My eternal home

Yesterday someone asked about our move, then said, “When all is in order, then it will feel like home.” I told her that the first time I saw it, even before we made an offer, this place seemed like home. However, today’s reading reminds me of something Jesus said:

Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. (John 14:1–3)

Years ago, I was grumbling about tedious housework. God used these verses to remind me that my Savior knew all about homemaking. He was building a most glorious place — a forever home with no sorrows, no bad memories, no troubles or tears. My task is not quite like that, but knowing He is doing this replaced my grumbling with a glad heart.

Today I read it again with joy, also realizing another parallel. For the past few weeks, our home has been upside-down, not just this one we are now working on to settle in, but the former one that went through a whirlwind of decluttering and downsizing. We are still doing that homemaking and even though I am an organized person, these rooms do not look like it — yet.

Apply that to the world around us. Contrary to many thoughts about ‘heaven’ and it being ‘out there somewhere’ the Bible says God’s people will experience eternal life in a restored new home here:

For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind. (Isaiah 65:17)
For as the new heavens and the new earth that I make shall remain before me, says the Lord, so shall your offspring and your name remain. (Isaiah 66:22)
But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. (2 Peter 3:13)
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. (Revelation 21:1)

The NT also says this odd thing about where I live now:

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus… (Ephesians 2:4–6)

In a spiritual sense, I am already home, seated with Jesus in an eternal place. While the sense of this is hard to explain, it does describe the reality that this being at home with Him is experienced before actually getting there. I know where that home is, just like I knew this new address was my home before we actually purchased it and moved in. And it is perfect for us right now, even though there are boxes to empty, touch-ups needed, pictures to hang, and furniture that is not quite in the right place. It is still already home.

PRAY: Jesus, the sense of being home is lovely regarding this physical house, and much like the sense of knowing where my heavenly home is and what it will be like. I am so blessed to know that You, the perfect Homemaker, are preparing a place for me, a place perfect in its design and layout, but even more so because it is where You are — and I will be with You, perfection personified, for eternity.

Peace, but not yet . . .

Humanity’s original assignment was, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” (Genesis 1:28) This dominion included all our needs supplied, but when Adam and Eve sinned, this ruined our ability to subdue and take dominion.

However, it didn’t rob us of the desire. MacArthur points to the effort expended in environmental issues and problems. Many have made them the focus of our problems instead of realizing how sin has ruined all ability to fulfill that mandate given by God. Once sin entered, the results were immediate:

To the woman (God) said, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you.” And to Adam he said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” (Genesis 3:16–19)

The animal kingdom fears or tries to destroy people. The earth grows weeds. We have extremes of heat and cold, poisonous plants, dangerous reptiles, earthquakes, typhoons, floods, hurricanes, and disease. Yet our battle with the earth is surpassed by our battles with one another. The effects of sin are greater on human relationships than what sin has done to this planet.

In my heart, I want the world to be a better place. Even the earth itself longs for that day. As the NT says:

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. (Romans 8:18–23)

When the angels proclaimed peace on earth at the birth of Jesus, it only happens now in the hearts of those who fully trust Him. Watch the news — there is very little peace on earth, but there is a day coming when Jesus will return and establish the will of God, a day that my heart also longs for, a time that the Bible describes:

Your people shall all be righteous; they shall possess the land forever, the branch of my planting, the work of my hands, that I might be glorified. (Isaiah 60:21)

“The wolf and the lamb shall graze together; the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and dust shall be the serpent’s food. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain,” says the Lord. (Isaiah 65:25)

But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. (2 Peter 3:13)

But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life. (Revelation 21:27)

PRAY: Jesus, on this Christmas Eve many hearts long for ‘peace on earth’ and we sing carols to celebrate Your coming and Your promise to restore this world to what You intend for it and for us. Bless our hearts with the assurance and hope we so desperately long for, and the ability to thank You that You will redeem the earth from the curse of sin, just as You have promised and just as You have redeemed us.

PONDER: ways I can share the peace of heart God gives me with those who mourn and struggle with the fact that, “At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him.” (Hebrews 2:8)

 

 

 

All of it is in His Hands . . .

 

 

This week’s walk in a nearby wildlife sanctuary stirs in me a deep marvel at creation. I sometimes look at NASA’s photos of the universe taken through massive telescopes or watch nature shows about tiny creatures and enjoy the same excitement — I know the One who designed this incredible world!

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” uses a verb with God exclusively as its subject. CREATE is something that God alone does. It implies that all things belong to Him. This is not limited to the universe, fish, bugs and rivers; God also created human beings for His glory:

Isaiah 43:1. “But now thus says the Lord, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: ‘Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.’ ”

His creative activity did not end at the beginning. Another creation will happen as Isaiah 65:17 announces: “For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind.”

This is affirmed in the NT. For example: 2 Peter 3:13 points to it as our hope: “But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.”

Scripture describes God and His Son Jesus Christ as the Alpha and Omega and those designations certainly apply to the start of and last of His creative history. But what about the in-between?

The OT accounts of God’s handiwork includes creating the earth and seas and all that is in them, a covenant and its related laws, a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night to guide His people out of Egypt. He created weather and earthquakes, even “hidden things not known” and creatures in the spiritual realm, including Satan who started out “blameless in your ways from the day you were created, till unrighteousness was found in you.”

The NT speaks of God creating the ideal marriage relationship and other blessings, but most of all, creating a way for sinful humans to be restored to a relationship with Him. Ephesians 2:4–10 speaks of that former state then says:

“But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”

He calls me to “put on this new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness” and I am amazed that He gives me new life and allows me to choose whether or not I will walk in it.

He also says that some will “forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth” adding in regard to food that “everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving” (1 Timothy 4:3–4).

GAZE INTO HIS GLORY. The choices He gives are in a world where evil exists and troubles will occur. Yet even as those face me, I have confidence in God’s sovereignty. These verses from the OT point out that even the worst of events are under the power of my God. I can, “Be glad and rejoice forever” in that which He created because He “created Jerusalem to be a joy, and her people to be a gladness.” I can be assured of His goodness when trouble comes also because He affirms:

“I form light and create darkness; I make well-being and create calamity; I am the Lord, who does all these things” and “Behold, I have created the smith who blows the fire of coals and produces a weapon for its purpose. I have also created the ravager to destroy” (Isaiah 45:7 and 54:16).

No matter what the calamity or the ravager tries to do, I know that the Lord will enable me to declare from my heart: “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”