TWO OPPORTUNITIES AT LIFE

Christians get two opportunities at life. The first opportunity is finite with a pre-established beginning and end. We can call this life a Dot... a heartbeat... Dot-Life, life as aliens in a fallen sin fabricated world. The second opportunity is infinite with no ending... extending into forever. We can call this life a Line... an infinite line... Line-Life, life as the redeemed children of God. Being a fickle stiff-necked people we tend to live in the Dot... live in the now. We would do well to live in the Line… live in the Blessed Hope we have in Christ. God has given us great and precious promises about Line-Life including the promise of a New Heaven and a New Earth, the new home for the righteous. Assuming the Lord tarries in His return, only two things stand between the drudging misery of Dot-Life and the love, joy, peace and sheer beauty of Line-Life, that marvelous world where we will live happily forever: Only two things: Death and Resurrection. It is a simple and obvious fact, that if we never die we will never be resurrected. As the result of sin’s curse death is an enemy of God’s people, a powerful fear provoking tool of the powers of darkness. And the disease of aging, the curse of sin, is the number one cause of death accounting for more deaths than all diseases, fatal accidents, nature’s catastrophes, and wars combined. But Wait! Romans declares “We know that all things work together for good ... according to His (IE., God’s) purposes.” So while death is an enemy, because of the death and resurrection of our Lord, death has been turned into God’s eternal good, the vehicle by which we receive our glorified bodies and enter the glory of never-ending life... Resurrection Life… Line-Life. If we never died we would never be resurrected into the joy of eternity with our Savior and our spiritual family – we would remain a Dot! Death is not the worst thing that can happen to a saint, for it leads to God’s best! Death is simply the door to Line-Life. Father, teach us how to access the essence of Line-Life now, living purposeful lives as Kingdom builders, never fearing death, ever anticipating the full reality of what awaits us when we step through death’s door.

EndNote:

“Death is swallowed up in victory.”

“Death, where is your sting?
O Hades, where is your victory?”

“Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.”

“DEATH IS SWALLOWED UP IN VICTORY”

(Rom. 8:28; 1 Cor. 15:54-58)