"I'm Okay"

"Hey, how are you doing?" We all get that question in one form or another often in our normal day. You will likely get it more than once at church today. And the answer will stereotypically be, "I'm okay." (My mother taught me, "Never say, 'I'm good.' There is none good but God.") We, of course, are not asking or answering the question for real. It's a greeting. We could just as easily do a "hello" and be on our way. "How are you doing?" sounds more ... engaged. So be it.

But ... are we "okay"? That depends on what we're talking about. "Most of my joints and muscles and bodily functions are working as expected. I'm okay." That's fine. "I have no outstanding interpersonal conflicts in my life." That's okay. "I'm saved by the grace of God, forgiven by the blood of Christ, and deemed righteous by the applied righteousness of Christ." That, I hope, would be a truthful answer. But are we okay?

Paul didn't think he was. "I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate" (Rom 7:15). Oh, that's not "okay." "I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing" (Rom 7:19). That's not "fine."

I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? (Rom 7:22-24)

"Hey, Paul, how are you doing?" "Not okay ... not okay at all!"

Paul understood. Jesus said, "In this world there will be trouble" (John 16:33). Paul sought to "be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith" (Php 3:9), but acknowledged that he had not already obtained it or become perfect (Php 3:12). We're not okay.

But we are. Paul answered his own question in Romans 7:

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. (Rom 8:1)

When Jesus promised that there would be trouble in this world, He also promised, "Take heart; I have overcome the world" (John 16:33). When Paul admitted that He sought to be found in Christ but had not arrived, he said, "One thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus" (Php 3:13-14)

If we are honest, we would have to admit that we are not "okay." That's not the end of the response, however. We are not "okay," but we are saved, not condemned. The Savior has conquered; we can have peace (John 16:33). We can press on toward the upward call (Php 3:13-14) in the power of God (Php 2:13). It may not look like it right now, but in Christ we are more than conquerors (Rom 8:37). Right now we are down but not out. We live in a dichotomy of "already" and "not yet," where we are okay by God's power and declaration but not yet in experience. And we know the final outcome. We're not okay, but we will be.