Do you believe in Jesus? If yes, then you are a part of the “holy brethren,” and a member of a community called, “partakers of a heavenly calling” (vs. 1). That stretches the imagination, doesn’t it. We, you and I, are partakers of a heavenly calling, who have as our leader, “Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession” (vs. 1).
As believers, we are the Church of Jesus Christ, who “was faithful as a Son over His house” (vs. 6). This amazing Son has spoken into our lives in remarkable and almost unbelievable ways. He is our Savior, a friend, the one who “made purification of sins” (Heb. 1:3), the one who “because of the suffering of death” was “crowned with glory and honor so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone” (Heb. 2:9). We have been called into the very community of God on earth. This is sacred soil on which we walk.
Jesus is the Change-Maker of lives. He takes us in our brokenness and brings us into a community of people who seek to live as a partakers of a life called forth from heaven. In 2 Peter 1:3-4, the apostle describes it this way. He says that God’s “divine power…has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature.” Partakers of the divine nature! Are you kidding me. Partakers of a heavenly calling. This is breathtaking wonder and mystery.
The Change-Maker has opened up the very heart of God and invited us to make our home in Him. Grace is not simply something God gives us. Grace is Someone God becomes in us. In a very real way the DNA of God flows in our veins as we live in Jesus. He is the Vine and we are the branches (see John 15: 4-5, 8). In Him, the very life of God flows in us.
Remember what Brennan Manning said, ““We should be astonished at the goodness of God, stunned that He should bother to call us by name, our mouths wide open at His love, bewildered that at this very moment we are standing on holy ground” (see the March 6 devotional). I get this. I really do. Writer, Tim Hansel, says somewhere, “Grace is the central invitation to life and the final word. It’s the becoming nudge and the overwhelming, underserved mercy that urges us to change and grow, and then gives us the power to pull it off.”
As we make our way to Good Friday and Easter Morning, let’s remember that God has reached out to us in spectacular fashion, and calls us to life that cannot be described in a better way than “abundant” (see John 10:10). Maybe this is why Charles Wesley wrote the famous words, “O for a thousand tongues to sing my great Redeemer's praise, the glories of my God and King, the triumphs of his grace” (1739).
Remember who you are, “Partakers of a heavenly calling."
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