You have probably all seen bumper stickers, buttons, signs, t-shirts, etc. that have the saying; "No Jesus, No Peace, Know Jesus, Know Peace". I remember seeing a church reader board that had that written on it many, many years ago and thought that it was pretty clever and over the years have certainly found it to be true. Now, like I said before, that saying is on all sorts of things and has probably lost some of it's impact because people have seen it so many times and in so many places.
I bring this saying up because I thought of it this week as I was reading 1 John 5:1-12. Actually, I thought of a revised version of it made from verse 12, it is; No Jesus, No Life, Know Jesus, Know Life. Everyone that is alive obviously has a physical life but as William Wallace says in the movie Braveheart "all men die, few ever truly live".
Life is hard, there is a lot of pain, a lot of disappointment a lot of hurt. I think most people just try to get by the best they can, they try to endure. Most people are trying to make the most of this life, after all, it's the only one we've got, right? But, if we are just living for now, for this world for the 0-80ish years we have on this planet, we are missing out. What most people are missing is verse 12 of 1 John 5. Without Jesus, we never truly live because it is through Him that we have real life, abundant life. Following Jesus has a negative reputation in some circles as something that limits us or puts restrictions on us. The opposite is true. If we are living for Him, that is when we truly have life, life now and life beyond what we know and can see here, eternal life.
Who or what are you living for? Are you living for this world and what it has to offer, or are you living for Jesus who offers you real life? To quote another movie, The Shawshank Redemption, "Get busy living, or get busy dying".
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