For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? (Hebrews 09:13-14, NKJV).
Dead gods abound. The gods of wealth and youth, of power and prestige, of renown and influence. These are dead gods by their very nature - they leech life rather than give it. And in the end they are as ephemeral as snow flakes in the heat of the sun.
Yet, all of human history is a corporate chronicle of two diametrically opposed pursuits: the false idols of this fallen world versus the true and living God.
Without miraculous intervention, the human heart is doomed to seek that which appears alive and meaningful, but is merely a thinly disguised tomb full of decay and dead men's bones.
Christ came to die so that the door to life could be opened, once for all. His entire purpose was to provide a means of escape from our default destiny of eternal darkness. That He had to suffer on the Cross to accomplish this speaks of His unutterable love and our utter depravity.
He offered Himself in our place, taking upon Himself the accusations and punishment of our offenses so that we could be cleansed of our unrighteousness and become pure in Him.
But He doesn't just wash us clean if we let Him, He goes far beyond that by inculcating His nature into us, and providing us with the power, ability, and prerequisites to achieve the greatest avocation conceivable - service to an infinite, perfect, good, righteous, powerful, loving and living God.
This vocation is all mercy and grace on His part. He in no way needs our service, just as He does not need our worship, adoration and devotion. He desires us to have and do these things not for Him, but for us.
It's a simple equation really. He, being fully aware of His omnipotence, omniscience and omnipresence, His godhood and power, and self-existing as the very definition of right and good - He made us for Him. He, being who and what He is, is the greatest reward we could possibly receive, and He has offered that reward as a gift, and enabled us as free moral agents to choose to accept or reject that gift.
Knowing ahead of time that our Creation would result in rebellion, and that our redemption would cost the excruciating death of the priceless human incarnation of the second person of the Trinity - His eternal Son - the Father in perfect cooperation with the Son and the Holy Spirit, created us anyway.
It is impossible for me to fully express in words alone what service to Him means. I can point to the magnificent glory of creation, the vast and intricate complexity of the material universe and say, "See! He made that for us."
I can paint a picture of the transformational love possible between husband and wife, and between parents and children and say, "See! This is for us, as well."
I can allude to the glories of eternal life in a new, immeasurably superior earth and heaven, in intimate fellowship with Christ and each other and say, "See! This is the everlasting home and family He has lovingly and painstakingly prepared for us, adopting us into His household, not because of us, but because of His beauty and goodness."
But these, while real and true, are mere pictures and hints at what it means to serve Him.
In the end, all that can be said is that we were made for Him, to delight in Him, to be with Him, to glory in His unspeakable goodness, and when we, through His grace, achieve that goal by believing in His Son, our life will forever afterward be fulfilled in increasingly profound and wondrous ways that “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.” (1 Corinthians 2:9, NKJV).
To serve the living God is the opposite of pain and death. It is the opposite of sorrow and loss. It is the opposite of being enslaved by sin and fear. It is, instead, the restoration of all things.
In Christ, all things become new and nothing is lost.
All for us.
