FROM SEEING TO BEING 

As for me, I will be vindicated and will see your face; when I awake, I will be satisfied with seeing your likeness. (Psalm 17:15)

Today we have a twofold blessing uttered to us in the Word of God: we have been promised God’s presence in this life right now, and we will be conformed to His likeness in the life to come. Let these blessings be a word of comfort to you today, right where this finds you.

The apostle Paul described our first blessing this way: “God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). We have been promised the blessing of seeing, through the eyes of faith, the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. To be sure, we see only dimly now, but we do see, and in seeing we are given a foretaste of heaven above. But that is only the beginning of the blessing, as we progress from seeing to being.

Throughout this life, God is at work conforming us into the image and likeness of His beloved Son. What we see today, we shall be tomorrow when we cross the Jordan. When we are received into glory, we shall see ourselves as reflections of the beauty and perfection of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, I know this promise may seem too good to be true, as we struggle against the world, the flesh, and the devil on this side of the grave. But we have been given this promise, “that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6). To rightly rephrase an old bumper sticker, “God said it. That settles it. I believe it.” And so should you!

Are these promised blessings not a cosmic comfort to you today? To go from seeing to being is a promise that you can count on just as surely as David did when, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, he penned our verse for today. Do you see it? Do you believe it? Let that confident assurance be the confession of your life, that what you see now as the glory of God in the face of Jesus, revealed throughout the pages of Sacred Scripture, you will one day be when you breathe your last.

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!