mind on this one main thing:
I was so far gone and so lost and so deserving of death forever. But God said, I want you and I will redeem you 100%, and it was just as He said in Hebrews 8, "I will remember their lawless deeds no more".
And not only that...
But He has taken the perfect life that His Son Jesus lived and imputed it to me!
"It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me" - Galatians 2:20
I will finish with this-
A call to action.
Pray, intercede for the lost - the pre-Christians that you know. It's not too late. Christ in you is the hope of Glory!
We are the rescue mission. Jesus said in Matthew 28- 'tag, you're it'. [Well, that's basically what He meant].
Read the great commission again, and ask the Lord for new eyes to see and a new mind to understand and witness:
"And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen.
