forest-road

I’ve spent much of my college career anticipating the years to come. The thing is I’m a dreamer, and I’d give an ironic right arm to be a professional dancer or on staff with “The New Yorker.” I’ve whittled away hours in the studio and hours with my fingers poised on the keys, hopeful for a future with my name in a program or staff column.

However, a large part of “the dream” is the fear of its crumbling. It’s like tightrope-walking on gossamer, and suddenly my doubts today outweigh yesterday’s confidence. How am I supposed to approach tomorrow, when I have a future whose every variable is up in the air?

The answer is this: that our future is a Person.

It’s one of those interesting and abstract noun-pairings that I like so much as a writer, but really it’s true; as Christians in all phases of life, our destiny, direction, inheritance, and point of arrival is nothing short of, and nothing other than Christ.

We see it in the way that God revealed Himself to His called people in the Old Testament. In Genesis, the Lord made Himself known as El Shaddai, the promising God, but in Exodus, He came to Moses as Jehovah, the promise-fulfilling God: “And I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as the All-Sufficient God; but by My name Jehovah I did not make Myself known to them” (Exo. 6:3). Today, God is Jehovah to us, actively fulfilling the promise to bring us to the good land, which is actually just Christ in our spirit (Gal. 3:14).

What was the inerrant destination for the Israelites? The promised land. For us? Christ, our sure destiny. Like an immense and specific magnet, every battle, complication, struggle, and positive experience brings us into this Person who is living in our innermost being.

The positive fine print: in our lifetime of arriving in Christ, our pathway will absolutely resemble that of the Israelites. What I mean is that a direct flight from Egypt to Canaan is about 240 miles, but God’s people somehow took 40 years to get there; it’s because their route was every way but straight, a custom-made loop-the-loop from God. In other words, my life could be this way or that, and yours might be the other, but we will both end up taking that leaping bound into Christ together.

Paul put a finger on it when he said that “all things work together for good” in Romans 8:28. The “good” is not getting into grad school or living in Seattle, but rather, being “conformed to the image of His Son” in verse 29. We are even “predestinated” for this—our future and pathway so enmeshed with Christ that we will match Him in every way. The Lord knows what “life ingredients” (my future career doing _________, your teeny inner-city apartment, and Paul’s landing in prison, etc.) will cause us to need Him, love Him, and be more filled with Him day after day.

This is how Paul could testify, “I know also how to be abased, and I know how to abound…I have learned the secret both to abound and to lack” (Phil. 4:12). And then in verse 13 (a common Christian mantra) Paul broadcasts, “I am able to do all things in Him who empowers me.” Paul could do all things—endure and submit to any and every situation—because he had found the secret to take Christ as his reality and future in every stage of life.

So let’s not be cowed by tomorrow! Whether we’re making headway or nonplussed by life, we have a cemented destiny. We can love our dear Christ through every situation until we match Him. Each ‘tomorrow’ is the next day of our future in a Person.

Erin Kedzie
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