“Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain.” 1 Corinthians 16:58
The context of this verse in the first epistle of Paul to the Corinthians speaks to the matter of the moment when the believing soul will meet the Lord, either in the air, when Christ comes for His saints, or at the moment when he or she falls to sleep in Christ, the body dies, and the spirit and soul are with the Lord immediately. In both cases, the issue is the moment of personally meeting the Lord and being changed forever. There is another reason to consider this most important meeting, not only because of the joy and blessing it will be to see Him who has loved us and washed us from our sins. That reason has to do with our life on this earth, and the opportunity and calling that God has given to every believer, to not only begin to know Christ in an ever-increasing manner, but to use the gifts, time, and open door of opportunity that He provides, to be about the Father’s business. The issue is how we use that time, that privilege, and this by the Spirit according to the specific will of God for each individual. In order to grasp something of the enormity of the importance of the use of this time and opportunity, and seeing it from God’s perspective, we need to begin with the consideration of God Himself, as Christ is the Alpha, the Beginning.
In the book of Jeremiah, we read where the Lord told Jeremiah: “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you; before you were born, I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations.” (1:5) The beginning of that period of time which would need to be redeemed in the life of Jeremiah began in the heart of God before he was born. The Apostle Paul would confirm this in his own experience by writing: “But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, to reveal His Son in me that I might preach Him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately confer with flesh and blood.” (Gal. 1:15,16) In the lives of both of these men, the sovereign hand of God is seen in their conversion and calling. Both men were visited by the God who had made them, saved them, and appointed them to a certain task, equipping them entirely for the accomplishing of the mission. This is the basis for redeeming the time which God gives to every believer in Christ. And even though not all are called to be a prophet like Jermiah or an Apostle like Paul, yet “God has set the members (of the body of Christ), each one of them, in the body just as He pleased…Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually.” (1 Cor. 12:18,27) On this side of Pentecost, it was God the Father who by the Spirit placed every true, born-again believer in Christ into a living, and eternal union with Christ, in order that from that point on, and living by faith in the Son of God, he or she should live by Chrsit’s life for Him. From that point on, all would be possible in Christ by the Holy Spirit, within the limits of the will of God, and this according to His calling of each individual. This is principally a very personal matter, and we see this in Paul’s declaration after meeting the Lord Jesus on the road to Damascus when he said: “I did not immediately confer with flesh and blood.” Paul understood quickly that in the matter of faith in Christ, Jesus Christ was Lord, not only Creator but Redeemer, and that from that important moment Paul belonged to Christ. God’s work in placing every individual believer into Christ, according to His purpose, and His sufficiency, is the beginning point for redeeming the time.
Dear Father, Make us truly faithful. In Jesus’ name, Amen.