Wednesday 8-24-22 4th. Day Of The Weekly Cycle, Av 25 5782 65th. Summer Day
Read: 2 Corinthians 5:6–10 | Bible in a Year: Psalms 116–118; 1 Corinthians 7:1–19
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We live by faith, not by sight. 2 Corinthians 5:7
The impala, a member of the antelope family, is able to jump up to ten feet high and thirty feet in length. It’s an incredible feat, and no doubt essential to its survival in the African wild. Yet, at many impala enclosures found in zoos, you’ll find that the animals are kept in place by a wall that’s merely three feet tall. How can such a low wall contain these athletic animals? It works because impalas will never jump unless they can see where they’ll land. The wall keeps the impalas inside the enclosure because they can’t see what’s on the other side.
As humans, we’re not all that different. We want to know the outcome of a situation before we move forward. The life of faith, however, rarely works that way. Writing to the church at Corinth, Paul reminded them, “We live by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7).
Jesus taught us to pray, “Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10). But that doesn’t mean we’ll know His outcomes beforehand. Living by faith means trusting His good purposes even when those purposes are shrouded in mystery.
In the midst of life’s uncertainties, we can trust His unfailing love. No matter what life throws at us, “we make it our goal to please him” (2 Corinthians 5:9).
In what areas are you struggling to see the next step you should take? Ask God to help you trust Him as you move forward in His grace.
So often, Father, I’m frozen by uncertainty and fear. I pray that You’ll guide my steps as I trust You for Your good will to be done.
For further study, read When Fear Seems Overwhelming: Finding Courage and Hope at DiscoverySeries.org/CB031.
Paul wrote this rich passage in the context of pondering death. Yet he put an unusual twist on it. Not only was he longing for death, but he also viewed it as being “swallowed up by life” (2 Corinthians 5:4)—inverting our typical view of it. The chapter begins with Paul contrasting our “earthly tent” with a future “building from God, an eternal house in heaven” (v. 1). The apostle’s certainty of this eternal future prompted him to say he “would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord” (v. 8). For now, “we groan, longing to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling” (v. 2). Paul had great confidence in this because God has “given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come” (v. 5). This is the great message of the gospel. For believers in Christ, death is obliterated by eternal life.
By Bill Crowder|August 24th, 2022
Faith 2 Corinthians 5:6-10
6 Therefore we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord:
7 (For we walk by faith, not by sight
8 We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.
9 Wherefore we labour, that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him.
10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.
Read full chapter
Love, Walter and Debbie
Landing Spot
Read: 2 Corinthians 5:6–10 | Bible in a Year: Psalms 116–118; 1 Corinthians 7:1–19
Download MP3
Subscribe to iTunes
We live by faith, not by sight. 2 Corinthians 5:7
The impala, a member of the antelope family, is able to jump up to ten feet high and thirty feet in length. It’s an incredible feat, and no doubt essential to its survival in the African wild. Yet, at many impala enclosures found in zoos, you’ll find that the animals are kept in place by a wall that’s merely three feet tall. How can such a low wall contain these athletic animals? It works because impalas will never jump unless they can see where they’ll land. The wall keeps the impalas inside the enclosure because they can’t see what’s on the other side.
As humans, we’re not all that different. We want to know the outcome of a situation before we move forward. The life of faith, however, rarely works that way. Writing to the church at Corinth, Paul reminded them, “We live by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7).
Jesus taught us to pray, “Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10). But that doesn’t mean we’ll know His outcomes beforehand. Living by faith means trusting His good purposes even when those purposes are shrouded in mystery.
In the midst of life’s uncertainties, we can trust His unfailing love. No matter what life throws at us, “we make it our goal to please him” (2 Corinthians 5:9).
In what areas are you struggling to see the next step you should take? Ask God to help you trust Him as you move forward in His grace.
So often, Father, I’m frozen by uncertainty and fear. I pray that You’ll guide my steps as I trust You for Your good will to be done.
For further study, read When Fear Seems Overwhelming: Finding Courage and Hope at DiscoverySeries.org/CB031.
INSIGHT
Paul wrote this rich passage in the context of pondering death. Yet he put an unusual twist on it. Not only was he longing for death, but he also viewed it as being “swallowed up by life” (2 Corinthians 5:4)—inverting our typical view of it. The chapter begins with Paul contrasting our “earthly tent” with a future “building from God, an eternal house in heaven” (v. 1). The apostle’s certainty of this eternal future prompted him to say he “would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord” (v. 8). For now, “we groan, longing to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling” (v. 2). Paul had great confidence in this because God has “given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come” (v. 5). This is the great message of the gospel. For believers in Christ, death is obliterated by eternal life.
By Bill Crowder|August 24th, 2022
Faith 2 Corinthians 5:6-10
6 Therefore we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord:
7 (For we walk by faith, not by sight
8 We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.
9 Wherefore we labour, that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him.
10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.
Read full chapter
Love, Walter and Debbie