Up close and personal

When my husband bought me a two-sided mirror that had a magnifier, our granddaughter (mid-twenties) said, “Isn’t that a bit extreme?” meaning who would want to see their own face that close? My answer satisfied her. I said it would help me avoid granny-makeup.

I am thinking of that intimate close-up mirror this morning while reading this verse. “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Corinthians 3:18).

This verse is about getting close enough to Jesus that I can see His glory. That means intimate times with Him in prayer, reading about Him from His Word, talking about Him, just hanging around in His presence and looking for Him in other Christians. It means keeping Him in my thoughts as I go through my day.

As I’ve written before, the more time someone spends with another, the more they take on that other person’s characteristics. With Jesus, this is more than a natural happenstance. God is involved because it is His goal that I am transformed into the image of His Son. Romans 8:28 says that He uses all things for my good because, “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son. . . .” (Romans 8:29)

This is my destiny, but it is also a process and takes a lifetime. Some days I think I’m so far from that goal and wonder if it will ever happen, but then am encouraged that 1 John 3:2-3 makes it clear. It will happen, and I do have a part in the process:

Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.

Cooperation. When He reveals sin, I’m to confess it and rely on Him to cleanse it. When I’m faced with temptation, I must resist it, run from it, not give into it. When He asks me to do or say something, I must obey.

Growth in Christlikeness is similar to growing a plant. It happens by itself in that the gardener does not produce the shoots or leaves or flowers, yet the gardener must water and feed the plant, giving those things necessary to its growth.

For me, the necessary thing is focusing on the glory of the Lord. When I get caught up with the affairs of this life, or spend too much energy on temporary things, I lose focus. If I insist on my own way, I cannot see His glory. He gives me all I need, yet I must participate in what He gives and use it as He tells me.

It helps to remember that life here is oh so temporary and oh so short. My eternal hope is being like Jesus, even having a body like His, and being finally rid of my sin, something that was laid on Him at the cross, but that by Himself He never had. An eternal perspective helps me to focus on Jesus and His glory too.

For my citizenship is in heaven, from which I also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform my lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself. (Philippians 3:20-21)

Today is my birthday. Instead of feeling older, I am excited that this is just one more milestone in my journey. One day, perhaps soon, I will be utterly changed from what I am to the likeness of Jesus Christ, and as the old hymn says, that day will be glory for me too.