Endurance for the Journey, Featured, His Word

And may you have the power to understand,
as all God’s people should,
how wide, how long, how high and how deep his love is.
May you experience the love of Christ,
though it is too great to understand fully.
EPHESIANS 3:18-19 (NLT)

The most important thing about any person is his or her view of God, for it shapes the entire course of one’s life. And yet, God is so utterly distinct from and above us that we can never fully comprehend Him or know who He is according to our own reason or speculation.

So then can we know Him?

We can only receive from Him revelation of who He is and through His own disclosure. If God were to disclose to us who He is in a specific way, we would remain in darkness about Him. Thankfully God has chosen to reveal Himself, and this revelation is most clearly seen through Jesus coming to this earth and through His written Word – The Bible (which carefully records God’s words, promises, redemptive history, and the climax to which it all points: Jesus – His birth, life, death, resurrection, works, and words).

Furthermore, as God reveals Himself to us personally, our faith is awakened and, spiritually speaking, the lights go on. It is through faith that we come to know God and interact with Him.

Reflection:
What are some of the first things that come into your mind when you think about God?


(Excerpt taken from The Increase Discipleship Handbook published and given permission by Professional Athletes Outreach. Website – pao.org)

On the journey with you,
Dave Dravecky

Endurance for the Journey, Featured, His Word

Let’s take a deeper dive into God’s own words about being made in the image of God and how we are all hardwired to desire eternal life and happiness. God made all people in His image, to reflect His goodness and character in the world.

Then God said,
“Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.
And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea
and over the birds of the heavens and
over the livestock and over all the earth and
over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.

And God blessed them. And God said to them,
“Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it,
and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens
and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
GENESIS 1:26-28

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars which you have set in place,
what is man that you are mindful of him, and
the son of man that you care for him?
Yet you have made him a little lower that the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honor.
You have given him dominion over the works of your hands;
you have put all things under his feet …
PSALM 8:3-6

You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and
knit me together in my mother’s womb …
You saw me before I was born.
Every day of my life was recorded in your book.
Every moment was laid out before a single day passed.
PSALM 139:13, 16

Reflection:
If every person is made by God (knit together in their mother’s womb) in the image of God and cared for by God, what does this say about the inherent value, equality, and dignity of every person?

On the journey with you,
Jan & Dave Dravecky

Endurance for the Journey, Featured, His Word

Dear Friends of Endurance: As we continue on our journey through the Discipleship Handbook, we shift from understanding the importance of having a high view of God to now understanding that we are “Made in God’s Image!” Think about that for a moment, God created man in His own image! It is absolutely amazing to me but it is also very convicting to me when I think of how I’ve looked and treated others in the past at times and not seeing them as being “Made in the Image of God.” However, theses days it is a much different story. I remind myself that we are ALL made in His image!

Made in God’s Image

Then God said, let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness …
So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them. And God blessed them.
And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply
and fill the earth and subdue it …”
GENESIS 1:26-28 (NIV)

In Genesis 1:26-28, we see that God created man and and woman in His image, after His likeness, and gave them dominion over the earth.

So what does it mean to be made in God’s image? Primarily it means that we are created with the capacity to know and reflect God to the world. We were given by God spiritual, moral, and creative capacities to first and foremost be able to know, love, and worship God. We were also given these capacities to reflect the goodness and character of God by the way we take care of God’s creation and interact with others. As a mirror clearly reflects an image, so we are made to clearly reflect God out into the world.

Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground
and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life,
and the man became a living creature.
GENESIS 2:7 (NIV)

It was God’s breath – God’s own energy and life – that gave Adam life. God breathed life and spirit into Adam through His Spirit, the Spirit who is the breath of God and gives life to all things. Unlike other created creatures, man has the ability to commune with God and to exercise dominion over the earth. When God breathed life and spirit into Adam, he was perfectly whole and integrated, working in harmony with God.

REFLECTION: How do you see and experience the “image of God” (Imago Dei) in yourself and others, and the reality that we are more than just physical beings?

On the journey with you,
Jan & Dave Dravecky

Endurance for the Journey, Featured, His Word

But your dead will live;
their bodies will rise.
You who dwell in the dust,
wake up and shout for joy.
ISAIAH 26:19 (NIV)

What a promise God gives us here in Isaiah 26:19! With new bodies, we are headed for heaven!

We have a permanent home waiting for us in a land where “there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain” (Revelation 21:4). God will no longer seem to be a resident of a far-off place, but He Himself will live among us (Revelation 21:3) and will wipe every tear from our eyes.

We will drink without cost from the spring of the water of life (Revelation 22:17) and will give overflowing thanks that the old order of things has passed away, never to return and trouble us again.

But someone may ask,
“How will the dead be raised?
What kind of body will they have?”
What a foolish question!
When you put a seed into the ground,
it doesn’t grow into a plant unless it dies first.

It is the same way with the resurrection of the dead.
Our earthly bodies are planted in the ground when we die,
but they will be raised to live forever.
Our bodies are buried in brokenness,
but they will be raised in glory.
They are buried in weakness,
but they will be raised in strength.
They are buried as natural human bodies,
but they will be raised as spiritual bodies.
1 CORINTHIANS 15:35-36,42-44 (NLT)

On the journey with you,
Jan & Dave Dravecky