Let’s say you have a great trip coming up. You’ve planned something you’ll really enjoy and you’re excited. The closer it gets the more pumped you get. If this trip is a vacation from a bad job, you’re even hungrier to see it hurry up and get here. This is your mindset every day when you go in to work: This daily grind is something I have to endure until I get to the thing that is going to be the best thing ever. This is now, but that thing I’m waiting for … that is great.
Somehow, we’ve allowed the salvation message to morph into that kind of message. This life is something we have to endure so we can get to the thing that is going to be the best thing ever. Almost like Heaven is a vacation from a bad job, or another way to check out of real life.
Let me be clear: standing in the presence of the most loving Being in the universe has got to trump standing in line at Kroger. Eternal life is a treasure. But practically speaking, we tend to treat it more as an escape. The bigger truth is that eternal life is God’s kind of life. It is this life the way it is supposed to be lived … now.
When we talk about eternal life, we’re talking about sharing in the life of God.* God makes life happen and God’s kind of life is designed to be eternal. It has a beginning (in God) but no end. This is what characterizes the life He gives.
If I choose to share in the life of Christ, then I’m sharing in that life now. I’m living my eternal life now. Eternal life begins now. I don’t know of any other truth that has power to bring more peace than this, nor any other truth we seem so remarkably incapable of embracing.
So here’s a question: If I fear death, how does that manifest in my choices about lesser things? Because if I believe this — if I really believe that my biggest questions are answered — that ought to make a difference in all the other choices in my life. In the same way, if I still fear death then that also will affect my choices about lesser things.
To say I am not afraid of death means I am also not afraid of anything less than that. This way of thinking is the path to peace, which means that peace is a choice I make every day. It is a choice to live as if my biggest questions are already answered.
Does my thought life prove my belief in eternity? Does yours?
*I got this idea from Billy Graham’s newest book, Where I Am: Heaven, Eternity, And Life Beyond.
