Prayer for Divine Guidance

Heavenly Father, I ask that your Holy Spirit bless and enlighten me as I read, reflect and rest in the boundless riches of salvation that Christ Jesus has won! Abba Father, draw me closer into the Divine Dance with You, Your Son, and Holy Spirit to continually transform my life here on earth to taste life with You in Heaven! Amen.

Reflection

I had been a Christian for a long time before I began to understand the difference between “I try” and “I trust” in the Christian life. Understanding that difference makes a big difference. “I try” is going about life as if it all depends on me; “I trust” is going about life depending on the life of Jesus in me.

“I try” is actually the language of the “old self” (Romans 6:6; Ephesians 4:22-24) with its determination to be a better Christian, to love better, and to serve better, all the while hoping to be good enough. “I trust” is the awareness that my “old self” was crucified with Christ who lives His life within me (Galatians 2:19-20). “I trust” relies on Jesus, not merely as the source of life, but as my very life. “I trust” results in going from anxious striving to resting in my oneness with Christ.

In his letter to the Colossian Christians the apostle Paul urges them to move from “I try” to “I trust”. Paul warns in Colossians 2 that they have been deceived by false teachers peddling a counterfeit gospel of legalism and trying harder, rather than living in the fullness of Christ. “For in Christ the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have come to fullness in him” (Colossians 2:9).

In Colossians 3 Paul shifts from warning about the bankruptcy of legalism to the focus on Christ, who is our life:

“So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory. Colossians 3:1-4

Paul begins, “So if you then have been raised with Christ”, not as a hypothetical but as a statement of fact, i.e., “you have been raised with Christ!” Paul’s words, “So if…” are a “first-class condition” in Greek grammar that assumes the truth of a statement: God did in fact raise us together with Christ. This is objective reality! Whether we feel it or don’t feel it, whether we are aware or unaware of it, we are included in the life of Jesus.

Most importantly, having been raised with Christ to new life carries with it the command: let us live accordingly. That is, we are to “seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.” To seek the things above is not wishful thinking or living with our heads in the clouds. It is to live from our true center where Christ is enthroned at the right hand of God.

Seeking the things above where Christ reigns is to be set free from legalism and anxious rule-keeping in order to live into our shared life with Jesus. The next command, “Set your minds on things that are above,” carries the idea in the Greek language “to keep thinking, to adopt a mindset.” It means to orient our lives to the reality that Christ is our life as He lives in us and we live in Him. It is to embrace Christ not primarily as our role model, or as our helper, but as our very life.

Why not take a moment to ponder Paul’s next stunning words: “your life is hidden with Christ in God.” A life hidden with Christ, in God, means that we are secure and protected inside the very life of God. Just as Christ’s glory is now hidden to the world, so the true glory of our lives is hidden, awaiting glorious revelation. While the world does not recognize us for who we really are, God does.

Colossians 3 verse 4 discloses that what is hidden will be revealed at Christ’s coming in glory. “When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.” The coming glory will be the full manifestation of that which is now hidden to the world: our sharing in the very life of God! The full glory to be revealed will not be self-promotion or self-exaltation, but the selfless love within the eternal Dance of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Imagine taking a piece of paper and drawing across it a straight horizontal line. Then imagine drawing a zig-zag, an up and down line beneath the straight horizontal one. Label the straight horizontal line, POSITION, and the zig-zag line, PRACTICE. The straight horizontal line represents the believer’s never changing, eternal POSITION, as we “have been raised with Christ…seated at the right hand of God,” regardless of our day-to-day PRACTICE.

The Christian life is not about our TRYING but about our TRUSTING all that Jesus Christ is for us! “God doesn’t intend to help us live the Christian life. Immaturity considers the Lord Jesus a helper. Maturity knows him to be life itself.” (Miles Stanford, The Green Letters)