An Elder Sees Jesus in All Things

Many church communities prize the opinions of older people because they are older.

People assume that just because a person is older, therefore that person is wiser, has more to share, and therefore no one has any opinion worth considering in contrast.

Let us first remember that for God, a day is a thousand years, and a thousand years is but a day (Psalm 90: 4)

Jesus Christ is the Alpha and Omega, and He is revealed to us in His Word, and we know Him through His death and resurrection:

"10For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:

11And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest.

12For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." (Hebrews 8: 10-12)

We know Him and grow in grace and knowledge of Him because of what Jesus did at the Cross, and the Holy Spirit living within us reveals more of Jesus to us, for "As He is, so are we in this world." (1 John 4: 17)

Wisdom is not based on how old we are, or even how much experience we have, but rather Wisdom is based on our relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

Solomon was just a boy when he asked God for Wisdom, and God ended up granting him so much more:

 7And now, O LORD my God, thou hast made thy servant king instead of David my father: and I am but a little child: I know not how to go out or come in." (1 Kings 3: 7)

Age and experience do not impart wisdom. God does, and Jesus Christ is made through to us first of all Wisdom, as well as righteousness, sanctification, and redemption (1 Corinthians 1: 30)

John in the His First epistle outlines the differences among children, young men, and fathers:

"12I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake. 13I write unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, because ye have overcome the wicked one. I write unto you, little children, because ye have known the Father. 14I have written unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one." (1 John 2: 12-14)

Little children know that their sins are forgiven.

Jesus' death on the Cross assured more for us than our sins forgiven. Just as the New Covenant ensures that He will be our god and will cause us to know Him, we can also rest and believe that He has overcome every enemy in our lives, that His word dwells in us ("Christ in you, the hope of glory Colossians 1: 27), but that He has defeated every enemy in our lives.

Yet to be a father, to be an elder, that means that You see Jesus as everything, as Him who has been from the beginning:

John had this revelation:

"In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (John 1: 1)

and

 10I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, 11Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last" (Revelation 1: 10-11)

Everything is and exists because of Jesus!

A true elder sees Jesus in all things. A child who sees Him who is from the beginning can be a father just as much as an old man can still be a child if he only knows Jesus as He who died for His sins.

For this reason, Paul exhorted his disciple Timothy:

"Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity." (1 Timothy 4: 12)


When preeminence based on age and experience is reduced, when Jesus is fully magnified, you are an elder in Christ!