A Holy Contradiction: Eternity in a Transient Time

Welcome to the Awakening Church podcast.

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Thank you for joining us.

If you haven't we haven't met yet, my name is Chris.

I'm one of the pastors on staff, and I want to invite you to reflect a little bit with me and to look at God's word in what he might have to say with us, uh say to us during this kind of chaotic time.

I think one of the unique things about this season is we're all experiencing time so differently.

You know, maybe your day feels longer than it's ever felt before in your life, stuck at home.

Or maybe it's feeling faster than it's ever felt before.

I think it kind of feels like both.

It's strange that this is only our second live stream right now.

You know, before we uh we were meeting in Del Mar High School just two weeks ago today.

It's crazy to think about that.

But it was really only like 10 or 12 days ago that our nation started to really reckon with this virus and all of the changes that went on.

When we started to see celebrities be diagnosed, the NBA season canceled, March Madness canceled, the Masters is canceled, South by Southwest, celebrities getting diagnosed.

Like that's when we started to reckon with it.

And it was really only 10 or 12 days ago.

Some of those things I mentioned even happened within a half hour.

All of this happening so quickly, um, things started to kind of cascade from there.

Those were kind of the luxuries, right?

And you know, sports and watching sports and stuff like that.

But then necessity started to affect us, right?

School closures, social distancing, and now this shelter-in-place ordinance, which has left many people without work and with possible economic situations that are dire.

No school, no job, no future is really certain.

And it's interesting the things we usually use to cope when things are bad are also somewhat gone.

Travel, we used to just escape to another place, right?

Uh, sporting events often allowed us to kind of escape our own existential worries.

Well, now we don't have those things to escape, and we're kind of stuck in our homes, and we're stuck to reckon with what do you do with a world that is disappearing?

What do you do when life has the kind of the rug's been pulled out from under your life?

This is what we have to face with.

And what's so beautiful, I believe, is God has answers that God actually has a word into your life.

I think right now we're kind of scrolling through our phones and our laptops and stuff, looking for answers, looking for something.

It's so cool.

God, He doesn't offer an opinion on our existence.

He offers a word into our existence, a word, a transcendent word.

And that's what we get today.

It's kind of funny but providential.

This series that we're in right now is called The Holy Contradiction.

And we planned this months ago.

And as we reflected as pastors, man, we we realized we got to keep going with this series because it really matters to where our world is at.

The series is called A Holy Contradiction, and it's actually going through just the first part of James chapter one.

If you've got a Bible, I'd invite you to turn there with me.

James chapter one.

There's even a Bible tab uh on the online experience that you can click over to.

In addition to prayer, if you want prayer right now, you could hit that tab and ask for live prayer, get a prayer request.

Some of our trusted, amazing volunteers and pastors will be there to meet you and to pray for you.

James chapter one, we've said it's providential because this series is kind of looking at how we live beautifully contradictory lives as Christians, how actually God's word offers us a window into a life that is possible when everything seems impossible.

Week one, the title of the message was Joy in a World of Pain.

That seems contradictory, right?

How can you have joy when things are terrible?

James says, consider it pure joy when you experience trials of many kinds.

And then the next week, we talked about wisdom in an age of chaotic information.

In other words, we were all getting just a cascade of info, right?

Tons on our Twitter feed and emails left and right.

And is wisdom possible when we're inundated with so much information?

James says, actually, if you lack wisdom, you should just ask God for it and he will generously and graciously give it to you.

That was last week.

Well, this week, James is gonna turn in his audience to this idea of eternity.

He's gonna start talking about what lasts and what doesn't last.

Isn't this a really important word right now?

As so many things are not lasting, as our economy seems to be failing, as our schools close, as our job future could be uncertain, we're starting to look at what's gonna last in this age where everything's kind of seeming to disappear.

James chapter 1, verse 9 is where we're gonna be, where God's word can give us answers.

James 1:9

Look at this.

James 1, verse 9.

James 1:9

Let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation, and the rich in his humiliation.

Because like a flower of the grass he will pass away.

For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass, its flower falls and its beauty perishes, so will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits.

Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him.

This is a kind of two-sided passage.

Actually, a lot of the passages in James, it's like half really hard to hear and half filled with hope.

Let's look at this idea of eternity in a transient time.

Like eternity is an interesting word.

In the Bible, the image of the world is really large.

It's a big, big world.

In fact, when the Bible talks about the world, it doesn't mean planet Earth.

It means the cosmos of God's existence.

God is talked about in Scripture as the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.

He's talked about as the one who was there before creation, which is impossible to imagine.

In our world, it's very small.

We see the world as what Charles Taylor, a philosopher, says, is an imminent frame.

What he means by that is everything we experience as modern people is inside a tight-knit frame that is material, consumeristic, and temporal.

Doesn't last very long.

It's filled with like reason, consumer products, the things that matter to our life, the 70 or 80 years if we're lucky to get them, and that's all quote-unquote existence really is.

It's an imminent frame.

And see, right now we're realizing that frame is kind of shattering.

We're realizing our life is not certain, our future is not certain, we don't really know.

We're confused.

But the Bible doesn't see it that way.

The Bible pulls back, it almost zooms out of that imminent frame into a vast picture of creation and God and what it calls eternity.

You might have hear eternity and think that's just time going on forever.

Well, sort of, but not really.

When the Bible talks about eternity, it actually talks about life just unconfined from time.

It talks about it in relationship to the eternal one, to God, that actually eternity is life with God forever.

That's when the Bible talks about eternal life.

Eternity, it's beyond existence.

It's beyond human function, it's beyond the imminent frame.

It's a zooming out.

And that's what James does here.

He talks about rich people kind of fading away and life being like grass, but he says, stay steadfast because a crown of life is coming.

So there's a word of hope for us in this moment right now.

And what I want us to do is to look at James in this way, looking at this passage to gain an eternal perspective.

How can we, as Scripture zooms out, how can we zoom out of the imminent frame and look at life the way that God wants us to look at life?

I think James gives us three things.

How do we gain an eternal perspective?

First, we have to embrace an upside-down reality.

Embrace an upside down reality.

You might be thinking, Chris, that's exactly what my life is right now.

It is an upside down reality.

It's like everything I thought was sure and certain is not sure and certain.

And everything I was kind of like uncertain about is now becoming so certain, right?

Like I was uncertain about certain things that now are becoming so apparent.

How about all these powerful things we banked on are now weakened, right?

And all the weak things we're wondering what to do with.

We panic when things turn upside down.

It's interesting though.

Scripture seems to say that's the way life always is.

It's just that we create illusions of control, don't we, around certain things like economic structures, our job, our future, our career, our education.

We bank on those things.

And Scripture always says, be careful what you prize and what you bank on, because the world is not what it seems.

It's kind of upside down.

These things are the eternal perspective.

James in verse 9 says, Let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation and the rich in his humiliation.

That's an upside down view.

We think in the modern West, we're like the rich should be boasting and the lowly should be humiliated.

But scripture says actually the way it always is is that the lowly should boast.

What does that mean?

How can he say that?

How can you say that right now if you're lowly?

James is giving us just new lenses, right?

Or like I said, a new perspective, kind of zooming out of the imminent frame to view reality from eternity with eternal perspective and eternal lenses.

When Jesus talked this way, he talked about the kingdom of God as a way to see what we can't really see, to see that which is unseen.

The kingdom of God is a world within a world.

It's a kingdom within a kingdom.

It's like America is a nation and a kingdom, let's say.

But the kingdom of God is like this nation within the nation, the kingdom within the kingdom, the world within the world.

And when Jesus talked about this, he said, in order to see the kingdom and to have this eternal perspective, you're going to need to have eyes to see and ears to hear.

What he meant by that is your normal sight will not be able to be like, oh, there's the kingdom of God.

Or your normal ears won't be able to go, oh, that sounds like the kingdom of God.

You're actually going to need God in your life to see this eternal perspective, to see what you can't see.

So a prayer for you today in the midst of the madness is very simply this: God, help me see what I cannot see.

God, help me hear what I cannot hear, because the kingdom of God is right in that space.

Jesus likened the kingdom of God to things that were hidden in plain sight.

That's how I've often described the kingdom of God.

It's the things that are hidden in plain sight.

He said, the kingdom of God is like seed that's planted in soil.

It's like you can't see it beneath the soil, but you do see its effects.

He says the kingdom of God's gonna be like that.

It's gonna be like a seed that goes in the ground, it breaks, it dies.

You don't see what's going on.

You know there's death happening there, but then you see the effects of the seed through the soil.

Life is beginning to produce.

Or, like he says, it's like yeast in bread, right?

You don't see yeast in bread.

You see the effects of yeast in bread.

You see the rising of the bread as the yeast goes into the lump.

And that's the way the kingdom is working.

It's like you're not gonna see it, you're gonna see its effects.

And the prayers that we need to be praying now is God, help me see the effects of your kingdom.

Help me see what I cannot see.

When Jesus talked about the kingdom, he used James's language.

And in fact, I should put it the other way, right?

James is using Jesus' language.

James was actually Jesus' brother, and he called his brother his Lord.

His he said he served this brother of his, who wasn't just his brother, but was God.

When Jesus was there in Matthew 23, 12, he said, Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

See, that's a way of viewing the world, not just in the imminent frame.

How do we see what we cannot see?

Well, we see the lowly and the humble be exalted.

All of Scripture beckons us towards this kingdom lens, this eternal perspective.

The things you and I prize are fragile.

The exalted things are fragile.

And God says, beware of prizing those exalted things, money, riches.

And you might be in that time where you're like, man, Chris, I thought I prized the godly things.

But I'm in this season now where I'm realizing I banked so much on the earthly things, on the things that Jesus said, man, if you're exalting yourself, you'll be humbled.

As Christians, we have to prize what lasts.

And oftentimes God prizes what the world despises.

Like the world doesn't see lowliness, humility, poverty as something to be prized.

But God looks at those things and says, they will be exalted because they will last.

There's something in the character of those people, the heart of those people, that when we're humbled, we actually know God and are connected to this eternal perspective in a fresh way.

And maybe you've been humbled.

Maybe you are lowly right now.

You have the good news that God will exalt you, and I believe right now is exalting you as you are humbled.

Because that's what's going to last.

Most certainly, James is actually quoting from the Old Testament here.

Isaiah 40, verse 6 says that all people are like grass.

Isaiah 40:6

Sound familiar?

Yeah, that sounds like James's language, right?

All people are like grass.

Verse 7, the grass withers, the flower falls.

This is Isaiah 40.

Because the breath of the Lord blows on them.

Surely the people are grass.

The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever.

I think some of you need to hold on to that verse this morning, that the word of God is going to last through this time, that the kingdom is going to last.

And right now, I really believe we're in a crisis of what lasts.

We're in a crisis of what's going to last through this whole virus.

An eternal perspective is essential for understanding what will last.

Because we don't see life in the imminent frame.

We see life beyond the frame in eternity and go.

Some of these things, they're going to come and go like grass, but there's going to be things like the word of God, the gospel, the message of Jesus, the hope found in this book will last.

Our culture has told you and told me our economy will remain, everything will be okay, the housing market will increase, your future career is just at your fingertips, you can achieve it.

But then we have seasons like this.

And we realize those things are not so sure.

And we panic, but the Bible goes, James says, that's the way it's always been.

Those things are transient.

Those things are temporal.

There's things that are gonna last.

Are you lowly right now?

Are you feeling depressed and depleted?

You know, the Bible has good news for you.

It says actually the lowly of heart will probably be the ones who last.

Jesus says, Blessed are the meek.

You know, I don't know why he blesses the meek.

He says, they will inherit the earth.

And are you meek?

Are you mild?

Are you low?

Jesus is bringing his life and blessing to you.

And I I know this is so much easier said than done.

I still have to say it because it's the truth of the Bible.

But this is so much harder sometimes in this place because as much as I want to tell you exactly how the kingdom's breaking in right now, as much as I want to tell you, hey, here's what we can see in the midst of what's unseen, all those things, you know, I don't know exactly how this is going to go out and work.

I mean, my wife works in healthcare, okay?

She's a doctor, she's in the hospitals every day.

And and our childcare is day-to-day at this point, and we're working from home, and our whole church has been flipped into a live studio, and we don't get to see you on a weekly basis.

And man, phone calls and Zoom meetings and uncertainty left and right, I'm with you.

This is a hard time to be sure of these things, but it doesn't mean we waver because we don't land where the world lands, and we don't just see the imminent frame.

We pull back, we see the script what the scriptures say, and we trust that the Lord is working his will through these things.

Because it's actually a gift.

An eternal perspective is a gift right now, because it not only helps you see that the world is upside down always, that the rich are not always as secure as they think that they are, that money is not always as you as secure as you think it is.

You know, that's the way it always is.

And it not only gives us this upside down vision, but secondly, the other reason, the other way to gain an eternal perspective is to understand the fleeting nature of life.

Is what James says in verse 11.

Look back at verse 11.

The sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass, its flower falls and its beauty perishes, so also will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits.

One major reason you and I need an eternal perspective is you and I need reality.

Like it's easy to get caught up in this life that reality is the imminent frame, that reality is our economic status, reality is our health, reality is our kids in school.

That becomes our reality.

But scripture says be careful of banking on those things because these things are fleeting.

I love it.

So also will the rich man fade away in his pursuits.

Like, what are you pursuing?

What reality are you pursuing?

Are you pursuing the temporary, imminent frame, or are you pursuing the eternal things?

We need a dose of reality.

Reality for many Americans is a secure, growing economy with a job and an education and a future.

James says, a lot of that is a flower in the field.

Even our life is a flower in the field.

James, later, we're in chapter one, in chapter four, verse 14, he says, What is your life?

You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

You might think, well, Chris, that's pretty depressing.

And I actually find that very freeing.

Like life is not about you or me.

Life is not restricted to the imminent frame, to the 70 or 80 years we may be fortunate to live, right?

Life is not limited to your life.

Life comes and goes goes.

God and heaven and eternity exists forever.

But we need that dose of reality.

I think when James's early audience, when they were getting this dose of reality, they certainly were thinking of Solomon.

I told you last week when James was saying, if you lack wisdom, ask for it.

They most certainly were thinking of Solomon.

When James is talking about the passing of life being like flowers in the field, Isaiah's popping in the minds of these believers in the early first century, but so is the life of Solomon.

Because Solomon had a dose of reality.

Solomon was David's son.

David, one of the most profound characters in the Old Testament, his son Solomon, an heir to the throne, became king.

And when he became king, he got everything he wanted.

He got wisdom, he got fame, he got money.

But he also, in the midst of his success, he got an eternal perspective.

And he started to see that life without this eternal perspective is really, really lacking.

I think for some of us right now, that's where we're at.

We don't have the eternal perspective, and we're feeling the cavity of existence.

We're feeling, man, without God, what do I have?

I don't have sports, I don't have kids, kids in school, I don't have any activities, I have no plans for travel.

So now what?

Ecclesiastes was a book that Solomon wrote.

That kind of goes on this thought experiment.

And it's a weird thought experiment, but I think it's beneficial for us to take it, a small journey into it.

The thought experiment is this what happens with in the life without eternity?

What happens when we just limit it to the imminent frame?

He opens his book with this, these words, Ecclesiastes 1 verse 2.

Ecclesiastes 1:2

He says, meaningless, meaningless, says the teacher.

That's him.

Utterly meaningless.

Everything is meaningless.

That's a depressing verse in your Bible, but you know what?

It's a person who's considering life without God, considering life without an internal perspective, considering life in a fake reality, life restricted to the imminent frame.

And the word there, meaningless, is probably not the best translation.

Some of your Bibles might actually say vapor.

It's because it's the Hebrew word heavel.

And this word literally means smoke.

And what the teacher is saying is without God.

God, life is smoke.

What is smoke?

The moment I see it is the moment it's gone.

That's kind of like life.

The moment it presents itself and you try to grab it is the moment you cannot possess it.

The moment you try to make sense of the smoke is the moment it starts to disappear.

And this writer of Ecclesiastes, Solomon, who got all the wisdom and all the riches, he's looking at life and he says, you know what, without God, that is life.

Life is like smoke.

It's like heavy.

And inside the frame, that's all we've got.

What's left when we don't have God is very, very little.

And you know, James, pulling off of this language back in verse 11 of chapter 1 in the book of James, he says, the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass, beauty perishes.

You know, these are two writers considering if you don't have God, you're facing kind of a fading and dying world.

Live life just in the imminent frame and you don't see the whole picture.

And it's depressing.

Consider only your economic situation and you'll be filled with dread.

But the beautiful part of these books in Ecclesiastes and in James is they do not end in that thought experiment.

They take that journey down that dark rabbit hole.

James says, man, the rich man fades like a flower in the field.

Ecclesiastes says, life is like a mist, vapor.

But the end of Ecclesiastes in chapter 12, it's 12 long, crazy chapters.

But at the end of it, he says, now, Ecclesiastes 12, 13, now all has been heard.

And here's the conclusion of the matter.

Fear God and keep his commandments.

Fear God and keep his commandments.

James ends in verse 12 by saying, Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial, having stood the test of time.

Having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life.

Both of these writers realize when God's out of the picture, life is vapor, life is hard, life is difficult.

But with God in the picture, there's hope.

Which is the reason you and I need this perspective right now is you might be in the Ecclesiastes world right now.

You might be in James chapter 1, 9, 10, 11.

James 1 · chapter mention

Man, things are fading.

It's like flowers in the field, grass, and all this stuff is just dying before me.

And the Bible says there's actually hope when you have the eternal perspective.

That's what James 1.12 says.

Blessed is the one who perseveres.

Once again, we need this eternal perspective because we need hope in order to persevere.

Both Ecclesiastes 12 and James 1.12 says life is not limited to the frame.

Life is not limited to your 70 or 80 years.

Life is not limited to this coronavirus season.

Life is not limited to your personal experience within the frame.

Life is the expansive experience of the love of God across all time and space.

It's life is so much bigger than what you and I experience on a day-to-day basis.

James concludes this section by a call to perseverance.

He actually calls us back to a couple verses earlier.

Do you remember week one?

James chapter one, verse two, where he says, consider it joy, pure joy, when you face trials of many kinds.

Because we know the testing of our faith produces perseverance.

It produces perseverance.

We talked about this word in week one.

Perseverance, it literally means to remain under.

It's the Greek word hoopamenoi.

It just means to stand under and remain under.

To use Ecclesiastes' language, it means to fear God and keep his commandments, like it says at the end of Ecclesiastes.

To use James's language, it means to be steadfast, to persevere, to hoopamenoi, to remain under God.

In other words, the best thing you and I can do when we are tempted to just view life in the imminent frame is to actually view life under God, which is not life just in this frame.

It's life in eternity.

It's life beyond the frame.

And when we do this, James actually calls this person who is steadfast.

He calls them blessed.

It's a very churchy word.

Maybe you've heard it before.

About a year and a half ago, when we talked through the Sermon on the Mount, that word is used a ton.

We unpacked it a little bit.

Blessed is the Greek word makarios.

And it actually can be translated flourishing.

I put it this way once.

I said it's kind of like you're headed in the right direction.

Like good things are happening in your life, and God is active in your life.

That's what it means to be blessed.

You're flourishing.

And notice that James equates that language, headed in the right direction and blessing, with perseverance, with just hanging in there, with remaining under.

Talk about a holy contradiction.

This is a holy contradiction, a contradictory way to live.

To live and equate these two things.

I'm hanging on to God and you're headed in the right direction.

A lot of us think, maybe, maybe you're there.

You're thinking, man, Chris, I'm barely hanging on.

And you think that's equated with like not a strong faith or a weak relationship with God.

Maybe you're feeling judged or you're feeling accused.

I just want to say that's not of God.

Of God is to say, are you remaining under God in any way?

Man, you are blessed.

You see, we often think that it's the quality of our faith that's going to save us.

Like, man, I got to have a good faith.

It's not really the quality of our faith that saves us, friends.

It's what we put our faith in.

Or to use James's language, where we place our faith under.

If you're under God, the strength of his word and his character is what lasts through eternity, not just the strength of your faith.

That's what it means to flourish, to be blessed.

That's the life of a holy contradiction.

God, I'm hanging in there, I'm steadfast with you, but I'm also blessed.

We know this blessing and flourishing comes because James says we will receive what he calls the crown of life.

The crown of life is coming.

1 Peter 5, 1 Thessalonians 2 talks about this thing, the crown of life.

It's kind of a strange phrase, is it not?

And the reward or the crown, the crown of life, really biblically speaking, it's actually just life itself.

That actually you will receive life as you persevere.

You will receive this crown of life, this almost like an injection of livelihood will happen in your life as you persevere.

Life in the midst of dying.

That's what the crown is.

The enjoyment of God's presence in eternity.

And here's why.

Because when we know God, we step outside of the frame.

We step outside of the limited frame we've always been experiencing, and we see life for what it is.

We see life for much larger than it really seems to be.

And I know I always get to these points in the sermon where you're like, how can I be sure?

How can I be certain that I will get life in the midst of my persevering when I feel like I'm one of those flowers fading?

And I feel like I'm the rich person who James says will be humbled.

Like, how do I know that I will receive life in the midst of a world that seems to be dying?

Well, we need not look any further than another man who wore another crown.

The crown of life is mentioned in the book of James, but in the Gospels, a crown of thorns is mentioned.

Jesus, upon his death, was given a crown of thorns to wear, to mock him as a king.

Jesus, the eternal one, stepping into the temporary, pulling himself into the imminent frame, and experiencing death.

He was beaten, mocked, betrayed, whipped, scorned, and nailed to a cross.

He was treated like vapor.

Here for 33 years and murdered.

The Roman government figured he's done.

There's no person who, in our whole historical record of the hundreds of thousands of people crucified, there is no name of any person remembered to be crucified.

The Romans planned on that.

We could just stamp out everybody, crucify everyone we don't want, and they treated God, the eternal one, as heavel, as smoke, as vapor, disappearing from the earth.

Jesus was executed and the crown of thorns was on his head.

And yet we know what the cross did, do we not?

It's here that we realize Jesus wore the crown of thorns so that we can receive the crown of life.

Because we, on this side of the cross, do not see the crown of thorns as a defeat the way that the Roman government saw it as a defeat and a mockery.

We see it as a victory.

The cross is the victory.

We don't sit looking at Jesus on the cross and just cross our fingers.

We actually see in Jesus on the cross the eternal one stepping into the temporary, taking on the heaven and the weight and the smoke of life and coming victorious in resurrection.

That's the gospel.

The gospel is that the very moment of dying is the moment of life.

Do you feel your life disappearing?

Do you feel like you're being treated like vapor, like smoke?

Do you feel like this is all passing away?

Jesus is the one we can hope in.

Revelation 14, 14 actually says that Jesus, he doesn't, when he returns, he doesn't return with a crown of thorns.

He returns with a crown of gold.

You know, we don't talk all that much about Jesus coming again, but we should.

In Jesus coming again, we have certainty that life will come with him.

In fact, the apostle John got a vision of Jesus returning.

He was actually quarantined of all things in the island of Patmos.

He was alone in the first century, and he received this vision.

And in this vision, Jesus says this in Revelation 2.10 Do not be afraid of what you are about to suffer, he tells John.

Be faithful even to the point of death.

And I will give you life as your victor's crown.

To John, suffering on Patmos, stuck in quarantine, alone and isolated, Jesus says, do not be afraid what you're about to suffer.

Be faithful even to the point of death, because I, the king of the world, the eternal one, will give you life.

And life is the victor's crown that I have purchased through the cross.

And this is where we see beautifully, in Christ, we do not just get the eternal perspective.

I've been talking about this whole time.

We actually get an eternal life.

Through Jesus, you receive eternal life.

And from eternal life, you receive an eternal perspective.

And today it's about focusing on Jesus.

Today it's about looking to Jesus and crying out to Jesus that will find your salvation.

C.S.

Lewis put it this way in his book, Mere Christianity.

He said a continual looking forward to the eternal world is not, as some modern people think, a form of escapism or wishful thinking.

But one of the things a Christian is meant to do, it does not mean that we are to leave the present world as it is.

If you read history, you will find that the Christians who did the most for the present world were just those who thought the most of the next.

It is since Christians have largely ceased to think about the other world that they have become so effective in this one.

Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in.

Aim at earth and you will get neither.

Today, the call of James, the call of the Bible, man, my call to you is to take your eyes off the imminent frame and to put your eyes on the eternal one.

To look towards Jesus, the one who has died and who will live, who has lived again, who is now alive, with you, present, calling to you.

Your time today is to look to Jesus and say, Jesus, I trust you, I believe in you, give me eternal life and with it an eternal perspective.

Let me pray for us now.

Jesus, we ask you to bring eternal life across those that are listening in today.

Father, I don't know the stories that are happening in various living rooms and houses and dorm rooms, apartment buildings, across the world as people are live streaming in, God, but I ask you to speak your word to them and provide for them eternal life.

God, we trust you in the midst of this madness, but we constantly need you, Lord, to show us what we cannot see and to give us ears to hear what we are not hearing, so that we may be able to see life from where you see it from eternity.

We pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.