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Welcome my friends to season 3 of the Determined to Dance podcast. My prayer is that you’ll be encouraged to persevere daily in our chaotic world. Today’s episode, Our Temporary Life, focuses on what’s really important in the world.
Show Notes: Our Temporary Life
I struggled to open this podcast. I mean, life is temporary? That’s deep, to me anyway. Probably to you also. If you are a Christian and you’ve given your life to Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, your life changes. Christians believe that life is eternal. Once life is over on earth, our spirit moves to heaven with a new body to spend eternity with Father God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, angels, and all the other believers who have gone on before.
We live on the earth and our existence in earthly bodies is limited. One hundred and twenty years is about the maximum, though the average would be more like seventy to eighty years. And considering the rapid pace that I’m moving toward those ages; life seems very temporary.
II Corinthians 4: 14-18, Paul says: “We know that God, who raised the Lord Jesus, will also raise us with Jesus and present us to himself together with you. All of this is for your benefit. And as God’s grace reaches more and more people, there will be great thanksgiving, and God will receive more and more glory. That is why we never give up. Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day. For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So, we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.” NLT
That is such good news. God is planning to raise us with Jesus. His grace will spread and God receives more glory. Our bodies might die but our spirit is constantly renewed. We don’t have to focus on our troubles all the time. We can gaze toward the unseen through the eyes of faith.
Jeff Walling says: “One family I know wrote down their ‘core values and displayed them on their refrigerator door. One of them read: ‘People are always more valuable than things.’ I certainly agree with that statement, but Paul would attach another clause to it: The invisible is always more important than the seen. Anyone who chooses to dance with God knows this instinctively because the unseen universe contains the eternal treasures that will never fade or depreciate.”
Walling goes on to say when we focus on Jesus, we see three eternal things:
- The love of God.
- The words of Christ.
- The life of the soul.
What wonderful promises. We might not be able to load our pickup truck for our heavenly journey but we don’t go alone. The love of God which lives in us and the words of Jesus stay with us through death and beyond. Our soul, the deep inside part that is truly us, will travel too. And we can witness to those around us and see many believe and follow the journey to heaven. Praise God.
By faith. We see the invisible by faith. We ask God to help us each day to walk by faith and strengthen our faith walk by the Word and prayer. Sometimes I’m frustrated when I look at my life. I have so many books inside me I need to write and such limited time. But if my life is eternal, who’s to say I won’t be writing in heaven? So, I turn my back to frustration and focus on the unseen and my eternal future.
Let’s pray: Father God, we turn to You as we examine our lives and admit our time on earth is limited. You alone can help us see the unseen and focus on what’s really important here on this earth. People. You love people and want them to spend eternity with You. We do too. Strengthen our witness each day. In Jesus’ name, we pray, amen.
As we keep our focus on God, we remember what is important in life.
I’m excited to announce that I have a new young adult novel, Smoking Flax, releasing in late fall/early winter. Think of it as the Disney movie The Kid meets Back to the Future. Except it’s set in 1978 and 1984.
Almost nineteen-year-old Reed Anderson wants to belong in a world where he hasn’t always fit. Three days after graduation, he decides to ride a bus back to Louisiana and deal with the events of his thirteenth summer once and for all. Back then, he’d stood up to his abusive Pa, protecting Momma and his sister, taking control of his life. But who was the faded image of the child he saw that day? Aunt Lula predicted his life would shift and change. Something about space-time-continuum and the fourth dimension? He tucks her words into his heart. If he survives the shift, this could be his chance to start over. But the ghost child haunts his dreams. Even though six years have passed, does he want to confront the lies he’s always believed?
To find out more about my new novel and the upcoming release date, subscribe to my newsletter at jenniferhallmark.com. You can also check out my publisher, Elk Lake Publishing at https://elklakepublishinginc.com/authors/
Next week, you’ll enjoy my interview with Jeff Walling, author of Daring to Dance with God, the book we’ve talked about all season. Until then, stay determined to dance…
Links:
My debut novel, Jessie’s Hope
Video of the week:
I absolutely love music and each week I’d like to share a relevant song we can enjoy together
Congrats on your upcoming release!
Thanks so much! I’m super excited about the release. (And slightly terrified)