Daily Devotion

Back Into Life.

Ephesians 1:20-23 (msg) All this energy issues from Christ: God raised him from death and set him on a throne in deep heaven, in charge of running the universe, everything from galaxies to governments, no name and no power exempt from his rule. And not just for the time being, but forever. He is in charge of it all, has the final word on everything. At the center of all this, Christ rules the church. The church, you see, is not peripheral to the world; the world is peripheral to the church. The church is Christ’s body, in which he speaks and acts, by which he fills everything with his presence.

Whether we want to admit it or not, He is Life. The world is peripheral to Him… Life, Truth, Love (that is the Church— how far we have fallen). We can say we don’t believe it or don’t want to believe it – but it certainly won’t stop it from being true. We can say that if no power is exempt from His rule – why is the world so ugly. We may even point our finger and say He’s not doing a very good job. But the truth I have come to realize is that the more Jesus is kept in my focal point and the world in its rightful place as the peripheral, the more amazed I am at His Goodness, His perfect, pure Love that He pours out on the broken and weary. He remains faithful even if and when we don’t. Praise Jesus for never giving up on us – for his unmerited favor. We can’t earn it and we certainly don’t deserve it – but there it is, for each one of us: forgiveness and new life. A master of Love. 

Ephesians 5:2 (msg) He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that.

He’s not threatening us… He speaks Truth, whether we like it or not in order to bring us back to Life – to raise us from the dead! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us. -Ephesians 3:20

Ephesians 3:6-7 And so here I am, preaching and writing about things that are way over my head, the inexhaustible riches and generosity of Christ. My task is to bring out in the open and make plain what God, who created all this in the first place, has been doing in secret and behind the scenes all along. 

He’s redeeming His Creation and saving us from ourselves. Bringing us Home, back into Life. Praise God!