Jesus Tented With Us

At his birthday celebration he received a package from his parents. He knew immediately what it would be. There was no particular surprise, yet there was considerable delight. He knew he could have "lost it" before it had ever first arrived. He knew it came from loving parents. And he knew he would be receiving it even before it came. He didn’t ever really "earn" the gift, nevertheless he had a chance to forfeit it, had he been careless."

This complex sort of dynamics describes well the "reward" which Christians receive at the end of the age. Not something we earn nor deserve, the gift from God can still be forfeited by our own carelessness or willfulness. Not really a surprise, the gift of life with God is still not given us until "that moment" when it becomes clear -- "official" even.

It is the reward of Christmas, the promise of eternal life which God brought to earth through Christ which we celebrate this season. We delight in it. We rejoice in it. We live in the confidence it will be ours because of our faith in Christ.

Yes, we can loose it. We can ignore it. We can reject it. We can gamble our promise of eternal life away as we ignore God’s word. We cannot earn God’s grace, but we can reject it. We can be careless with it.

We can be like the following person:

"I’m a gambler. Oh, not the kind that frequents places behind doors in some secluded spot. Nor, do I play the ponies, or bet on sporting football games. You see, I gamble with my soul as the stake. I’m betting that I can live a life of indifference, a life of neglect of those thing that are of the Lord and still receive His blessings.

I’m gambling with the souls of my children as the stake. Although I neither live righteously nor influence them toward unrighteousness, I’m betting their souls on the hope that they will have wisdom to guide their own lives unto the Lord.

I’m betting that I can remain indifferent to Christ’s teachings, that I can fail to give as prospered, and that will still bless me eternally; I’m betting I can still have a nonchalant attitude toward the lost, and still please God. Yes, I’m a gambler--the most reckless type: I’m an indifferent Christian!!!"

As Jesus tents with us, we know that He will be with us in all circumstances of life. He is here for the duration. As He said in Matthew 28: "and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age." His tent is pitched. He is here. Through His Spirit which He gave on Pentecost, He is here for all people in every circumstance of life.

In the second half of our verse we find the word glory or "doxia" in Greek, it means the presence of God in this world .His glorious presence is here. Or another word in English which describes Jesus’s presence is aura. His light, his glory, his aura, his presence is shining, is illuminating all the places in our lives. He is shining in the good as well as the bad, in the happy as well as the sad, in the whole and in the broken, in the healthy as well as the ill. Jesus Christ is present in all of life in ways we comprehend and in ways we cannot comprehend.