What God has revealed most clearly to me lately is eternal perspective.
You see, I just spent a month in a country where nearly every one of my new friends did not know the grace of Jesus Christ. Even today I do not know if they will find Christ and that eternal hope of heaven. While away, I held orphans in my arms and prayed over them, that one day they would come into contact with the gospel message and receive salvation. Suddenly, exhaustion and sickness and hunger and hot temperatures and traveling alone and being afraid- they did not matter. Eternity is what matters.
This past month I invested a lot of my Bible study into the book of 1 Peter. The second chapter, verses 9 to 11, really stood out to me. Verse 11 talks about how the fact that we as believers are to be "sojourners." We are only traveling through life on this earth. This should be reflected in the way I live my life, the areas in which I invest my time, and the purpose I choose to pursue.
What Peter is saying that since we are only traveling through, why invest so much into our temporary time in fading things that are here? Why look for pleasure here, when the lasting crowns will be in heaven?
In Revelation 2:9, John writes to the church Smyrna, "I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you are rich!)" Yes these believers were physically suffering and were impoverished, but they were rich in Christ. They had all they needed in Him and they knew it. They were "sojourners," "tourists," "nomads..."
As I seek to be a "sojourner," I'm learning to care less about what others think. I am learning to care less for money and more for giving. Yes, I am still loving my family, friends, and enjoying what God has blessed me with, but I am focusing less on the temporary.
Jesus is my inheritance, now and always. No matter where I am, He's there. No matter what surrounds me, I am called to listen to the Holy Spirit and follow His lead. No matter what I am afraid of, I need to overcome it to live the way that God can be glorified in me.
"Therefore, we also, since we are surrounded by so great a crowd of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who, for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." Hebrews 12:1-2.
In the "hall of faith" (Hebrews 11), God did not give any of the men and women there the full picture, yet they trusted Him and lived differently because of it. They are now witnesses to my faith as I look to Jesus as an example. He went through difficult things on this earth "for the joy set before Him." He was eternally minded.
Jesus is my Savior. I want the cry of my heart and the results of my actions to show that I know I am a "sojourner" and I have a "joy set before me" no matter what life here on earth brings. As I go through life, I want my prayer to ever be, Be Thou My Vision.
