In lots of different ways lately, I’ve been reminded of this truth: 

Our formation is a lifelong process. 

There is no “big finish” that we reach here on earth and then are done. Our life with God is a lifelong experience. It continues and continues and continues, unraveling more layers of truth and growth as we go, inviting continual form.

This might seem discouraging. We are conditioned to look for answers to problems. We want things to be better. We want a happy ending. 

I’d like to invite you to take the long view in this.

This reality we’re living in is about healing and wholeness. Reality, in the end, does resolve. This is what we understand from the holistic teaching of the Scriptures. 

But it doesn’t resolve until the end. Meaning, the end of all ends, when all things are finished and are then made new.

Our lives today are a piece of that. Our lives today prepare us for resolution. But the resolution doesn’t finish in this life. 

Growth happens here. Healing happens here. Jesus is about your continued wholeness as his aim. But it doesn’t happen in a flash. We are not zapped into perfect existence. It is a process. And a beautiful one, at that, I might add.

How do you respond to this notion of life with God as process? Does it surprise you? Anger you? Relieve you?