God our Hope!
Easter 2010 Beyond the Tomb “This is my life work: helping people understand and respond to this Message. It came as a sheer gift to me, a real surprise, God handling all the details. When it came to presenting the Message to people who had no background in God's way, I was the least qualified of any of the available Christians. God saw to it that I was equipped, but you can be sure that it had nothing to do with my natural abilities. And so here I am, preaching and writing about things that are way over my head, the inexhaustible riches and generosity of Christ. My task is to bring out in the open and make plain what God, who created all this in the first place, has been doing in secret and behind the scenes all along.” (Ephesians 3:7 – 3:9)
If I had to describe what my life is all about, who I am, what I am doing, where I am going, what am I saying or at least trying to say I would have to say ditto to the Apostle Paul because long before I was born he took the words right out of my mouth!
It is important for us to realize that our conversion experience is necessary for us to begin the next phase of our life’s journey it comes, “as a sheer gift to me, a real surprise, God handling all the details,” Following Paul’s conversion experience on the road to Damascus he spent a number of years in Arabia (Galatians 1:17). I know if we had a chance to ask Paul he’d tell us that including it was his life’s work to constantly refine, update and deepen his relationship with Jesus because it was only because of that he was able to do his, “preaching and writing about things that are way over my head, the inexhaustible riches and generosity of Christ.”
I am so glad that I’ve included the writings of Paul on my journey to the tomb and beyond I need to learn so much because I am not as close to Jesus as I need to be. But, then none of us really are, not even the Apostle Paul.
I am so glad that God has taken upon himself to be working, “in secret and behind the scenes all along,” in my life because in reality it is he who is constantly preparing me to tell his story and eventually to meet him face to face.
"My task is to bring out in the open and make plain what God, who created all this in the first place…” What God does for one he’ll do for all!
ONWARD!Grace and PEACE,
Gary,
http://www.garypiper.net/" Scripture quotations are from “The Message, copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group."
