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The Lord is my strength and my song; He has become my salvation. There are shouts of joy and victory in the tents of the righteous… I will not die, but will live and proclaim what the LORD has done. - Psalm 118:14-17
The Lord is risen! Christ has the victory! the Lord has become our strength, our song, and our salvation. We have become resurrection people, living in the grace mercy and good will of our Lord and Savior. We rejoice because of the great things God has done. This is the hope that we have as resurrection people, people who belive in the one who rose from the dead to give us life. We continue with the wonderful celebration of Easter each and every day, and especially on Sunday. Even when we aren’t in the ‘Easter season;’ being Easter people make every Sunday a ‘little Easter.’ The joy of a resurrection life is that each and every day we have a life that we can share with others, we have joy that overflows to the nations, and we have a love that needs to be expressed in everything that we do, to everyone we meet. Because of this love, we do not and, will not die, but we will live for all eternity praising God for the great things He has done.
I wonder how many of us really sit back and think about how many blessings we receive each day? Instead, we usually find the few things that we have to complain about and dwell on those. I wonder what it would mean for us to be righteous, not self-righteous, but truly righteous in the sense of Christ and the resurrection. If we are resurrection people, who have been raised with Christ to new life, then we should take on the righteousness of Christ within us.
I find that this idea is mostly equal to what John Wesley called ‘sanctification.’ Also known as Christian perfection, sanctification is having an insight as to what “it” is that makes some people seem different. The kind of different that makes you wonder, what’s so great about their life? It’s the realization that God has complete control, and deciding that we prefer it that way. We give over our will to the perfect will of God. It’s the knowledge that you have a love that will never grow cold, and it’s the affirmation of the joy of eternal life in the glorious kingdom of heaven. The righteousness of Christ, is our very ability to praise God through all the rough and trying times in life, as much, or more than the good times. This is why there are “shouts of joy in the tents of the righteous,” because the righteous are less concerned with the worries and complaints of this would, but driven by the glorious life that is to come in the complete presence of our Savior, our LORD and our God.
Praise be to God for his strength and song, sung in us. Amen.
Grace & Peace,
Sam