When giving our testimonies, we Christians tend to talk about what we’ve been delivered out of – we tell how we’ve been saved from drugs, or gambling, or some other circumstance – but it does no good to stop there. We need to go a step further and ask: what have we been saved into?
We get a glimpse of this when we look at the original creation. In Genesis 1:26-28, we see that all man is created in the image of God (even that inconsiderate bloke who beeps you in traffic!) and we have God-created purpose and are intended to find our satisfaction in Him. But because of The Fall, this image and purpose have become distorted.
Now that we are saved into The Kingdom, we are instructed in Colossians 3:9 to put on our new nature and be renewed as we learn to know our Creator and become like Him. As much as we would like Jesus to wave a wand over us to remove our dirty garments and renew us, it does not work that way. WE must take off our dirty clothes and WE must put on the clean clothes!
I believe we are created for four things, and it is these four things that the Devil will attack us on.
We are created to:
- We are created to relate. We are created to be in relationship the same way that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are in relationship, but the first thing to break down after The Fall was relationship (God to man and man to man.)
- We are created for work. Sin makes work meaningless and a real burden, which is why fame, winning the lotto, or being a genius sounds so appealing, but Solomon had all this and said, ‘life is meaningless’. Only with Jesus at the centre can we find satisfaction in work!
- We are created for rest. God rested, not because He was tired, but to demonstrate that He intends us to rest. In our seeking, we either become lazy or we work ourselves to exhaustion or illness. Rest was created so that we would learn to press the reset button and enjoy Him.
- We are created to rule. We were created to rule but Eve abdicated her position while Adam watched. But Jesus restores that right to us!
I would like to see this worked into the fibre of the church. May we be people who do life with Christ at the centre, stripping off the old and putting on the new, learning to know our Creator. May our relationships be blessed. May our work fill us with satisfaction. May our rest be restorative, and may we rule over stuff while we restore those around us!
Blessings,
Mark