“For you have have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God.” Colossians 3:3

This is truth too marvelous for the common mind to grasp quickly. It often escapes us, as we continue to live as if we are primarily people of the natural world, the fallen world. We are so accustomed to defining our reality by familiar feelings, that we tend to put such truth off into a category that we label “spiritual,” by which we really mean not practical or not now. It is so easy to buy into the lie that we have to wait until heaven to enjoy full fellowship with God Himself.

The fact is that the new order has invaded the old. The new consists of Jesus, our forerunner and ultimate representative in obtaining the blessing that God has always intended for his people. He has so identified with us that (in a certain sense) His past is ours, if we are of His people. His future is ours. In the present His life is ours. One day every creature in every sphere of existence will see the full manifestation of what is now hidden in God.

For now it is somewhat hidden. But being hidden doesn’t mean it is not available. We are “in Christ.” What is true of His life is true of ours — not that we are infinite and eternal, as only God can be, but that sin has been condemned in His flesh. In Him, wrath has been expended upon sin. Death has been conquered. Authority has been granted. Satan has been defeated.

Circumstances can no longer define the person who knows that he “has died” to this world, and also knows where his life is hidden. He lives in an inexhaustible resource of love.

This is a truth that we must seek and pursue! It is too grand to grasp with casual attention. We must think true thoughts instead of flowing along with old patterns, old ways thinking. We must refuse to substitute regulations and ritual for joyful fellowship. We must remember, remind and repeat the majesty of this great truth.

So, if all that we are is not yet visible to the gawking world, it is because our life is hidden with Christ in God. It is too precious to be marketed or bartered. It will prove to produce a kind of life that causes the genuinely curious to seek out what’s going on there. One cannot live in such intimacy with God without being fundamentally transformed.

Consider what God has done in Jesus Christ. His love has been fully expressed in this great gift of the Son. Taste this love. It satisfies fully.