Day 6 – Transformation In The Waiting

“For God knew his people in advance, and he chose them to become like his Son, so that his Son would be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. And having chosen them, he called them to come to him. And having called them, he gave them right standing with himself. And having given them right standing, he gave them his glory.” (Romans 8:29-30, NLT)

“When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples. This brings great glory to my Father.” (John 15:8, NLT)

“So all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image.” (2 Corinthians 3:18, NLT)

One of the coolest days I’ve ever experienced was during my trip to Iceland during the summer, when the sun never truly sets. At that time of year, there are twenty-four hours of sunlight in Iceland. This northern phenomenon allowed our day to stretch out, and the longer it got, the more dreamlike it started to feel. It wasn’t simply that the day held cool moments. It was that the day had become an unending string of cool moments wrapped in one long, uninterrupted highlight reel. Each new wonder compounded on the next, making every moment more incredible than the one before.

And I think that’s a little bit like how heaven will be.

Here on earth, we experience God’s glory as it pokes through the pains of a broken and fallen world. In heaven, we’ll experience it uninterrupted and full.

Think of every happy memory, every sight that has ever captivated you, every moment of pure, unadulterated joy. Here on earth, these events pop up sporadically amid mundane, painful, or sad moments . . . because that’s life—good and bad, happy and hard, all rolled up into one. But we have the promise of a day when it will be only good because we’ll be fully restored to right relationship with God. Think of all your most joyful moments, coming at you uninterrupted, almost overwhelming you with their sheer relentlessness. Even that is only a glimpse of the sure hope we have as followers of Jesus. Our ultimate hope is to be with Him fully in heaven.

One day we will stand before God face-to-face and enter into His eternal glory. Pain, waiting, and suffering will be no more. Yet the pain, waiting, and suffering we experience here on earth have an eternal purpose: to prepare us and purify us for that day, to mold us more into His image. Understanding this gives us a lens to view everything we walk through in this life: All of it is a tool in the hand of God to be used for our transformation.

According to Jesus, we glorify God when our lives and our character are transformed by Him and display His goodness to the world around us. What is the goal of the Christian life? To become like Jesus, and to grow into His image. Knowing this gives us the proper perspective when we go through discomfort, misfortune, persecution, or seasons of waiting. God cares about the things we’re waiting for, but even more, He cares about who we are becoming while we wait. So, in both our times of waiting and our seasons of fulfillment, we behold His character and continually grow to look more like Him.