abundant life = ?

THis is what pastor Eugene Peterson wrote

We wake up each morning to a world we did not make. How did it get here? How did we get here? We open our eyes and see that ‘old bowling ball the sun’ careen over the horizon. We wiggle our toes. A mockingbird takes off and improvises on themes set down by robins, vireos, and wrens, and we marvel at the intricacies…. There is so much here–around, above, below, inside, outside. Even with the help of poets and scientists we can account for very little of it. We notice this, then that…. Before long we are looking out through telescopes and down into microscopes, curious, fascinated by this endless proliferation of sheer Is-ness–color and shape and texture and sound.

After awhile we get used to it and quit noticing. We get narrowed down into something small and constricting. Somewhere along the way this exponential expansion of awareness, this wide-eyed looking around, this sheer untaught delight in what is here, reverses itself: the world contracts; we are reduced to a life of routine through which we sleepwalk.

But not for long. Something always shows up to jar us awake.

[Source: Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places]

One of the things we need to think about as we read this is what Jesus meant when He said He came that we may have abundant life.

I am afraid we have defined this in Singapore’s standards and equate it with having more cash, convenience and less pain!

What would our brother and sister in Myanmar think when they hear these words of Jesus ? Or our brothers and sisters in war-torn Sudan? What does the abundant life mean then?

Looks like we need to mature and outgrow our tendency to limit God’s Word and Will to our routinized lives and habits.