This Place of Highest Privilege.

Romans 5:1-5 (NLT)
¹ Therefore, since we have been made right in God's sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us. ² Because of our faith, Christ has brought us into this place of highest privilege where we now stand, and we confidently and joyfully look forward to sharing God's glory. ³ We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they are good for us—they help us learn to endure. ⁴ And endurance develops strength of character in us, and character strengthens our confident expectation of salvation. ⁵ And this expectation will not disappoint us. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.




Lynne and I are celebrating our 35th wedding anniversary.  We will be celebrating with our kids and grandchildren in Pawtucket, RI at a PawSox game sandwiched within a Christian music festival.  It's so us!  Still crazy after all these years!  How ironic.  Our first date was to a Christian music event.  We were very young then, and in love.  We pretend to believe we're still young, no doubt we are still in love.

I truly believe God brought us together.  Lynne grew up in a wonderfully devoted Christian family.  I grew up in a good home with very little religious exposure.  Lynne led me to the Lord when I was 18.  We were both 20 years old when we married.

The verse above was the theme verse for our wedding.  Lynne and I had met each other a little over three years earlier and already the Lord had done so many wonderful things in our lives.  We believed then that through our common faith God had brought us to that place of high privilege, the wedding altar.  We took nothing for granted, but stood in awe of Him as we exchanged our vows of devotion and commitment to one another before our Saviour, our families and our friends.

We knew we would have days not nearly as wonderful as that one.  We knew there would be trials and difficulties.  But we knew that together with God we would grow through these trials.  We knew He would never leave us or forsake us, because He loved us.  We knew that wherever Christ was, regardless of circumstance, that was a place of highest privilege.

Christ himself modeled what our relationship should be.  I am told in Scripture to love Lynne as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her in order to make her holy and clean.  I surrender myself to her in order present her before God and others as beautiful and holy.  Likewise Scripture tells us that she is to be submissive to me as she would to the Lord.  But before that we are told to submit to one another in reverence to Christ. In a nutshell, we give ourselves to each other as we give ourselves together to Christ.  God promises to fill our hearts with His love.

Christ in all his teaching emphasized humility and servant hood.  My family and friends, contrary to the world's thinking, that is where God gives us strength and blessing.  We serve God as we serve one another.  God is present in this act of worship.  That is a place of highest privilege.