Intended ...

Infinite recursion.  To understand our destiny with respect to returning to what God intended for each of us, imagine being so filled with joy that you could not imagine ever feeling better than you do right now.  Then despite your certainty that this is the most joy one is capable of experiencing, a day passes, and there is even more joy than before.  And despite your certainty growing that today is surely the day that the most joy possible is within you, tomorrow brings even more; an infinite process that covers not only joy, but fulfillment, peace, hope, love, faith, and wisdom.  No matter how much you experience, there is always even more on the horizon you are constantly encountering.  It is like memorizing every page of every book contained in the library of congress.  The task seems overwhelming (particularly for those absent eidetic memories), but despite your fears, you accomplish it anyway a few pages at a time each day.  It might take what seems like forever, but when the timeline loses meaning, the task might appear to get accomplished “quickly”.  Now imagine that the library of congress is only the first volume in many libraries you will memorize.  This is the kind of life you were intended for; a life without limits, a life without boundaries, a life of absolute freedom to experience love more and more each day.  In the constant accumulation of wisdom, is the fuel to constantly find new ways to love others.  This is the death of mediocrity.  This is the death of compromise.  This is the death of the status quo, and with it, the birth of the destiny for which you were intended.

We were meant to live lives that are so much deeper than what we see today.  Our minds were meant to retain so much more than they do.  Our bodies designed to experience so much more than they can at the moment.  To contemplate what God intends for each of us, is to begin to think without the self-inflicted boundaries that have so long made us content with the meager expectations we set for ourselves.  This is not about raising the expectations for humanity as a species; but it is about achieving a destiny marked by a power outside of ourselves to re-create us.  Imagine what it would mean to the world to see Christians who are not merely “readers” of the Word, but “do-ers” of the Word instead.  What if instead of recounting the stories in the Bible, Christians were accomplishing even greater feats for the glory of God?  Atheists often contend that the Bible must be false, because they themselves have never witnessed any such miracles first hand.  That argument might have to disappear in the face of the power of love that could not be denied.  But then returning to the destiny God has in mind for us, is not simply what we begin to accomplish in this life, but for eternity as well.

People search for the secrets to life.  They want to know why they are here, what will make them happy, what is the point to their particular existence?  These answers are available to us, but only from the source of our creation.  Strictly speaking, evolution as an ideology, offers no answers to questions regarding the meaning of existence.  Under that line of thinking, random chance is responsible for it all, therefore meaning is absent from everything.  The idea of a God however, that takes a personal interest in you, and wishes to develop a relationship just with you, who wants to see you end the pain in your life and begin to experience what you formerly believed was impossible; now that offers a wealth of meaning.  An acceptance of God translates to the knowledge there is a unique purpose for just you, that you alone were intended for.

God creates snow, but each flake is unique.  God created man, but each man has been unique from Adam to you.  There is commonality in our destiny.  Like snow that covers the earth, humanity was created to love.  The blanket of snow is created by the accumulation of each individual snowflake, remove even one and snow is diminished.  Man is even more important.  Each of us was designed not only be unique in our appearance, but to serve a unique purpose in the overall fabric of humanity that God intended.  What we have in common is unbridled joy, unbounded love, and an eternity to experience it.  What we do not share is our unique perspectives and unique contributions to the whole.  This secret can only be discovered in our God.  To experience the re-creation of who we are through surrender to Christ puts us on the road of discovery to what our purpose in His kingdom truly is.  Our greatest hope, our greatest aspiration becomes one of being His servant, doing His will.  We begin to define ourselves, not by our jobs, or by our accomplishments, even by our relationships with others – instead we begin to see our value only in how we might serve Him, accomplish His goals, helping Him any way we can.  Christianity shares the commonality of testifying about our Lord, yet each unique perspective must be heard in order to see a better picture of the whole of Christ.  Each voice is critically important, each testimony critical to seeing the entirety of God, not just one view of Him.

While evil continues to exist, whether within us, or around us, it will constrain our ability to achieve what God intended.  But it will not prevent us from beginning our journey home, back towards His intentions.  Evil may slow our rate of success, but it cannot stop it altogether.  The process of redemption that leads to perfection has immediate, and near term results.  Where a treasured sin used to occupy so much of our time, or stunt our ability to truly love another, the removal of that sin through surrender of our will to Christ brings nothing but freedom in its place.  Our time is returned to us.  Our ability to reflect His love, is instilled within us, and the mediocrity of our existence begins to fade in favor of the destiny of His intentions for us.  This is where the source of our exhilaration comes from.  It is the very process of re-creation and redemption that adds a quantum level of joy and fulfillment to our everyday lives.  When this process has been adopted into the life of a Christian, the evidence begins to show up on their faces.  A Christian undergoing the process of liberation from sins, just seems to be happier so much of the time.  They cannot help it.  They cannot stop it.  They cannot deny it.  It is because they are becoming someone new, someone different than they were before, and it shows.

The world around you would have you believe that love is defined in a feeling of pleasure you get from the relationship with someone else.  But that is really focusing only on what “love” is bringing to you.  Christ offers you His example of love that is wholly consumed in redeeming you to Himself, ending the pain of your life, and always finding new ways to express itself in bringing you joy.  The kind of love Christ demonstrates is one where the infinite God of the universe is constantly expressing love in action to make your life better every second of every day.  You do not see Christ focused on what He can get out of loving you.  Instead you see Him focused on “how” He can find yet another way to show you what it means for Him to love you.  This example of “how” to love another is something that the process of re-creation brings.  It is part of the restoration to the ideals and intentions of our God.  And the transition is something we share in common, even if the expression is unique to each of us.

Our mistake within current Christian thinking, is to believe this process can only begin in a perfect environment of heaven.  We consequently defer our hopes for something more, or something better, to a far off proposition that we will likely see only after a long time in the tomb.  But this is in error.  Christ came to break our bonds in the here and now, to see us experience His kingdom in the here and now.  Surrender of the will to our Lord, begins the journey right now.  While the transition may not be completed instantaneously, it does occur.  The transition back to the intentions of God for each of us, back to the purpose He intended, back to the fulfillment only He can bring; starts right now and produces immediate results.  It may take a lifetime to complete, it may take less than that, but the journey is sure, and the results are cumulative.  To discover the true meaning to one’s personal existence, and then to being to fulfill this destiny, is no longer beyond the hopes and dreams of those who call themselves by His name.  This is what He saved us for.  This is what happens as we allow Him to really begin saving us from ourselves, as we surrender the will to Him.  Our destiny is not merely the removal of imperfection; it is the journey towards purpose and fulfillment.