This is an expression I’ve heard from people time and time again since my wife Claudia died over 10 months ago now! And of course, that is true in most ways. As a matter of fact, for me at least, I’ve found NOTHING is quite the same now. Even stuff that seems “the same”, such as being in the house, being with friends at golf or in a group of friends, even being with family, is somehow “different”. I bring this up not to focus on me, or what it’s like to lose a loved one, or any of that! What I want to focus in is that the fact that I’m in a TRANSITION PHASE in my life, and if you are not now, you soon will be also!
Some transitions are good: going to college, getting married, having kids, moving & getting a better job, retiring, etc. But many transitions that come to us are unwanted and are the result of living in a fallen, sinful world and experiencing the effects of that sin on all of us! Things like death, sickness, divorce, hatred, murder, poverty, racism, terrorism, and on and on… Nobody likes or wants these problems that cause us to change and adjust to a sometimes dark and dangerous world. And if you know God and the Biblical story, you know none of these things is what God intended for us in the first place when he created us!
So, if all these negative transitions in life are not what God intended for us, what is God teaching us through them? And where can these transitions take us, if we listen to God?
1) God put us on earth originally to live in direct contact with him, enjoying his love and presence constantly, and enjoying life together as humans as well.
And he gave us each a SOUL, which was meant to be in perfect harmony with God and integrate everything we are and do with God’s amazing plan for us! The late Christian philosopher, and deep spiritual thinker, Dallas Willard, defined the soul this way:
“Our soul is like a stream of water, which gives strength, direction, and harmony to every other area of our life. When that stream is as it should be, we are constantly refreshed and exuberant in all we do, because our soul itself is then profusely rooted in the vastness of God and his Kingdom, including nature; and all else within us is enlivened and directed by that stream. Therefore, we are in harmony with God, reality, and the rest of human nature, and nature at large”.
The problem is, none of us have souls that are even close to being in harmony with God and his plan for us, do to our sinfulness! Rather than being perfectly integrated with God, our souls are all terribly “dis-integrated” from God, separated from his plans and power and love. We live on a planet of lost souls! Our souls are filled with confusion, anger, doubt, hurt, and despair at times, so we take it out on each other rather than turn to God and seek his healing!
2) God saw our hopeless lost-ness of the soul, and sent his Jesus to, literally, “save our souls”!
8 Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, 9 for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls. – 1 Peter 1:8-9 (NIV)
The salvation of our souls is much more than getting into heaven in the future rather than going to Hell, where we are all destined without Jesus and what he did for us! No, the salvation of our souls is restoring who were are to who we were meant to be, before sin took us away from God’s plan and left us as wandering souls in a world of darkness and confusion. Jesus wants to transform us NOW, from the inside out, and help us reconnect our lost souls to God and his plan for us. And the only way to get there is through Jesus, and nothing else!
Jesus explained the futility of trying to “save yourself” in Mark 8:25-37:
35 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it. 36 What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul? 37 Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? – Mark 8:35-37 (NIV)
Jesus here was not talking so much about a destination, but rather a diagnosis! As John Ortberg says in his book “Soul Keeping”, “For the ruined soul—that is, where the will and the mind and the body are dis-integrated, disconnected from God, and living at odds with the way God made life in the universe to run—acquiring the whole world could not even produce satisfaction, let alone meaning and goodness. To lose my soul means that I no longer have a healthy center that organizes and guides my life. I am a car without a steering wheel. It doesn’t matter how fast I can go, because I am a crash waiting to happen!”
3) Once Jesus saves your soul, he will help you focus on His Kingdom and what he plans for you, rather than be distracted by the confusion and evil of this world!
We get so caught up in the horrors, injustice, hatred, and fear this fallen world instills in us that we miss the beauty and joy that God gives us each day, even in the midst of the chaos! Christian singer Matthew West has a great song about this called “The Beautiful Things We Miss”. Listen to it on YouTube! It is basically saying we get so caught up in the busyness and chaos of everyday life that we miss the most important and joyful things God is offering us each day, in the people and circumstances around us!
Jesus put it a little differently in Matthew 6:25-34:
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? 28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.- Matthew 6:25-34 (NIV)
Life is in the Transitions!
Some will be good; many will be dark and difficult and unwanted!
You alone can choose how you react to the transitions!
– you can be discouraged and angry and turn away from God
– or, you can ask Jesus to save your soul, and reconnect you to God and his plan and the amazing, eternal future he has for you!
Which do you choose?
I choose to let Jesus save my soul, reconnect me to God and his amazing plan for my life, and live with hope and joy for the rest of this life. And then, move into eternity in the New Heaven and Earth he has promised to us! Won’t you join me?