Eclipse of Kingdoms (Part 6) Living Between Two Worlds

Over the past weeks I've been establishing the fact that followers of Jesus are caught in the overlap between two worlds.  We are already saved, but not yet in heaven.  Already accepted, but not yet fully able to process this love in the deepest levels of our hearts.

This tension explains so much of what happens in our day-to-day lives this side of heaven.  

Through most of my life, I've struggled with a low-grade depression (aka dysthymia).  At a surface level, this makes no sense.  I should be filled with joy. I have a wonderful Savior, my family is amazing, and I’m blessed to be a part of a loving church. Any moment angst or doubt should be quickly intercepted by the fact that I am a child of God and that nothing can separate me from God's love.  I've prayed, sought counsel and studied God's Word.  I've been through the Search for Significance, Bondage Breaker, and studied my identity in Christ.  I'm still working on it ... but I'm also exercising and have been on and off anti-depressents over the years.

Add to this the lifelong struggle with sin.  I'll spare you the specifics of my own sins, but Paul describes us all extremely accurately in Romans 7 when he writes:

“I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. ...I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. ...So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.” — Romans 7:14, 18-20, 25

If the already/not yet isn't real ... then I am forced to let these dark thoughts and habits define my salvation. A depressed sinner is not a saint. Without a biblical foundation, it would be easy for me to wonder if I’m even saved!

The power of the already/not yet is that it explains the crucible of this life.  My citizenship is in heaven, but I am still earthbound and struggling.  I can know that I am loved by God, while still feeling lonely.  This doesn't let me off the hook.  I still have to "work out my salvation with fear and trembling."   (See Philippians 2:12)  But this does explain my struggle and give me hope for an ultimate victory.

This side of heaven, our lives will be marked with seasons of sin, loneliness and frustration.  It is very easy to let these echoes of our old selves define us.  Some days a single sin or a stray thought can be enough to convince us that we are far from God.

Don't believe that lie!  If you are in Christ, then you are a citizen of the Kingdom of Heaven.  You live in liminal space, on the threshold of God's full redemptive act.  In this place you will be transformed; but that transformation will be slow.  We won't be fully sanctified (made holy; without sin; just like Jesus) until either we go to heaven or Jesus' second coming.

Life in the already/not yet is marked by waiting and praying; hanging on and pushing forward.  

I’ve told this story before, but during my middle year of seminary, our New Testament professor asked us to journal through 2 Corinthians.  We were supposed to make a daily entry as we studied and prayed over that powerful letter, noting how God is shaping us into the leaders He was calling us to be.  That semester I found myself on empty, just grinding through the course work without much joy or insight.  My few journal entries were halfhearted endeavors. When it came time to turn it in, I sat down fully intending to fake a couple dozen entries, making up insight and pretending to have done the work.

As I started, something gripped my heart.  I simply wrote an honest note, confessing that I was sorry but that I just hadn't been able to do the work.  Spiritually I just wasn't there.

I'll never forget Dr, Kidd's response.  He wrote, "Sometimes it is enough to know that, even when we cannot hold onto God, He holds onto us."

That's what life in the already/not yet looks like.

Struggle being welcomed by grace. An identity founded in unshakable love; not on our day-to-day moments.

With You;
Pastor Tim