Copyright by Shea Oakley
All rights reserved
There are two worlds that every human being experiences. One is the world of “objective reality,” that which is outside ourselves and independent of us. The other world might be called “subjective reality”. This is what we perceive through the eyes of our own heart. Unlike objective reality subjective reality is internal to us and thus is not always reality in the same ultimate sense (although it can be). But whether this perception is fully true in the sense of that which is subjective it expresses how we feel about ourselves and thus by definition is, if nothing else, deeply and personally meaningful to us.
In our presently fallen world there is, of course, much that is wrong both inside and outside of us. The external world we live in everyday, as well as the internal world of our hearts, has been damaged by the sin that unfortunately continues to exist on this side of Heaven. Beyond this these two worlds affect one another because what we are inside ourselves obviously influences what we do outside of ourselves and vice-versa.
In the context of our existence, then, it is a fearful thing to know that darkness continues to manifest itself in the world both within our hearts and in the world around us. Even as Christians the seeming intractability of the evil we see both within and without can be daunting in the extreme. The only thing that provides hope in this predicament is the redemptive power of God through His Son, but sometimes we tend to forget that this power addresses both the objective and subjective aspects of reality, and thus our hope may not be as complete as we need it to be.
The redemption secured on the cross by Jesus is an all-encompassing thing. The world that exists outside of us is subject to it. Someday, at the consummation of all things which will occur after the return of the Son of God; the Creation, in fact the entire Universe, will be “set right” by the omnipotent hand of the Savior. At that same time the “universe” within each redeemed human heart will also be finally set fully right. In this way absolutely nothing will be left with imperfection in the Kingdom of God. This is the promise He has made to us who are His children: both everything we see and everything we are will be transformed.
It is a wondrous thing to know that God will right every wrong in this complete sense. For some of us it is easier to imagine Him redeeming the world around us then it is to imagine Him redeeming us because we perceive our hearts as being somehow the harder thing to change but, blessedly, this is not true. God almighty can and will change both because, for the believer, everything within and without is destined to ultimately yield to the purpose and power of His love in Christ.
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