He has rescued us from the kingdom of darkness and transferred us into the Kingdom of His dear Son, who purchased our freedom and forgave our sins (Colossians 1:13-14).
There’s a recurring theme you may have noticed in many of the stories and movies we’ve grown up with. It’s the idea that life appears to be wonderful and happy, and then one day the character’s eyes are opened to an evil they’ve never noticed before.
We see this theme in the Lord of the Rings when the Hobbits go about their laid-back lives in the Shire completely unaware of the growing darkness surrounding them.
It’s the central element of most fairy tales: an innocent child/princess/critter finds themselves mixed up with an evil witch/wolf/giant and then suddenly singing sonnets with birds and squirrels has to take a back seat to survival.
We even see this theme in the great twentieth-century cinematic masterpiece, Dumb and Dumber, when Harry and Lloyd set off on a happy-go-lucky cross-country adventure completely oblivious that they’ve become wrapped up in a criminal hostage situation.
Inevitably, these stories all end with a triumphant rescue. Sauron and his armies are defeated and peace is restored when the true king returns to his throne. Snow White is awoken from her poison-induced slumber by the prince. The FBI shows up to arrest the bad guys just as Harry and Lloyd are about to be shot. Darkness is overcome, life can return to the way it should be, and the Hobbits can go back to eating second breakfast in peace.
Like most themes we see repeated throughout popular stories, this one appears so frequently because it speaks to what we all know on some level to be true: There is darkness in this world, and we need to be rescued from it.
Everywhere you look today you see pain and suffering. If you need a reminder of this fact, just turn on the evening news. It’s not hard to recognize how this world we live in truly is a kingdom of darkness. But it’s also important to realize that this world is not what you and I were created for. We were created to be with our God “in the Kingdom of His dear Son.” According to the apostle Paul, God has already rescued us from the kingdom darkness. He purchased our freedom and forgave our sins through the work of Jesus, clearing the way for us to be transferred to God’s Kingdom—the Kingdom we were created for.
I believe this transfer is one of the reasons the darkness in this world continues to break our hearts so deeply. Now that we are no longer part of that system, we have the ability to stand back and see it for what it truly is. This clarity of perspective has opened our eyes to the true source of the darkness—sin—and made us aware of how many people are still trapped by it. Knowing, however, that our eternity is secure in the Kingdom of God’s dear Son, we now have the freedom to be courageous as we aid in God’s continued rescue of those who remain lost. We may still be scarred by the darkness in this world, but it will never again enslave us. We, my friends, have been set free from that kingdom.
