I reached a point in my life that I determined that I didn’t need or care to know anymore math. I had exhausted my interest, my brain wasn’t comprehending new formulas or concepts, and I was completely at peace to venture into the world with the meager math that I knew.
This is not the best thing for me to share with my kiddos (who I homeschool). Trying to help my highschooler with Algebra is not my strength, and even though it might be beneficial to show her the willingness to try relearning it, I will never believe lying to be beneficial – because I’m not willing to relearn any of it.
So, while I have reached the end of my desire to know math on a deeper level, I am recognizing that I haven’t even scratched the surface when it comes to knowing God and scripture. I believe it to be simple in its complexity and complex in its simplicity. And on this side of Heaven, many things in scripture will simply be as clear as mud.
But unlike with math, I feel a hunger for more understanding of God’s Word.
As a child – y’all, I grew up in church – I didn’t read the Bible stories taught in Sunday School from the Bible. No, I read the Sunday School version of those Bible stories (or they were simply read to the class). The story of creation was simplified to bullet points and pictures, Noah’s Ark was a flannelgraph masterpiece, and it was an easy challenge to shout at the top of our lungs to demonstrate how effective we might have been against Jericho (those cardboard bricks were a blast to knock down).
I love taking what I’ve been taught and reading it for myself in scripture. It was just a few years ago that I noticed in my reading that God breathed His own breath into Adam to bring him to life (Genesis 2:7). The first man – the first Adam – came alive when God breathed into him!
Our being made in His image and created to be like Him wasn’t enough (Genesis 1:26-27)… no, He also saw fit to breathe His breath into our lungs! Learning that is so much better than learning math! And unlike math, it just gets better.
Around the world, Christians just finished celebrating the remembrance of Jesus’ death and resurrection. I’m not sure that anyone can comprehend the great exchange that took place… we also can’t really grasp the power it takes for blind eyes to be opened, storms to be calmed, or leprosy to fall away in front of us. But Jesus did all of that and more by speaking, touching, or commanding. But Jesus did even more than that.
In our reading of Jesus’ resurrection, we come to a verse that we can easily skim past. Perhaps we’ve read it and only understood the Sunday School version of it or just completely missed the details altogether. Because it’s in the details that we see a whole other world of beauty. After His resurrection, Jesus appears before His disciples and does something interesting.
He breathes on them (John 20:22).
I’ve read this passage multiple times over, but I read it this last time and that simple act stood out to me like a neon sign. He breathed on them. This little detail after the crucifixion and resurrection is not pointing to restoration, but it’s expressing that we’re a brand new creation and He’s breathed His own life into us. First God the Father breathed life into Adam, and then God the Son breathed life into His believers.
What Adam and Eve lost in the fall wasn’t experiencing a simple repair job – all of humanity has the ability to choose this newness. Not fixed… not improved… not repaired…
Made into a new creation… a new life… and brought into a new covenant… And it continues to get better with each layer of revelation. New life was breathed on them to demonstrate that God wasn’t going to simply walk beside you (external), but with His breath in our lungs, He is living inside us (internal).
We are a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17) and we have the same spirit living inside of us that raised Jesus from the dead (Romans 8:11). There are a whole lot of Christians that are trying to become alive spiritually when Jesus already breathed that life into us.
It reminds me of when people pray for God to come be in their presence when He already promised to never leave or forsake them. Please, God, don’t leave me... don’t worry – He won’t. Please, God, breathe Your life into me... don’t worry – He did that, too. Please, God, give me strength... Don’t you see? You already have Him living inside of you – what force is greater than Him? To put it plainly, your feelings and experiences will fluctuate, but God’s presence doesn’t. His life-giving breath is permanent.
As I’ve been studying this out, I find myself more and more encouraged to keep digging into scripture. Not because it’s simply cool to find these nuggets or these new concepts that come to life before my eyes, but because this breath of new life that He’s breathed into all of His believers beckons us to reach for more of Him. It beckons, welcomes, and encourages us to press deeper into Him.
As a new creation, I’m more than alive in Jesus Christ – scripture tells us that He is my life (Colossians 3:1-4)! Not a part of or an addition to – He is my very life. This truth shifts the focus away from my meager efforts and places them on the One who is my very life. The only effort I’m told to make is the effort of entering His rest (Hebrews 4:11). Rest in Him… Follow His guidance… Trust His direction. In doing that, I’ll find rest.
If we continue with our focus on His life in us, all of the other things will come easier (maybe even math… possibly). Troubles in life will still come, but we won’t find that we’re as shaken or overwhelmed when they do. My life – your life – won’t feel as though it’s falling apart because it is His life… and we can trust that He’ll hold us together, strengthen us, and empower us until His work is finished.