PAID in FULL

Recently, with help from my father, my school loans are now paid in full. No more monthly billings, no more interest rates adding up, no more debt. Done. It's all paid for.

As my trip to Mali approaches in just a couple more days, and I prepare the things I want to share with people there, I'm reminded of a story about a different kind of debt, and the measure the Father took to pay it off.

From the beginning the Father has always been there to care for his children and provide. Yet they keep turning away from him, farther and farther away until they are buried deep in debt, and unable to pay it off on their own. Nothing they did even close to paying off this debt. Sometimes the more they tried the deeper into debt they got. Only the Father knew exactly what it would take. So the Father comes and provides the ultimate payment that will cover all the debts - past, present, and future. A payment that would free them from the debt, and the things that brought them there. A payment that is not without a steep price. A payment covered by the blood of His Son, Jesus Christ.

This debt, was our sin, and with it comes separation from the Father God, a life buried deep in hopelessness, sorrow, and unsatisfied. And a sentence to an eternal death. I can't even imagine how awful that would be.

But for those who accept this payment given on our behalf, accept salvation in the name of Jesus. They are welcomed into the family of the Father. They are given a new life filled with hope, and joy, and true satisfaction, not just in the life to come, but in this life now. Of course that is not a promise that everything in this life will go smoothly. We are not exempt from temptations, trials, and pain that belong in this broken world. But for us who's debt has been cleared by the payment Christ offered, we then have a hope, because our debt has been Paid in Full. We have a hope that there is something better to come, and  "By faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope." - Galatians 5:5

"Oh praise the one who paid my debt and raised this life up from the dead"