The Unseen

Everything you see know is breaking down, ending. What about what you don’t see? Is it possible the whole meaning of life is in what you don’t see.

What would you do to prevent your family from getting the Corona Virus?

That was the question we were faced with this week

… So we ...

With all that we did and celebrate that no one caught the unseen disease it led me to another question

What would you do to prevent your family from being separated from God?

Both are what feels like invisible.

Both have consequences, one could end in death, and the other eternity of death.

one a disease that could last for 7 to 10 days or much worse, the other that can lead to a mis lived life, a life where the point of life is missed.

There is a saying that became popular in 2018, and I have seen more, it was adapted from an Opera book in 2005, Living my best life. One Millenial blogger interpreted the phrase Living My best Life this way, “Everything at this moment (despite society’s standards) is just the way I want it to be.”

Yet, in this year, what if nothing is the way you want it to be. What if you got everything just as you want it to be in February of 2020 and it all falls apart.

Or what if, is more often the case, we realize that we got exactly the way we want life to be and then we see the results, realizing nothing that I wanted life to be really matters?

We lost a lot this past year. Does what I have been working for, or what Jesus calls “sowing for, like in the farming sense of what you plant that’s what comes up,” is what you’ve created or work to create does it make a bit of deference right now?

Two weeks ago, we had an action, done by people in a Washington DC, rioting, that could’ve changed our entire governmental system. 10 months ago, we had the emergence of a disease that changed how we worship, socialize, spend money, shop and how much time we spend with our families.

Many of us, myself included, have been working extremely hard to figure how to keep moving through all this.

I wonder about being

the Best Teacher in A Pandemic

we had to learn all kinds of new programs

I have all new students, most of whom cannot speak

Had to train all these parents, who don’t do school

My wife is teaching an amazing choir class virtually

And what if we get really good at it, great at it even, what will matter next year?

Teachers build on this year’s lesson plans for next year

Most of what we learn and did this year will be thrown into the trash as soon as the students come back to school.

You can’t tell your students to mute themselves when they are talking in a class

So big questions are coming

When will all this matter? What are we working hard for?

One thing is abundantly clear, we could losing everything physical in a split second.

Think about this, this pandemic will be over, most likely by the end of this year and likely much sooner, it will be a historical blip in our life, and most likely will never repeat.

On a bigger scale, it is similar to your life. You will most likely live somewhere between 70 to 80 years. In historic terms but a blip, and you will never get a chance to repeat.

How will you actually live a life of eternal significance? How will you live a life that actually matters? That is worth something?

Nothing about being your pastor, or you being an incredible follower of Jesus prevents your house from burning down, car from being stolen, job from being lost or your health disappearing.

These are all seen things and according to the physical laws of science they are all breaking down. That is what happens to what we can see but what about what we can’t see.

There was a guy who was doing the work of Jesus, really serving Jesus, seeing people become followers of Jesus, encouraging people to worship God only and you know what happened?

A riot, where everyone wanted him and his team dead.

You kind of know what a riot looks like

What if the things you are doing know, the good you are doing, caused everyone to want you dead?

Someone posts a video of you on Facebook and because of what you do whether it be as a mom, stripper, a teacher, a bartender, whatever you do, or whatever cause you represent people now want you dead.

Sometimes the good we think we are doing leads others to hate us.

Would you keep going

We know it’s important to you if you keep going in the face of incredible odds. But why?

This guy who dealt with this horrible attack on himself, God gave him the words to write this about what He was doing

2 Corinthians 4:14–18 CSB

14 For we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you. 15 Indeed, everything is for your benefit so that, as grace extends through more and more people, it may cause thanksgiving to increase to the glory of God. 16 Therefore we do not give up. Even though our outer person is being destroyed, our inner person is being renewed day by day. 17 For our momentary light affliction is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory. 18 So we do not focus on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

In verse 14, He acknowledges our resurrection, the one who raised Jesus form the dead, the Trinity God, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit will also give us resurrection. We will spend eternity with Him.

All the hardship He and his friends were going through was helping others to be ready for that eternity in coming to know Jesus, in forgiveness and in purpose to serve God right where they are at.

Never forget that God has called all of us to be and do different things in this world but in each of our places we can bring glory to God and love others.

Or we can work to get ahead, to find seek what we believe will make us happy. With all the sacrifice that it will take to get what you are working towards. Will it matter?

Paul, the person God choose to write this, shares that God showed him investing in leading people closer to Jesus was the most important thing ever. It was the greatest gift to give others. It was the focus of his life and everything about was building for the eternal.

You too can build for the eternal.

But don’t think you have to do church jobs to serve God or even work in the world.

Followers of Jesus should never see their lives as church/work/family, but as God’s gift of life to use in all places.

So what does it look like for you.

Different abilities, skills, talents, and resources

Do not forget the one thing we all can do - prayer, seek after God

Do not forget the other things we all can do - Love God

Do not forget that wherever you are at, you can - Love Others

It is because of the eternal nature of these things that they work in a riot. work in a pandemic, and work in whatever setting your in but like forgetting to wear a mask, we can become distracted by what is seen, and lose track of what is unseen.

We learn that focusing on what really matters, what is going to be, and what is really important, than unseen, than dealing with all the consequences and hardships of life takes focus, and we get strength to keep going, to keep dealing with all the pain that life has to offer and God will allow us to go through.

2 Corinthians 4:16–18 CSB

16 Therefore we do not give up. Even though our outer person is being destroyed, our inner person is being renewed day by day. 17 For our momentary light affliction is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory. 18 So we do not focus on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

AS these incredible hardships keep coming, if we continue to focus on following Jesus, seeking after Him and His ways through prayer, loving Him and loving others, while this life begins to fade we actually discover we are becoming stronger and stronger for eternity.