Becoming an After

I just saw my friend's pictures...her before picture from a year ago and today's picture!! She's lost about 70 pounds this year and I'm so proud of her. Her secret? Just one day at a time doing the right thing.
I so love the "quick fix"...quick is so much easier than slow! I think that is why so few of us grow in Christ. We want quick and easy, but it is the slow steady growth in faith, day after day, that produces the greatest results.
Most of us have put our faith in Jesus for eternal life and we believe that one day we will breath one last ragged breath and be ferried across the great chasm of death to the other side where this life ends and eternity begins. And we also believe that God will somehow gather the ashes of our bodies, the disintegrated, rotted or non-existent particles of ourselves and from that produce a glorified body like His own.
Yet few of us trust Him and believe in Him for our everyday life. Few of us believe Him during the trials, the confusion, the pain, but we must understand that "without faith it is impossible to please Him." Hebrews 11:6
When I finally appear before Him and see Him face to face I want so badly to be an "after", looking much more like Him than I did before I put my faith in Him. I have to admit that I am at a point in my walk with Him where I am struggling. He is teaching me new things and I'll just say right now that old dogs do not learn new tricks easily! While I do not know what He is doing, why He is doing it or when He will finish this new work in me, I do know Who and how it will get done....God through His Spirit, by faith. And each day that I stick to His path, His way, His will, His truth I will be that much closer to eventually becoming an "after" in Christ.