I’ve heard a lot of different ideas about what the Bible really says. Some say it’s irrelevant to life now that we are modern people. Some say it’s about how we go to heaven after we die. Some say it’s just a story of an ancient people and what they thought.
And I’ve heard a lot of ideas about who Jesus is – I’m talking about the Jesus who was born in Bethlehem and they say died on a cross. Some say he was a teacher who helps you be a good person. Some say he is a prophet who tells us what is going to happen in the future. Some say he’s just an ancient person we can’t really know the truth about.
But here’s the thing. This might be the best kept secret ever. Because they – the people who wrote down the part of the story that happened almost 2,000 years ago – they say that they know the plan. The master plan of what the Bible records are really all about. The truth about who Jesus is and what the heck he was doing 2,000 years ago.
Wanna know what it is? Cause it’s a doozy. I mean, it’s an absolutely colossal claim. Here it is: “To bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ” (Check it out in the Bible in the book of Ephesians, chapter 1, and verse 10).
This word “heaven” is just their way of talking about God’s space. And earth is the land where we live. Our space. So to bring them into unity means it’s all the same. No different. They’re talking about…
Making heaven on earth! Told you it was colossal!
So, they claim that God’s master plan, the point of all that’s going on in the story of the Bible, was always to restore the earth to good and it has now begun with Jesus.
Can you imagine the earth restored to be like heaven? Not just us leaving to go to the good place when we die. Not just a promise of a better life after death.
Not just us waiting in the messy broken world until he comes back and finishes what he started.
But the beginning 2,000 years ago of all the things we know – relationships, climate, family, community, economics, housing, poverty, war, everything, even the broken wounded hurting parts of ourselves we carry – restored! Made new again. The broken pieces healed and renewed. And Jesus the King over all of it.
That’s what they say is going on. And no matter who you are, this is good news! I mean, when heaven and earth are completely unified it’s going to be good! Real good.
And, the next part, well, it’s no secret… we are all invited to get in on this restoration mission.
By submitting our lives to the real King of it all, and learning to follow what He has taught us, we begin to see pockets of heaven on earth. Restoration. Renewal. Good.
Want in?
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Melanie Koch Nichol serves as youth centre director at Youth Unlimited/YFC North Perth.
