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TAKE HOLD OF LIFE

“Lay your hold on Eternal Life”, 1Tim.6:12

There is much we can say about this. However, there is very little that people do aboutit. How manytimes have you given a thought to the fact that you need to lay hands on Life? By that you might know how serious it is for you.

Many become slack for many reasons. Some even despise life and save their effortsfor the last moments. Nowadays doctrines don’t help them much either. Slack or lazy theologians havemade them up to turn people slack. They have mixed personal experience to their understanding of the Bible. And it can’t bea good combination at all.

Even though there are many reasons, allow me to talk about one why people’s grip on Life becomesslack and offensive to God.

God is good to bad ones just as He is good to good ones. He is what He is all the time. Hedoes not depend on what we do to Him or to anyone else to be good to us, unless He chooses to exhort usthrough our circumstances because we are His Children. Children of the Lord experience the rod moreoften thanthe average sinner does. However, humans are used by the law of their sinful nature to be good and kindto all those who do them good and are naturally inclined to be mean towards all the rest, even towardsthose who are passive and indifferent towards them. Now, because they are like that, they assume that ishow God is as well. And when they think of God as good, they believe He will be good towards them. Theyshall also naturally assume that the reason why God does them good is because they are right with Him. Werethey not right with Him, they believe He would be mean towards them in this present life. If this was truly so, whatwould we say have Job? They conclude that God would never be good to them unless they had been acceptableto Him. They have an unconscious and distorted idea about God and think of Him as they would of an averagesinner and expect God to act like the average human being would.

How does this affect people? How does this hinder them from holding their grip on Life? Itis very simple to understand what happens next here. Because God is good to all, either to good or evento bad ones, the human mind easily tricks people into error and vain believing. People are good towardssuch who are good towards them and towards such who are pleased with them. They believe they must be rightwith God for Him to be good towards them. But, God is not like humans. Such vain thinking leads people tobelieve they do not need to fix their lives with God when God is good to them. They think all is rightwith them already when that happens.

If God is good to you in some way, try to believe it isbecause He is good towards anyone and not because of you. He is good becauseof His character and not because of yours. Do not use the fact that God is goodas an excuse not to fix your life right away, even if you are a preacher. Goddoes not accept persons. Do not easily assume everything is right between youand Him only because He has done some good to you or even because He divertedevil from your way. Remember that the Lord won't pull the weeds out of the cornfield till Judgment Day. Let’s take hold of Life and be responsible, thinkingpeople even when God is good towards us.

If we put all we have and are into taking hold of Life,we are surely helping Life to get a full hold on us. This is why Paulsays, "Lay hold of Eternal Life". However, we must never forget thatLife allows us to do so because it seeks to get hold of us in everyaspect of our whole living. By doing so, we often hasten times becausethe aim of God is to have "a prepared people" for Him. Then, ourspiritual clock will be set according to God's. However, if this is thecase, I mean, if we put all we have into getting hold of that Life which,by having us doing so, also gets hold of us, we must have in mind that we are puttingall effort into finding the life we imagine as eternal and constant. Imean that we have our own idea of what that Life is. Therefore, when weseek to get hold of Life with all our might we must add to our effortsan openness of mind which does not mystify or hinder the proper visionof that Life God has for all of us. Our hearts must be open to changeits vision about Life without losing on perseverance because of having ashort or wrong idea of what Life really is. When it does not happen thatway we shall surely enter the way of error and the proper ground forfanaticism will be created. Consequently, later on God will need to pullthose weeds of fanaticism out of us through much pain on our part and, also,through much effort on His part.

And if God is good this way, so should we be. "Be perfect as yourFather in heaven is perfect. For if you love those who love you, whatreward do you have? Do not even the tax-collectors do the same?" Mat.5:46-48. Amen.

José Mateus

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