We are invincible. We are eternal. We are amazing and resilient and capable of so much more than we can possibly think or imagine. We are created in the very image of the one who created us. Then we, in our perspective, are limited to this mortal fleshly body, on this planet, with an uncertain future, in a state of denial towards the Creator through the rejection of our forefathers. We see and perceive through a darkened glass as though what is real and present is mystical and distant. So which are we? As we are created or as we perceive through the deception we are fed daily?
It IS good to know who you are. It is better to know whose you are. Birth is when we transition from what was into what is. We are influenced before birth by the beliefs, practices and hopes of our mother and those around her. If they are Christians, they would most likely be praying from the beginning, the moment your life was known, that you would become all the Lord of glory designed you to be. Each new birth is a gift from God the Creator. A gift with talents and capabilities and desires already built into the innermost core of the individual being birthed. Some of those qualities will need to be nurtured and developed. Some traits may need to be carefully molded and even restrained.
Through the process of time and influence, a change comes. Some would say many changes. Still change is inevitable. Change comes because we are not begun as we will end. Change is desired because that which becomes glorifies the Creator by agreeing with His plan, His purpose and His providence. No one is just lucky, things do not just happen by the wildest intermingling happenstance and folly. Change comes when we surrender to truth and love. When we know that we know truth and fall in love with the one who loves us better than we love ourselves. Growth is not change. But change seldom comes without growth. Growth comes with challenge. Growth comes with adversity. Growth is natural. Change is natural. When it comes is supernatural.
Where will you be when your change comes? Not necessarily an address or physical place. Not even a job or a location in relationships. But where in time, where in your journey to the destination of His desire will you find yourself when your change comes? Will you be at the place where the change is the most natural next step that could take place/ Will it be a point of struggle between what you thought you would gain and what is obviously best for you? Will it be a less spectacular place of wanting something other than His desire and gift? Will it be missed by the obstinate unregenerate selfishness of one who desires to prevent your change?
Yet there is a promise not to be missed by the child of God in that question. It is not where will you be. It is when your change comes. It is not if your change comes. It is your change comes. It is the promise. You are the beneficiary of those prayers, those influences, those practices which allowed your path to be channeled to the ultimate outcome; His desire. Your change is momentous, clarifying, calculated and totally without complete description. So different, so purposed, so dynamically disruptive that the you who you were is scarcely a distant recollection to those who observe the change. It is both a moment in time and an eternity without measure. It happens and it has always been.
You have had at least one change and maybe a few have had a second. There is at least another to be known. And when your change comes it will be glorious. Let a distant memory help you quantify your understanding and enhance your desire. Do you remember the time in your mother’s womb before your change? A few unique individuals appear to retain some of those memories and even fewer have significant recall of those months. Yet for most of us it is an anecdotal refreshing from friends and family which allows us any glimpse to the time before our birth, our first change. After many months of growth and comfort being gently jostled, sung to, fed marvelous mixtures of the finest nutrition, our change approached. Whether dreaded or desired, longed for or loathed, our change was coming.
The promised change was even scheduled. Once life begins in the womb there are but two glorious outcomes. One unto life after birth with new growth and new challenges and an expected change designed by the creator as we are all born in sin. The other to life eternal in a change so radical and dynamically energizing that you become instantly the worshiping child the Creator planned from the beginning. For the second the change is complete. For the first, change will come again and again, as the fruits of the prayers of the saints and the wooing of God the Holy Spirit lead to the sweet completion. Then there is the final change which Job spoke of in his complaint to the Lord.
“If a man die, shall he live again? All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come.” (Job 14:14)
Appointed time. Till my change come. And just as we are willingly ignorant of the trauma, trials and fears during our journey within the womb, so shall we be of our current distress when the next change completes. Let me use the word, death. Death precedes life. It is the necessary predecessor to our desired change. The one who fails to enter into this lifetime but goes directly into the presence of the Lord, as the child of King David and Bathsheba, dies physically before being changed into eternal life. The one who enters this life and becomes a sinner at birth must come to the moment of change where they die spiritually to receive new life by faith in Christ Jesus. Yet the change Job longs for awaits the faithful followers of the Redeemer.
We may do so in denial, yet we also await our change. It comes in His time, at His appointment, through His means, according to His mercy and sovereign grace. Whether unexpectedly or through long deliberate participation, life gives way to the transition of death that frees us to the promised change. We arrive at that place, that time, that state of relationship to find ourselves grudgingly willing to journey on. Leaving the familiar womb for the challenge of these short years of life may not have been the most joyous change. Leaving the friends and familiars of the worldly pleasures we enjoyed for a season may not have been the easiest change to embrace. And leaving the memories of loves and accomplishments granted by His grace in this life to enter into the rest of His presence may be a bit of a struggle as well.
So as we approach our door of appointed time, we gather in hopes and promises. We wrap our hearts in confidence and trust, in knowing that nine short months precedes seventy years of waiting for an eternity of love and desire without more than vague memories of disappointments. And perhaps all these years will be seen through the filter of His perfect plan. Showing that while we wait for our appointed time, we glorify He who brings it to us and us to Himself. We are invincible. We are eternal. We are amazing and resilient and capable of so much more than we can possibly think or imagine. We are created in the very image of the one who created us. And we are not deceived when our change comes for then we are home at last.