Fashioned For This

PASSAGE FOR THE DAY:
2 Corinthians 5 (click the link)


KEY VERSES:
Now the one who has fashioned us for this very purpose is God, who has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come. (2 Corinthians 5:5, NIV)


REFLECTIONS:
What fleeting lives we live. As children, all we want is independence. As teens, we long for confidence. As young adults, we crave recognition. Middle age wants connectedness, and mature life wants… well, the energy to enjoy what measure of independence, confidence, recognition and connectedness we’ve gained through the years. Americans, especially, avoid aging sometimes literally at all costs. The thought of death is distressful, yet Paul talks about it as stepping from a temporary state into a permanent and secure dwelling. How is that? 

I believe the key is in verse 5: We were fashioned for this very purpose. With our temporary, but still spiritually attuned senses we see, feel, smell, hear and taste both decay and rapturous goodness. Decay, when we realize our bodies, relationships and personal accomplishments are subject to our own frailties and brokenness. Goodness, when we recognize that anything we enjoy now is simply a deposit… a promise (the Greek word translated “guarantee” has the same root as “engagement ring”) of what awaits us in the day to come when we are gone from this life but fully alive in the presence of God. 

As good as life here on earth can be, we were ultimately made for more, and that more will only be satisfied in heaven. That beautiful painting? The entire sky of heaven has deeper colors and richer texture. The deep connection you have with a brother or sister upon sharing your heart and being accepted? You and he/she will one day swim together in the overflowing acceptance of the creator of both your hearts. Suddenly that concept you could never quite grasp here in this body will seem quite natural and elementary to you. All the gracelets we enjoy now won’t go away, they’ll simply mature into full-blown glory.

Have you ever thought of what you want your resurrected self to be like? You will be that, at the very least and you will be entirely pleasing to God. But before we throw up the white flag and huddle in the church basement singing “In the Sweet By And By” consider this: there are some opportunities for pleasing God that we will only have while present in these ridiculous bodies of ours.  When we get to heaven, there will be no more need for faith, no more need for enduring through trials, no more need for courage and boldness in representing Jesus.  Now, while we are in these bodies is our only shot to please God in these areas. 

I don’t know about you but sometimes I take myself too seriously. I behave as if people’s opinions of me matter much more than they do. That’s what the world does, but I now have the ability to live a new way, as one promised, guaranteed, even “engaged” to heaven. I forget that “to fear the Lord” means to care more about what God thinks of me than what others think. While I am here in this body I can live as a citizen of heaven. What’s more, Jesus gives me the authority to invite others into the same kind of life… to invite people to His party! That changes the way I see myself and the way I see others.


PERSONAL APPLICATION:
This passage reminds me of a fantastic book I read a few years back called Journey of Desire (recently retitled Desire) by John Eldredge. Its premise is that anything we enjoy here on earth is meant to make us desire more, the more that will only be satisfied in heaven, and that desire is a good thing. I love the idea of “holy discontent,” because we often settle for so much less than what God wants for us. May it be that we have a holy discontent for our own lives and for those we intersect.


WHO AM I?
I’m Leigh Anne Bland and this picture, though not very flattering, represents a moment of extreme bravery for me. I’ve always been afraid of heights… my legs turn to jelly at the thought of tall cliffs. But in this instance I conquered that fear and jumped from South Point, Hawaii, the southernmost tip of the US. It’s about a 45ft drop into clear blue water. How did I conquer it? I didn’t tell anyone I wanted to do it, and simply walked off the cliff.