We don’t like to wait. Especially in today’s instant-gratification culture where you can get Amazon Prime delivery in an hour, entertainment on demand, and a detailed AI answer (though of inconsistent helpfulness) to almost any question in microseconds. We may not like slow and hard, but that’s exactly what elite athletes, musicians, or special forces military soldiers have learned to embrace in developing the skills they need.

Our transformation and healing may feel slow and hard too. To quote Eugene Peterson, in our spiritual formation it’s most certainly “a long obedience in the same direction.”

But does that mean our lives here are nothing but a holding pattern while we wait for eternity? Jesus primary message when He was here said otherwise.

Luke’s gospel positions Jesus’ visit to the synagogue in Nazareth as the launching of his ministry, his keystone message. Jesus quotes Isaiah: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:18-19).

And then Jesus spoke the words that, in part and but for His Father’s intervention, could have gotten Him killed right then: “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:21).

Today!

Good news, liberty, insight, healing, freedom, favor – today.

Not after twenty years of trying harder.

Not after you die and “get to heaven.”

Not for somebody else.

Today. For you.

So, what can we expect here and now? And what do we have to wait for eternity to experience? It’s worth considering.

Lives Changed Now

So what is truly available to us here and now? What kind of transformation is realistic to look for and expect in following Jesus in this life?

Ask the person who was addicted to alcohol, pornography, or gambling, and who is now free.

Ask the husband or wife whose marriage was healed after experiencing abuse, betrayal, or other deep trauma.

Ask the person who had been mired in depression, hopelessness, and fear who is now living with joy and peace.

Ask the one who, like Christian in Pilgrim’s Progress, had been carrying a load of guilt and shame so heavy it was crushing them, and who has found freedom in the cross of Jesus.

Ask the person held by invisible chains through demonic oppression who is now enjoying true victory and light.

Or ask the men or women who have come to one of our small-group Intensives at Transformation Place, who have found healing and freedom from the messy places in their story because Jesus has shown up.

These are real changes that make a lasting difference in people’s lives here and now.

I know; I’ve been there. As a younger woman I experienced a long season of deep mental, physical, and spiritual distress. I had always known about God but it wasn’t helping. Then I met Jesus personally, and everything changed. I experienced the power, love, and sound mind that God makes available to us. And I’ve never been back in that pit again.

How long that transformation takes and what your individual process will be is unique to you. But who of us experiences all of the “today” life in the kingdom of God that Jesus makes available to us here and now?!

There is more. For you. Today!

It’s Still Not Enough

After my husband died, at his home-going service I said words I still believe today; “No matter how many years we live on this earth, or how good those years are, it’s never enough. Because we were not made for this earth. We were made for eternity.”

The breakthroughs are real – here and now. And so is the suffering. We’re still in the both-and season. This contrast is sometimes stark and painful. In my own grief journey I understood for the first time how indescribable pain and irrepressible hope can exist in the same person, sometimes in the same moment. Here are a few more both-ands:

• The glory in spring flowers, a sunrise, the love of a pet, the strength of a galloping horse. And each one of those is temporary. Each one will end, deteriorate, die.
• Love and beauty in the embrace of a child, the kiss of a lover, the soul nourishment of good friends. And every one of those relationships will one day end through life events, moving away, death, etc.
• Moments when your whole being sings with rapture at the nearness of God and the glory of His presence – that then seems to fade so quickly. Your eyes, your ears, your heart longs for it to be lasting in a way our finite human bodies do not yet experience.

Our hearts are leaky; all the goodness we can take in will never permanently fill us up. Even our journey of transformation is incomplete here. The freedom, victory, and transformation is real! And the old brain pathways, old triggers, old vulnerabilities often stick around. It’s not that you’re in bondage; you’re living in real freedom. Sin can go! But parts of you remind you that this is not as good as it gets, not yet.

What Is Yet to Come

There will come a day when the suffering is no more, and the kingdom of God will be ushered in in fulness. We struggle to believe what that could possibly be like.

• There will be horses and other animals; the Bible describes them. But they will never get sick or old. Every living thing – including us – will be permanently and fully alive.
• No more ending of relationships. No estrangement, frustrations, failed expectations, trauma, losing touch, or death. Ever.
• Temptations are over! Your old brain pathways will never pull you in a way that is less-than-good. You won’t need an escape plan from temptation; your wholeness will be complete.

And most of all, you and I will be able to walk and talk with the God of the universe, with the Lamb who gave His life for you, with the Holy Spirit who will no longer seem ethereal or fuzzy. Joy, love, peace, meaning, purpose, excitement, rest, satisfaction that has no end.

In this world everything and everyone has an expiration date.

In eternity “expiration date” will be so far in the past that we’ll forget it was ever a thing.

Even so, Come, Lord Jesus!

Your turn: Where are you in need of more of the “already” – that part of the kingdom of God that Jesus makes available right here and now? And where are you homesick for heaven, yearning for eternity where everything is good?  Leave a comment below.

Want more? This week’s podcast conversation with Niki Kirby provides great encouragement for what it’s like to live in the here and now while yearning for eternity. Listen or watch.

Tweetaables: why not share this post?

• We are living in the already-and-not-yet. None of us has fully experienced all the wholeness Jesus makes available to us now. And we will only be fully satisfied in eternity, when God makes all things new. Tweet that.

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