Setting our minds on the Mission of Heaven - Keeping Jesus Before Us!
We are now in our third week of discussing the question, “What does it mean to bring Heavenly Direction to our Earthly duties?” How do we, being now raised with Christ, set our minds on the things above and not on Earthly things, and how do we live that out? Last week we talked about the first way we do that, and that is by becoming a FOLLOWER of Christ! This week I want us to think about a second way we can practically answer those questions, and that is by, “Keeping Jesus Before us!”
In order to understand what I’m talking about, I want us to think on 2 Cor. 3:18.
“We, who with unveiled faces all REFLECT the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into His image with intensifying glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.”
We are called to reflect, like a mirror, the Lord’s Glory on this Earth. Man’s chief aim, we know, is to Glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. We were made to Glorify God and this passage tells us that the veil has been removed from our faces and we get to stare, as in a mirror, at Christ. Other versions of the Bible say that we get to “Contemplate the Lord’s Glory,” and then we are called to reflect it! All that we are, in everything that we do, is to reflect the image of Christ to this world. That means that one of the ways we bring Heavenly Direction to our Earthly duties is by reflecting our Creator and Savior to the world He created and died to save. Just like the rest of His creation, we too can make our Creator known through our very existence.
I want us to ponder something very simple. If we (our lives) are mirrors made to reflect, then we are going to reflect whatever we keep in front of us. Have you ever spent time in front of a mirror? If you have, you will notice that a mirror can ONLY reflect whatever is before it! In fact, a mirror reflects nothing until something is put in front of it! We are supposed to reflect Christ! That will only happen if we keep Him before us! You see, when we first came into this world all we knew how to reflect was the world, because the world was always in front of us, however, once we were saved, and freed from the things of this world, and became followers of Christ, it is Jesus who becomes the One who is more and more before us. He is the one we focus on, the one we look to, the one we worship. If we want to set our minds on the things above, and Live out Heavenly Reality on this Earth, then we need to keep in front of us the One who is the object of Heavenly Worship. We say that our minds need to be busy with the business of Heaven, well a big part of the business of Heaven is the worship of the King of Kings! Read the book of Revelation to find this out. Chapter 7 of Revelation makes it clear that the one who is always “before” the 24 elders, the one who is always “in front of” the throngs of angels and the myriad of creatures is God almighty. If He is before you, in front of you, you can not help but to worship Him with your life. Revelation speaks to the fact that in His presence humanity will throw their crowns down before Him because He alone is worthy of praise. If we live continually placing Christ in the fore front, always before us, it will be Him that we reflect. We will be living a life where we are laying down what is important to us and are crying out with the angels, “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God Almighty!”
A great question to ask ourselves is what am I keeping in front of me on a daily basis? Is it myself? Am I so self focused that I tend to only reflect myself? Do I keep the cares of this world always before me, where I am reflecting the problems I am facing in this world? Do I reflect the sin I will not surrender? Do I reflect worry or doubt or depression? Or do I wake up in the morning quick to place Jesus Christ in front of my eyes? Do I open my Bible as soon as I am awake, just to let His truth dominate my thoughts? Do I listen to a song of worship, making praise the focus of my lips. Do I drop to my knees in prayer right away so that He is in the fore front of my heart? These are just some of the ways we can keep Christ before us, that we may reflect Him throughout our day! Whatever we place in front of us is going to be what we reflect. We are a mirror and this world, our friends, and our families are watching to see what they see in us. Let’s bring Heaven to this Earth by Keeping Jesus Before Us, so that we may reflect Him to the world!