Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread,"
Someday we will be in God's eternal kingdom of glory, thanks to our Savior. We'll look back on our earthly pilgrimage, wondering why it took us so long to overcome our worldliness, our selfishness, our sinful addictions, yes, our Laodicean lukewarmness. We will see that pure "river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb" (Rev. 22:1).
"The Lamb"? Yes, the crucified Christ. We will at last understand why Paul said long ago that he would "glory" in nothing else "save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Gal. 6:14), why he "determined not to know anything among [us], save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified" (1 Cor. 2:2).
We will then begin to understand, "clear as crystal," how Christ as the Lamb of God "tasted" our second death; endured the horror of hell in our behalf; endured being made the "curse of God"; "made to be sin for us, who knew no sin"; experienced in Himself all the agony of the total of all our human terror multiplied by the unspeakable agony also of divine terror; and endured to the fullest the reality of every man's worst nightmares. Then at last we will sing with new understanding the anthem, "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain" (Heb. 2:9, Gal. 3:13, 2 Cor. 5:21, Rev. 5:12).
But what a pity if we can't begin to understand all that today! Or can we? If we could, we would find the victory over our worldliness, our sinful addictions, yes, our deep-seated selfishness, not sometime far off in eternity but now, today. True, a little child can't appreciate what happened on the cross; he or she can only laugh and coo and enjoy his superficial level of life (thank God he or she can!). But who of us is content to remain a little child forever? Is it not time to begin to grow up into Him, to "come" into "the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ" (Eph. 4:13)?
Ask the Father to lead you to His Son's cross so you can begin to see what happened there. You'll never be the same person again.
--Robert J. Wieland
From the "Dial Daily Bread" Archive: January 12, 2009.
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