The Presence Of God预览

Learn to Live Between the Times

Are you looking for a Christianity that will keep you excited, thrilled, riveted, and buoyant twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, three hundred sixty-five days a year? Tell me when you find it! And if you think you have found it, I’m sorry; you have not found biblical Christianity.

We have two grandsons. You have to keep them occupied or they get bored and come crying to have something to keep them excited. This of course will have to change as they mature. But I fear many Christians are like children: they want a Christianity that keeps them happy all the time.

A vital part of Christian maturity is learning to live between the times. When Jesus gave instructions for the disciples to wait— and not to leave Jerusalem—such waiting was between the times. Most of Abraham’s years were characterized by waiting, challenge, bewilderment, and suffering.

It is the anticipation of the conscious presence of the Lord that keeps us going. Indeed, such anticipation is what enables us to wait. It is between the times that we are privileged to know we are pleasing God. We are doing what we are told to do. And that is when character is born and developed.