Good Morning All,
In ancient Greek
philosophy, Plato said that we never see reality only our perception of
it. It is like we are in a cave and the
reality occurs behind us and all we see is the shadows on the wall before us. There are many in the world that agree with
this. You and I don’t have to. We know reality; it is God Incarnate in
Jesus. Yet even as we know the reality,
we don’t fully grasp it. We live in the
existence of “now but not yet.”
We know the reality that
awaits us; we have eternal life assured to us.
Our future is in heaven celebrating with all believers in the marriage
feast of the Lamb. We know this is true,
but we can’t see it fully. We are saved
right now. Our salvation is secured by
the blood of Jesus. Our future in heaven
is guaranteed by the atoning sacrifice of Jesus. You are saved right now. There is no delay in this. This is the “now” part of our phrase.
The thing is that we are
not fully glorified. This is the “not
yet.” We are living in the time of our
life where we live by God’s grace. Right
now, we are living according to God’s grace.
When the time comes, either our earthly death or Christ’s return, we
will live according to God’s perfected, complete glory. So, as we go through life, we want to
remember that grace is glory begun and glory is grace that is perfected. This
is also why we should be very careful about thinking we “know” what is going
on. We truly do not know everything, only God knows everything, and He has
chosen to not reveal everything to us. We need to always trust God and God
alone. We know this and must remember this, that today we do not see anything
completely clearly, we only see shadows in this imperfect time.
So, we live in an
imperfect time. Our time will not be
perfect until we receive our full measure of God’s glory. As we wait, we see it dimly. We really only have hints at what is to
come. We often speak of Holy Communion
as a foretaste of the feast to come. We
see it as just a small, microscopic taste of the wonderful gift that, while we
have received it, we haven’t opened it yet.
It is the Christmas present under the tree with your name on it and it
is only the 23rd of December. It is ours
completely and totally; we have just not yet fully opened it. Just like that present, we only dimly know
what it is. We can pick it up and feel
the weight; we can shake it; we can smell it, but we can never fully know what
it is until we open it. Then we can hold
it and look at it and play with it. We
can fully enjoy it. We no longer have to
wait but we can enjoy it completely and perfectly. This is what Paul means when he says, “now I
know part, then I shall know fully.” We
are now-but not yet.” We are saved
according to God’s grace, awaiting for the completion of his glory.
Dearest Father, we only dimly see our future glory. Yet we can celebrate your grace as we wait
for the fulfillment of your glory to us.
Keep us in your peace. In Jesus’
precious name we pray, amen.
God’s Peace,
Pastor Bret
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