This new life is starting right now, and is whetting our appetites for the glorious day when our great God and Saviour, Jesus Christ, appears. He offered himself as a sacrifice to free us from a dark, rebellious life into this good, pure life, making us a people he can be proud of, energetic in goodness.
Titus 2:12-14
There is lots of advice and encouragement in the Bible on how we are to get the most out of life – how we can live life to the fullest. Sometimes we might misunderstand it as merely a list of rules: we should do this, don’t do that, be good, and if we keep doing it all then God will like us. This thinking could not be further from the truth!
Living a ‘holy’ life is all about knowing God, receiving his forgiveness and salvation from all that is bad and evil, responding to God, accepting what is good in life, and leaving behind the bad. Life without God is not the life that it could be! I love the last sentence – Jesus ‘offered himself as a sacrifice to free us from a dark, rebellious life into this good, pure life, making us a people he can be proud of, energetic in goodness.’ Maybe you have come across people like that – who are energetic in goodness.
Last Saturday my son was wanting to go for a ride with a friend who has been acting as a positive mentor for him. But there was a slight problem … our friend needed to be home later that morning – so the ride was set for 6:30 am from O’Halloran Hill. My son thoroughly enjoyed the ride and in the car on the way home said, ‘It’s just great seeing my friend, you just always come away feeling really positive, he is such a great guy’. Energetic in goodness!
I recently read these words: True ‘holiness’ is when you leave every person more alive than you found them. What a blessing to know that God gives us all we need to do this.
Reverend Ben Bleby
Associate Chaplain