True Completeness
February 2024 – Grace & Truth Magazine
True Completeness
Many people in the world feel like something is missing in their lives. This is also true among believers who are still trying to live for themselves. For their own benefit and pride they find “a need,” as it might be called, to be better in their job, acquire more respect from family, have a bigger home or other material item. This is associated with the “philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ” (Col. 2:8 NKJV ). Believers who follow in this path miss out, for they are cheated by these things (v.8).
God desires something so much better for His own: a sense of completeness found by wholehearted faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. We can be thankful that even when we do not feel complete, we “are complete in Him” (v.10). This fullness is one of the many blessings we have regardless of how many times we fall short of its enjoyment.
We stumble along life’s way; we don’t understand many things. But God bears with us in His great love. The Gospels give testimony to His abundant kindness, demonstrated by the Son as He walked here among men. He was interacting with people of all backgrounds. This One, Jesus, is fully Man and fully God (v.9)! This is hard to grasp, and it was not recognized by most in His day. To think that God came and interacted with sinners draws our hearts to Him. God’s love has been manifested to us in the Son (see Heb. 1:1-3).
May each of us be encouraged to trust the Lord fully as we walk here. Only in this way will we sense the completeness He has given. In this, there are untold blessings, including that we will learn more about our Savior and follow in His example. There will be fruit for Him as a result of what He does through us, and God will be glorified by our lives – the lives He has given to us to live for Him!
We thank the Lord for you and each one who opens this magazine and reads its articles. May the Lord use what is written within these pages for blessing to your heart and life. To Him be all the glory!
By Paul Alberts