During our staff meeting today, my pastor introduced a thought based on some things that he had been chewing on and things he had been reading that sent me down one of my Attention Deficit Disorder DayDream Adventures (A.D.D.D.D.A.). He was sharing from Revelation 4-5 and he was specifically talking about worship and why it's relevant (as a worship guy, you always love to see your pastor place a high priority on worship). He was talking about the scene in Revelation and how in seeing God, we will not need to be ordered or obligated to worship but instead, we will not be able to help ourselves. He gave the illustration of attending the Johnny Lang concert (that my wife and I attended with him) and how we found ourselves slapping and hitting each other in total disbelief of the total carnage that Lang was laying down during a seven minute unbelievably gratuitous guitar solo. You couldn't help but shout or just stand there making uncomprehendable utterances because there were no words to explain what you were seeing and feeling. As I thought about this, I had another image come it my mind. I remembered back to one of the past olympic games where the long distance runner from England (I think) was coming to the end of the race and during the last quarter mile, the cramping in his legs over came him and his body shut down and he was driven to his hands and knees. It was a tragic sight to see a lifetime of dreaming and training seem to become all for naught as he was not going to be able finish his race. But then his dad came running out on to the track and picked his son up and helped (carried) his boy finish the race. I remember watching that moment and being overwhelmed with tearfilled joy. There was something about that moment that resonated with the deepest part of my soul because everything about it was right and good. I wanted to shout and jump around my den (to my loss, I didn't) because my soul had witnessed something that was eternally right.
I really think that that is how it is going to be when we see God. We will be coming from a world where we have seen parents bury their children and unbelievable cruelty carried out against the innocent. We will have come from a place where we are used to dissappointment and deceit. We will have come from a land where finding goodness and truth were like mining for gold in caves and tunnels that have long been mined barren.
And then we will walk in to the throne room and we'll see God. Our souls will feel the sense and security of being home in a way that is familiar but so deep and profound that the intensity of that feeling will be unfamiliar. Our hearts will explode inside of us because for the first time in our lives we will see what (or who) perfect justice looks like. We will weep as we see the Son sitting by the Father and we remember the saga of their seperation but we now get to experience the ecstacy of their reunion. And at seeing that, we'll realize that we are now in a place where fathers are not seperated from their children and parents will never again have to bury their children and the callouses on our hearts that have come from living with the constancy of death will fall away as our minds are re-alligned to living in a reality where death is no longer...
I suspect that wave upon wave of emotions will surge through us. Emotions of unrestrained gratitude, levels of joy that were never known on earth will errupt from within us, and shouts will pour out of us as we experience a reality of freedom never before experienced on earth (though longed for in the deepest recesses of our souls). That gnawing sense on earth that told us that things were not as they should be will finally be confirmed and fulfilled as we finally see all made right. And our response will be worship. All of our focus will be on the One who made it all possible and with every expression that comes out of us, we will worship.
I really think that that is how it is going to be when we see God. We will be coming from a world where we have seen parents bury their children and unbelievable cruelty carried out against the innocent. We will have come from a place where we are used to dissappointment and deceit. We will have come from a land where finding goodness and truth were like mining for gold in caves and tunnels that have long been mined barren.
And then we will walk in to the throne room and we'll see God. Our souls will feel the sense and security of being home in a way that is familiar but so deep and profound that the intensity of that feeling will be unfamiliar. Our hearts will explode inside of us because for the first time in our lives we will see what (or who) perfect justice looks like. We will weep as we see the Son sitting by the Father and we remember the saga of their seperation but we now get to experience the ecstacy of their reunion. And at seeing that, we'll realize that we are now in a place where fathers are not seperated from their children and parents will never again have to bury their children and the callouses on our hearts that have come from living with the constancy of death will fall away as our minds are re-alligned to living in a reality where death is no longer...
I suspect that wave upon wave of emotions will surge through us. Emotions of unrestrained gratitude, levels of joy that were never known on earth will errupt from within us, and shouts will pour out of us as we experience a reality of freedom never before experienced on earth (though longed for in the deepest recesses of our souls). That gnawing sense on earth that told us that things were not as they should be will finally be confirmed and fulfilled as we finally see all made right. And our response will be worship. All of our focus will be on the One who made it all possible and with every expression that comes out of us, we will worship.
No comments:
Post a Comment