When God Kissed My Soul

August 6, 2014

When God Kissed My Soul

“For to me, living is Christ and dying is gain.”

Philippians 1:21 (NRSV)

Brennan Manning, contemplating he was near to the end of his life and paraphrasing Thoreau, once noted that he would be appalled to discover that he had died without having lived. What does it mean to live? Do I need to update my bucket list and become more proactive in reaching the sunset of my life with everything scratched off? While I find that somewhat appealing, I believe there is for me an even better indicator that having lived, I am ready to die. That indicator to me was when God kissed my soul.

Our soul is our mind, our will and our emotions. It is the very essence of who we are. When God’s spirit comes within us, when we are born again, our souls become alive to God, and we begin our journey of transformation to become as Christ. When I envision God kissing my soul, I see a father bending down to tenderly kiss his child on their forehead. There is within such a moment of intimacy a complete knowing and acceptance flowing from the father to the child. The kiss can be eternally transformative for the child, if only the child’s soul is laid bare to receive the kiss.

To be laid bare is to be fully aware of yourself and to know that God fully knows you and loves you, just as you are. My image of God kissing a soul is Rembrandt’s painting of the father kissing his returning prodigal son. The son knows he’s been in a pigpen, the father knows his son has been in a pigpen, and the son knows the father knows. The prodigal’s soul is laid bare, and his father kisses him. That’s being alive.

Sē’lah

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(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com. The BLOG is also available on Amazon Kindle, by subscription.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188.