What God Wants Everyone To Do With the Rest of Their Lives

All of universal history is joyfully leading toward a wedding…The climax of Revelation reverses the tragedy of the fall that we read about in Genesis 3…presents to us the bride and the Bridegroom living together eternally in a restored paradise…This glorious woman is in Him, by Him, through Him, and to Him…Heaven’s Bridegroom takes His spotless bride into the wedding chamber, behind the veil, and purity is poured into purity, light flows into light, and the Lord Jesus Christ and His beloved bride become one. And she is no longer a bride. She is now the wife of God. And God the Son is no longer a bachelor…Your destiny is to be fully united with Christ and lost in God in inseparable oneness…Any missional endeavor, therefore, that doesn’t put the church front and center falls short of God’s central thought…Everything else should flow out of it…

-Frank Viola (@frankviola), From Eternity to Here

You are engaged to be married.  The rest of your life is a walk down the aisle.  That’s where this is all headed.  And every time you find yourself asking yourself what God wants you to do or read something that talks about God’s purpose for your life,  or hear someone preach about God’s will, you should always end up here.  You’re purpose is to prepare for the wedding day. Whatever it takes to do that, that’s what you should be doing.  You should be watching and listening for your opportunities for movement toward this outcome.  You should be consumed with excitement like a woman dreaming about her wedding day.  Well, even more so.  After all, an earthly woman is likely marrying an imperfect man that she’s going to find out would rather watch football than have deep conversations while redecorating the house (or whatever his preference is).

Are you wondering how you should prepare? God’s given us an environment in which it happens naturally.  She is the environment.  In the NT, it’s called ekklesia.  When you unite with other Christians to form the corporate woman and express Christ visibly on the earth, the by-product is your crucifixion and transformation.  As you eat of the Tree of Life together, God’s divine life bursts from the inside out to radiate His glory and spread His life; the same life that will one day envelope the whole universe.

What is God’s purpose for your life?  Learning to live by His divine life individually and sharing it corporately as His Bride.

Your turn…what do you have to add?  Questions? Learn anything new?

*The first post for this book is here.  The next post is here.