Day 3265 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

Colossians 1:29 NIV

That which has been so graciously given seems now what I should graciously give.

For the generosity needed from God for Him to give this gift of His great grace should inspire in those who receive such a gravity the giving of lives in return if such might mean that more might gain. Because there's a contrary that runs in constant contention against the cold inventions of this culture we've created. It's a hope that calls out from up ahead, cries down from high above, asking us, imploring us, compelling us to come and taste and then go and fish.

To be fishers of men, not for the glory of the number we may reach but rather to the glory of the Savior to whom we might happen to inspire that they may reach.

It's a servant's story, this entire salvation. It's been from the start a chance to help those falling apart see the mercy that's always held that last little bit together just so that the soul within might win the war that's waging against us all. God's will was and is and will always be for our good, proven so perfectly in the Son that we shouldn't retain any idea to withhold any of all He's done.

Because He didn't do it for me alone. You, the one reading this right now, you weren't the only one on His mind in that miracle. It was and remains the greatest gift of God's grace given to a thousand generations of those who might have eyes to see, ears to hear, hearts that are tired of trying to beat by themselves and souls starved for the security of a salvation we know we need but know we can't provide.

That's why we're here now.

Sure, for a few years there is seemed like our lives were just our own collective of time to collect whatever we may have wanted at the moment. Sort of this selfish chance to choose only that we'd win, never once lose anything, everything that we wanted, that we loved, that we enjoyed and whatever efforts we felt such selfish satisfaction were worth. An opportunity to object to everything that pointed out the obvious problems against that, the problems we found or made in our remaining oblivious to His objective.

You see, that's what we're fighting against here. It's not to ensure that we ourselves succeed in either finding salvation or heaping satisfaction. It isn't some undertaking spent undermining everyone else's apparent attempts to steal from us what we want for us. Life isn't this competition we've become convinced it should be. It's not a reality show with scripts and hot-takes from cold hearts heavy with hatred. This isn't our stage from which we put on some show that gains us some fame and a share of the ticket sales.

This is a war, and far from temporary freedom to do as one might please, we fight instead for a freedom which makes all who accept it free indeed. Free indeed! Free from everything to which we've become enslaved. Free from the selfish advice of every vice that seemed pretty nice. Free from this feeling that our feelings are worth more than our freedom finding us free forever.

Yes, we have been called to something far bigger than everything this world is, was, will become, will likely want, has already lost. We're here with a job to do, a mission to make good upon, a message to make known to everyone to whom we're sent, to everywhere in which we might go. This world is not our oyster, it's our office!

And yet when you take a gaze around the place you see more mansions than missions. You see more fame than faith. You'll find far more far more concerned about concerts than Calvary. And such a state should shatter our hearts! It should be absolutely intolerable to listen to a world chatter on about all that in no way matters while we know the soon coming conversation they'll have with their Maker.

Because that day will go very, very bad for very, very many.

But if it were to be considered in regard to the urgency and effort shown from those who claim to know the Name enough to bear a bit of it in calling themselves, ourselves Christians, you'd think it's nothing. That judgement day will be a cakewalk for everybody. That God's love, as we hear so very often, will simply render His righteousness and call to responsibility irrelevant.

Yes, we live in a world that's got folks spreading this idea that God won't judge us, every single one for even every single word, even though His very Word says very differently. Down here we're being consumed by this false idea of the fakest figment of love and service and submission that has ever existed. Any more it's all about appeasement and affirmation, service and submission coming in the form of a smile as we applaud the lewd lunacy of a land so lost that most hate the idea of finding faith's freedom.

How did we get here? We've somehow reached this point where the biggest thing people are willing to try is to not try to do anything that would require them to try. Don't step out of your comfort zone. Stay inside your shell where you feel safe. Surround yourself with your "chosen family" and listen to the lovely lies they speak that soothe those ears that itch.

In all honesty, the real question isn't how we got here as that's rather obvious, isn't it? No, the real question is why we're seemingly so adamant to stay? Stay where? With what? Why?

"What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?" Mark 8:36

Or, and one far less often heard, seen, quoted, the next: "Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?" Mark 8:37

Can't we see what we're doing? Or again, better question, why are we doing what we know we're doing? What's the endpoint? To what will this way lead? Where can we go when we're the ones leading the way and insisting everyone else follow us and listen in and hear us out and help us out and refuse to let us go without anything for which we've set out to sell out?

Yes, we've become a society of sell-outs, scared to serve, afraid to offer, unwilling to undertake as if we don't understand the only reason we can stand. The only hope we have. The only Name worth knowing. The narrow gate we'll either walk through or through which we’ll fail to fit.

And if you don't get the difference yet, that difference is us!

We're the ones who decide just how wide our lives become by what all for which we insist to live. We determine the depth of our depravity. We choose the choices we chase. We pick the problems we have, and just how long they stay around. We're the ones who accept our addictions. We're the ones who idolize the ideas we incentivize. We're the ones who choose what we win, what we lose, if any others might win as well as what we don't care if they lose.

We decide it all based upon who we serve and just how fervent the effort. Sadly, most seem quite content to continue on serving themselves as if God literally spent all that time creating them and then saving them only for them to soak it all up and slide safely across the finish line.

But, and please do consider, what is the point if our lives accomplish only one happily ever after?

What will my purpose have been if I'm the only one to win in the end? What do we expect God to say when He asks about what we did with the chances He gave? Is He to be impressed should we not manage to lose any more of the time He's saved to the wrong side of truth? Is our life something for us to horde as if we can run out? Is it welcome-worthy to want for a world of comfort while we're here?

Do you think He will be more pleased that we made sure we got to Heaven or by our reaching that day only to desperately look around trying to see if we recognize anyone else that we tried to help?

I think we know the answer as the cross makes it clear. God isn't an all-for-one kind of Savior. Flip it. One-for-all. He died for all. What are we doing? How does our response compare? Are we, unlike Christ, of any concern to ourselves? Are our lives being lived unlike He showed as we soak up His safety while leaving others to sink in their sins? Does the only truth that we care about sound plenty Biblical, just maybe not too Shepherdly?

See, it's easy to sift through Scripture and pluck out some passages here and there that can be used to skew the point and purpose. It's easy to read our wants and wishes into those pages and come away convinced we're here to ensure we're safe and able to skate the rest of the way. But through it all, it's Christ by which we'll either be saved or be suffering.

And so it's His example we should probably be following.

To give. To serve. To speak the truth which still sets captives free. To fish for men knowing that their eternity depends upon our trying. To take up our crosses and die to our preferences upon them. To seek the good of the lost, not merely to assume we've never been there. He died so that we might see that we will lose.

It's just what we might gain in the process that will determine the worth of us.

Will we bring before Him any evidence that we tried to tell the world of His story? Will He see in our efforts any fear of failing to reach one more? Will we reach that finish line with a little energy left in the tank? Or rather will we die on this ground to be then found before His throne as if soldiers finally going home entirely worn and beyond weary from the war we’ve been fighting?

We're not called to gain in this life anything other than the promised hope of the next. That is where our reward here starts and ends. It's the hope of Heaven and the peace which the Spirit provides as we fight our way out. And if we have that peace, that hope, that assurance that He sees us and that we're striving endlessly to see more of Him through study and prayer, then where do we go from there?

Do we keep Him to ourselves as if a genie running out of wishes to grant? Is He to be a secret we can't risk anyone else knowing about as if they might ruin the surprise of this last chance at eternal life? Are we to ensure we've enough to make it home while merely hoping that others find themselves there too?

Or rather are we to do as He did, as He literally calls us to? To wash feet. To go and speak. To fight this good fight knowing that more than our own, more than our family's, more than our friend's, but that literally every single life so entirely depends upon their finding Christ?

See, I fear we're losing sight that this is a fight. It's not meant to be easy. We're not expected to show up at Heaven's gates well-rested. He never once asked us to make sure we're safe and won't come to any loss or hardship. No, He carried the cross! What are we if ours remain on the ground? Who are we if ours remain on the ground?

Whose are we if ours remain on the ground?

Friends, He gave us everything so that we'd have plenty to share, cups overflowing as it were. As it is. But as it is, are we overflowing this hope we have so that others might have some too, or are we just looking for bigger cups so as to stave the flow? Truth is that we have another day for a reason. We have this inkling inside to fight these lies we're seeing for a reason. We have this Word we read that speaks to the severity of salvation for a reason.

What are we doing with it all?

Strenuously. With great effort and determination. In a way that requires great physical exertion. Something done in such a frantic urgency that there is no time to consider the cost. Because honestly, if we truly do believe in the fullness of His promise, do we not then know that our cost is paid? And if our cost is now then cheap, what does it matter if we do die trying?

"For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain." Perhaps it should be seen that way again?

Because the outcome of every life is that all will die. Those of us who know His Name are therefore here only still to ensure that another, that any other might too gain that hope of avoiding that pain we owe through that debt He paid that set us free to serve rather than to be served.

What's the point if my life sees me safely home while others live never knowing they have that same invitation? No, I can't go out like that, not when He's given me a few more breaths to breathe and a window to tell the world about who He is and what He's done. No, if I know Him then I've already won. Same goes for you.

Who else then might we now reach and strive to inspire for them to reach for that same impossible victory? Because that is why we remain. A little more effort meant to give away so that others might come away from this battlefield also worn, but finally home.

#LeaveNoSoulUntold