Life is precious. Every breath is significant as any one of those breaths could be our last. That is an exhilarating truth; both an invitation to truly live, and a heeding not to do anything less.

APPRECIATION FOR THE LITTLE DETAILS

Would you miss the sound of wind rustling through the trees if it stopped? What about the cool, slow ripples through the water of a pond? Feeling the tender, fragile petals of a beautiful flower on the pores of your skin? These preponderances of life are the delicate and ubiquitous complements to existence; reminders that we are still alive. And yet, so few of us pause in appreciation of these details, as if they have little or no value.

These examples aren’t all there is of course. God also provides human relationships, the closest relational bond we can have; second to experiencing relationship with Him.

RELINQUISHING FREEDOM IN FAITH

For the unbeliever, life on Earth is Heaven since this is as close to an idyllic life as one gets when they deny the existence of God and Heaven—the promised eternal home for believers of Christ. Under the closed eyelids of the unbeliever, Jesus and the Bible are the most conflicting, confusing message of love, miracle, and intimacy in the history of humankind.

Furthermore, for many the unbeliever, to believe in Jesus as Lord is to relinquish the freedom to live autonomously, and therefore to lose the ability to enjoy life—or at least, to enjoy it the way they want to enjoy, that is. The lifestyle following this deliberate form of disbelief is convoluted in two ways that I want to mention here. The first is, as Timothy Keller intuitively writes in his book, The Reason For God:

“This oversimplifies, however. Freedom cannot be defined in strictly negative terms, as the absence of confinement and constraint. In fact, in many cases, confinement and constraint is actually a means to liberation.
If you have a musical aptitude, you may give yourself to practice, practice, practice the piano for years. This is a restriction, a limit on your freedom. There are many other things you won’t be able to do with the time you invest in practicing. If you have the talent, however, the discipline and imitation will unleash your ability that would otherwise go untapped. What have you done? You’ve deliberately lost your freedom to engage in some things in order to release yourself to a richer kind of freedom to accomplish other things.”

DILAPIDATION OF TIME

Some of us choose to allocate our time towards practicing disbelief, but the freedom that we lose in that is the assurance of where we’ll exist for an eternity; we sacrifice the peace of knowing every moment here is purposefully spent preparing for the promise of Heaven there.

Without deliberation aimed in the direction of an eternity permeated with unconditional love and infinite peace and joy, one’s life culminates in deprecation; the disappointment that all our Earthly endeavors merely leads to the dilapidation of a finite time allotment. 

Yes, believers choose to give up their freedom, but in exchange for avoiding a life full of constant disappointments without reassurances for any kind of turnaround or comeback.

MISSING PIECES

When we believe the comeback to this life is the promise of an eternal home where there is no pain, death, suffering, sin, or tears—there isn’t much to consider or think about—it’s pretty black and white. Why choose a life of disbelief when following Jesus not only changes our eternal destination, but also incentivizes us to live more authentically here and now? Belief in Jesus hasn’t reached the status of trust if one believes faith in Jesus only means “You get eternal life in Heaven” without repentance and being reborn in the very moment we turn away from the world and towards salvation.

WHAT IS FREEDOM?

What is faith if it’s not a heart change? What is freedom if we’ve chosen to remain a prisoner of a world that doesn’t offer any reassurance of the purpose of suffering in this life?

Living our lives fully believing we are going to Heaven relieves us of the disappointment of acquiescing to the demonic lie that everything that happens between now and then is purposelessness, in that everything we experience while on Earth is fruitless and completely dependent on the arbitrariness of chance and probability.

THE POINT WHERE EVERYTHING MATTERS

The eternal promise of the Bible is the exact opposite of the above point: Everything we do here and now matters in that it leads us directly to where we go next. In other words, if we believe every word we speak, every action we take and decision we make are part of our journey towards Heaven, would we not seriously reconsider the words, actions, and choices we make to be the very best in the name of the One who demands our moral integrity?

HEAVEN IS THE HOME OF THOSE WHO RECEIVE GRACE

Let’s not leave a stone unturned. Make no mistake, Heaven is not anything we earned, nor anything we deserve, rather—it is what we are given freely through the grace, mercy, and love of God through Jesus Christ sacrificing His life for ours on the cross. Heaven isn’t about what we do on Earth, it’s about what Jesus did on the cross.

Let me repeat that for emphasis: Going to Heaven has literally nothing to do with anything we could ever do on Earth (as if to prove our worth to God), it has everything to do with God’s grace, and Jesus’s sacrifice on the cross. That is the relief and hope of believing in Christ; not that we get a free life living in sin and expecting Heaven—of course not—the hope of Christ is that as a byproduct of having faith in Jesus as Lord, we have hope in what’s to come because of what Jesus did in our place.

THE KIND OF GOD WE PLACE OUR TRUST IN

Receiving faith by His grace is a life-changing alteration of our soul substance. Before we have Christ, we are lost in our sin; selfishness, greed, lust, gluttony, pride, etc. When we accept Christ, we become aware of our sin (like Adam and Eve after they ate fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and became aware of their nakedness with shame (Genesis 3:7)), we realize sin is wrong, and we repent by surrendering to the will of God. Let’s remember God literally clothed Adam and Eve Himself right after they had sinned (Genesis 3:21). What kind of God rebukes the sin but loves the sinner all the same? This one does; the God of the Bible.

REFINED, REBORN, TRANSFORMED

Do we live our lives in thankfulness that a God like this loves us so much? Not that we live perfect lives, but do we live transformed lives? Lives different than before? Refined by gratefulness, thanksgiving, and obedience…. That is Christianity; that is rebirth.

Are we aware of how much godly beauty is in this world, or do we take it for granted? Are we aware that every breath is given to us? When we aren’t suffocating for air, that is a blessing. That is a gift from God. Every time. Do we spend our lives thanking Him for these gifts, or do we take those moments for granted?

IMPRESSIONABLE CHILDREN

This kind of lifestyle is like (in the most rudimentary, basic sense) a parent, after carefully and lovingly baking a batch of delicious, savory chocolate chip cookies, and watching their child stuff the cookies in their mouth and leave without so much as a smile or “thank you”. The parent still loves their child, and I imagine the parent would still want to make more cookies for their child just because they want to see their child take pleasure from what they know their child enjoys, but—where does that leave the state of the heart of the child?

Will they go into life expecting everyone to treat them with such consideration and love without thanking them for their generosity and selflessness? If they don’t, and they die one day in that state of their soul, should they be judged as “normal” (“like everyone else”), or as selfish and hedonistic? Does that kind of soul know God? Are they transformed and living a life in thanks for the gifts they are given, in effect leading others towards the same God of love?

RECONSIDERATIONS ABOUT GOD

How would the parent feel, ultimately, every time they make cookies and the child just walks away after taking everything?How do we expect God to feel when we ignore Him, reject Him, and live morally corrupt when we get what we want? And yet, a life of closed-minded disbelief does not lead us to a selfless life of purpose, but to a life of meaningless gain and purposeless suffering. Even those who give in the “name of love” do so without giving credit to anyone but themselves; even their “selflessness” is rooted in narcissism. Without giving credit to God, how do we thank the Giver of life?

CONTINUE TO SHINE TOWARDS JESUS

I urge you to consider these thoughts and, if you’re truly living a selfless life in the name of Jesus, I commend you and urge you to continue shining your light towards Jesus so others will continue to notice how and why you’re different from others they know for a specific reason. You aren’t the way you are “just because”. The love we give comes from Jesus, or it is meaninglessly selfish. How do you define what is selfish and what is selfless? Perhaps this will change your definition of what living in faith means when compared to “living in peace but without God.”

CONDUCTING A NEW LIFE IN CHRIST

My hope and prayer is that this article opens someone’s eyes to the way God loves us all, and how the way we live our lives impacts not only God’s Kingdom, but others’ witnessing of His love through our change lives and behaviors. The way we treat others matters for this exact reason, and the way we respond to this truth ultimately defines our view of faith, the authentic transformation that comes with that faith (or lack thereof), and finally, the way we conduct ourselves as we prepare for our eternal future—in hope, or in fear/ignorance.

Where are you today? I pray you find Jesus, and that you come to accept His grace, mercy, love, and the promise of hope in His resurrection from the dead. He did not stay dead—He came back to life, and that is why we all must live a life of worship, thanksgiving and praise; living a life of gratitude in the name above all names: JESUS.

Oversight

Photo by Ben White on Unsplash