Tuesday, July 23, 2019

Certainty In Christ



              Allow me to reintroduce myself! Just kidding, but it has been quite a long time since I’ve sat down to write in this space. It’s been a busy few weeks at work with mid-year financial result reviews. I’m also happy to announce that I bought a house. Come the middle of August, I’ll be an official resident of Murfreesboro, Tennessee! The new location should cut down my commute by about 30 minutes, so needless to say I am extremely excited. While I am excited to be sure, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little nervous. Being a first-time homeowner, there will be a lot of things I’ll have learn on the fly. I’ll have to make mortgage payments (Nashville area ain’t cheap!), manage maintenance expenses, and find various ways to make the house a home. To sum it up, there’s a lot of uncertainty.

              But uncertainty is nothing new in our lives, is it?  How many things in our life do we truly have control over? Think about all the things in our lives that are variable:

-          What will traffic be like during our commute tomorrow?
-          Will we get that raise or promotion at work?
-          Will gas prices go up?
-          What will the economy be like next year?
-          Who will be the president in 2020?
-          Will bro country ever die?
-          Will Bartolo Colon ever retire (look him up!)?
-          Will Michigan beat Ohio State this year (there’s always hope, c’mon Jim!)?

But you get the point. Our daily lives are filled with more variables than a high school algebra test - You never ended up using any of that stuff, did you? But this column isn’t meant to be a downer today – the news gets better. What if I told you there is certainty in the single most important area of our lives? Well, it’s true! Scripture clearly articulates that our God never changes. Take Hebrews 13:8 for example: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” The point is further driven home in James 1:17: “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” In case you wondered if God’s character changed in the Old Testament, let’s look at Numbers 23:19: “God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?”

Don’t you wish you had this level of certainty that all the other various aspects of our lives wouldn’t change? I sure do, but if I had to choose, I’d rather be certain of the possibility of spending eternity with the Creator than anything else. I’m not trying to turn this post into a debate over eternal security (once saved, always saved). There’s always Twitter (or my comment section below – have at it!) for that discussion. Regardless of where you fall on the doctrine of eternal security, I think we can agree on the basics. If we place our faith entirely in Christ and by doing so fulfill the law of Christ (love God and love neighbor), we can have the certainty of eternal life.

Trusting God shouldn’t be as difficult as it is. Trusting God is like knowing the outcome of a ball game before placing a big wager. (Not condoning gambling!).  Trusting God is like knowing the return on your stock shares before you purchase them. It’s like knowing if that cute girl will say yes when you casually ask her to coffee. Through the divine gift of the Scriptures, we have certainty of what is in store for us when we place our faith in Christ. We know the result of the battle. Christ was and is the victor. Through his victory and blood shed on Calvary, we can be reconciled to God despite our sinful and wicked nature. What a thing to be certain of!

So I’d ask you to pray for me as I enter a time of newness and uncertainty in my life. Pray that I stand on the promises of the Godhead found in Scripture. I’ll certainly do the same for you. Please submit any prayer requests in the comments section directly below this post! I’d love to get to know my readers.

In Christ,

Kendal May



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