Resurrection’s Reality

What are some of the struggles that you are facing today?

Is it self-condemnation because you didn’t do all the things that you thought you were supposed to get done yesterday? Maybe you haven’t ‘really’ prayed in a few days and now you feel that God is upset with you because you just aren’t being holy enough.

I wonder what we would see if we were given ‘spiritual x-ray vision’ a few minutes a day? We might see some of the heavy burdens of condemnation and guilt people are carrying around. We might also see some angels hanging around some people, which means we also might see some demons attached to people too - which is when we would probably realise that life on this realm is probably easier if we don’t always see what we are better off not seeing.  

While we unknowingly choose to have selective vision most days - either seeing and appreciating the blessings in our lives or focusing on the negatives that inevitably pull us down into depression, it is only God who sees it all and knows it all.

God doesn’t just look at the things within our limited scope of view. As Creator of the Universe, who is perfect in wisdom, He sees all the things that we don’t see. Not limited by time, He looks at past, present and future as one complete entity.  So while we measure the worth of our lives on the unbalanced scales of our past and our present, God already knows our final destination and waits for us to take Him by the hand so He can help us along our journey.

It reminds me of a line from an India Arie song: “Slow down baby, you’re going too fast, you’ve got your hands in the air, and your feet on the gas, you’re about to wreck your future running from your past, you need to slow down baby.”

 I can really identify with that song because I have the pieces of a ‘wrecked’ vehicle of self-effort. Let me tell you what my vehicle of DIY salvation looked like: for many years of my life, I worked against God, thinking that He didn’t really care about me, I took it upon myself to make things happen. Then, for what seems like an even longer time, I worked for God, flipping the script and trying to make up for all my mistakes and failures.

What I didn’t notice on my runway of religion was all the warning signs along the way. I was too busy volunteering, ushering, going to meetings, running and serving, and even serving while running.  I had really pulled one over myself but I wasn’t fooling God. He tried to warn me that serving man in my attempt to serve Him wasn’t going to produce anything of real substance.

It was only after the daze of having the vehicle of self-righteousness crashed into the wall of shame that I came to my ‘spiritual senses’. God didn’t judge me by saying “I told you so.” Instead, He  was right there to stop the bleeding from my self-inflicted wounds and pour His healing touch over my heart and mind.

Only my Heavenly Father could take something so devastating and turn it into something divine. I am now (finally) working with God, trying to remember that I could do things with or without His help. I try to remember how all my efforts to get to Him only made me feel like I was further away from Him, when all He ever wanted was for me to open my mouth and speak to Him from the heart that He can already see inside and out.

On an ordinary morning at work, the powerful truth of Christ’s resurrection finally sunk in. I, Cheryl Ramurath - the one with all the hang-ups and insecurities and self-doubts - no longer live. But it is Christ - the one who has already done everything that needed to be done to draw me into the heart of the Father - who now lives in me. It is a process of ‘coming alive in Christ’ that I am privileged to experience everyday.

Everything I thought I could do, He can do so much better and everything that I know I can’t do, He has already done. So every time I get a ‘blast from the past’, I try to counter with a ‘blast of eternal truth from the Word of God’. Every time I feel fear, guilt and condemnation, I try to remind myself that it is no longer I that lives, but Christ that lives in me - the hope of glory.

So the only ‘struggle’ I now have is to remind myself every morning to live in Resurrection’s Reality.

©Cheryl Ramurath 2010