SEEN BUT UNSEEN

“See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are! But the people who belong to this world don’t recognize that we are God’s children because they don’t know him. Dear friends, we are already God’s children, but he has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like him, for we will see him as he really is.”
1 John 3:1-2 NLT

Children of God! Has this truth ever really sunk in?  God’s love for His human family has stretched beyond the limits of our understanding. Despite our fallen state, with our horrendous track record of rebellion, disobedience, filthy talk and vile behaviour, He has loved us, rescued us, and molded us into a family of sons and daughters who are the way to resembling His perfect son.

How did He do it? By revealing the extent of His love that refused to give up on us. Helpless and hopeless as we were, He intervened with a plan so daring that only God could pull it off.

God became man! How is that for humiliation!  He not only became man, not a “pretend” man, but a real flesh-and-blood, suffering, pain-feeling, bleeding, weeping, bone-weary, dusty, hungry, thirsty, real man. This man also went to the end of the road for us… death, a criminal’s death, beaten, tortured, bled out to the last drop, completely drained of life, limp, dangling from a pole like an abandoned rag doll. And the Father watched it all happen and approved!

“Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer…
Isaiah 53:10 NIV

“But it was the Lord’s good plan to crush him and cause him grief…. ”
Isaiah 53:10 NLT

How is that for betrayal… and the Son agreed to the plan!

Love like that must win… and it did. So, now God is building a beloved family, people across time, all over the world, leaving the realm of darkness through faith in the one who took their place, and wonder of wonders, slowly taking on and being molded into the likeness of their Saviour. God’s way of doing things turned enemies into sons.

So, John says, this is all happening behind the scenes. People in the world have no clue about what God is doing. They only see, here and there, people who offend them because they don’t join in with their rebellion. They don’t understand what is happening under their noses because the unseen realm is closed to them.

And what of the future for God’s family?  Where is this crazy scheme taking us?

One day, God will rip the curtain aside, like He did on the day Jesus died, and the ungodly world, together with all creation will see what He has been doing behind the scenes.

“For all creation is waiting eagerly for that future day when God will reveal who his children really are. And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering…. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us.
Romans 8:19, 23 NLT

So, says John, there us work for us to do, here and now. With a future so bright and glorious, we cannot afford to plod along in spiritual mediocrity. This present life is a partnership venture with the Holy Spirit.

“And all who have this eager expectation will keep themselves pure, just as he is pure.”
1 John 3:3 NLT

God does not want the lives that belong to Him and for which He paid such a high price to be mixed with anything that dishonour Him. He has offered us grace in abundance to overcome the flesh and to live in holy fear.

Paul says the same thing a little differently…

“… Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear. For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.”
Philippians 2:12-13 NLT

There is a goal to pursue which should take up all our energies as we live ordinary lives in a chaotic world. Paul called it “one thing” to which he strained forward with all his focus and motivation. And the prize is….

“Dear friends, we are already God’s children, but he has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like him, for we will see him as he really is.”
1 John 3:2 NLT

Wherever we are at the end of our earthly journey, God will close the gap when we see Jesus. What a hope and what a prize!

This is the process from earth to glory

“For God knew his people in advance, and he chose them to become like his Son, so that his Son would be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. And having chosen them, he called them to come to him. And having called them, he gave them right standing with himself. And having given them right standing, he gave them his glory.”
Romans 8:29-30 NLT

And from God’s perspective, it’s a done deal.