Take Your Seat…and Change Your View!

by Dale Stoll

Memorize and Meditate to Maximize Impact…

June: Colossians 3:1-4

This Week: Colossians 3:1

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.

I once heard of a man named Jon who had a plaque on his desk that said, “Keep looking down!” It generated a lot of discussion with people who came to visit him. They would invariably say something like, “Why would you want to keep looking down? Isn’t it better to keep looking up?” Jon’s reply was always the same: “Well, it depends on where you are seated!”

“Since then you have been raised with Christ…”  Father God finished his work of creation, then sat down and rested. Jesus completed his work of redemption, then took his seat at the right hand of Father God—a position of authority as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Now then, according to Ephesians 2:6, “God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus”—even while we have our feet planted firmly on this earth. God has given us a position of authority alongside Jesus, so that we have the capacity now to see things from that perspective and to “set our hearts” on what we see.

Since we have been seated here with Christ, it is now crucial to “set our hearts on things above.” Why? Because according to Proverbs 4:23, everything we do flows from what’s in our hearts! Before coming to Christ, we had an old identity lurking there in our hearts, formed by all of our life experiences, good, bad and indifferent. Our behavior came out of that old identity.  But now, we “have been raised with Christ” and given a new position, capable of seeing from a new perspective. We form that new perspective as we “set our hearts on things above.”

Take the seat God has given you, alongside our Lord and Savior Jesus.  Then, “Keep looking down!” from that position and set your heart on what you see…and consider the following questions:

1. Have you taken your seat yet? You do so by resting from your own efforts to earn your salvation and trusting the work of Jesus on the cross.  If you haven’t yet done so, then I urge you now to bow your knee to Jesus as your Lord and Savior…and rest in him.
2. Are you keeping your seat…or do you keep jumping back up by trying to make happen what you want to see happen?
3. Have you asked Jesus to show you what he sees from your common perspective…or are you still looking through the same old glasses you have always worn and seeing the same old stuff you have always seen? As you take time to get to know him, his perspective will become yours!