07/23/2023
Where do we look for wisdom? How about righteousness, sanctification, and redemption? Do we find them in church or bible study? Do we seek them out while plodding along a pilgrimage path in some far off country? The answer is that we find them in one place only... Jesus Christ, and He can be found in all of these places.
“But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.”
1 Corinthians 1:30-31 KJV
God has given all these things to us through Jesus, and many of us thought His life was all about redemption. In fact, that was just the beginning. Our faith and relationship with the Lord is more like one of those grand old western movies where the hero rescues the girl from the villain and then they ride off into the sunset to begin a wonderful life together on a beautiful ranch. We watch the movie thinking it was all about the rescue and the ranch... but in fact, it was really about the sunset. The rescue had to happen before they could live happily ever after. The hero in our movie is Jesus, and the sunset is our eternal relationship with God.
So we have the rescue, and are delivered from harm and danger...
“waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.”
Titus 2:13-14 ESV
And then we experience the sunset...
“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.”
1 John 3:1-3 ESV
But, as we ride into the sunset we realize that our love for Him, and His for us, will never cease to be a light before us.
“This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.”
1 John 1:5 ESV
One of my favorite westerns is "True Grit", starring John Wayne as Sheriff Rooster Cogburn. I have seen it a hundred times and yet I am still on the edge of my seat as He rides her horse until it collapses while holding little Addie, who has been bitten by a rattlesnake. Will he save her life? I know he will, and yet this scene still thrills me. But my favorite line in the entire movie is in the closing moments when they are in a graveyard where they have buried a Texas Ranger, their friend. As Addie and John Wayne are about to go their separate ways, she tells Rooster not to jump his horse; to which he turns his tall horse and while saying "Well, come see a fat ole man sometime!" He and the horse clear a four rail fence.
Jesus is our hero, and in the end, after His work in us is complete, He will still remain heroic... just as Sheriff Rooster Cogburn was in True Grit. Heroes may be killed, but they never really die. They are complex, and what makes them heroes, lives on in those they save.
Jesus is more than just our savior, he brings much more to our lives... wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and of course, the redemption. These are only a few of the major attributes, but there are so many more. When we think of Jesus we think of the rescue... our redemption, and we sing about it, because that is what we do as humans... we glorify the rescue. We see the heroic, and trivialize the sunset that we ride off into. As much as our salvation is the thing that the movie of our life is focused on, Jesus didn't come to save us and ride away alone... He wants to take us with Him, and beckons us to "come" and ride into the sunset beside Him. If we don't do that, then what was the point of our salvation? The rescue was heroic, but the sunset is eternal, and that is where we live happily ever after.
Prayer,
Father, I thank you for your Son Jesus Christ, and for His sacrifice that saved us from sin. I thank you for our redemption, but Father, I thank you most of all for the relationship with you that is the true climax of our lives, and the point of all the heroic suffering that Jesus underwent. Help us to realize just how much His pain upon the cross, and His agony in death, were about reuniting us with you, and that without our return to your eternal arms, His life was in vain... His heroics were for naught. Holy Father, we sing about the heroism of Jesus, but never let us lose sight of the sunset that He wants us to ride into with Him. Our destination is to be forever with you… and Jesus, through His life, shows us the way. Jesus leads us into the sunset, into the never ending light that is you.
“Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him."”
John 14:6-7 ESV
Rich Forbes