God Is at Work—Behind the Scenes

At the church I grew up in, I was as likely to be called “Kay” (my mother’s name) as to be called by my own name. I resemble my mother with our dark hair, but not so much in other ways. She was outgoing and kind; I was a self-conscious, self-absorbed teen. I answered when church members called me “Kay” because my mother cast a long, positive shadow, which I was happy to live in. They recognized me as Kay’s daughter because I resembled her.

Now and then we are noted as “children of God” because some glimmer of God’s goodness makes its way through us, and we resemble God for a minute or two. We’re glad to see ourselves as God’s children because God makes a good parent. As God’s children, we can be led by the Spirit of God and can put to death our self-absorbed tendencies to live according to the flesh.

Being specially chosen by God as children, we can move away from our fears and learn to love well. Once again, God works behind the scenes to make us joint heirs with Christ so that we receive the flow of goodness from God. We learn to trust in what we cannot see rather than in what everyone else says.

That flow of God’s goodness can transform us into the person we’ve always wished we might become. We learn to wait on God with patience because the transformation into the “freedom of the glory of the children of God” is slow. In fact, it’s normally so gradual that we don’t notice it; but the people who live with us may well notice the changes in us that indicate our growing oneness with God.