What will mean life for us? We have many ideas. The right job, the right spouse, the right entertainment or hobby, financial comfort, and many other things all promise to be life for us. Scripture has a different view. We must find life "by loving the LORD, your God, heeding his voice, and holding fast to him."
He is already working to open the way to our destiny. He is preparing the promised land for us. Yet he still leaves it within the realm of our own choice as to whether we ultimately want the the blessings he has for us. The promised land stands shining just across the Jordan but we are free to refuse it. That isn't what the LORD wants for us.
Choose life, then,
that you and your descendants may live
that you and your descendants may live
For this to work, the promise of the LORD must be real to us. That means we must have hope. If we do not have hope we will quickly turn aside at obstacles or fleeting pleasures. If we invest ourselves in such things our way will vanish with them. But blessed are we if we hope in the LORD.
He is like a tree
planted near running water,
That yields its fruit in due season,
and whose leaves never fade.
Whatever he does, prospers.
planted near running water,
That yields its fruit in due season,
and whose leaves never fade.
Whatever he does, prospers.
Really? Whatever we do will prosper? If we understand the ends which the LORD intends then yes, even if it doesn't seem that way to us. All things work together for the good of those who love him and are called according to his purpose. This is why we must hope in his promise rather than trust our own ability to quantify the good and the bad and estimate wherein is the biggest net gain. His promise is more than can ask or imagine which eye has not seen and ear has not heard. If we insist on the things which we can imagine and have already seen and heard we thwart and subvert the ultimately better intent of the LORD.
Jesus has blazed this trail for us. On the one hand, his human life certainly was good. Yet he still hoped in the Father's will, even while being repulsed by the idea of death and desiring on one level to cling to the life he had.
“The Son of Man must suffer greatly and be rejected
by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes,
and be killed and on the third day be raised.”
by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes,
and be killed and on the third day be raised.”
In the sacrifice of the cross, he ultimately took our own disordered and human desires and loves and subjected them to the greater love and obedience he has for the Father. In doing so he opened the way to resurrection for us all. He opened the way to the true form of the blessings of which the promised land of the Old Testament was a mere foreshadowing.
Let us not gain the whole world and thereby lose our souls. Let us count even natural goods as garbage compared to the supreme good of truly knowing and being in relationship with our God.
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