“How else but through a broken heart may Lord
Christ enter in?”
— Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
Allow me to contend with myself.
In writing the article, What God Has Prepared for Those Who Love Him, I was left with a strange sense that it was
incomplete; even somewhat selfish. You see, whilst it is an incredibly
beautiful reality to consider—venturing through Heaven’s gaze—it celebrates an
imminent fact (our entering Heaven) that also causes us pain: for those we must
leave behind and for those who won’t make it there to be with God in the next
life.
It should cut us to the heart that
anyone we would know might enter a godless eternity. And still, we limit
‘eternity’ too much if we consider it an end-of-life reality, alone. Eternal
life is an eternal
prospect—just as available here, in this life, as in eternity.
But there is something stopping
the unregenerate person from receiving Christ.
Beyond broken hearts are broken
hearts wedded to grief in its purest form: coming face-to-face with the
knowledge of our sin, and our need—never more certainly—of God. Unless we would
come face-to-face with the reality of such truth we are forever apart from God.
We cannot know the abundant life unless we first know our possession of the
poverty-of-a-life without God. Blessed are the poor of spirit—knowing their utter
lack without God—for theirs
is the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:3).
Those of us with relatives who
don’t know Christ—who don’t believe, who haven’t reconciled themselves to the
fact of their sin, who have no Lord true to the believer’s sense of ‘Lord’—are
caught between a rock and a hard place. We pray for our opportunities speak for
the Lord into their lives, but alas all too many of us never get through.
Truly, salvation is the greatest
of gifts, but, in these circumstances we discuss, it is a reminder of a grief
within us that, in this life, cannot ever be tamed.
Praying for Peace and Acceptance
What are we to do regarding the
stiff-necked within our families and our friendship groups, notwithstanding
those within our reach otherwise?
Those who will not hear of Christ
may not be able to be helped, but we have to find a balance between never
giving up on being used by God and accepting that our best will mostly not be
good enough.
Then there are those trying to
water down the message of the gospel. In a Love Wins universalistic world we ought to be here to say that God’s Word
and eternal will, alone, wins. Not everyone knows or receives Heaven. And we
are to hold two ravenous tensions together: the knowledge and power of our
salvation together with an acceptance of the incapacity we have in convincing
others that that salvation could be theirs, also.
We have to live with both
truths—accepting same. We have no choice.
***
As Christians we ought to carry a
burden for the unsaved, particularly our loved ones. But we must then also
accept that convincing them is well beyond us. We can pray for them and we can
accept our limitations. Like with so many things, we must trust God.
© 2013 S. J. Wickham.
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