by Rev Douglas Brauner

A mystery to keep us up at night.

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

Silver Falls State Park, Silverton, Oregon

Reading does not come easily for me, so I don’t read much. I was always in the lowest reading groups, and I frustrated my teachers, because I just didn’t want to read. If it wasn’t a picture book, I wasn’t interested.

So, when I pick up a 500 page book and finish it, in nearly two weeks, it’s an accomplishment. Such is the case with a book that I’m now reading. Books usually puts me to sleep. However, the night before I started to write this devotion, I had to force myself to put the book down and go to bed.

The book I’m reading is a mystery, in which almost every chapter ends with an unexpected twist. I so deeply want to find out what’s around the corner that I lose track of time.

There’s a mystery in this picture. Where do these steps go? We get that they climb into the green foliage, but where do they lead from there?

It’s a mystery.

“God wanted his people throughout the world to know the glorious riches of this mystery-which is Christ living in you, giving you the hope of glory.” 
Colossians 1:27 God’s Word to the Nations

The greatest mystery of our lives is that Christ has chosen to take up residence in us…in you. We are clothed with Christ in baptism (Galatians 3:27). This isn’t pious speak, rather, it’s our reality. If you are like me, it doesn’t always “feel” as if Christ dwells in us, or that we are clothed with him. We struggle with our broken, sinful, nature. We argue, and fight, and we lust over things we can not have. Yet, Paul is emphatic, Christ lives in us. Christ lives in you.

That’s a mystery which keeps us up at nights, hoping for a glimpse of what’s around the corner.

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado