Expect the Unexpected

[HKHaugan]

Expectations are the things that every one has as they approach their every next experience. You can expect problems or satisfaction or the unexpected. And actually, as Christians, it is the unexpected we are looking for. If our outlook is shaped by the world around us then we are limiting God to its expectations. If all we expect is to be able to do the things the world tells us in order to live painlessly with economic security and relational peace we will end up alone, empty, despairing and depressed.

For instance if we take a trip we have been told about there is the usual flurry of advertising that guarantees us wonderful times, new people to meet and experiences you’ve never had before. While true, once you’ve done it the experience is old hat. Been there, done that and got the shirt. But, if you are open to the spiritual reality around you, a trip can become an expanding array of other truths, insights and realizations of the breadth of what God has to offer of His qualities through His Spirit. And these will be consistent with the miraculous nature of His Son Jesus. It is this reality that is a taste of the Kingdom into which we have been born when we accepted Jesus as the ‘gate.’ For those experiences are tastes of the eternal.

Jesus has provided the keys to the unexpected in His Word. They are keys to His Kingdom. These keys open doors that were closed with Adam and Eve’s disobedience in the Garden of Eden but were opened when Jesus went to the Cross and was resurrected from the dead. The keys are the insights that the Holy Spirit provides as you open Scripture’s pages. They are the ‘oh-now-I-see’s’ that burst into our minds unexpectedly as we read or hear Scripture taught. They are Jesus’ insights. Each insight is one of the rays or beams of light from Jesus touching our ability to see within, ‘in’sight. Jesus told us the Kingdom of God is ‘within (Lk.17:21).’ He brings the Kingdom, His Kingdom, within, to our minds, hearts and spirits.

For example, in Matthew 16 when Jesus asks Peter “Who do you say I am?” Peter blurts out, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!” That was a vivid example of the unexpected piece of the Kingdom given Peter. He was given that special key to the unexpected and He was never the same after that. He continued to wrestle with that insight, that key to his heart the Holy Spirit twisted in the rusty lock of his gate of fear and guilt, until he repented and was given the key of forgiveness after the Resurrection. Peter then was given a continual flow of unexpected touches of the Spirit. They're called blessings.

From that time on Peter was a living example and message of the keys of repentance and forgiveness Jesus offered to anyone who would accept Jesus as personal Savior and Lord so that whatever was bound and loosed on earth would be the same in Heaven (the Kingdom within). That is the point. Repentance is the key of light that opens the gates of our fear, pride, self-doubt and all the other self-protecting devices we use as shelters from relational pain. Forgiveness is the key that opens the gates of Heaven to be within the heart, to bring His light within, His ‘in-sight.’ Then follows the master key of His Word and the ring of keys that are His teachings and the unveiling of truth as the Old Testament once given becomes a treasury of the never-ending insights that are the Kingdom of God. It’s the unexpected pieces of His light that bless the spirit in us, that give us new ideas to expand our belief and encourage deeper trust. When you are a Christian you are excited about the unexpected because every next moment is a God-moment waiting to happen.

More on the keys to come…….