WYSIWYG is an acronym for the aphorism, “What you see is what you get.”

It’s often uttered as a vaccine against disappointment, ensuring that expectations are “properly" calibrated. You’ll sometimes hear it expressed another way as, “It is what it is.”

But isn’t that really just a prescription for malaise and hopelessness? “Get used to it folks, it doesn’t get any better. What you see is what you get.”

And what if that’s exactly wrong? What if what we see isn’t what we get?

St. Paul takes up the answer to that question in the middle third of Romans 8. He insists that the redeemed children of God—and all of creation—are heirs to a future beyond our sight. What we will get is not what we now see.

It’s not WYSIWYG.