The reason for the season

I often wonder what I would be like if I were not a Christian. As the common testimonial line goes, I’ve “been bought up in a Christian family…” and I sometimes feel that I’ve missed out in not knowing life without God. I’ve got nothing to compare faith to!

Would I be as I am now? Would I swear more? Would I lie more? Who knows. In reality, I get a taste of my sinful nature everyday. I swear and I lie anyway. I’ve been reading the Old Testament recently and it is filled with examples of the people of God turning away from Him in selfishness (Try Judges; Gideon and Sampson are in there…). It is grim reading; a promise breaking people repeatedly suffering because of their rebelliousness, God, angry and pained, reaching out only to be neglected each time.

Today, we celebrate the amazing fact that God did not give up, He “so loved the world that he gave his only son, so that whoever believes in him might not perish but have eternal life…” (John 3:16) The Old Testement cycle was broken! Jesus took upon himself the wrath of God for all sin. I see the Old Testament pattern in my own life, but there is a crucial difference; the pattern plays out in a state of total forgiveness, of grace. Sin is defeated! Suffering will end! What hope. I long for greater revelation of it by the Spirit, that it would impact my life here and now (Galatians 5:13-22).

I don’t need to know what its like not to be a Christian; I need to know more about what it is like to be one!

Happy Easter.

Dan