The Special of the Day… From the Orange Moon Cafe…
“Eternal Prospects”
“Who art Thou, Lord?” (Acts 9:5).
This first question of Saul of Tarsus upon seeing the Lord Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus could not have been more apt, pertinent, and to the point regard everything in Saul’s life. Or in ours.
“To live is Christ” (Philippians 1:21).
Saul, better known as the Apostle Paul, doubtless still asks this question in the Heavenly presence of the Lord Jesus. Again, as we will forevermore. How could we not, considering the infinite wonder of who we have already discovered our Savior to be? Indeed, even the most seemingly profound notion of a Creator who sees His creatures “gone astray” in willful rejection of Him, but who responds by suffering and dying for them bears witness to a character and nature beyond comprehension (Isaiah 53:6). Never can such a One be fully known, as the Psalmist declared - “His greatness is unsearchable” (Psalm 145:3).
The reference to Isaiah 53 speaks of the Biblical passage that perhaps most encourages the great “Who are You?” question of our eternal existence. The prophet’s chronicle of Christ’s suffering to come at the hands of both God and man allude to One whose moral compass suggests a heart of goodness never to be fully charted and traversed. The more we know of such unfathomable wonder, the more we realize we do not know. One wonders what Isaiah thought and felt as the Holy Spirit inspired the words that foretold of an act of God that would have made no sense to his Jewish mind. Nor would it to any Gentile mind. Nor does it to any human mind, if the truth be told. “How unsearchable are His ways, and His judgments past finding out!” (Romans 11:33). Indeed, a reading of Isaiah 53, upon sober reflection, can and will forever properly result in as much bewilderment as revelation. “Who are You, Lord????”
Our Heavenly Father doubtless rejoices in the inquiry. God exists as a communicator by nature - “the Word” - the primary expression of which concerns the revelation of Himself (John 1:1). He will reveal who He is, so long as we avail ourselves of the means by which He bears witness. His Spirit, His Word, His church, His creation, and His personal presence and working along the pathways of providence shine as glorious beacons to all who sincerely inquire, “Who are You, Lord?” He will reveal new things about Himself, enhance wonders already known, and confirm over and over again the simple declaration that bears eternal prospects, prospects of wonder - “To live is Christ.”
You are the life, the Life of our lives,
the joy of our spirit.
A Voice speaks by Your Word.
We more and more hear it.
To live is Christ, it says, nothing else is.
We kneel to draw near it,
to hear and respond, in the truth of Your light,
the grace of Your Spirit…
You art the Life, the Life of our lives.
“Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.”
(Isaiah 55:7-9)
Weekly Memory Verse
Ye are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you.
(Romans 8:9)
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