Imagine with me, just for a moment. Pause your daily routine. I want for you to take just a minute and picture your dream house. Do you have an image in your head? An idea of what your ideal house would look like? Picture, for a moment, your DREAM house. No limitations. No restrictions. Just dreaming. What do you picture? (Close your eyes if it helps…just open them back up to continue to read the devotional!)
Do you have the picture in your mind? Great! Now, let’s get to some of the particulars.
Location. You know what they say, “Location is key!” “Location, location, location!” So, where would your dream house be located? In the country? Next to the beach? On the top of a mountain? In the suburbs? City? Close to family?
Now that we have the location settled, let’s move onto the type of house you would like. What style of house would you choose? Are you a log cabin sort? Cutting edge? Modern? Traditional? Cape Cod? Split level? Single story? Apartment? Condo? Mansion?
Let’s go further. How would the outside appear? Landscaping? Paint color? Shutters? Metal roof? Shingles? Swimming pool out back? Garage? Garden? Lawn? No lawn?
Do you have it in your mind? Can you picture your dream house?
(Sometimes, it can be kind of fun to imagine things, to dream, to picture, to have fantasies. However, before we travel too far down this road, I need to be clear. This is no HGTV, “your dream home will make you happy” kind of devotional. Ultimately, houses will not make you happy. You could have the house of your dreams, right down to the last finishing nail and still be discontent. True peace, joy, happiness comes in Jesus. It would be better to be in a run-down shack or on the street with Jesus than in a mansion without him. Got it? Good. Let’s continue.)
Now, as you picture your dream house, as you imagine your ideal abode, I want you to imagine that it is yours. Let’s put aside reality for just a second. Let’s pretend that money wasn’t an object. In fact, let’s say that this was gift, an inheritance, something given to you without cost. Even the taxes would be handled. You have the keys in your hand. You’ve signed the deed. No mortgage. Nothing owed. No payments due. In fact, it’s been arranged that you don’t even need to cover property tax, water bills, garbage payments, electric. Nothing. Ever. It is yours. Completely, fully.
Pretty exciting, right? The house of your dreams, and the costs have been covered! How would you respond? What would you do? Backflip? Celebratory yell? Fall over in disbelief? Shouts of joy? Perhaps just a shrug of the shoulders, no big deal kind of a response? What would you do?
As the home owner, you are free to enter, free to explore, free to move into your new home. Put your clothes in the closet. Fill the shelves with your favorite books. Find the comfiest seat, pop your feet up, relax. Granted, there will be times when the dishes will need done, when the laundry will need folded, when you might have to dust. Still, the house is yours!
Sounds nice! Doesn’t it? Sounds like a good deal. A house that we’ve imagined, a house of our dreams. Given to us without cost. Everything is covered. Yes, there are a few chores that would need handled, but isn’t that true of everything? Wouldn’t you be excited, and wouldn’t you want to see everything that this house has to offer?
Maybe you wouldn’t, but I know I would. I’d want to know every nook, every cranny. I’d open up the drawers, look into all of the closets, check out the basement, crawl up into the attic. Everything. I’d want to see it all, to know it all, to experience it all.
It makes sense to explore the new home, to learn about it, to move in. Doesn’t it? After all, who would want to be given a dream house and never even go to see it? Who would answer, “Yeah, that’s great” and never even bother to go and check it out? Or, who would be given this home without cost and stay standing in the doorway without going inside? Who would want to be handed the keys to the house of their dreams and never pass further than the threshold to see if there are four bedrooms or five? Who would do such a thing?
Too often, many would.
I’m serious.
There are many who do this very thing.
They are offered a new house, new life, without cost, without having to pay anything themselves, and some choose to never even accept the gift. Some have heard the offer, heard the promise, received the invitation, have been given the inheritance, and yet, they never accept the gift. “Too good to be true.” “I don’t believe in such things.” “That’s just a fairy tale. Who needs it?” “I am content where I am!”
Obviously, I’ve shifted, and I am no longer talking about some materialistic dream for an ideal abode. Instead, I’m talking about life in Jesus. Unfortunately, we can all agree that there are many who are offered life in Christ who do not accept the gift of Jesus. Jesus offers new life for all, and yet some refuse to accept, even after they have been presented with the truth time and time again. (This isn’t to say that they won’t ever accept Christ. It just means that they haven’t yet. We need to do our part in ministering and in praying that they would be receptive to what God has given them in Jesus.) There are those who are content in their way of life, content in their shack, content in their homelessness and have not received the house that they have been promised. It is sad, but it is true.
Unfortunately, there are also many who do receive Christ, who do accept the gift of Jesus, who have put their faith in the Lord for the forgiveness of their sins and acceptance into relationship with the Father, and they never leave the doorway. Or, if they do, they might take a couple of steps into the entryway, but never move into the house completely. They leave their jackets on. They never bend down to untie their shoes. They don’t go to the refrigerator for a glass of lemonade. They don’t try out the bed or pause for a moment in the recliner. Unfortunately, there are many who are given a mansion and never see past the coat closet.
You see, friend, we are offered a new house, a dream house, a new place to reside in God. This house isn’t one that we conjure up in our minds, selfishly deciding the best location, the best finish choices, the ideal model and all of the other physical attributes that we might desire. Instead, it is a house designed by God, one in which we will learn to grow to be more like Jesus. God not only offers us to enter the house through faith in Christ, but he also offers for us to move in, to explore, to set up our home in Him. Yes, initial faith in Christ is awesome, is tremendous, is a thing to be celebrated, but that is not all there is to the Christian life! Stopping there is like stepping a couple of inches in through the doorway but never venturing further, like being given a dream home and staying right at the threshold. It sounds ridiculous, and yet it is the very thing that many of us do in our relationship with God. “I’ve been forgiven. What else do I need?” “I prayed the ‘sinner’s prayer’. What more is there?” On the one hand, yes, faith in Christ is all that is needed for eternal life, but is that really all that we want here on this earth? Do we really just want to enter the house and never know the fullness of what has been given to us?
Look at what Paul says in his letter to the Corinthians:
By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as a wise builder, and someone else is building on it. But each one should build with care. For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person’s work. If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames.
~ 1 Corinthians 3:10-15
The analogy is slightly different, but the idea is the same. Paul says that Jesus is the foundation. Then, he encourages us to build upon that foundation with things that will last. To follow our analogy, the doorway into our house is Jesus. The rest of the house is life in Christ. Living a life just inside the doorway is similar to building upon the foundation with hay and straw…it just doesn’t last, it doesn’t work, it doesn’t make sense whatsoever.
Friend, in my life, I want to know Jesus. Fully, completely. I want to experience the things of God. I want for Christ to use me, to shape me, to mold me, to work within my heart to make me more like Jesus. I want to explore every nook and cranny of the life that I have been given in him. Just like a physical house, this might at times require some effort. There might be laundry that needs done. Dinners that need prepared. Dishes to put away, etc., etc. I might need to crack open my Bible. Develop a habit of prayer. Seek to be more forgiving, etc., etc. These things aren’t done so that I can earn the house. It has already been given to me. Instead, they are done so that I might know the fullness of the house. That I might continue to grow into all that I have been given. I am willing to cooperate with God, to participate in the housework, so that I might continually grow into this fullness, that I might continue to know that which I have been given. To use Paul’s analogy, I want to build lasting things with my life, not just barely squeak through the flames.
What about you?
No matter where you are in your journey with God, there is always more. There is always more. That’s part of the fun, part of the excitement, part of living in Christ. There are always more ways that we might know Jesus, more ways that we might serve Jesus, more ways that we might share Jesus with others.
There is always more, but I ask, are you seeking it?
Are you desiring with your whole heart to know all that there is to know of God? To be filled with the Holy Spirit? To allow God to continue to do work within you? Are you seeking God’s kingdom, exploring the house? Discovering new life in Jesus? Or, to ask in Paul’s terms, are you building things that will last?
Or, are you stuck in the doorway…refusing to go in and to explore?
~ Pastor Chris
