Wednesday, April 7, 2021

“Because of that obedience, God lifted him high and honored him far beyond anyone or anything, ever, so that all created beings in heaven and on earth—even those long ago dead and buried—will bow in worship before this Jesus Christ, and call out in praise that he is the Master of all, to the glorious honor of God the Father.” (Philippians 2: 9 -11, The Message Bible)

                The classic, religious definition (i.e., in the ancient true sense of a religion being a life-binding principle) for the purpose of humankind is “to glorify God and to know Him and make Him known by glorifying Him with our lives.”

                Doesn’t sound very modern or secular, does it? It doesn’t seem very politically or culturally astute. It doesn’t seem like something the average Joe and Jane would be very much interested in.  It might seem to some who claim to be spiritual but not very religious that this sounds too pious, too sanctimonious, too in-your-face.  Most of us neglect our purpose as being too spiritually rigorous, too demanding, too impossible. It demands a lot!

                But at the heart and soul of our humanity is our basic and essential need to reach for the sacred and divine, to strive to rediscover the One in whose image we have been made (Genesis 1:27) and to reconnect to the Homepage of God’s Love, Mercy and Grace. We can neglect that desire, ignore it, try to revoke it, forget about it, break it into pieces, trample on it and do all manner of sin and wrong, but we are always going to be intrinsically connected to the Divine nature of God.

                With Resurrection Sunday (my preferred name over Easter) barely behind us, we have a lifetime to live the Resurrected Life ahead of us. It is the Risen Lord who reimagines our human nature and re-establishes our Created Purpose to know God and be known by him. “God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him. After God made that decision of what his children should be like, he followed it up by calling people by name. After he called them by name, he set them on a solid basis with himself. And then, after getting them established, he stayed with them to the end, gloriously completing what he had begun.” (Romans 8: 29 -30, The Message Bible)

                Christ’s Resurrection is the invitation for us, once again, freely and openly, to engage God in a brand-new relationship. At an incredible cost to God, God closed the gaping divide between us and Godself. God is made know to us in Christ, the Word made flesh, and it is through Christ that we may come to know God more richly, more personally, more intimately, more deeply and more hopefully.

                All peoples will be included in this worship of this human but sacred link to the Divine. It doesn’t mean that everyone is going to become church-going Christians necessarily, but that all of humanity will understand, respect, acknowledge that Jesus Christ is worthy of shaping the world in the right Way, full of reconciliation, mutual respect, and gracious Love.

                Thus, the followers of Jesus are given a rich mandate to be inclusive, to be compassionate for all, to be gracious and tolerant of differences, to be broad-minded in the best sense of that word.  We are all fearfully and wonderfully made. We practice our worship of God in the world, not only in a Sunday morning event but in a day-to-day regular lifestyle expression of living out of God’s image in us and expressing His Love because of this magnificent relationship we have with God through Jesus Christ.

                So we are back at where I started in the first week of Lent, but it also describes what it is to be an Easter People, from Romans 12. “So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.” (Romans 12: 1 – 3, The Message Bible).

                Alleluia, Christ is Risen. He is risen indeed.

                Live like it matters!

 

Dale