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Maker of Heaven and Earth (The Creed, Part 3)
[This devotion is part of our series on The Apostles’ Creed, you can find all the videos in there series on our Apostles’ Creed Page. The devotions will be added as they are posted.]
John 9:1-3
I believe in the maker of heaven and earth. In fact, one of the things we say is that I believe God made me and all that exists that he gave me my body, soul, eyes, ears, and all my members. But one of the attacks today that we hear against the God of creation is a very simple phrase, a phrase that you’ve probably heard before. “God made me this way,” or “I was born this way.”
And oftentimes in this phrase is used, people are saying it as if to say that because I’ve had this condition, because I’ve had this thorn in my flesh since the time of my early childhood, then that must mean that God wants me to embrace it. In a certain sense, we could say, yes, God does teach us that all Christians have a cross to bear, and Jesus teaches us to take up our cross and follow him.
But what does that really mean? I like to turn to John chapter nine. (John 9:1-3) When Jesus and his disciples saw a man that was born blind from birth. Do you remember what his disciples said? They said, Jesus, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born this way? And Jesus said, neither. But this happened so that God’s glory could be revealed in his life. Isn’t that a beautiful answer? God’s glory would be revealed in his life. And if Jesus had just stopped there, if Jesus had not healed the man at all and had just said those words, those words alone would have changed that man’s life forever. Because that man would have grown up looking at his blindness as something to be ashamed of, something that made him different from everyone else and instead what Jesus says is no, this means that you can glorify God in a unique way, different from anyone else.
You see, the Bible teaches us that all of us are born in sin. We were originally created in the image of God. And I like to use a picture of a mirror. We were created to reflect God’s glory and goodness and love. So when people see our lives, they see a picture of your father’s love in heaven. But the fact is, because of sin, those mirrors are shattered. Our world is shattered. People are born with broken bodies, broken minds and broken souls. We need a redeemer. We need to be not just created, but recreated in his image. Redeemed. Forgiven by Jesus blood. What that does is that pieces those broken parts of our heart back together. You’re reformed. Reborn in Christ’s image.
And the truth is, as Christians, we all have cracks in our heart and cracks in our mirrors still, we’re not perfect. But in a unique way, each of us, by embracing our cross God has a special way that you can glorify him through embracing that struggle. For some Christians, that means you have the unique opportunity to glorify God as a single person. Other Christians that might mean that their cross is fighting for their marriage and doing whatever it takes to fix their marriage. Others might have the cross of being widowed and having lost their spouse. There is a unique way that God has for you to glorify him. And the one thing as Christians that we all have in common is that by living our faith, people will see the father’s heart reflected in your life. Amen.
