“Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy? Caught in a landslide, No escape from reality.” Queen, Bohemian Rhapsody
I have for many years lived with the burning desire to know the reality of life as a believer; to experience what it truly means to live on earth as it is in Heaven; to be able to discern the facts of a life lived in Christ from the fiction of a life lived outside of Him; and to reveal the freedom-giving truth of this reality to others. All the while, aware that the great deceiver is actively working to get us to believe a false reality, to deny who we really are.
“Our expectations are always fallacies, attempts to control reality and manipulate mystery... Our expectations are our greatest obstacle to union with God in the present moment.” Brennan Manning, Lion and Lamb
Reality is such a slippery subject, it’s difficult to grasp. When you think you have a handle on it, your experience can rise up to bite you, and the lies can creep back in, redefining your expectations and telling you that what you believe is not really true at all.
As a believer though, there are some immutable truths which define my reality. However, these truths are not always ‘seen’. For example, I know that Jesus heals, that I, through Jesus victory on the Cross, have the power to heal, but I personally have never SEEN anyone healed through my prayers. Does my experience deny the truth of the healing power of Jesus in me? No.
We also believe in Heaven, the paradise of Eden where we can walk as Adam did with God in the cool of the evening. I haven’t seen it, yet I believe it is real. In fact, I am seated with Christ in heavenly places right now! It’s a reality I simply haven’t seen. Yet.
We believe our sins are forgiven. If we don’t, we’ve missed the whole point of the Gospel! Yet, though we are forgiven, many of us live on a tightrope, expecting to fall from grace if we sin again. Perhaps the problem is believing a Gospel that is SUCH good news - one in which His grace is more than sufficient for all our sins, past present or future.
We believe that God is good. All the time. The entire Bible, culminating in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, reveals the heart of a loving Father, prepared to do anything to be reconciled with his beloved sons and daughters. And yet our daily experience of life lived in a broken world, with all its pain and suffering, might seem to provide evidence to the contrary.
Another truth, though is that just because we see something, it doesn’t mean it’s real. By the same token, the things we don’t see aren’t necessarily unreal. The Bible tells us that faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. (Hebrews 11:1) Faith says ‘I’ll see it when I believe it’, doubt says ‘I’ll believe it when I see it’. There is NO room in faith for doubt: faith + doubt = unbelief.
“If you want to see things you have never seen before, you must be prepared to do things you have never done before!” Graham Cooke
Albert Einstein defines insanity as doing the same thing over and over again whilst expecting different results. Using this definition, the world might classify faith as insanity - just because to date I may have seen the same result in response to my prayers for healing, provision or change, I still expect a different result - our victory and His glory.
Equally, are we prepared to do something different, to respond to circumstances in a way that is contrary to the world, to step out into the ‘unknown’ and the ‘unnatural’ in obedience to Papa’s prompting, in order to see His Kingdom come and will be done? Even when we do find enough courage to step out, do we always see His power manifest in our lives? In my own experience, I can’t honestly answer ‘yes’. Does that mean I stop expecting to see it? Despite my own experience, I can honestly answer ‘no’.
“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” 2 Corinthians 4:16-18
For most of us the ‘reality’ of our daily lives consumes our thoughts: we agonise over hands without work, stomachs without food, bank accounts without funds, retirement without a pension, a home without enough room, or no home at all, (add your own here). The brokenness is real. I’m not denying that we live in a world where we experience pain, loss and hardship, or suggesting that we do not have compassion for those whose suffering is all too real, but I am convinced that there is another reality in which we, and they, can experience joy, peace and freedom.
Often too, the colour of the grass that others feed upon seems so much greener than our own, and this presents us with another illusion - that our lives would be so much better if only we could have what they have: their house, their family, their friends, their job or even their husband or wife. But, as John Eldredge in Wild at Heart puts it so well, “The answer doesn’t lie in the arms of another woman” (man, house, job, money, etc.).
"However tempting the flight into unreality may be, there is no comfort in it." Mary Craig, Blessings
So how do we live in the reality of the Kingdom of Heaven, when we dwell in the brokenness of this world, when we live with the temptations of the flesh and when we find ourselves in dire need? It is here that we learn, perhaps,
why the poor, those with literally nothing, choose to put their trust in God - because there is nothing else. And the reality is that there really was nothing else in the first place!
I have heard it said, and have probably been guilty of it myself, that some people are too heavenly minded to be any earthly good. But doesn’t the Bible tell us to set our minds on things above, to seek first His Kingdom and righteousness and all these things will be added to us?
“We only believe what we can see, so I make sure I'm looking at the unseen.” Seth Dahl, Bethel Church
We are also invited to share in the sufferings of Christ, to love in spite of sin, rejection, torture, alienation, misunderstanding and betrayal, as Jesus did when He went to the Cross. To suffer for the sake of Love is God's strategy for overcoming evil - not to resist evil, but to overcome it by surrendering to it in love and obedience. Love moves forward to face evil not to fight it, finding victory not necessarily in immediate, tangible results, but in the transformation of the world around us.
“Because you are identified in the Name of Jesus Christ, you can afford to always overflow in gratitude to the Father, (not for everything that happens to you but) in spite of everything that happens to you; you are not under circumstances but above circumstances because you are in Him!” Ephesians 5:20, (Mirror Translation)
In the upside-down, back-to-front, Kingdom of Heaven, to surrender is victory. God brings good out of evil - even greater good than if there had been no evil - and the trial will have been an immense good for us. When circumstances would seem to indicate the opposite of His promises that we can ask for anything in Jesus name and it will be given to us, if we choose to trust in God and His love for us, He can and does bring good out of any situation.
“No matter what the circumstances are on the outside, I live with the inner revelation that Christ is always with me. He knows me, He holds me and He loves me.” Mick Mooney, Phillipians
In every circumstance. we are faced with a choice: to either let our reality be determined by what we see, or by what we believe. Either to let our experience determine our beliefs, or to let our what we believe determine our experience. In choosing to accept the reality of who God is and who we are in Him, despite our circumstances, we align our expectations with Heaven, rather than the world. Only then will we see and experience the reality of the Kingdom in which we live and breathe and have our being.
“Losing our illusions is painful because illusions are the stuff we live by. The Spirit is the great unmasker of illusions... God strips those falsehoods from us no matter how naked it may make us, because it it better to live naked in truth than be clothed in fantasy.” Brennan Manning, Lion and Lamb
To live in the truth of the reality of who we are in Christ, sets us free from the illusion of the safety net we build for ourselves and the pain we experience when that illusion is unmasked, when that safety net fails. To live in the light of the truth of our adoption and in the fullness of our inheritance as sons and daughters of the Living God, in spite of our circumstances or experience, exposes us to the reality of Heaven on this earth. If we stand on this truth, hold to this truth, embrace this truth, believe this truth, I believe we really will see.
"Jesus was matter-of-fact: Embrace this God-life. Really embrace it, and nothing will be too much for you. This mountain, for instance: Just say, 'Go jump in the lake'—no shuffling or shilly-shallying—and it's as good as done. That's why I urge you to pray for absolutely everything, ranging from small to large. Include everything as you embrace this God-life, and you'll get God's everything.” Mark 11:22-25 (The Message)
I cannot deny the reality of pain, suffering or hunger, any more than I can deny that gravity keeps my feet on the ground, but to deny that some things are impossible for God, that somehow my problems are too big or difficult for Him to handle, or that I am just not important enough to warrant His divine intervention into my life, is to deny the sufficiency, power and love of God in Jesus to meet all our needs according to His riches in glory.
It is at the Cross that the stark reality of brokenness, loneliness, hunger and pain is met with the sweet reality of love, healing, provision and compassion. The Cross is where we died with Him and, through His resurrection, have risen to new life in Christ. Such a life, lived to God, in this broken world but not of it, is a journey of discovery in which, as much as I may have seen or experienced thus far, there will always be much more of Him than I have ever known or experienced. And so I simply cling to the Cross, pursue His presence in intimate relationship with Papa and let Him define my reality.
Mike x
