GODS LOVE AND PREPARATION FOR ETERNITY

 

 

The Bible promises us God’s relentless love and protection in its many forms:

 

·       but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. (Romans 5:8-10)

 

However, we must also endure painful refinement:

 

·       …it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God? (1 Peter 4:17)

 

God requires us to endure painful refinement. This had also been the lot of perhaps the church’s greatest missionary—Paul:

 

·       Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. (2 Corinthians 11:24-27)

 

However, even this wasn’t enough. Paul was also given a Satanic “thorn in the flesh” to humble him. (2 Corinthians 12:7-10)

 

In the midst of such suffering, we need to know that everything that happens to us serves a divine and glorious purpose. Therefore, the trials are positives and not negatives—God’s nourishment to make us Christ-like and to prepare us to reign eternally (2 Corinthians 4:16-18):

 

·       And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. (Romans 8:28)

 

I would advise that we embrace this perspective. Not only is it Biblical but it is necessary that we believe that it’s all about Jesus’ love for us and not about us so that we do not become overburdened by life:

 

·       I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:20)

 

It is not only that He has claimed our lives as His own, the Lord is actually molding our lives into harmony with His own, creating something beautiful out of them. We will readily endure surgery to remove a cancerous tumor. Why not also God’s removal of our spiritual tumors?

 

·       For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:10)

 

We are His and so too is His artistry in perfecting our lives. We are clay this Potter molds through our weaknesses, infirmities, and even suffering. As a result, we cannot boast in our good works, since they are actually His workmanship. But we also need not worry about our spiritual performance and failures. They too belong to Him. Consequently, Paul even credited his character and good works to the Lord:

 

·       But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. (1 Corinthians 15:10)

 

This is because:

 

·       for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (Philippians 2:13)

 

This enables us to be free from worry and self-obsessions:

 

·       Am I good enough,

·       Spiritual enough,

·       Loving enough,

·       Unselfish enough?

 

How much better to be obsessed with our Lord and His care for our lives! To delight in Him enables us to take our eyes away from our weaknesses, insecurities, failures, suffering, and vulnerabilities, the sources of our grief:

 

·       What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? (Romans 8:31-32)

 

How are we to endure? By looking towards our promised home—eternity:

 

looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. (Hebrews 12:2–3)