Romans Chapter 13 cont'd
Since we all know that precious time is ticking away, we need to rise up from our spiritual slumber- the end of the age has never been closer! The sun rose some time ago leaving the night far behind. So let us cast off our old sinful "night life"- outrageous behavior, drunkenness, lustfulness, infidelity, contentiousness and envying. Rather, let us put on the shining armor of the daylight- honesty, integrity, sincerity and transparency. Constantly welcome the Lord Jesus Christ to live in you and through you and don't be on the lookout for any loopholes for the expression of your selfish desires.
Comments:
Paul was the New Testament "theologian of the new creation". The reality of the historic bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ changed the essential dynamics of the heavens, the earth and their inter-relations. The new creation was powerfully and forever inaugurated via the first coming of Jesus even though its consummation awaits his return. In light of this, Paul and the other NT writers constantly call followers of the Christ to live with a consciousness of the realism of the kingdom of God that is both mysteriously and practically unfolding all about us in the midst of earthly cultures in which, assuredly, not everything goes well and nothing goes perfectly.
The apostles teach us that responding to the Holy Spirit in the context of our daily lives, our vocations and our inter-personal relationships provides a substantial "prophetic" witness to people all about us that there is a "time coming" in which all things will be properly reintegrated (with all goodness vindicated and evil divinely judged/banished) through Jesus Christ. Our lives and loving communities of faith are to manifest that the process is significantly underway. The Dawn is already here, since Christ's resurrection and ascension...and so...High Noon (the resurrection of all others--living or dead) is sure to follow. The climactic moment of "God's Big God-Story" arrived ahead of the expected schedule, changed the fabric of everything added a shocking twist to the plot line and yet...has hardly been noticed by the "powers that be". (Yet again, and don't you find it odd, that the whole world seems to pause at Christmas Eve and ponder, with bated breath, its repressed hope that God himself humbly came to earth as a human being so long ago in Bethlehem.)
The practical apostolic advice on "how to then live here and now" simply follows: believers are not called to live as sleazy denizens and dealers of the spiritually/morally bankrupt "night" of previous ages, but as powerfully equipped citizens and agents of the spiritually/morally vibrant "day" of the new creation. Christ is risen and is expressing his resurrection life in and through those who have courageously chosen follow him.
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