Not way back, I used to be sharing an early morning coffee with a lovely woman when she surprised me with a sincere query, “What would Jesus say to my friend who believes she was born within the unsuitable body?”
I’m not a morning person. So, I took a deep breath before answering. “First, He would tell her she was loved.”
She nodded. I continued, “Then He’d tell her, ‘You’re not a mistake. But I understand your discomfort.’ Then He would explain that this world is just not her home and that she’d never feel completely comfortable here because she was made for eternity.” And these words are as true for her as are they’re for all of us.
We long for more because we were made for more. We fight sickness, aging, and death because at some level we all know we were made for everlasting life. As wondrous as our bodies are, they’re merely seeds of what they at some point might be. Paul explained it this fashion in 1 Corinthians 15:42–44:
“So is it with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perish- able; what’s raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonor; it’s raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it’s raised in power. It is sown a natural body; it’s raised a spiritual body. If there may be a natural body, there may be also a spiritual body.”
Think of it this fashion: If you’d never seen a tomato or a tomato plant, could you imagine either of them just by taking a look at a small, oddly shaped, colorless tomato seed? That seed doesn’t reveal the wonder of what’s hidden inside it. And yet, given the proper environment, that tomato seed will explode with growth in color and flavor. We are the identical. In this moment, we’re merely seeds waiting for an everlasting environment to disclose who we actually are. The apostle Paul goes on to say,
Thus it’s written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam [ Jesus] became a life-giving spirit. But it is just not the spiritual that’s first however the natural, after which the spiritual. The first man was from the earth, a person of dust; the second man is from heaven. (vv. 45–47)
For now, we’re dust and seeds, born of earth awaiting our heavenly rebirth. Why would any of us think our present dust-and-seed state can be comfortable after we sense there may be so way more waiting inside us? We are all in a state of agitated containment. There is the stress of who we’re and who we are going to perpetually be. The seed of our “more” is not going to be realized until His appearance.
But our enemy is a liar who twists each the reality and our longings. He whispers, This life is all there’ll ever be. Be your personal god. The enemy has seeded a generation of little children with the concept that their formation was a mistake. He knows if he can get them to consider this lie, it would be difficult for them to ever trust the one they perceive as a negligent Creator with the weightier measure of their transformation. By twisting the reality, the enemy wants us to doubt the One who’s the reality. C. S. Lewis wrote,
“A creature revolting against a creator is revolting against the source of his own powers—including even his power to revolt. . . It is just like the scent of a flower attempting to destroy the flower.”
To understand this Lewis quote in its deepest sense, our role on this statement requires more clarity. We are the creature, not the Creator, and as such, we fall into the category of those that are empowered reasonably than the One who’s all Power. We are the scent, the fragrant vapor of a blossom, not the flower.
This comparison captures the disparity between the One who creates magnificence out of nothingness and people He created. Think of it: without His gift of free will, even revolt can be inconceivable. And yet we still revolt and find ourselves blinded to reason. The prophet Isaiah described our frailty this fashion:
A voice says, “Cry!”
And I said, “What shall I cry?” All flesh is grass, and all its beauty is just like the flower of the sphere. The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the Lord blows on it; surely the persons are grass.
The grass withers, the flower fades, however the word of our God will stand perpetually. (Isaiah 40:6–8)
The breath of God’s Word cannot fade. In the New Testament, James echoed the brevity of our days:
What is your life? For you’re a mist that appears for just a little time after which vanishes. (James 4:14)
Considering eternity, we’re a fleeting fragrance, a scent that disappears only to reappear in eternity. The words of C. S. Lewis reflect the traditional laments of the prophet Isaiah.
You turn things the other way up!
Shall the potter be thought to be the clay, that the thing made should say of its maker, “He didn’t make me”; or the thing formed say of him who formed it, “He has no understanding”? (Isa. 29:16)
In so some ways and on so many fronts, our worldview has turned the vantage of the sacred the other way up. In these passages Isaiah exposes the breakdown between the created and the Creator. Paraphrased, it’d read, “You are those in My hands. I’m not in yours.” We are His idea. It is time we stop allowing our feeling and self-perception to supersede our divine formation. Prophet Isaiah gives us the treatment for our confused pursuits. Isaiah 2:3
They’ll say, “Come, let’s climb GOD’s Mountain, go to the House of the God of Jacob. He’ll show us the best way he works so we are able to live the best way we’re made.” MSG
As we pursue God, Our Father, He reveals us. Not the person we’ve been, not what others say about us, or say we should always be, but the true us. The person we have gotten.
Excerpt taken from The Fight for Female. Used with permission.
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Lisa Bevere is an internationally known speaker, a New York Times bestselling creator, and host of The Fight for Female podcast. Lisa has been married to her husband, John, for over forty years, and together they’ve 4 sons and nine grandchildren. You can connect with Lisa on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, X, and LisaBevere.com. Click here for her latest book, The Fight for Female.
