Moments of clarity come, sometimes, in the midst of seemingly mundane circumstance. Seeing clearly...or, rather, more clearly...for just a moment.. ..is such a blessing.
All anxiety falls completely away, as though it were never there. Fear of being rejected by others, fear of being misinterpreted, fear of being misrepresented, fear of being attacked..
..all fall away.
Concern falls away.
No sense of worry remains.
And it's as though the sky has cleared, and the sun shines so brightly through...illuminating the beauty all around, warming the heart to love all which surrounds, without regard for what might, could, or will come of any given moment. But just to be there, in the moment, experiencing a depth of the Lord's love in such a way as makes all life precious and brothers and sisters in Christ absolutely beloved.
Precious, so precious.
Those moments serve as reminders, serve as echoes, serve as a glimmer...of the depths of God's love for us.
It is unfathomable. And He longs to lavish His love, but yet we ever rebel...harden our hearts, whether as blatant rebellion (loathing Him, effectively), overt lack of trust in who He is, or even as suspicion of His goodness persists.
He has made a way for us to come into His love, and yet...we choose our own flighty and fallow ideals. Each and every one of us. We all choose to go our own way. Except that He restrains us, whatsoever, even those who are His chosen and regenerate ones would wander listlessly into distraction and error, blindly oblivious to even wandering.
We choose to walk away from Him. Constantly.
Because the flesh...the mind...even as the spirit has been regenerate and made like unto Christ at the point of regeneration...these members of our own body have had the workings of sin corrupt them to varying degrees (whether sin wrought by the individual or as part of the general working of sin in genetics/heredity/inclination). And it must need be worked out. Period.
By diligent seeking of the Lord.
Reading His word. Living there. Abiding in His loving presence. Unceasingly and ever increasingly. Praying...talking to Him...constantly. As much as breathing, such that there comes a point where words no longer are even necessary to the process of giving praise. One's heart may lift in rejoicing without ever the eye or lip twitch awry.
And it should always be so.
We were all told as much. And the Holy Spirit still attests to the necessity of these things. Period.
Not as a matter of rote, but as a matter of what is necessary so to progress. For our own good, to His glory, we must do these things. Not just as a set of requirements laid out in order to give structure. For the sake of our sanctification, so as to be increasingly freed from all the wretched trappings of the world which yet seek and desire and attempt to subsume what good the Lord does work in and through us, to the praise of His glory.
In terms of how Ephesians 2 speaks on a latter part of what comes through these things--the doing of works...
...it is made plain that we aren't saved by works.
Period.
You know this, and yet everything in the world seeks to attempt to send a message otherwise...that if you are diligent enough, ardent enough, unwavering enough, devoted and motivated enough...
...if you want something enough...
...then surely you can and will achieve it. Period.
Hard work and motivation breed success is the relative by-line of the world, now. Even in those countries with caste systems, from what I currently understand, there's still...within strata...a sense of division between those who press forward to secure whatever the utmost is, unto themselves, and those who are viewed as somehow lesser for not doing so.
Implication per that always being that those who work are the ones who are successful, the ones who will have a good life, the ones who are admirable and intelligent and desirable.
For the sake of their works in the world.
We look at everything backwards, though, in terms of the way things actually are...regarding sanctification and works.
We cannot be saved by good works...even as we cannot do good works, apart from Christ. Period. So, another way of putting it would be--if you were to try to do good works, so as to achieve salvation or to work goodness in the world...apart from Christ...you're ultimately manifesting sin, in some way. First off, just by refraining from giving view to who God is as part of the process, which effectively as implicitly esteems self beyond reckoning... ...so, starting out with self-idolatry, self-worship, making self into a god..
And...really, do you need to even go further than that, as far as how it's impossible to do good apart from Christ?
Take it a step further back, perhaps, in terms of what it means to do things apart from Christ (which, this will only be a brief survey, lacking depth and intricacy which is utterly inherent this to such extent that superficial appearances of contradiction may oft seem to arise in a deeper survey, but only perforce the utter complexity of such as this)...
...firstly, there is implicit and requisite a condition of doing things in and of and through Christ...
...which first and foremost reveres Him as God.
That's just a baseline requirement as to even be in position to be capable of walking in the Spirit. Period. So, if that's not there, in some utterly unshakeable way...
...anything which might be done is going to be done apart from recognition of Christ as who He is, at the very least, thus entirely done apart from Christ, as wholly neglecting to consider what His will is, being rightly desirous of conforming to said will to whatever end is the Lord's purpose, and thus is entirely full of whatsoever false notions and ideals are otherwise exalted within self as opposing Christ so significantly as to prevent honest and right acknowledgement of Him as God. Operating from such a position of wrong-mindedness, in error according to the most basic of all precepts, can only work further perversion of truth and effect. Bit by bit by bit, till the whole of any given system would become utterly infested with error and wrongness, even unto a point of collapse.
Bit...by bit...by bit..
..and one small thing is all it takes, then a lifetime's worth of those such small aberrations will be passed on to the next generation, which is then that much more deviant from truth for having begun from a position of greater error, then corrupting and perverting it even further, for yet still failing to even desire to want to know truth...rather just accepting all things at face value, and proceeding from there.
It does not wash.
And even as the truth is corrupted beyond recognition, according to reason which becomes increasingly impaired by the overbearing weight of attempt to reconcile full-scale insanity, in terms of the level of deviation from truth which is yet wholly societally touted as truth, excepted to be accepted without question, otherwise to receive at least verbal flogging...
...then so, also, flesh corrupts. As even a mirror of what's passed, mentally.
Until you have entire continents of people who are literally starving to death from infancy into adulthood, then disease stricken over course of adulthood. Only knowing death, for a world so corrupted by sin.
Sin works death, is all. Because, at the end of the day...no matter how much we despise Him, attempt to ignore, try to be like Him while yet refusing to even acknowledge Him in truth, attempt to limit Him according to ideas which are more palatable or comfortable at a given moment, or even refuse to fully follow Him for fear of where He may lead...for fear of being unable to attempt to comprehend all things in ways which are comprehensible and thus more readily regurgitated for attempted processing and proselytizing...
...regardless of any of all that, and anything similar or howsoever else might exalt self against Him...
...He is God...
And that's just that. Whether we accept the truth of His sovereignty or not. Period.
He IS. He IS God. He IS sovereign. And as such, He is the only being in all existence with the prerogative to do as He wills.
Period.
Anything else falls under purview of what He either will or won't allow, from the very outside...although moreover, it all falls within scope of His will.
And regardless whether that's understandable in a way which we can at any moment grasp so well as to reconcile with the simultaneous and full truth of His abiding and incomprehensibly vast goodness and love, then still...it's truth.
Period.
Reason it out all you want, but it's absolute truth, so anything else could only be appended to it and not be capable of subsuming or unseating it.
Rationalization is after the fact, in other words. You can't undo what exists, just attempting to reason. Same as, say, you have a paper-cut...
...sitting and refusing to acknowledge the paper-cut happened won't change the fact that it did happen and that the wound is real. Period.
Only, whereas with the wound's presence being something which...through continued refusal to acknowledge the matter...eventually (given normal-ish health), quickly there will be healing which then will make it appear to've never been present...reality then reaching a point of apparent conformity to the lie...
...such that the lie may then begin to take on false reality...
...whereas all that might take place, regarding such an instance, as goes the reality of our God...
...attempting to rationalize Him away using any means which presently exist or have yet to be discovered...
...will never find some point at which He ceases to be, in truth. He will never cease to be a part of reality, in other words. Reality consists in Him, so...yeah, kind of makes it impossible to have reality without having God.
As with the example of the paper-cut, though, part of His allowing us to have what we choose also entails allowing us to have delusion, when we prefer it over truth (which is explicitly entailed per any perspective which refuses to acknowledge His existence, as a requisite underpinning of any line of reasoning which could allow a person to persist in believing a lie so blatantly). So, there comes a point...
...which modern psychology has given somewhat a term to, as goes a very minor facet of such being a part of the all which is the Lord's ways...
...wherein a "confirmation bias" is given by Him, allowing us to see what we believe.
We choose to believe a lie, He allows us that luxury. Travesty though it is, He allows it. And past a point, then does allow the lie to take on a false flavor of truth--ever as seeing seeming confirmations in all directions.
So, yes, the perversion of truth becomes deeper and darker and more twisted (as we attempt to move further and further away from Him). Even as disease becomes more and more degenerative...because we've chosen it and have continued to work the same wretchedness which ever resulted in the deviance so to yield death and disease, from the first Adam, onward, until the last Adam--our Christ Jesus...put death to death through His resurrection.
Even to be finalized at the last day, but already known and tasted, now...through Him.
On that day though, those who despise Him will no longer have delusions to hide behind. Their utter despising of God will be entirely apparent (even as mine was, last year), and they will endure eternal fire. Our God...is a consuming fire. His unabated presence, with nothing to shield nor shade. Torment beyond measure, for those who despise Him...even as having to endure His Presence, unabated.
So, seek Him now, while He may be found. Because His love doesn't waver. Even as His grace has certainly restrained the evil we work on earth, so very, very much. Otherwise there would be no nicety. There would be no pleasure. But only torment and hatred.
But His mercies are exceedingly great. And so there is pleasure, even so for those who will despise Him now and throughout eternity.
A lot of the pieces may seem disjointed, but there's continuity...and a lack of time.
May the Lord bless you with wisdom and revelation of the knowledge of Him.
Seek to know Him. He would have that.
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