By David ReayWednesday 7 Sep 2016LifeWords DevotionalsFaithReading Time: 0 minutes
Transcript:
Read 1 Corinthians 13:9-12
9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! 10 But when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless.
11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely. (NLT)
A Christian author called Jeff Lucas was once asked what was the most important thing he had learned in his recent history. He replied with one phrase: “Everything is broken”. Such a reply may seem unduly negative or cynical. But it is in fact a fundamental perspective we need to have on faith and life.
We are not the people we are meant to be and so our human communities and institutions will not be what they are meant to be. Expecting perfection or even near perfection from our marriages, our families, our churches, our friendships, our governments, is to expect too much. We become disillusioned and even embittered.
Rather we accept in advance that nothing this side of heaven is perfect. And so we are free to enjoy what good God gives us through imperfect people and less-than-ideal situations. We avoid an excess of idealism which leads to continual disappointment, and excess of cynicism which leads to apathy and despair. We acknowledge, as our passage acknowledges, that things aren’t right just yet but one day they will be.
It is in the midst of the brokenness of all things that God lives and moves and loves. The cracks in our lives and the lives of others are the places where God gets in.
Blessings
David Reay