Shortly after I came to Edgewood almost 17 years ago, I remember telling a man in our church that I had a fear (not a terrible fear, mind you, but at least a thought) that one day everyone who called Edgewood home would just…stop coming. And there would be no church anymore. He smiled and assured me that this would not happen.
By the way, he eventually left Edgewood and started attending another church.
I kid you not.
Anyway, I tell you this little story because there have been times in my life when I have felt or worried that everything was “falling apart.” And I imagine that I am not unique in my neuroses. Maybe it is something at work…or at home…or at school (back in the day)…or with the kids…or in our marriage. But we have had this sense that everything could just collapse. The spinning plates of life would all stop swirling, and we would be left with only broken china.
Well, if you have been thinking this way lately, then let me introduce to you a wonderful, biblical doctrine called the supremacy of Christ. Hebrews speaks to it like this:
He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power… Hebrews 1:3 (ESV)
There it is – the Lord Jesus is upholding the universe by His powerful word! And Paul writes the same wonderful truth to the Colossians:
And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. Colossians 1:17 (ESV)
Jesus is holding everything together. Jesus is upholding the universe. This truth has meant so much to me in life; I have come back to it time and again through the years. King Jesus reigns, and He is upholding the universe, holding all things together.
And though the truth is that sometimes, in Christ’s sovereignty, churches do fall apart…and families do come unraveled, yet in the midst of it all, He holds us, His brothers and sisters (Hebrews 2:11), together. And isn’t that what we’re really worried about…that in the midst of a sometimes painful and difficult life, we might ourselves come unraveled?
Not possible…no, not at all…not for those who are His.
And now, allow me to invite you to worship and pray with the late, great Rich Mullins…
Entrusted with the Gospel 