Focal Passages: Acts 9:26-27;
11:19-26; 15:36-41
I believe it was C.S. Lewis who stated, “We live in the
presence of immortals.”
Every person we meet, every person with whom we live and
work, will end up living forever somewhere.
Yet we will often say a harsh comment to our spouse or to a
sales person merely because they irritated us or “we’re in a bad mood.” Why
would we treat someone who will live forever as if they will vanish tomorrow?
I believe the two main reasons are fear and selfishness.
Sometimes we’re afraid we will be judged by another’s reputation. It could be
the new Christian in our church was a drunk, party boy, who had come out of
homosexuality or had felony convictions in their past.
We might worry that their problems could become our
problems. Jesus faced the same problems in His ministry. Even though Christ was
“without sin,”
He was called a “friend of drunks and sinners” by the
religiously immature (Luke 7:34).
Jesus did not separate Himself from those to whom He was
ministering.
Instead, it was His personal holiness, His “separateness” to
the Father that maintained His reputation — and as Paul wrote in last week’s
lesson, it is God who judges in the end. If fear can keep us from obedience and
loving as we should, then we must repent and change. The same is true of our
selfishness. Selfishness is essentially “self worship.” We, our lives, our
wants and our needs are what are truly important to us; we have become our own
“god.”
When we ask the Lord to open our eyes, to see people as He
sees them, we will be broken by the immensity of people’s needs.
Any time we ask God for something He desires us to have, He
will give it to us. God is willing to make us more like His Son which means we
will love like Jesus loves. Our problem isn’t our ability, time or even
courage; our problem lies in our desire and will.
When we invest in the temporary, we shouldn’t be surprised
to only reap the momentary.
There is a sadness which surrounds gaining the things of
this world, especially for the believer.
To surround ourselves with the brevity of time only
compounds our ignorance of what is real and forever.
If we desire to look like our Savior, we need to see like He
does. We must desire to invest in the immortality of those around us. Eternal
investment begins by investing in eternity.
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