One Day

I wrote a sonnet to go with that last post.

I know one day I'll feel my Savior's breath,
Who bought my life while I was yet a fool.
He saved me from eternity of death,
Though unto Him I'd acted only cruel.

I know one day I'll see the heavens wide,
A multitude of angels bowing down.
And at that time I'll crucify my pride,
Before His throne to humbly lay my crown.

I know one day I'll feast before my King:
A wedding banquet honoring His Son.
His bride in white, my sins they cannot cling
For over hell the victory is won.

And on that day will shine His wond'rous light
To blind me from all I gave up by night.

EDIT 2/5/07: If anyone has comments or critiques or suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

Heaven is better than anything I could ever imagine

I've been thinking recently about the question "Do I really want to know the Will of God?" It's easy to answer "yes" on an impulse, but when you think about it a little more, it starts to get a bit more difficult. What if God's will is that I become a martyr for the Faith? Or what if He wants me to be celibate my entire life? There are all sorts of things that, if I somehow got a certified comminique from on high, I really don't want to see. If I don't know what God wants, it's easy enough just to go on blissfully ignorant. And when I stand before the throne of judgment and God asks "Why didn't you ...?" I can honestly reply "What's that you say? I really didn't know that!"

But that's not how God deals with us. It's clear that God has plans for each of our lives (Jeremiah 29:11). More than that, I believe we can indeed know at least fragments of this plan (James 1:5 says "If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him"). And if we know what God's Will is, we must do it: Jesus taught in John 14:15 "If you love me, you will keep my commandments." and later in verse 24, "Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine, but the Father's who sent me." So indeed, we do hear word from God, and loving God entails keeping these words.

Now comes the hard question: what if God tells me something I don't want to hear? This is certainly quite possible. How many Biblical servants heard words from the Lord they didn't want to hear? Think about Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Hosea. More recently, Jesus, Peter, and Paul. What God wanted for their lives is not necessarily what was most pleasant or what they would have wanted in the absence of God's Spirit working in them. So what motivated them? How did they die to themselves so that God would work through them? Jeremiah tells us (20:9) "But if I say, 'I will not mention him or speak any more in his name,' his word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot." God didn't give him any other option. But more often, this is not the case. Paul speaks of running the race so as to recieve the prize, of disciplining his body, and even still he struggled (Romans 7). Scrambling the verses a little for readability,

By faith, Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, "Through Isaac shall your offspring be named." He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back."
These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had the opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.
-- Hebrews 11:17-19,13-16

A few things come out from this passage. First of all, that faith was the key motivation: "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1). This thing which they hadn't seen was to them better than anything this world has to offer, and they would gladly sacrifice anything in the world to attain it. The author of Hebrews goes on to say (12:1-2) "Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which so easily entangles, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God."

God gives us glimses of this hope. Revelations 4 is an amazing picture of the twenty-four elders and four living creatures worshipping before the throne of God, casting their crowns before it. Elsewhere we're told that there will be 100 million angels worshipping in that day. And Reveleations 19-22 tells of the marriage feast, and the new heaven and new earth and new Jerusalem. Isaiah gives pictures of heaven as well. And at the center of all of this is the thone, of which it is said "The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne" (Revelations 3:23). Our love relationship with Jesus is that intimate that we'll sit with him on his throne.

I know in my head that this is clearly better than anything on earth, real or imagined. I pray for that last 10 inches, that I will become more and more fully convinced of this in my heart, counting all things as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Jesus Christ my Lord (Philippeans 3:8).

Desire

Here's an excerpt from C. S. Lewis' novel That Hideous Strength:

How it would have attracted him once.

Would have attracted him once . . . Suddenly, like a thing that leaped to him across infinite distances with the speed of light, desire (salt, black, ravenous, unanswerable desire) took him by the throat. The merest hint will convey to those who have felt it the uality of the emotion which now shook him, like a dog shaking a rat; for others, no description perhaps will avail. Many writers speak of it in terms of lust: a description admirably illuminating from within, totally misleading from without. It has nothing to do with the body. But it is in two respects like lust as lust shows itself to be in the deepest and darkest vault of its labrynthine house. For like lust, it disenchants the whole universe. Everything else that Mark had ever felt -- love, ambition, hunger, lust itself -- appeared to have been mere milk and water, toys for children, not worth one throb of the nerves. The infinite attraction of this dark thing sucked all other passions into itself: the rest of the world appeared blenched, etiolated, insipid, a world of white marriages and white masses, dishes without salt, gambling for counters. He could not now think of Jane except in terms of appetite: and appetite here made no appeal. That serpent, faced with the true dragon, became a fangless worm. But it was like lust in another respect also. It is idle to point out to the perverted man the horror of his perversion: while the fierce fit is on, that horror is the very spice of his craving. It is ugliness itself that becomes, in the end, the goal of his lechery; beauty has long since grown too weak a stimulant. And so it was here. These creatures of which Frost had spoken -- and he did not doubt that they were locally present with him in the cell -- breathed death on the human race and on all joy. Not despite this but because of this, the terrible gravitation sucked and tugged and fascinated him towards them. Never before had he known the fruitful strength of the movement opposite to Nature which now had him in its grip; the impulse to reverse all reluctances and to draw every circle anti-clockwise. The meaning of certain pictures, of Frost's talk about "objectivity", of the things done by witches in old times, became clear to him. The image of Wither's face rose to his memory: and this time he did not merely loathe it. He noted, with shuddering satisfaction, the signs it bore of a shared experience between them. Wither also knew. Wither understood . . .

Gradually he realized that he had sustained some sort of attack, and that he had put up no resistance at all; and with that realization a quite new kind of dread entered his mind. Though he was theoretically a meterialist, he had all his life believed quite inconsistently, and even carelessly, in the freedom of his own will. He had seldom made a moral resolution, and when he had resolved some hours ago to [possible spoiler omitted], he had taken it for granted that would be able to do what he resolved. He knew, to be sure, that he might "change his mind"; but till he did so, of course, he would carry out his plan. It had never occurred to him that his mind could thus be changed for him, all in an instant of time, changed beyond recognition. If that sort of thing could happen . . . It was unfair. Here was a man trying (for the first time in his life) to do what was obviously the right thing -- the thing that Jane and the Dimbles and Aunt Gilly would have approved of. You might have expected that when a man behaved in that way the universe would back him up. For the relics of such semi-savage versions of Theism as Mark had picked up in the course of his life were stronger in him than he knew, and he felt, though he would not have put it into words, that it was "up to" the universe to reward his good resolutions. Yet the very first moment you tried to be good, the universe let you down. It revealed gaps you had never dreamed of. It invented new laws for the express purpose of letting you down. That was what you got for your pains.

Resistance

I've been thinking about what the author of Hebrews wrote: "In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood." (Hebrews 12:4) And Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount, "If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell." (Matthew 5:29-30) How many people today come anywhere near this? It seems that our struggle with sin today may go as far as doing what might be a little inconvenient. But God forbid anything which might make a fundamental change in how I live my life. I know that if I chopped off a hand or plucked out an eye, that would seriously change some things. What sort of response might be comparable to that in my life today? How far will I go to "resist the devil, [that he might] flee from [me]" (James 4:7)?

The slightly broader context on the quote above (Hebrews 12:1-13):

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.

In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And you have forgotten that word of encouragement that addresses you as sons:

"My son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline,
and do not lose heart when he rebukes you,
because the Lord disciplines those he loves,
and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son."

Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father? If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.

Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees. "Make level paths for your feet," so that the lame may not be disabled, but rather healed.

Malaise

I've been in a funk recently. Not sure what's up, but I just don't feel too motivated to do much of anything. This is kinda bad, since I'm supposed to be taking my A exam soon to determine my future. I think a lot of what's going into this is not interacting very much with people - it's kind of a vicious cycle, because I don't get much work done, so I feel like I have to spend more time alone in my office, and then I get more into this funk from not spending quality time with my friends. I spent a chunk of time tonight looking at a bunch of my friends' wedding pictures on facebook from the last few months. Apparently this marriage thing is the hip thing to do these days. I'm gonna read my Bible and go to bed.