DISCIPLESHIP
From
Eternity to Here
By
Frank Viola
Guest Writer
CBN.com –
Excerpt from From
Eternity to Here by
Frank Viola.
Rediscovering
the Ageless Purpose of God
The
year was 1992. My life as a Christian changed forever.
All
the sermons I heard since I was a child faded dead away. They were
profoundly eclipsed by a higher vision. By God’s grace, I caught a
wondrous glimpse into what Paul called “the eternal purpose”
(Eph. 3:11).
For
the first time in my Christian life, I discovered that I was
involved in something much larger and more glorious than I ever
dreamed. The Christian life was no longer merely about winning
souls; helping the poor; learning theology; studying doctrine;
mastering the Bible; deciphering eschatology; praying more;
attending church services; praising and worshipping; doing spiritual
warfare; exercising spiritual gifts; hearing God’s voice;
imitating Jesus; and engaging in good works. Nor was it about the
other endless activities that I had been taught were the center of
God’s will.
I
discovered that all of the above had an end in view that went far
beyond giving people a celestial fire-insurance policy, bringing in
the last great harvest, or changing the world for Christ.
Being
a Christian had taken on a completely new meaning. That meaning had
to do with something bound up inside the beating heart of God. The
Christian life was no longer about me and what I could or should do.
Neither was it primarily about others. The needs of human beings
became secondary. A page had turned. Suddenly everything became
about Him and His ultimate purpose. It all became about God’s
ageless desire—a desire that is “from him and through him and to
him” (Rom. 11:36).
I
stepped into a new world where I began to look through the eyes of
God and see things from His vantage point rather than from my own. I
discovered something of what it means to see the unseen. This
high-altitude view hit me so hard that it wiped everything else off
the table. I began to see with eyes not physical, and I discovered
that the intangibles are where reality lies.
While
we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which
are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the
things which are not seen are eternal. (2 Cor. 4:18, NASB)
Did
I have it all figured out? Certainly not. Do I now have all the
answers? Far from it. But a door had opened that put me on a new
journey that I continue to travel this good day.
Before
this “epiphany” I had read the Bible dozens of times. I had
heard countless sermons and read scores of books and commentaries.
Yet despite all of it, I realized that I had genuinely missed the
main point. I was blissfully ignorant of the central, all-consuming
dream of God that tied everything together. As a result of this
realization, I pushed the reset button on my Christian life. I
pressed the DELETE key and watched all my religious activities
vanish into the electricity.
I
hit CTRL-ALT-DEL and rebooted my spiritual CPU.
What
was so revolutionary? What exactly did I see? I
had discovered the driving passion of God. And
that passion gave birth to a divinely crafted purpose—a timeless
purpose that had little to do with my individualistic efforts at
being a good Christian or “going to heaven.”
I
gradually discovered that the ageless purpose of God stretches from
eternity to here, then from here to eternity. It is a purpose so
brilliant that the mere glimpse of it can cause the human spirit to
be blinded by incomparable glory.
A
sighting of that purpose has the power to deliver us from all the
things that do not matter; things that do not give life; things that
divide and fracture the body of Christ into pieces. The sighting of
God’s all-governing purpose possesses the power to set us free
from the “me-centered” gospel that’s so commonly dished out
today. In addition, I discovered that this purpose runs throughout
the entire Bible like an unbroken thread, weaving all of its
teachings together into one heart-stirring narrative.
That
initial glimpse of the Lord’s ageless purpose has become an
ever-expanding revelation within me. It has given my very existence
on this earth new meaning and direction. To put it another way, in
beholding God’s central purpose, I found my own purpose. In
touching His ultimate passion, I found my own passion. This eternal
purpose burns in me to this very day.
What
I will share in the pages that follow are three narratives, which
woven together, tell the epic story of God’s ageless purpose. All
three narratives are solidly grounded in Scripture. In fact, they
embody the whole story of Scripture, streaming through it like a
constant current.
The
first is the story of a God who is an ageless romantic, driven by
one consuming pursuit. The second is about a God who has sought
since eternity to have a resting place, a habitation, a home. And
the third reveals a God from another realm who visits planet earth
to establish a heavenly colony that will give Him visible
expression.
For
most of us, life spins on with few breaks or transitions. This book
is designed to help put on the brakes and navigate you through a
terribly important question: What
is my purpose and my passion? And how does it map to God’s?
From
the book of Ephesians, we know that the triune God is chiefly
occupied with the following:
•
a house and a family for God the Father (Eph. 2:19–22).
• a bride and a body for God the Son (Eph. 5:25–32; 1:22–23;
2:15–16; 3:6).
Part
1 of this book is dedicated to presenting the bride. Part 2 is
dedicated to presenting the house. Part 3 is dedicated to presenting
the body and the family. Interestingly, all of these images are
different aspects of one reality. Taken together, they embody
God’s grand mission in the earth.
This
progression is also rooted in Scripture. And it is the heart of the
biblical story, the metanarrative (overarching story) of holy writ.
The Father obtains a bride for His Son by the Spirit. He then builds
a house in which He, the Son, and the bride dwell together in the
Spirit. The Father, the Son, and the bride live in that house as an
extended household and they have offspring by the Spirit. The
offspring constitutes a family, a new humanity called “the body of
Christ.”
My
hope, therefore, is that as you read this book, new life will be
breathed into these familiar terms. I pray that the Holy Spirit
would fill them with their original beauty and awe to this end: that
you would be given a dramatically new, if not a staggering, look at
the ageless purpose that drives your God. For that purpose is the
very reason why you exist.
Order
your copy of From
Eternity to Here
Endorsements
for From Eternity to Here:
“From
Eternity to Here is
a masterpiece. A must read for those who believe and for others who
want to believe. It reads like a movie on paper.”
Dr. Myles Munroe
Frank
continues to challenge the church-at-large with a powerful mind, an
impassioned voice, and a love for the bride of Christ. You need to
get this book and wrestle with Frank through the biblical passages
regarding our identity in Christ as His body and the mission our God
has entrusted to us.
Ed Stetzer
“This
re-telling of the ‘old, old story’ is a much needed gift to the
church today.”
Greg Boyd
“A
masterful work of art.”
Dr. James W. Goll
 Frank
Viola is a Christian author and conference speaker. He’s written
numerous books on the deeper Christian life and church restoration,
including From
Eternity to Here, Revise
Us Again, Pagan Christianity, Reimagining Church. His
books and articles have been translated into Spanish, Korean,
Japanese, Dutch, German, French, Portuguese, and Russian. www.FrankViola.com
CBN
IS HERE FOR YOU!
Are you seeking answers in life? Are you hurting?
Are you facing a difficult situation?
A
caring friend will be there to pray with you in your time of need.
|
