Christ is Our Life II

"For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory." Colossians 3:3,4

So, if Christ is our life and we say our life sucks, what are we really saying? Christ sucks? Christ stinks (using a more sanitized word)? When we really believe that Christ is our life, our outlook will change. We will seek nourishment from the Christ-life in and around us. We'll be much more content and much more loathe to say our life sucks.

Christ is our life

"For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory." Colossians 3:3,4

Early Easter Sunday morning billows of disappointment swept over me. The disappointing waves were courtesies of a storm that brewed for days. I just had to be in church even if I'd be alone; my husband and daughter had miserable colds.

I stepped out of the house into a glassy blue sky, drenched by sunshine. Ah . . . . I inhaled the crisp air. Refreshing. All of a sudden, I forgot my disappointments. After a 10 minute sunshiny drive, I slid into the back pew of a beautiful church I'd never attended.

There I heard chapter three of the epistle to the Colossians. The words "Christ who is your life" overtook me. I sat understanding that I was trying to squeeze life out of situations, and when these situations didn't produce the life I wanted, disappointment followed.

Lately I've been disappointed a lot.

Yet when I heard these verses anew, I realized anew that if Christ is my life, it doesn't matter what situations I find myself in. He who is my life will give me life in the midst of disappointment if I would but look to him for life, not circumstances. This truth is an idea I've comprehended but needed to experience afresh.

Contentment

"But godliness with contentment is great gain." I Timothy 6:6

What is contentment? Are you content?

Faithful and True

"I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and makes war. His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself. He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God. The armies of heaven were following him, riding on white horses and dressed in fine linen, white and clean. Out of his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. 'He will rule them with an iron scepter.' He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written: KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS." Revelation 19:11-16


Is God faithful when he seems unfaithful to you -- that is, when you've loved him and obeyed him to your utmost yet your entire world still falls apart (like Job's did)? In that instance is he true, that is, is he who he claims to be in the Bible?


Most of us would quickly reply, "Why of course he is!" But when our world actually falls apart, when what we never dreamed would happen happens, do we treat God like he is faithful and true or does our faith fall apart with our world?


If you are committed to following Christ a time will come when he strips everything away, maybe all at once. At that moment will you say with Job, "though he slay me I will trust him" (because you know he is faithful and true even though your circumstances seemingly contradict what you believe about his faithfulness and goodness to you)?


It is difficult to honestly declare that God is faithful and true when our world falls apart. But God wants to bring us to the point where we know and feel he is faithful and true despite the onslaught of slaying circumstances. More than anything, God wants us to trust that he is who he says he is.

God tests our trust.