A Beautiful Discovery

 The resurrection of Jesus takes us many places, one of them being into the inner arena of our personal life, where nobody lives but us, and where nobody knows what goes on except God and each one of us personally.  Rather than scare us to death, this ought to ignite energy and enthusiasm in us.  In Jesus' life we are empowered to confront just who we are and to find that we are not trapped in hopelessness but set free to be what we never dreamed, in the wildest stretches of our imagination, we could be.  

           

Perhaps the greatest awakening in the human heart, made possible because Jesus lives, is that we do not have to give ourselves to the self-destructive ways of sin.  Sin is not our friend; it is a destroyer of everything good in us and in our world.  In Christ we are under no obligation to weigh ourselves down by that which, in the end, seeks our demise and not our benefit. 

           

I John 3:1 says that God's love, which is "great," lifts those who receive His love into the status of being "Children of God."  We human beings don't have to be children of sin.  We don't have to call evil our father, and conclude that what has been must always be.  Jesus can set us free from that sort of nonsensical thinking.  We don't have to practice things that lead us to be less that whom God has created and called us to be.  We are created in the image of God.  His likeness is in us, and when we truly connect with His likeness it is a beautiful discovery. 

           

Jesus has come to destroy the works of the evil one (I John 3:8), works that deny the amazing grace of God.  Now we are on the journey toward a day of great revelation.  Soon, "when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is" (I John 3:2).  Today we look forward in hope because we know God is at work in Jesus. 

           

Let's put our hands in to Jesus' hands and live up to the grace given us, live like "Children of God" (I John. 3:1).