Let's get high.... In our thinking

This weekend two of my sisters in Christ and I sat on my bed and read Chapter 4 in a "Purpose Driven Life". I have read the book back when I was in middle school, so lets just say that my perspective obviously had changed. 

The title of the chapter was "Made to Last Forever". As we read through the pages the chapter touches on eternity and the concept of eternal thinking. I always knew that as a follower of Christ, my mind shouldn't be on earthly things but on eternal things. Unfortunately Adam and Eve ruined that for the best of us. Gr. 

Not that my mind doesn't think about my room that Jesus is preparing for me in Heaven, but it definitely doesn't think about the concept of eternity as often as it should. 

The one thing that Warren points out is that man was made in an essence to want to last forever. It's been embedded in us. That attribute is from God, because He wants us to want to spend forever with Him. 

"He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human hears; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end"- Ecclesiastes 3:11

Hmmm. Why would God give us this character trait? It seems frustrating sometimes because He made us with a want for eternal things yet is keeping it a big secret of what He is up to or what eternity, Heaven/Hell is really like. 

Or maybe that's so we can seek Him? He promises if we do, we will find Him. It always amazes me that some Christians believe that we don't have a part in our relationship with God, not according to the standards of a true relationship and the standards of God's word.

In John 17:3 it says "This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent." 

Now thinking on heavenly things does not mean your head is in the clouds and you're too cool for school to never think about your duties on this earth, the point of eternal thinking is to "...balance our earthly concerns with our heavenly values" to make better decisions involving what it would mean for my eternal soul or how this action is going to look under heaven's standpoint, because things look a little different from up there. 

I always told myself, living in the moment is probably the most dangerous thing I could do for myself. Most of my biggest consequences in the past have been because I lived in the "now" and didn't think about or just didn't care about what was going to happen later. 

Eternal thinking takes it to the next level. Questions I must ask myself are, "How am I preparing myself and others for God's Kingdom?" "What am I doing for Gods Kingdom?" and "What do I need to do less of and more of to keep my mind set on God's Kingdom"?

These are things I definitely have thought about and still need to search out in my heart, life, and scripture. Looking at the life of Jesus is a sobering experience each time and gives me the best example of how I should be here on earth. 

"Life on earth "is like a mist", however eternity depends on it."