The Journey

Somewhere in my youth, I got the impression that starting something was almost the same as ending it.

Find Prince Charming and live happily ever after. Have a child and your life is complete. Accept Jesus as your Lord and all will be well. Plant a seed and you will have fruit. Build it and they will come.

Most of us have learned that it rarely works out that way. Starting something is just the first step. A very important first step, but just a step. If you’re ever grown anything, you know this firsthand. Jesus was talking to an agricultural society when He said,

Other seed fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. Matthew 13:9

They would have understood that there was a length of time and a lot of activity between falling on good soil and bringing forth grain. Somehow, I expected it to be instantaneous; the beginning being almost the same as the end. I just assumed that accepting Jesus as my Lord would take away my love of sinning, fill me with love for humanity, and overwhelm me with joy and peace. You know what they say about that word “assume.”

Because sanctification is a process. The Church has developed big words to describe the process of Christian growth – justification, sanctification, glorification. Basically, the Church is recognizing that the beginning is not the same as the end, and that there is a growth process between the two. Jesus used much simpler words:

Jesus said to him, “I am the way.” John 14:6

The way implies a path, implies movement and activity, a change in scenery. A path may be curving or straight, rocky or smooth, uphill or level. A path implies a distance between the start and the end – and Jesus is the way to travel on that path. And Jesus is the beginning and end of that path as well, the Alpha and the Omega.

Everything in life, in nature, teaches us about the growth process. A child is not born mature. Seeds transform into plants; caterpillars transform into butterflies; tadpoles grow into frogs. Science teaches us that the earth is constantly changing and the universe is ever expanding. Why would I think the Christian life would be any different?

Nick and I took a class based on the book Sacred Marriage, which asks, “What if God designed marriage to make us holy rather than to make us happy?”  What if God designed life to make us holy rather than happy? America has constitutionally enshrined happiness as a goal, and pursuing it a right. I wonder how different our world would be if Thomas Jefferson had stuck with “property,” or, better yet, inserted the word “holiness?” Would we be pursuing holiness as arduously as we seem to pursue happiness?

What if I were to look at everything in my life as a step along the path to a closer relationship with God? Would I be able to accept pain and grief and frustration as part of the sanctification process?

So we do not lose heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure, because we look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen; for what can be seen is temporary, but what cannot be seen is eternal. 2 Corinthians 4:16-18

Accepting Jesus as Lord, recognizing His gift of forgiveness and reconciliation, is just the first step. It’s the wedding, the birth, the re-birth, the seed. Justification is an incredible gift, but there is still quite a journey ahead. There will be difficult times; we may actually be unhappy sometimes. But Jesus goes ahead of us and beside us and shows us the way.

His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness, through the knowledge if Him who called us by His own glory and goodness. 2 Peter 1:3

Have a wonder – full journey my friends.

Betsy