The
assumption that we have somehow given our best to God is an absurdity. What we have to give is His already and what
we think is a form of best is so riddled by sin and vanity that we cannot in
any way assess its quality. We do have
something to offer though...it is our will.
Our Lord will never forcibly retrieve our will once He has given it to
us. It is ours for eternity...a gift of
God that makes us in His image. Belief
is not our will but rather a function of our will. Why is it that hell is a gaping abyss for
those who deny God His devotion? To not
give the abyss would be to deny us our will and destroy the basis of our
humanity. We take our will with us
wherever we are sent and a will that refuses God and the humanization of His
love, His Son, cannot be pushed or squeezed or manipulated into Heaven no
matter how great the goodness and mercy of our Savior. We truly choose our life, whether that life
is redeemed from Sin or wrecked by it.
The devil cannot break your will either...he can make a scramble of your
mind but he cannot kidnap your will. You
may hand it to him and then he has the free run of your head as seen in Judas
and Herod. The obstinate unbeliever is
no more or less willful than the most saintly of believers. What separates the two is the throne at which
the will has been placed. When Peter and
the other disciples handed Christ the will each of them possessed, they found
themselves at once beside a lake, next within a temple and finally upon a
hill. It all seemed a whirlwind of
following, following, following. But as
they went with Christ in the full power and depth of their individual wills,
they became transformed by Him and His crucified and resurrected life into His
actual presence so who they were was merged with who He is and their wills
became His...bearing much fruit.
I
am the vine; you are the branches. If a
man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. John 15: 5 NIV
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