Sometimes I really wrestle with what I read in the Bible, or listen to in a sermon, or hear from someone who purports to be following Jesus…because two intelligent sources or people can seem to be advocating two very different things. Or, perhaps, if not diametrically opposed, I find myself asking: how can those two conceivably biblical ideas be reconciled?
One discourse of the Christian church that I’ve been exposed to more than ever before over the course of the last year is the concept of the guaranteed victory we have in Jesus. More-so than that, the concept that the Kingdom of God should be here now, fully. When I look at the ways that I fail to live out my best intentions every-day, when I hear about others struggling similarly, and when I see people healed only sometimes with no discernable difference in methodology, I wonder: if the Kingdom of God is fully here, would we see those inconsistencies? I don’t think there is anything inconsistent, or going to be anything inconsistent about the Kingdom of God. It will be “on earth as it is in heaven.” I don’t think that inconsistency is in God’s nature. Don’t get me wrong—I do think we have guaranteed victory. But aren’t we called to work out our salvation? And doesn’t it ever seem as if that victorious living talk is a bit shallow at times?
More often than not, I very much feel like I’m “on the way.” In fact, the more I’ve digested and poked through and learned and internalized life, the more questions I have, the hungrier I’ve become. I’m patient, I’m hopeful, but I’m certainly hungry. Thirsty. The other week my teammate, Andrew, unknowingly pointed me to a blog that discussed this very “conflict” within another context. In it, the author referred to one of Josef Pieper’s works, in which Pieper wrote:
The concept of the status viatoris is one of the basic concepts of every Christian rule of life. To be a ‘viator’ means ‘one on the way.’ The status viatoris is, then, the ‘condition or state of being on the way.’
Pieper goes on to say:
It’s proper antonym is status comprehensoris. One who has comprehended, encompassed, arrived, is no longer a viator, but acomprehensor.
I breathed a huge sigh after reading this…I’m not sure whether it was relief or some strange thanksgiving for something that was more consistent with was going on in my head and heart, but it certainly made more sense. Notice I didn’t say it makes anything easier.
Like writer Wesley Hill describes, “We hear a lot from a certain corner of the Christian world about ‘victory’ and ‘change’ and ‘healing.’” And I affirm this language in many ways. It has been a huge part of my walk, and I believe I serve a God that is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow, and is a supernatural God. I’ve seen it. I believe I’m a co-heir and therefore a co-laborer and I’m part of that kingdom come. But, like Wesley describes, I think this kind of talk can come at the expense or even the “avoidance of the ‘state of being on the way’. It’s an expectation that the kingdom of God should be here fully now, WITHOUT (my emphasis) our having to endure its slow, mysterious, paradoxical unfolding until the return of Christ.”
I await that day when I “have arrived.” Man, my body and spirit cannot wait for full deliverance! Until then, however, I am hopeful and content in a state of being “on the way.” It’s ok to be in that place. I pray “his kingdom come, his will be done”, but I also realize He’s more concerned with how deep I grow than how fast the process is. We can’t be hopeful for what we see—who is hopeful for what they already have? “It is finished”, but won’t the fullness only be realized when the day we hope for finally comes, the day that Jesus comes back? We are hopeful for what we do not see.
So perhaps “having victory” vs. “being on the way” is not a ‘versus’ situation at all; it seems to be more of a claiming victory, living into victory, believing victory perspective that brings about its realization.
We are part of the realization of the victory.
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Yup, I know, I went through another blogging slump—sorry peeps. Last month we were out in Maasai Mara (Kenya) with little internet access, but I also decided there probably couldn’t be a more socially acceptable time for me to be “off the grid!” It was one of those special moments in life where you wonder: “how could Maasai Mara and New York City actually be on the same planet?” My computer is also having technical difficulties, but one can only use that excuse for so long.
I hope to write a lot about what God revealed and spoke during that month over the coming weeks…
