Life on Earth is a temporary assignment.
I've had a lot of different jobs since I started working. However, it wasn't until I was in the Navy that I understood what a temporary assignment is. In the Navy they were very common things. TAD stood for Temporary Assigned Duty and it was anything from working on the flight line, or working in the chow hall. It was someplace you went to work that wasn't where you were trained, or hired to work. Just recently, I went on a temporary assignment to Maryland.
While I was in Maryland, I had a place to stay, I hung out with friends I was working with, I had video games to entertain me when I got bored plus I was earning extra money that I could spend on whatever I wanted. I had everything a guy needed to be happy. EXCEPT I WASN'T HOME. I was living in a room, not a house. There were people there who weren't my family. And no matter how comfortable I got with the area, it wasn't where I belonged.
So, I can totally relate to this chapter. We were made for eternity and for life in Heaven. Earth isn't our home. Your identity is in eternity and your homeland is in Heaven. . .In order to keep us from becoming too attached to Earth, God allows us to feel a significant amount of discontent and dissatisfaction in life. There are many good points brought up in this chapter about not becoming to attached to the world.
My favorite quote was actually from C.S. Lewis "All that is not Eternal is Eternally useless." And, since I know that only souls are eternal, it is more important that I invest in relationships with other people than material things that will fade away in the blink of an eye once I am gone. And I'll be left wondering why I wasted so much time on getting stuff.
When life gets tough, when you're overwhelmed with doubt, or when you wonder if living for Christ is worth the effort, remember that you are not home yet. At death you wont leave home -- you'll go home.
The Bible verse is from Paul in the second book of Corinthians.
So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
2 Cor 4:18 (NIV)
The question for day six:
How should the fact that life on Earth is just a temporary assignment change the way I am living right now? I answered this earlier in my writing, I need to spend more time on relationships that are eternal than I do on objects that are temporal.
Remember: This world is not our home.
I can't even begin to explain what reading this chapter has done for me.
ReplyDelete"Don't indulge your ego at the expense of your soul."
That hit me like a Mack truck!
I never knew that I could do so much more, so much better. What have I been doing?! I don't care about material things, I don't care about what's the "in thing" today, I don't care about what people say about me but I do care about being the best person I can be. I have been failing this earthly test miserably...I want to be looked at as a faithful person, filled with compasion and love and so many temporary distractions have taken me so far away from the person with such a love filled heart, the person God made me as.
Seeing this life as just a temporary home, makes me think that I should not let myself get consumed over anything pertaining to this place. I should focus my energy more on my next and eternal home, and not let silly mundane things upset me.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with earthly things is that each one is a small step away from God. And those steps add up. Even if you think 'it's not that big a deal' all sin is. And putting anything before God is sin. When we put God first, in our thoughts and our routines; when WWJD is something we seriously consider before we act, then everything else in our lives will fall into place where God wants it. And what God wants for us is so much better than anything we could want for ourselves.
ReplyDeleteOur citizenship is in heaven, not here on Earth. We were created to live here for a short time and one day be with God for eternity!
ReplyDeleteWe're not completely happy here on Earth for a reason. It is not our final home. At death you won't leave home, you'll go home.
The earth being temporary changes everything. It makes choice, decision or the path I take seem trivial because I know there is SO much more waiting for me in eternity.