Lie or Reality?

We believe what we were told when we were young. You're on your own in this world -- it's tough out there -- no one will look after you when your parents die. So get a good education so that you can get a good job and have children and keep yourself secure and comfortable! The result is that we spend the next 50 years striving to make ourselves comfortable and secure, so that we can then be happy and enjoy life.

The truth is utterly different from this. You're not on your own -- you aren't even alone when you're alone. You aren't at all just a piece of flotsam --a scrap of humanity -- a little speck or amoeba thrown up by chance plus time. You are part of the maker of the universe. No, you're not "the Maker" of the universe you're not equal with him -- he exists outside you. BUT you are made from his life. His life is in you -- it's his life that makes your heartbeat and your brain work. If he is the fire, you are one of his flames!

This is why you feel you're worth something -- you are worth something. This is why you feel you're different from other people -- you are. This is why you feel you're here for some special reason -- you are. Here's the way our Maker explained it through John in the first century: "that which has been made was life in him" i.e. Jesus, the only son of the Maker of the universe; "all things were made by Him and without him was not anything made. That which has been made was life in him" (John 1:4,5 -- footnote in Revised Standard Version of the Bible).

A Predesigned Life

God expressed it in other words through Paul when he wrote Ephesians 2:10: "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." You exist not because your father or mother decided to have a baby -- that is simply the physical, temporal expression in this time-space world of your real creation in the son of God. That creation has taken place in the timeless -- spaceless world of God Himself. It's meaningless to say it took place before your birth here on earth because there is no such thing as time in this limited local earth of ours. It's more accurate to stress the design and purpose of this reality rather than its place in time.

And the truth is that God carefully predesigned you as part of His Son to do certain things that He himself has prepared for you. This is the meaning of the Greek word "pro-oridzo" in Romans 8:29- predestined in the sense of pre-designed rather than forced like a robot to do things you can't help doing.

Moreover, God has not left you to somehow do these things by your own hit-and-miss efforts. You're made from his Son's life and the life of His Son is in your veins and your heart and your brain. In fact, you are part of His Son (1 Corinthians 12:27) so he will act through you -- IF YOU LET HIM! Even though God has planned all this, He refuses to do anything without your willing agreement. He does not want shackled robots -- He wants people who love like his son and enjoy being part of his family.

Inner Guidance

This is why it's vital for you to realize that there is a spirit inside you that lets each of us know what Christ has planned to do through us to complete his creation. It's this spirit that enabled Einstein to do what he believed he was made for. It's this spirit that enabled Caruso to do what he believed he was made for. But it's also this spirit in you that will let you know what the son of God has planned to do through you for his world. It doesn't really matter whether it's cleaning bathrooms or playing the violin in Carnegie Hall -- either will seem natural as Christ gives the gift to do it. So you'll experience fulfilment without self-congratulation. AND God will add to you the other things you need -- clothes, food, and shelter.

But it's this spirit within you that guides you to the unique life that God's son wishes to live in you: let's talk again about this light inside you (Proverbs 20:27).