It’s exciting to have devotional thoughts from Elisabeth Buono this week! You may learn more about her on the contributors page.
“Dead people don’t have potential.”
These words are written in my Bible in Ephesians 2:1, spoken in a Bible study or sermon I once heard. As a kid, I knew we were all sinners. As a teenager, I saw that a little bit more. And now as an adult, I have seen the magnitude of sin in ways I would never have imagined, and yet I see more hope than I ever saw before.
From the eyes of the world, this doesn’t make sense. From my eyes five years ago this doesn’t make sense. And from eyes looking solely at the utter sinfulness of man, the situation doesn’t have much potential.
But we have a Savior. But we have a Living Hope (1 Pet. 1:3). But we have a magnificent Christ Who chose to die for already dead men. We have the Lamb of God Who was wounded, crushed, and afflicted at the allowance of His own loving Father- so that we could be healed (Isa. 53:5, 7). So that dead men could not only be made alive, but could then shout the name of Jesus Who chose to love them despite their wickedness, to rescue them though they ran from Him – to give them a purpose despite their lack of potential.
When we look around ourselves, and inside ourselves, and see the crushing darkness of sin, we have a few options. We can see the darkness, and we can give up in despair. We can ignore the darkness and try to live our lives running always from its reality. Or we can see it, and while rightfully hating it, can let it point to just how AMAZING is the love of our Savior. How powerful was the sacrifice of His blood! How incomprehensibly vast is His grace. How gentle and kind His compassion.
We were every one of us those dead men. We had no potential. We were utterly without hope, and our lives could only ever have been dark.
Yet the God of this world chose to pour His love on us and to give us endless life and hope bought by the crushing death of Jesus. He knew we were doing nothing but sin, and still chose to do everything for us. And by His matchless grace, by faith we are saved (Eph. 2:8-9).
Dependent fully on no one else but this amazing God of power and love, we have hope beyond the wavering of the world around us. Resting in this God of grace despite ours and others’ failures, we have hope for today and for every tomorrow. And abiding solely in He, the One Who never changes despite circumstances or sorrow, we have a hope that will never die. Because we have a Savior, Friend, and King Who with us will forever live.
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