We live here and while here our purpose is to bring glory to God so that when He appears, “we also will appear with Him in glory” (Col 3:4). When in this life we have tribulation, remember all this will be behind us one day. Live your life for heaven. The Christian ought to spend everyday of his or her present life living with an eye on our future life. There is great benefit in doing this. Below I have suggested four benefits of living for the future.
1. If we live for the future, we will invest in eternity instead of merely spending their lives. When Christ returns, He will reward faithful service. “For the Son of Man will come… and then He will reward each according to his works” (Matthew 16:27). Even a hedonist can do the arithmetic. A short lifetime of benefit compared to an eternity. Someday everyone will understand that material things are just things and stuff and junk.
2. If we live for the future, we will be able to cope with any worldly enemies. God’s vindication is coming later. “When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory” (Colossians 3:4). All earthly critics will disappear on that day. The mere sight of the glorified Christ and of Christians sharing in the glory of Christ will be enough.
3. If we live for the future, we will be able to grow in holiness now. The apostle John wrote, “We know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure” (1 John 3:2-3). Faithful Christians understand that moral choices should not be made based only on the present moment or in terms of instant gratification.
4. If we live for the future, we will not get overly disappointed in this life. Christians know better than to have unrealistic expectations. We live with the awareness that even when things are good, “this too shall pass.” It is not that we are cynical or bitter. We are not disillusioned by the failure of this world to be what we believe it should be, but are focused on the world to come. We are “Eagerly waiting for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 1:7).
Lonnie Davis
Approaching eighty years, he had been frugal and had provided well for his financial needs. He came by my office to say hello. It was not the visit that surprised me, but how he got there. Sidney had a can route that he ran every day. He put wire baskets on his old fashioned bicycle and would ride up and down his self-appointed route and pick up cans on the side of the road. He was not doing it to keep the highways clean. He was earning money, as meager as it might be.
One day I went out in front of the church building just as he rode up. His bicycle was what I would call a piece of junk. It was at least twenty-years-old, had only one gear, and wobbled as he rode. Since I knew he could afford anything he wanted to buy, I asked him, “Sidney, why don’t you buy you a new bike, a ten-speed bike?” He thought for a minute and then answered, “Well, I can barely use the one-speed I have.”
Sidney grew up in a time when one-speed bikes were the norm. It had been that way for seventy plus years and he was not going to change something that worked. He was right. His bike did work. It worked, but there was something better. A few years later, Sidney died and he still had that one speed bicycle.
It has been many years since that event, but every so often I remind myself about Sidney’s one-speed bicycle. I think about it when I get stuck in how things used to be. I think about it when the church gets stuck in how things used to be. We love “how things used to be” because we know how things worked out when things were like they used to be. The future is unknown and in an effort to bring comfort to it, we cling to “how things used to be.”
You cannot go back in time. Well-adjusted, happy people are people who can look to the future and embrace whatever change it brings. As Christians we do not know what the future holds, but we know who holds the future. That is enough for us.
Lonnie Davis
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Daily Devotional –From Lonnie’s Pen
Superstitious Pigeons
B.F. Skinner was right – you can make a pigeon superstitious. We usually associate superstition with black cats crossing our path, the number 13, or walking under ladders, but these are merely examples of ways people are superstitious. To be superstitious is to have a compulsion to take an action which has no actual effect on the desired outcome.
All you have to do to make a pigeon superstitious is to put him in a cage and wait for him to do some act such as bobbing his head or spinning around and then feed him at the second he does that thing. In time he will start doing that act over and over in the hope that food will appear.
Aren’t you glad that you are smarter than a pigeon? We have no irrational beliefs which in reality have no effect on a desired outcome. After spending a lifetime around good people, I can say that we sometimes are superstitious. Some folks have told me that whenever they attend a game of their favorite team, the team always wins. One lady told me that when her team falls behind, if she will start doing laundry, her team starts winning. Baseball players put their hats on in certain ways and call them “rally caps” in the belief that wearing the cap in that way will cause them to win. I knew one great Christian lady who drove the long way home rather than cross the path of a black cat.
Honestly, these are not harmful superstitions. I have worn my lucky suit a time or two. Superstitions that do bother me are those where people believe that God has spoken, when in fact he has not. “Back in the day,” people said if you went to the movie on Sunday you could not go to heaven. Some believed that if you played pool, you could not go to heaven. I know one preacher who was rebuked in a men’s meeting for playing golf.
To believe something is right or wrong when God has not spoken makes us superstitious pigeons. We are doing a little dance and saying this is what will cause God to save us. We need to have our beliefs firmly grounded in what God says and not some belief that is not found in His Word. Paul told those listening to his sermon, “I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious.” (Acts 17:22 KJV). To be grounded in teachings which are not God’s clear teaching is to be “too superstitious” and makes us like superstitious pigeons.
Lonnie Davis |
Begin with a Smile The busiest day of the week is “Manana.”
Reflecting on Today’s Text: All of God’s followers would be refreshed if we only remember this great fact. God helps us and He helps us daily. For that we ought to give praise to Him. He is our God and our Savior.
Today’s Bible Chapter
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