Revelation part 4
What was hidden that needed (and in some cases still needs) to be uncovered (or revealed)? What are we talking about here? What's it all about? Well, in a Word... love! It's all about love. Everything we do is controlled by love. Because either we think we don't have it and we do everything we do in order to get it... or we know that we have it and we do everything we do in order to experience it by sharing it. By giving it away. And clearly one of those ways is better than the other. Giving what we've got (and, again, in that way experiencing it) is the more excellent way. Chasing the carrot but only ever getting the stick is no way to live. Trying to be someone we're not in order to get something we think we haven't got is doomed to failure. Because you can't earn someone's love. Love is unconditional. It is freely given. If it is conditional, it is not love. If it is not freely given, it is not love. Love is never about getting. Because love IS giving. That's why God first loved us--so we could have something to give. So we could have everything we need and we wouldn't have to chase it, or try to earn it, or try to get it. We've already got it. We've always had it. We just didn't know what we had. Because we didn't know who we were. Because we didn't know who God was. We were made in His image and likeness. As He is, so are we in this world. But it wasn't until we were conformed to the image of God's only begotten Son that things started to click into place for us. It wasn't until we began to see Him as He is--by HIM revealing Himself to us by Him appearing to us--that we could begin to see ourselves as we truly are. Jesus is the mirror. Jesus is our true identity. God in the flesh. Love in a body. God in OUR flesh. Love in OUR body. That's what was hidden. Christ in you, the hope of revealed glory. And now it (HE, LOVE) is not just hidden in you anymore. Now the mystery is revealed. Because now the love inside us can come flowing out of us. Because now we know and believe that it is in there. Here's the deal, guys: You can't give what you don't have. And you can only give what you do have. If you want to feel loved, the best way to do so is to love someone. Be the change that you want to see, I guess is another way of saying it. If you want revelation... reveal what you know to others. If you know it, throw it. "God loves you!" Well, how do you know? "Because I know He loves me!" Give what you've got. Be a witness to what you've seen, and heard, and experienced. Test the height, and length, and depth, and breadth of God's love by loving people bigger and stronger and harder than you ever thought you could. Love never fails. If you love someone, you're doing your part. And it might not always get you the result you think it should. But it WILL get the result God knows it should. You might not ever see that result--some plant, some water, but it is God who gets the harvest--but if you're giving in the hopes of getting something... that's not love. Love is (one more time) never about getting. Because love is (for the last time in this particular Rant) giving. God has revealed it to you. Given it to you. Reveal it to others by giving it to them!