Tuesday, February 03, 2009

finding one's life

Over and over again Jesus told his disciples and he tells us that those who hold on to their lives, and hoard their lives will lose them. But those who lose their lives for Jesus' sake, who give up their lives to God through Christ, will end up finding them, finding their true life. Something that begins in this life.

True life is in Jesus. This is where we find the (good) kingdom of God. And where we really begin to lose the false selves we hang on to for dear life. Even as we know that deep down inside something is wrong. Are we willing to let God do his death dealing of us so that we can end up living, truly living? Finding the life that God intends for us, the life he made us for, of the new creation in Christ? Or does this just seem like empty fiction to us? So that we hold on to what is real to us, while wondering what we're missing in Jesus?

These are the kind of questions I'm asking myself. And maybe they are more the kind of questions we should be asking (among others). Questions either voiced in Scripture, or which arise from Scripture; questions that indicate God's word at work in our lives to show us our real selves and God's death and life dealing for us in Christ, and by the Spirit.

I have been thinking about this through some of my reading, and of course we know it well through the gospels. And I have found myself rather numb and just sensing that God is at work in me, lately. I don't live on feelings, but I do pay attention to them, especially anything out of the ordinary, to see if I can understand what they might indicate.

How can we who have trusted in Jesus miss out on this kind of life? Why do we? (a multitude of answers to these questions, seems to me) Or anything you'd like to add here.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

i think i am going to have to come back and read this a few more times.

allow it to sink in.

Ted M. Gossard said...

Nancy,
Not easy stuff. Part of our life in Christ. But a part we need to learn to intelligently embrace and live out more and more. And sometimes this means putting to death certain things in our life and existence. But we can only do so, of course, by the Spirit (Romans 8).

But I'm with you. Yes, we have to keep coming back and pondering.