Here’s another spontaneous post about Fiona, my lovely wife who tragically passed away from cancer last October.
What makes this post really special is that I am featuring a song in which Fiona is actually singing. Fiona recorded very few songs, I don’t really know why we didn’t really record much music together; I guess we were both always completely spontaneous đ
So, this is a lovely little number called ‘Lucy’s Song‘, by Heather Pope, and we discovered the song on an obscure little tape called ‘Celebration – Things of Beauty’, (recorded in the 70’s) while Fiona was at University in 1982. The track I am presenting here is Fiona’s cover of that song recorded in July 1985. What’s especially wonderfully prophetic with this cover of Lucy’s Song is that it’s as if Fiona recorded it, half a lifetime ago, for our grand-daughter Lucy, who’s now 7. Lucy loved her Nanny Fe and was heartbroken when she died. This song is Fiona’s legacy to Lucy, telling her that despite life’s storms, and despite her Nanny Fe not being there for her, still her loving Heavenly Father holds her closely in His hands.
I think this is a song that Lucy will treasure.
I apologise that the backing track is a little out of tune; this is because this was one of my dad’s early forays into four-track portable studio recordings, as I said, in 1985, which back then was all done by adjusting the tape speed to retune the tracks, and it appears he got it a little wrong. But the vocals are the focal point here; Fiona’s voice is the higher, purer soprano while the lower, more smoky and husky voice is her best friend, Cath. Their voices always went so well together and it always amazed me that I should be so privileged to be able to make music with these two superb vocalists. Here we go then: Lucy’s Song, vocals by Fiona and Cath, backing instrumentals by Johnny Douglas (my dad’s stage name):
Lucy, when the sky is cloudy, smile Lucy, when your mind is racing, rest awhile For there is time for all you long for, time for so much more And every day’s a new beginning for you
As the springtime turns to summer, so you’re changing day by day And the rain has come to water all the land And the drops of life fall heavy, sometimes they’re hard to understand But your Loving Heavenly Father holds you closely in His Hand
Lucy, when you don’t know what you’re thinking Lucy, when you feel that life’s too hard Remember to give your cares and worries to the One Who loves you so For every day He’s walking close to you
As the springtime turns to summer, so you’re changing day by day And the rain has come to water all the land And the drops of life fall heavy, sometimes they’re hard to understand But your Loving Heavenly Father holds you closely in His Hand
Yes, your Loving Heavenly Father loves you and understands!
God loves to surprise His children with wonderful things.
Quite out of the blue, He will pop up something that, for us, is totally unexpected and brings us great blessings. An example from my own life, from two and a half years ago, is here. This sort of thing has happened to me so many times recently that I just can’t remember most of the events. But each time the surprise and delight is real. Some would put it down to coincidence and ‘confirmation bias’, which of course it could be. But these things are so personal, so targeted, that I really doubt that it’s coincidence.
But it’s not just me that it happens to, either. A few weeks ago, I was writing on Facebook about one of my favourite worship songs, and one of my friends came up with this lovely anecdote. I have ‘sanitised’ it of the song and personal details to avoid embarrassment, but have left it unchanged apart from that. Here is the story, just how it was told:
“I know the guy who wrote that song. I was a DJ in a small southern gospel radio station in the south, and I’d sneak in a worship song here and there. One day, I found that song on an album and put it on. A few minutes after I started it, a man came back to my booth, he was a new hire that had just started that day working in the office. He had tears STREAMING down his face, and asked me why I played that particular song. I told him because I’d just found it and previewed it and it brought me deep joy… he was sobbing. đ Come to find out, he’d been struggling with so many things and had been really discouraged. He told me about how he and his wife WROTE that song and how it was just a sign to him that God had not forgotten him… so then of course I was in tears, too! lol, I had to put on a really long cut from the Kingsmen (10 minute song! lol) just to recover. đ “
Wow. What a lovely story, and all because of a song that is one of my all-time favourite worship songs. I have several đ … But anyway, here’s the response I wrote to my friend:
“Now that is a lovely story. Wow. It’s one of my favourite worship songs and always has been since first I heard it. I have used that song to bless countless people in congregations large and small, singing it with great anointing and reality. Because for me it’s true. Maybe you could encourage him some more with that. I am going to bed now with my heart rejoicing because of your story”.
I wish I could tell you which song it is, but I want to protect that man’s privacy. Sorry. But really, you could pick any one of the many worship songs I have posted on my blog over the time I’ve been running it, and you can bet there will be similar stories surrounding many of them.
And it’s simply because God is like that. He’s brilliant; He loves His children with a fiery, jealous passion that pales even the strongest natural mother instinct. If He made us to have that sort of love for our own children, how much more is He like that, given that we are made in His image?
But I have just been to see the movie, ‘The Shack’, which was released to movie theatres here in the UK only last Friday.
And I am a complete and total wreck.
Let’s just say I didn’t take enough tissues in my pockets.
I can’t really say much more just now, except just that the film definitely did the book justice.
And it is completely unsurprising that The Shack in either/both of its iterations is offensive to the Religious. In this film is freedom, joy, release, forgiveness, healing; the exact antithesis, in fact, of the suffocating strictures of human Rules about God and how to approach Him.
But, less of that. If you haven’t already done so, let me encourage you in the strongest possible terms to go see this movie.
The other day I was listening to a talk by a man of God whom I greatly respect, and one of the things he said really made me think. He said that ‘there are great times ahead!’.
So what?, you might say. Of course there are great times ahead; God is involved in our future, isn’t He?
Well, yes. Absolutely. And I am sure that the words are correct because of that. But the drift of that man’s message was that tomorrow will be better. Tomorrow, or at some indeterminate time in the future, things will be better. There will be better circumstances, better displays of God’s power at work, better whatever. But it’s tomorrow, not today.
Well, I have learned a real little gem through my grieving process, and it’s this:
Today is the Day of Salvation (2Cor 6:2)
No matter what you are going through – and I am going through some horrible circumstances as I write these words – Now is the day for wholeness, for salvation (remember the word ‘sĹzĹ’?); now is the day in which it is possible to find God’s peace and to find rest, in your relationship with Him, despite, and in the midst of, your circumstances. St. Paul’s encouragement to ‘give thanks in every circumstance’ (1Thess 5:18) was written with precisely this sort of thing in mind. Bringing Jesus in to a situation changes everything.
This doesn’t mean that everything will just suddenly, magically change and all your circumstances will improve, at least on the physical level. But it changes the way you cope with it. This is because as you turn your eyes to Him – maybe in worship, prayer and/or thanksgiving –Â it puts all your circumstances into a heavenly perspective. It sets up what you see before you, in the context of eternity. Not that you are thinking, ‘Well, it’ll all be ok because when I die I go to Heaven’ – Jesus’s teaching was all about His blessings on this Earth for us – but in the midst of our circumstances.
So for my friend the man of God, while I agree that indeed great days are ahead, I need to remember that Now is the Day of Salvation. God wants to bring His miraculous power, His sweet, sweet Presence, His incredible wisdom, into the here and now for us – right here and right now. Today! Now! When we are actually on one of those ‘great days’ in the future, for us it will then be simply ‘today’. So, on this ‘today’, as you are reading this, this is one of the ‘great days ahead’ that my friend the man of God talked about yesterday, last week, last month. It’s now!
So, yes, ‘Great Days are Ahead’, but God is not procrastinating His blessings – putting them off until some indeterminate ‘great days ahead’ in the future. It begins right now. And so, I need to remember this idea:
Great Days are Here Already!
Yes!
As a great preacher friend of mine once said, “This is not ‘pie in the sky when we die’. This is meat on a plate while you wait! “. And this is the encouragement I am trying to get across to you today.
In Matthew 23:13, Jesus says, “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in peopleâs faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to”
Who are these gate-keepers of the Kingdom? Quite simply, they are those people who say that their way is the only right way. You want to get into the Kingdom of Heaven? Then you have to do it OUR way, and no-one else’s, otherwise you’re not getting in.
And because of that attitude, they demonstrate that they are not really ‘in’ either, according to Jesus’s words that I have quoted above. It follows from this that actually the Kingdom is really broadly encompassing, welcoming to all who would come, and not just those whom the Religious people deem ‘worthy’. Those who have such an exclusive attitude are virtually showing that they do not understand the nature of the Kingdom of God, hence Jesus’s words.
Notice also that the Teachers of the Law are mentioned – the legalists. Those who would espouse certain do’s and don’t’s in order to be ‘good enough’ for God. Also the Pharisees – those who would be slightly more ‘helpful’ than the Teachers of the Law, in that they are eager to point out others’ ‘sins’ in order to try to ‘help’ them attain the standards that they thought qualified humans for the Kingdom. But of course it just comes across as its plain source: judgementalism! And anyway no-one can be made righteous (in right standing before God) through following rules (Rom 3:20).
I mean, it’s not rocket science. I think the take-home message of this is that dogma, doctrine and ‘sin-policing’ help no-one; in fact, quite the opposite effect occurs: You behave like those guys, and you will just put people off God altogther!
The thing is that God is not at all like the angry, narrow-minded monster that some Christians make Him out to be. He’s more like Jesus than he is like the Terminator, but many Christians would have us believe that the latter is actually a better likeness.
I can’t think of many things more likely to put people off my Father God….
Bullying in the Church. You’d have thought, wouldn’t you, that a place meant to be known for healing, love and acceptance is also known for intolerance, bigotry and bullying. Sadly, extreme churches showing this kind of behaviour are generally the only ones who make the news – for example, the infamous ‘Westboro Baptist Church’; those who just quietly do the work of Jesus are never mentioned. Well, we can’t have Good News on the news media, now can we? đ
Therefore, I must say first up that bullying does not go on in every church. My church, for example, is known for its acceptance of people from every walk of life from lawyers right up to the homeless đ And especially the homeless. We see every homeless person coming through those doors as Jesus wanting a hand. When I was naked, you clothed Me, and all that (Mt 25:36). And there are many, many churches out there which are similar; they simply show the love of Christ without partiality to all who would come.
But unfortunately some churches are still known for their insularity, exclusivism, dogmatism, and their intolerance for anyone who even slightly ‘strays’ from the ‘path’. Awkward questions are discouraged. Invariably, the leadership’s authority is unquestioned. Everything is tight as a drum with no wiggle-room, and the Bible is to be believed absolutely as inerrant, inspired and infallible, and ineligible for discussion. The belief systems are laid down in stone and woe betide anyone who tries to change that. The idea of believers being ‘…transformed from one degree of glory to another…’ (2Cor3:18) is fine as long as that transformation occurs in accordance with the approval of the group. Instead of a real, fluid, living Relationship with Jesus Christ, members are confined entirely to the straitjacket of rigid belief held by the leadership. I could go on, but that’s enough negative for now.
What does all this have to do with bullying? Well, these types of churches predictably use bullying tactics to keep their members – whom, don’t forget, Jesus died to set free – in line. And I recently read an article on Paul Ellis’s ‘Escape to Reality’ blog which, along with its discussions, has become for me the ‘go-to’ article about church bullying. It describes what church bullying looks like, and how it is used to control those in the group. So, if there’s any potentially dodgy behaviour going on in your church, simply look at this list – it is not fully comprehensive, but helpful commentors have added other items (which you can see if you go to the original article by clicking the link at the end of this piece) – and see what you think. Some of this stuff I didn’t even realise was bullying, but when you look at it, it really is. One day, I might compile this list myself with all the additions. But, for now, here’s Paul’s article. It’s quite the eye-opener!
As a parent of four, I regularly encounter bullying. No, my kids arenât getting abused at school. But we often receive messages from educators informing us of the symptoms and types of bullying. Honestly, it must be hard to be a bully these days, either at school or in the workplace, with everyone so well informed.
But what about bullying at church? Hardly anyone talks about this â unless itâs sexual abuse, in which case itâll make the front page. But there are other types of bullying. Iâve heard hundreds of stories from readers and church leaders. You wouldnât believe the damage done to people in the name of God.
Jesus is not a bully and his church ought to be a safe place. But religion turns people into bullies. (By religion I am referring to that pseudo-spiritual system of self-improvement that Jesus condemned.)
Bullying is using power to control, harm, or intimidate others, which sounds a lot like what religion does all the time. In essence, religion is a system to control and coerce people through intimidation and manipulation. Which makes religion pretty stinkinâ evil.
So why arenât we talking about this? If we are to stand up for the weak (Ps 82:3-4), doesnât that mean standing up to bullies wherever they are found?
My desire is not to name and shame anyone (and I wonât publish comments that do), but to start a conversation about bullying behavior. I suspect a lot of church bullying is unintentional. With the best of intentions I have bullied people from the pulpit. This was wrong. Forgive me. My only excuse is I didnât know I was doing it, which is why weâre here.
My purpose is not to hurt anyone but to identify hurtful behaviors so that all may be free and Jesus may be glorified. If you have come looking for stones to throw, you are in the wrong place. But if you want to be forewarned about the types of bullying in the church, read on. Here is an incomplete list of 30+ ways we use power to harm others in the church. Let me know what I missed.
Bullying behaviors in the church
A: Bullying from the pulpit
Preaching law (which condemns and inflames sin (1 Cor 15:56, 2 Cor 3:9)
Lording it over others (1 Peter 5:3). âObey the man of God!â
Terrorizing people. âGod is mad at you. He hates you.â
Demeaning those who are suffering: âIf you had faith youâd toss those pills.â
Slander: âSheâs sick? She must be a sinning.â
A church that is subject to bullying will be depressed, weak, and unfruitful. If you are part of such a church, your choices are either confrontation or departure. But before you do anything, pray. Pray for grace. If youâve been bullied, look to Jesus your Healer, and be better, not bitter.
And pray for wisdom. I know some will criticize me for not standing up sufficiently for victimâs rights, but often bullies are victims themselves. They need healing too. So pray for those whoâve hurt you (Matt 5:44).
And donât forget to check the log in your own eye, for we are all broken people. We all need grace. The tragedy is that religion brings out the worst in us. Religion makes us ugly.
But the good news is that Jesus loves us at our worst and his love changes us. Just look at what he did to that bully of bullies Saul. He turned him into the Apostle of Grace!
Jesus loves all of us â bullies and their victims. By his grace we can all be free.
Click the graphic below to go to the original article:
Here’s a great post from one of my Facebook friends, a chap who comes out with a whole lot of wisdom:
Friend,
If you’re thinking a relationship with God through Jesus adds the burden of meeting his requirements onto your already difficult life, rather than lifting that burden from you, giving you unspeakable joy and making your heavy load feel light, then perhaps it’s time you reconsider why God sent his son to die and rise.
Lifting pressure and making your heavy load feel light, not adding pressure by placing requirements on you, is precisely what Christ died and rose to accomplish and what Gods good news does each time it’s believed.
That’s why it’s called “good news!”
And still, so many hold tenaciously to a message that says until they meet certain requirements, they cannot enjoy God’s pleasure and “lightness” this side of heaven…so they never do.
So not true!
Christ died and rose so you wouldn’t need to wait another minute.
If this describes you, God can go from the taskmaster he isn’t to the savior and friend he is, all with a flick of a switch God calls faith.
Most of my readers will be aware that I am a big fan of the book, ‘The Shack‘, by Wm. Paul Young. I strongly recommend that people read this book, because it is simply incredible.
Via a great and moving storyline (it is written as a story), the book proposes total freedom, a carefree relationship with God, and also a closeness with God that some believers do not seem to have. It is essentially an extended parable. But rather than learn from this, some believers actually would rather try to discredit the book (and the movie that has been made of the book), most of them without even reading it themselves and instead relying on hearsay to ‘know’ what the book is about.
The Shack has life-changing concepts in it. You can look at my previous articles on it by clicking the category ‘The Shack’ at the top of this piece. The book is, of course, not Scripture, but, in the same way as the Scriptures were written, that is, by ordinary people writing about their interactions with God and their ideas about God, so too The Shack is such a book. As are all of the millions of books that Christians all over the world read. Theology is not confined to the Bible, it is also contained in the billions of pages of wisdom (or otherwise!) written in these countless books from people like Billy Graham, Joseph Prince, Derek Flood, Rob Bell, to name but a very few.
As I said above, many people ‘don’t like’ ‘The Shack‘, even though they’ve never read it. They say it contains ‘heretical’ ideas. While ‘heresy’ just means ideas that are formed from thinking outside the ‘box’, still many people in the Church shy away from it as something ‘dangerous’.*
So, after all that introduction, let me tell you that I read a great article the other day, an article that presents some of the claimed ‘heresy’ of The Shack, and discusses those claims in a level, balanced and rational way. This is one of the best articles I have ever read on this debate; indeed, it is one of the best-written articles I have ever read. It is a real joy to read.
Click the picture below to go to the article.
Enjoy!
*If God is for us, who can be against us? (Rom 8:31) What possible danger does God not protect his children from? These people know little of the awesome power of God!
I think that some leaders don’t want their people reading this book because it will cause them to lose ‘control’ of their flock. Some of these guys see themselves as the backstop, the guardians, ‘shepherds’, if you like, of their ‘flock’. I know they feel they are ‘protecting’ their ‘flock’. And that’s fine up to the point where they replace Jesus as the Good Shepherd (Jn 10:11). Jesus is perfectly capable of building His Church. In fact, I would not have thought like this in the past, but I now consider that if someone says that people should not read a certain author, a certain book, or go and hear a particular speaker, then a) that’s a sure sign of control; get out of there as soon as you can; and b) Go and listen to that speaker, read his/her books and especially that book that they don’t want you to read!
At the time of writing, the Kindle eBook edition of The Shack is only 99p (in British money!) on Amazon UK, and $1.27 on Amazon.com. The links are here: Amazon UK and here: Amazon.com if you’re interested.
The other day I took the PA-38 Tomahawk ‘Romeo-Romeo’ (so called because of the phonetic alphabet rendering of the last two letters of her registration ‘Golf- Romeo Victor Romeo Romeo’) up for a dance among the clouds. The idea is that you find some medium-altitude clouds, and use them as a point of reference around which to throw the aeroplane. Turning, rolling, swooping, soaring, climbing and diving – the feeling of freedom is huge, and the scenery (both of the clouds and the beautiful Devon landscape) is spectacular. Sometimes you fly so close to the clouds that it feels as if your wingtip is grazing the brilliant white vapour and you feel like you could simply reach out and touch the clouds themselves.
So, today I present a photo record of my recent cloud dancing flight. All of the pictures are clickable to give you the full-size, zoomable detailed picture. I hope you enjoy them!
This is Romeo-Romeo, prepped for flight and raring to go. Preflight check completed and everything is ready.Here’s where the fun begins…
Yes, that is Auntie Betty’s Headset sitting on top of the instrument panel, along with my kneeboard and flying gloves…
There are fewer more thrilling, evocative sights than this. Lined up and cleared for takeoff on Runway 26 at Exeter. The adventure begins…Five minutes after take-off. North end of the Exe estuary and Topsham.Here I dipped the starboard wing to get a better view of Topsham and the Exe M5 motorway bridgesExmouth and the seaward end of the Exe EstuaryA good view of Starcross and Dawlish Warren. Shaldon, Babbacombe Bay and Hope’s Nose, Torquay visible in the distanceRainbow over Dawlish Warren, looking towards Exmouth from the Kenton area.Torbay coming into view in the distance.Teignmouth Golf Course with the Teign estuary behind.Heavy squall near Newton Abbot. I will be avoiding that…Despite the dark cloudbase and squalls, the visibility today was actually immense. You could see for miles.Another view showing the excellent visibility.Chudleigh from 2,000ft.Time for some cloud dancing. At 3,500ft near Newton Abbot I found these little beauties. They will do nicely for my proposed activity today. When you go cloud dancing, the aeroplane feels like an extension of your own body; the instruments an extension of your senses. There is a real feeling of being ‘in the Zone’; at one with your machine and you can feel the airflow over the wings and fuselage, you can feel the whole thing…there really is nothing like it.…and some more clouds too. You can tell that I am clawing for more height by the wing angle… Things got a little busy from here on in: swooping, banking, rolling, climbing, diving, skimming the cloud tops and ducking under them, flying through valleys of cloud. Too busy to use the camera, unfortunately. Cloud dancing involves both hands and both feet working the stick, throttle and rudder respectively; this isn’t aerobatics but sometimes it feels as if it is…you need to maintain the ‘energy loading’ of the aeroplane (this is a combination of airspeed, altitude and engine power) and keep a close eye and feel on what the aeroplane is doing. Because the Tomahawk can ‘bite’ quite viciously at low speeds around the stalling speed, you want to stay away from there as much as you can, and this means maintaining a high airspeed. This is especially important when performing tight turns because the margin of airspeed above the stalling speed decreases, due to the stall speed increasing with the square root of the g-loading. So, for example, if you’re pulling 2’g’, the stall speed becomes 1.414 (the square root of 2) times what it normally is. So for a clean stall speed of around 50kt, at 2’g’ you’re looking at about 71 or 72 kt. You really need to keep an eye on things and maintain at least 90kt for the whole thing, and this demands your full attention. Certainly there are no hands free, nor brain cells available, for operating a camera! My apologies…‘Hovâring there, Iâve chased the shouting wind along, and flung My eager craft through footless halls of air. . . ” Cloud so close you could reach out and touch it…Cloud dancing finished, plenty of altitude left at 3,800ft.View down the River Teign from nearly 4,000ft.Oh, all right then, one last go….More clouds to dance around! These clouds were treated to a powered dive through a valley of cloud between them. The impression of speed is awesome, at about 120kt (that’s about 137mph).And here’s Romeo-Romeo back on the ground. Thanks for the flight, dear lady. See you next time…
To be honest, I was at a loss for what to write for my regular 25th-of-the-month article about Fiona. Over the three weeks or so before writing this piece, (which was actually written about ten days before it was published), I have been quite fed up; I’ve certainly not been my usual buoyant, optimistic self! It’s mainly because a number of occurrences and circumstances have together reminded me especially of the permanence – at least for this life – of my loss of that amazing lady. We were very close and we shared everything. And so, I am missing her so much, and there is this huge gap that she left in every area of my life. And of course there are the huge gaps in the lives of all the people who loved her. We lost a real treasure on that day, seven months ago today.
And yet, as I have shared previously, I know she is in the presence of her Lord Jesus. She is in an amazing place where she has her animals, she can worship the Lord face to face – and she is most likely part of that great crowd of people in Heaven that I mentioned in my previous post*.
Let’s look at them again:
“And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying,
âGreat and amazing are your deeds, O Lord God the Almighty! Just and true are your ways, O King of the nations! Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship you, for your righteous acts have been revealed.â (Rev 15:3-4)
Those are people who can see that God’s purposes in History were all part of His Great Plan, on a level and of a complexity that we cannot even begin to fathom. As I’ve said before, we can only gain an inkling in this life of how that all works, what the answers are to Life’s Big Questions. But these guys have what you might call the Heavenly Perspective – they can see what’s really been going on all this time, and, like I said before, they worship God in response to what they have seen!
Now, think of it like this: I too – and you – are also in that great multitude. And so, you see, it means that we too can live today from within that Heavenly Perspective that our ‘future selves’ will know. Part of bringing the Kingdom into today, part of our eternal life in the here-and-now, is surely to bring that Heavenly Perspective into our lives, and the lives of others we meet, today. Jesus said that “the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand” (Mt 3:2). This meant that wherever Jesus was, so there the Kingdom was. He was bringing forward, into the lives of the people around Him, the glories and benefits of the Kingdom of Heaven. And because Jesus lives in us by His Spirit, that same Kingdom is here with us right now, in our everyday lives. All we really need to do is to realise this!
Now, we know that one day we will be singing with that great crowd, in the full knowledge of God’s huge creative and redemptive genius throughout history, where we will see that even those things that bother us now were but a part of that huge tapestry of interconnected events that all worked out in the end. We will in fact have that Heavenly Perspective. We too will see how it all worked; how that great Plan happened and how it all came together.
And so, because we will see that perspective then, why not pre-empt that and live in that knowledge now? We know even now that, one day, we will know in completeness what everything was all about (1Cor 13:12) like those in that great crowd, why not today join with our ‘future selves’ in their knowledge that it’s all great, and actually just fine and dandy. You can imagine our ‘future selves’ thinking wryly (because there will be no regret in Heaven!) “Oh if only I’d had that perspective back then!” But we can indeed have that perspective right now!
I hope this makes sense; it is a bit metaphysical, and I know as well as the next guy that it’s hard to maintain a ‘Heavenly Perspective’ when life is burning us and we are still in the flames of whatever troubles we are going through. Believe me, I have been through the fire these past three years; I have walked the walk, and the talk I am talking is based on what I have learned over that time.
But, you know, the Scripture speaks of ‘Treasure in jars of clay’ (2 Cor 4:7) – something immeasurably valuable in ordinary human bodies. It speaks of us having the Holy Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, a downpayment if you like, to guarantee the things that are to come (2Cor 1:22, Eph 1:14). This is what powers the Life in the Spirit.
What does this life look like? Well, I have written a piece on this here, but I will summarise by saying that there is joy, there is healing, there is power, there is love, there is freedom from bondage, freedom from religious Rules, freedom from the power of sin, freedom from addiciton, freedom from the fear of death; there is the overriding sense of God’s Presence that gives this immense ‘peace that passes understanding’ (Phil 4:7) – a peace that is beyond understanding because it cannot be explained in terms of worldly circumstances. And beyond all that, there is this:
““Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me will live, even though they die. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” ” (John 11:25-26)
Sounds as if Jesus is contradicting Himself, doesn’t it? But He’s not. He’s using the old Hebrew poetry device where two concepts are matched together to reveal a deeper truth. What He meant was that when we die, we will still live. He’s talking about the ‘afterlife’, if you like. And He reinforces this by saying that when a living person like you or I believes in Him, we will not die, since He has already explained that we will still live even after death. So, in a totally real way (not just ‘in a sense’, as I was going to write), this means that once you believe in Him, your life will be one amazing, long walk with Him through this life and, without pause, into the next. Jesus says it quite plainly, in fact, in John 5:24, where He says, “Very truly I tell you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be judged but has crossed over from death to life”. Did you see that? A believer has already crossed over from death to Life! It happens now. This is the assurance that Christians have. This is the assurance that Fiona had, and now knows in full measure. This is the Gospel, or at least a huge part of it. Passing through the veil of death at the end of a believer’s life here on earth is merely the moving on into the fuller, complete life we have been just starting to get used to, during our lives here. This is simply amazing stuff; it’s the sort of thing you can build your entire life on (Matthew 7:24).
This is the inheritance of the Saints (that’s you and me and Fiona) – eternal life beginning now, and continuing for ever. How’s that for Good News! Of course, the thing with an inheritance, remember, is that it’s something you get in this life because of Someone who has died. Go figure!
So, as the old hymn goes:
“Strength for today, and bright hope for tomorrow, Blessings all mine and ten thousand besides!”
Wow!
And so, in the light of my opening lines here about being fed up, even just writing this piece has buoyed my spirit again. It has reminded me once again of all the mighty promises in God that are mine – and yours – to hold and to use. I needed to regain that perspective. And I have.
Even now, for the things I have already seen in my life and in the lives of others, I can still worship God for what He’s done already, very much like those people in Heaven.(Psalm 145:4).
So, I am asking God to increase my awareness of the Heavenly Perspective, like the one that Fiona and our ‘future selves’ have. It’s very much a foretaste of what is to come!
And for such great things as these, what better response than worship? Let me leave you, then, with a great song based on the words those saints are singing – The Song of Moses:
And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb Saying Great, great and marvellous are Your works, Lord God Almighty Just and true are Your ways Lord, O King of the Saints Who shall not fear You O Lord
And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb Saying Great, great and marvellous are Your works, Lord God Almighty Just and true are Your ways Lord, O King of the Saints Who shall not fear You O Lord
Hallelujah, O Hallelujah!
Be blessed!
Header picture shows Fiona on the South-West Coast Path overlooking St. Mary’s Bay, Brixham, on a glorious Devon spring day. We are so blessed to live in such a beautiful part of the country, and Fiona always loved this walk. If Heaven is anything like Devon – and I believe that everything beautiful on this earth is a pale reflection of the glory and reality of Heaven – then it will be glorious indeed.
*I know that the Book of Revelation is not intended to be taken entirely literally. But there are still passages in that book that nevertheless show a glimpse of things indescribable to the human mind, through the use of metaphysical imagery. Basically it’s the best that John (the writer of Revelation) could do given the limited descriptive powers at his disposal – the same limits that you or I would come up against even today, were we to try to describe the inexpressible things he saw in his vision. And so, I have no problem in setting aside some of the more weird imagery in that book until such a time as Holy Spirit makes its meaning clear to me, while at the same time getting to grips with those parts – like the passages in this piece – for which I feel I have sufficient revelation (no pun intended; I hate puns!) to make a decent case for my insight in this piece.
[Edit: Not long after I wrote this post, there was a terrible terrorist suicide bomb attack on a crowded arena in Manchester. It was at an Ariane Grande concert; 22 people at least lost their lives and many more were injured, many of them young people and children. I don’t know why these things happen. But it is my sincere wish that people from such bereaved families find this post and take comfort from it. It’s easy to say this now, but, believe me, one day it will all make sense. I say that not from a callous heart but from one that has been through the same kind of fire. Jesus loves you. God loves you. Rest in the knowledge that your loved one(s) are being held gently in God’s arms. If you want to contact me about this, please do so and you’ll find the contact link in the menus at the top of the page. Or post a reply below.]
