Thursday, July 21, 2011

You Have Entered The Comfort Zone





Sorry, that sounds like the title from an episode of the, "Twilight Zone."  But the  concept of a person  entering into a comfort zone where you can rest your weary body on the efforts of what somebody else does  is  kind of a twilight zone analogy.  I am from the generation of Baby Boomers.  We were not the generation of entitlements.  We did not expect something for nothing.  We worked hard and tried to do the right thing and hoped for the best outcome.


Lately, I am feeling a sort of  shift in my thinking.  I find that I am not beating myself up as much, I don't let the voices of the past dictate my future.  I now find myself making a conscience effort of refusing  to accept the lies I once told myself.  Lies like God wouldn't really send His only son to come to earth, to suffer, die and be buried, then rise on the third day,  just so I could go to heaven.  This occurred to me as I began to lean upon my Lord and Savior, in an effort to draw closer to Him and see less of myself. 

You see, there is nothing I can do to live in the kingdom of heaven while I am on earth.  Just like there is nothing I can do to get into heaven.  I mean, I  believe in heaven, but a heaven somewhere up in the sky, beyond the horizon, eternity, somewhere else.   I would get small portals, where I could see a sliver, hear a small still voice or  just briefly feel the presence of the Almighty and my mind would race with thoughts of,  " How did I make this happen?",  "What do I do to keep it?"  The thoughts left me with more questions then answers.  So I began to shake if off,  just  shake off the discouragement and by faith I began to challenge what I know.

What I know is, I trust my Lord and Savior.  I believe He is the incarnate of God, I believe in the Holy Spirit who Jesus said He would send to us as our comforter, comforter, hmmmmm!  I believe there is nothing I can do to get into heaven, and  believing in Jesus is the only way, as written in John 14:6, "I am the truth, the light, the way, no one goes to the father except through me."

Okay, so when in the Lord's prayer, Jesus says, "thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven",  this says to me that earth is mirrored after heaven.  This says to me that heaven is not some far off place in the future, but get this, it is right here on earth.  So getting to the, "Comfort Zone", is just believing in what we know.  If we know how to get into heaven, then kingdom living  must be the same belief process.  If we get into heaven on the merits of what Jesus did, by His stripes, by His fulfillment of following all 613 commands, by His bearing of all of our sins, and by the shedding of His precious blood upon the cross, then kingdom living comes down to that belief.  Living our lives based on that belief is faith.

Kingdom living, is living in the presence and the assurance that all of the promises that God our father, gave to His son Jesus, now pertain to believers.  Faith in this belief  is in the daily living of our lives as if all the promises are true.  Faith takes courage because it is out of our control.  We have to believe Jesus is real and that He is enough.  

I challenge you to step out of your own self induced comfort zone, in spite of fear, and to enter into a new comfort zone.  One that does not depend on who or what we are,  but rather, who and what Jesus is.  If you have the courage to step out, I tell you this, you will find rest in spite of fear, as you go from glory to glory.   Welcome believer, "You Have Entered The Comfort Zone".