Over the past decade or so, friends have generously offered us the use of their Lake Michigan cottage. Peggy and I have toured many countries over the years, and I would include this stretch of Great Lakes shoreline among the most beautiful of destinations. White sands, relentless waves—sometimes lapping, sometimes crashing—blue skies and blue waters in relentless rendezvous on the horizon. It never changes, never grows old. Always restful, always rejuvenating. We return there from time to time for respite. In a similar way, this blog space occasionally revisits the wonder of transformation, specifically our ongoing metamorphosis into the likeness of Christ Jesus. This is God’s preordained plan for us and the Spirit’s beautifying work in us. So, let’s return again for respite.
We start here: the Scriptural promise of inner change. Paul writes, “We all . . . are being transformed into [Jesus’] image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.”1 How refreshing; such peace. Yet here we pause already to ask this question: If mankind is created in God’s image, as clearly established in Genesis,2 why must we be transformed into His image? On the surface, it seems redundant, and confusing besides. Here is the missing piece that makes our scenario less puzzling: Though we were made in God’s image, we eventually chose unbelief and disobedience, the aftermath of which “cataclysmic” cannot begin to describe. “When Adam sinned, sin entered the world. . . Death spread to everyone, for everyone sinned.”3 And so says Paul, “we have borne the image of the man of dust.”4 This is to say, though we were made in God’s image, all of mankind has yet carried and reflected the sinful likeness—the soiled image—of Adam. It is necessary, therefore, that that we be “conformed to the image of [God’s] Son.”5 Only God can do this, and this God is doing. Praise His name.
Sometimes we seek to justify or minimize our sinful nature in its various forms and desires by claiming to be made in God’s image—and therefore justified in our flaws—or born in sin and therefore without hope or expectation. Neither is ultimately true, for God is “[working] in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever.”6 He is at work, transforming us from the dusty image of Adam into the glorious image of Christ.
So think for a moment and throughout the day: In what ways has the indwelling Spirit of God transformed you already? Do you sense Him transforming you even more ways, new ways? He is faithful.
Father, thank you for loving us so much that you steadily transform us, your church, into the image of Christ Jesus, your Son. May your Spirit have your way in us. Great is your faithfulness. In Christ I pray. Amen.
1 2 Corinthians 3:18 NIV
2 See Genesis 1:26-27 ESV
3 Romans 5:12 NLT
4 1 Corinthians 15:49 ESV
5 Romans 8:29 ESV
6 Hebrews 13:21 NIV
Tag: Paul Nordman
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Jesus Our Brother and Closer Still
Aware of my involvement with Kairos Prison Ministry, a dear friend recently asked me, “When you visit people in prison, how do you think of them? Do you see them differently from your friends or neighbors?” These were great questions, so for today’s post I thought I’d flesh out my response.
My view on crime has not changed. Society needs accountability and rightfully demands justice for the wrongs perpetrated within it. We know this; we all clamor for justice in its various forms. Moreover, society needs to be protected from those who have demonstrated their willingness to harm its people one way or another. And conversely, malefactors need protection from those who would otherwise take vigilante vengeance and perhaps to a disproportionate extreme, i.e., an eye for a tooth. But what has changed is this: I no longer categorize offenders as refuse to be wadded up and discarded into dumpsters like yesterday’s news. They are instead individuals, each with his own life story, each surviving or trying to survive, and each precious to God. How precious? Let’s look.
Shortly before His betrayal and arrest, Jesus spoke of a future judgment when commended are those who have shown proactive love toward the hungry, thirsty, strangers, unclothed, sick, or imprisoned—or in His words, “the least of these my brothers.”1 If Jesus claims the least among us as His brothers,” how can we categorically belittle or dismiss them? Why even would we want to? If anything, we might do well to look inwardly and spend some time praying about our own heart.
Yet to these least among us Jesus draws even one step closer than “brother,” for what we’ve done for one of the least of these, we, in His words, “did to me.”2 Notice He did not say we did it “as if to me,” rather, “to me.” This is the intimacy of identity and oneness with believers: Christ in us and us in Christ.
So do I see people in prison differently from my friends or neighbors? No, many are my friends and, in a sense, all are my neighbors. In fact, some of my closest friends live this life in lockup, yet in their words, “free on the inside.” And how do I think of these people in prison? I must think of them as Jesus does—His brothers, and closer still.
Father, we confess that, though you have shown us much love, forgiveness and grace, we sometimes fail to extend these to others. May we know your love so intimately that we freely, eagerly and joyfully share it with those in our midst. In Christ we pray. Amen.
1, 2 Matthew 25:40 ESV
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A Wakeup Call for Us All
“Hilkiah the priest has given me a book”1—so reported Judah’s secretary Shaphan to his king, Josiah. It was an understatement for the ages.
With the temple under repair, the king had sent his secretary to Hilkiah, the high priest, with instructions to fund the workers for their materials. Task accomplished, Hilkiah raised a new topic, telling Shaphan, “I have found the Book of the Law in the house of the Lord.”2 What?!? He found the book of the Law? He found it in the house of the Lord? How long had God’s people been without God’s Law? Who chucked it into storage in the first place? And how far had they strayed without it? We have a clue, for when Shaphan, in turn, read the book of the Law to the king, Josiah “tore his clothes”3 and commanded Hilkiah, “Go, inquire of the Lord for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that has been found. For great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not obeyed the words of this book.”4 The Law was there all along with truth, wisdom, guidance and power, yet the people strayed without it. How far? Plenty far.
We read this amusing account from the distance of place and time, yet it remains relevant. For while the Law of the old covenant resided in the man-made temple, the Spirit under the new covenant lives in God’s new temple—us, the church. God through Ezekiel foretold the day when “I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.”5 Forever faithful, God has sent us the Holy Spirit who lives in us through faith. It is vital that we know this, yet clear we sometimes do not. Paul’s wakeup call to the Corinthian church alerts us still today: “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?”6 “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?”7 and “Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you?”8 One message, three times, in two letters—it must be important: Through faith in Christ, the Spirit dwells in in us, His temple.
We live in God and He in us.9 And of His living, breathing dwelling place, He says, “the word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart.”10 Then may it not be relegated to storage and neglected there, but may it spring forth from us at the Spirit’s urging.
Father, thank you for choosing to live in us. Grace your people, your dwelling place, to hear your Spirit’s voice and obey in His power. Be glorified in your church. In Christ we pray. Amen.
1 2 Kings 22:10 ESV
2 2 Kings 22:8 ESV
3 2 Kings 22:11 ESV
4 2 Kings 22:13 ESV
5 Ezekiel 36:27 ESV
6 1 Corinthians 3:16 ESV
7 1 Corinthians 6:19 ESV
8 2 Corinthians 13:5 ESV
9 1 John 4:13
10 Romans 10:8 NIV
Paul Nordman—Author 