Divine Power

 [Jesus'] divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.  Through these, he has given us his great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature... 2 Peter 1:3, 4

This is a heady promise:  to participate in the divine nature of God.  Since Jesus was the divine manifested in the human, we now share those divine characteristics with him and not by being less human, but rather fully human. To think that the sanctity of the human person is embedded in my humanity is huge!  To know ourselves, our true calling, our ultimate and basic identity this way is intimate and demanding.

Do you know who you are?  Can you sense your status with Christ, joining in his divinity?  I think to explore this is to seek God and find God through our own personhood - body and soul.  When God's Spirit takes up residence in the soul, I can know Him and myself even better.  Thus, believers are inhabited in the divine as much as by the divine. Often, we speak of the God-shaped hole in our being that only God can fill.  (Is that bit confining of a definition for God?)  Is it also that there is a me-shaped hole in God and I enter his heart?

Could this be the "mirror that we now see dimly" to which Paul referred?  Could our own reflection be the very thing we need to see clearly so that we could see what of God is reflected in us?  Would I dare say I am partly divine?  That would be incredible!

To apply this incredulous line of thinking for myself draws me to a growing sense of love for others, who also hold the divine in them.  That would change my approach to all believers, if not all of humanity.  The sanctity of the human person is an idea that comes from God, made clear by Jesus embracing his role as human.