A good question

I had an interesting conversation with Scott, our worship pastor, last evening. He's in the middle of writing a new worship song with some friends and had included a phrase that's pretty familiar to a lot of us--"I am found in you." He sang a few of the lines for me and then asked, "What does that phrase mean to you? I mean, do you think most people really understand what it means to be 'found' in Christ?"

Interesting question. I'm not sure that most really do. For me, the phrase means that everything about us--our worth, our meaning, our value, our future, our present, everything--is found in the person of Jesus Christ. While that's a very hard place to come to in our lives, it's absolutely essential if we are ever going to know the peace that God has promised us. You see, being found in Christ means that we no longer depend on the world to determine our value. Their opinions of us will not determine our worth. It means knowing that the future we have is in His control and that nothing short of our own desires can take that away from Him. It also means that when life gets difficult, we can rest comfortably in the knowledge that God will carry us through.

It's a phrase we sing and speak often but my fear is that it's a reality that most of us never know fully. Schedules and pressures, stress and circumstances can quickly relocate our lives away from Christ and back in our own hands. We become frazzled, desperate in an attempt to stay above water. Usually, it's only after we reach a place of desperation that we come back to the reality that our lives are best left in His hands. Yet, the next event will come and we are right back in control. It's a place that we'd really rather never be but spend far too much of our lives.

Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in me. John 15:4