As We Have Been Fully Known

1 Corinthians 13:12 says, “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.”

I love this verse. As a perfectionist myself, I am constantly evaluating myself and looking for places in which I can improve. This verse is such a comfort to me at times where I’m feeling inadequate, unqualified, and unfinished. What a joy to be fully known. There is nothing you can tell the Lord that surprises Him. He sees all of you, He sees you where you are and where you need to be and loves you through the journey. He is patient with us, never forsaking us, even when we stumble.

Perhaps it is a blessing in this life that we can only see through the mirror dimly. It is a blessing that we are too close to the picture to see it in its fullness because then, we can rejoice in the small victories and progress, every individual shaping from the hand of the Father. If we would see all of it, we would see all the work yet to be done and become discouraged with ourselves. What an absolute joy when considering this, that we are loved by a Father who does see all of this and loves us where we are right now and is working and waiting and whittling away at our hearts in the most joyous anticipation of what we will become – what He’s created us to become. And at the end, when we finally see the full picture, we will be a finished product and we will see where His light was, and His goodness will overwhelm us in the best way.


C.S Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity, “…God’s demand for perfection need not discourage you in the least in your present attempts to be good, or even in your present failures. Each time you fall He will pick you up again. And He knows perfectly well that your own efforts are never going to bring you anywhere near perfection. On the other hand, you must realize from the outset that the goal towards which He is beginning to guide you is absolute perfection, and no power in the universe, except you yourself, can prevent Him from taking you to that goal. That is what you are in for. And it is very important to realize that. If we do not, then we are very likely to start pulling back and resisting Him after a certain point. I think that many of us, when Christ has enabled us to overcome one or two sins that were an obvious nuisance, are inclined to feel that we are now good enough. He has done all we wanted Him to do, and we should be obliged if He would now leave us alone…But this is the fatal mistake. Of course we never wanted, and never asked, to be made into the sort of creatures He is going to make us into. But the question is not what we intended ourselves to be, but what He intended us to be when He made us. The job will not be completed in this life: but He means to get us as far as possible before death. That is why we must not be surprised if we are in for a rough time. When a man turns to Christ and seems to be getting on pretty well, he often feels that it would now be natural if things went fairly smoothly. When troubles come along — illnesses, money troubles, new kinds of temptation — he is disappointed. These things, he feels, might have been necessary to rouse him and make him repent in his bad old days; but why now? Because God is forcing him on, or up, to a higher level: putting him into situations where he will have to be very much braver, more more patient, or more loving, than he ever dreamed of being before. It seems to us all unnecessary: but that is because we have not yet had the slightest notion of the tremendous thing He means to make of us.”