To Give Life.
 

The heart of God is consumed with love. He is just, fair, righteous, patient, temperamental, creative, fun loving, angry, serious, jealous, kind, and much, much more. But, His overpowering characteristic, His attribute that takes precedence over everything else is love. His tremendous anger and hurt from being spurned over false gods and personal preferences always carry an appeal, "Repent, and return to me."

God originally made people for friendship and fellowship with Himself. That plan was scuttled when our enemy deceived our ancestors. The greedy self-exaltation and evil that has characterized mankind ever since has caused God to become our enemy rather than friend. But God's love still overshadowed His anger and hurt, and He set in motion an even more wonderful plan.

God Himself would come and rescue us. He would deliver us from greed, from religion, from self, and from all the other effects of the knowledge of good and evil. He chose a certain people to be set apart from all others as the matrix through which He would come. These people were given many special and wonderful gifts, but also a religious straight jacket designed to both keep them separate and also punish them for refusing to enter His rest.

He came to give life - fully and abundantly. He was full of life, and it shined out from Him for all to see. He gave His life so that He could actually live His life in us as His body, and that His light might shine from us also. He shares life with us as He lives in the house of God (us). He gives and shares life everywhere - in the shower, on the toilet, in the car, at work, at play, at the grocery store, in bed, in sickness, in health, in troubles, in good times, at picnics, at reunions, in prison, at the mall, on the job, at the spa, during disagreements, while singing, while dancing,  …..

When the Lamb of God was sacrificed for the sins of the world, the veil in the Temple was ripped in two from top to bottom. This was a miraculous testimony by God Himself that the religious stuff was now over. The blood of Jesus has once for all made clean and holy those who receive Him. The only sin that counts anymore is the one the Holy Spirit convicts the world of - that they do not believe in Jesus. The tearing of the veil was not so much to let us get in, but to give God a way that He can come out and relate to all through the blood of Jesus. Hallelujah! The veil is torn and open. God has access to all and can accept all through Jesus. But look what we do.

What do we do with this torn veil that God uses for access to all men? We quickly sew it up as fast as we can. We sew it up and make new religious requirements for entering in.

We relegate God to a very expensive building (a high place) for an hour or so a week. We hire (and control) powerful motivational speakers, religious scholars, and CEO executive types to keep our ears scratched and our lives free to continue to live in the first Adam. We learn all the idiosyncrasies that separate us from the rest of our body and think we justify our divisions. We don't wait for one another and as Paul says in that same chapter, "Your church meetings do more harm than good."

Help, Lord! Help! Help us live Your life in us. Help us decrease that You might increase. Help us to be more aware of Your presence in us always, that we might constantly carry on our conversation with You and joyfully pray without ceasing.