Scripture
Read: 1 Timothy 6:12 Fight the good
fight of faith; take hold of the eternal life to which you were called, and you made the good
confession in the presence of many witnesses
Application: What does it mean to “take hold” of
eternal life? The original helps us:
ἐπιλαμβάνομαι
epilambanomai seize,
grasp, to grasp something, in the sense of acquire for oneself (1 Tim
6:12, τῆς αἰωνίου ζωῆς;
6:19, τῆς ὄντως ζωῆς)[1]
It almost has a sense of selfishness, but not for an evil end. God wants
us to want this, to go after it and gain it for ourselves. That’s because when
it comes to eternal life, no one else can grasp it for you. The reason the idea
of “acquiring” it is so appropriate in its concept is because eternal life is
not a one-time incident. Consider what acquire means:
To get as one’s own; to come into possession or
control of; to come to have as a new or added characteristic, trait, or ability
as by sustained effort[2]
Becoming “born again” is when we pass from death to life in a moment.
When we come to the end of ourselves and trust in the saving grace of Jesus
Christ we have been Born Again, but we have just entered eternal life.
Acquiring eternal life is a process, we understand it deeper and deeper as we
continue to explore Who our Lord is. It is not a destination solely, although
knowing we will spend eternity in heaven is an unbelievable truth. Eternal Life
is a relationship with the eternal God and all that He is. We are to grasp this
as tightly as a vice grip grasps a piece of wood, while we continue to squeeze
more and more understanding and richness from it. This is acquiring eternal
life. For this to happen we need to move from “temporal living” to eternal
living. When we live only in the “here and now” we get pulled into the mundane
– all the temporal concerns and worries. Paul tells us in his letter to the
Corinthian church that we should see things in a different light:
1 Cor. 7:29-31 What I mean, brothers, is that the time
is short. From now on those who have wives should live as if they had none;
[30] those who mourn, as if they did not; those who are happy, as if they were
not; those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep; [31] those who
use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its
present form is passing away.
This does not mean we do not deal with the “now”, we do, but we never
lose our focus on how the “now” effects the “forever”! Our vision sees the Big
Picture that God has given us:
2 Cor. 4:18 So we fix our eyes not on what is seen,
but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is
eternal.
We learn to keep the “main thing, the main thing” as has been said by so
many in many different ways. We do not “sacrifice the ultimate on the alter of
the immediate!” From the first time I heard that statement my life changed!
When we take hold of eternal life it puts everything in our life in
perspective. His perspective!
Meditation Questions: When
was the last time you thought about what you spend most of your time thinking about?
What does that show you? When was the last time you were not content about a
certain scripture – so you dug into it to discover more of what it meant? What
does that show you? How much do you allow circumstances in this world; i.e.
Political, Financial, Hollywood, etc., dominate your thinking? Affect your life
to the point that you change a core belief? When you think about “eternal life”
do you think of a place? What does that say? If you have trusted Christ. When
you did that was it to escape hell? Is that the main reason even now? How much
do you want to be with Him? How much time do you make right now?
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