My Deliverer is Coming

“My deliverer is coming, my deliverer is standing by.” As Rich Mullins said, “The song the captive children sang.” Here we are the freed-captive children. Here we stand in our ‘bodies of death’ here our hearts pine for the coming of our standing by Deliverer. Here we suffer the torments of sin; here we are ‘weary of earth, myself, and sin.’

Here we, ‘Hope for what we do not see.’ Trusting that one-day all sorrow and woe will be lifted. Trusting that our broken hearts will be mending by the Great Physician. Trusting that our conformation into the image of Jesus will be complete. Trusting that we will be wholly satisfied by the One who created. Yet there remains this unspeakable sadness even in our overwhelming joy.

By the grace of God we understanding we are redeemed from what we so justly deserve and to an extent desire to get what we deserve. For in the conformation of Jesus we begin to realize the unfairness of our redemption.

“As he [the believer] has more holy boldness, so he has less self-confidence…and more modesty. As he is more sure than others of deliverance from hell, so he has more of a sense of his desert of it. He is less pat than others to be shaken in faith, but more apt than others to be moved with solemn warnings, and with God’s frowns, and with the calamities of others. He has the firmest comfort, but the softest heart: richer than others, but poorest of all in spirit; the tallest and strongest saint, but the least and tenderest child among them. (Jonathan Edwards Religious Affections as quoted in God’s Passion for His Glory by John Piper)”

Growth ought to be evident in the believer’s life. If growth is not evident there is no belief simply a fraudulently ‘affection’ for the gifts of God, not for God.