This includes you who were once far away from God. You were his enemies, separated from him by your evil thoughts and actions. Yet now he has reconciled you to himself through the death of Christ in his physical body. As a result, he has brought you into his own presence, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before him without a single fault. (Colossians 1:21-22)The story of Little Orphan Annie used to be one that people really liked. Annie was a little girl in an orphanage who was adopted by a rich man. Because of this, she got to go on adventures and had a great life. She went from being a poor orphan abused in an orphanage to being the child of a rich man.
The story struck such a chord. It is the dream of all children who do not have a home, finding someone who will love them and take them home with them.
Everybody, no matter who they are, want to belong to a family. We all have that need.
God looked at us. We were without a home, without a family, lost and adrift in the world. And the funny thing is, every person goes through that. Every person finds him- or herself coming to a place where they realize that they are alone.
When God made humanity, he made us to be with him, to walk with him, to talk with him. He never intended that we be alone in the first place. He meant for us to have a face to face relationship with him.
But humanity sinned and continues to do so. Since we sin we cannot be with God. He is holy and we are not. Our systems are diametrically opposed. Yet we want to. It is our makeup to be with him.
So what to do? How do you solve this dilemma? We want to be with God, God wants us to be with him, but it is impossible. We are sinful and he has no sin.
What was done was that Jesus came. He was God yet human. He was human, yet sinless. And he could touch God and us at the same time. In doing this, he brings us to God and makes us part of his family, the family of God.
We were sinful. Now in him we are sinless because God looks at us through Jesus. We were once far away, now we boldly approach the throne of grace where we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most (Hebrews 4:16). Where once we stood outside, now we are in his presence and stand before him.
He loves us. He has always loved us. But our human condition is such that we can choose. And when people choose, they almost always choose the wrong thing. When that happens, we find ourselves outside of God where neither we not he wants us to be.
But we do not have to stay there. We can choose otherwise. And we can choose to be his children, part of his family, basking in his love, immersed in his grace.
But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Corinthians 15:57)
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