Psalm 16:11 “You make known to me the path of life; You will fill me with joy in Your presence, with eternal pleasures at Your right hand.”
In the morning, I love to get up and go outside. From our house in La Mesa, you can see all the way to the ocean, the Coronado Bridge, and on a clear day, you can see the tip of Point Loma and downtown. There is beauty all around, and all I have to do is look for it and I can see it. This world, even in its fallen condition, has such incredible beauty and God has created the earth in all of its fullness for our joy and our pleasure. However, when I think about my eternal home and what it will be like, I consider how beautiful God made our planet and how much more amazing Heaven will be. But in the meantime, as I wait on the Lord to bring me into paradise with Him, I am still in this physical body, in this physical realm and there is a deep longing in my soul for Him and His perfection that can never be fully satisfied as long as I live on the earth.
1 Corinthians 2:9 says, "What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived – the things God has prepared for those who love Him.” Interestingly as I study this verse, I have found that these words from Isaiah 64:4, “Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides You, who acts on behalf of those who wait for Him,” often is incorrectly interpreted as referring to the wonders of Heaven. Rather, these verses refer to the wisdom God has prepared for believers. God’s truth is not discoverable by eye or ear, nor is it discovered by the mind. God’s wisdom is made known by revelation, inspiration and illumination to all of those believers who seek to know and understand that divinely written truth can be discovered through God’s divine agent, the Holy Spirit. And unless God’s Spirit dwells within me, my mind will never conceive or know the things that God has prepared for me; He will never make known to me the path of life; I will never experience true pleasure because no one has witnessed the likes of His awesome works on their own behalf. Paul adapts the words from Isaiah to speak of the direct revelation of God imparted to His apostles and prophets pertaining to mysteries hidden from mankind before the birth of the church. However, direct exposure to the awesome character of God on a daily and consistent basis will bring me to a place where I have consistent communion with the Creator of the universe. When doing so, I can become a partaker of the Holy Spirit, a partaker of Christ and a partaker of His divine nature. What God is accomplishing in me here on earth is a sanctification process that will only lead to the perfection I am longing for in my soul.
1 Corinthians 15:51-52 says, “Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed – in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.” I don’t know about you, but when I read God’s Word and He essentially says, “Listen, I am going to tell you a secret,” my ears perk up and I want to know exactly what that secret is. He is saying these bodies are prototypes of what we will be when we get to Heaven. We cannot live in God’s eternal heavenly glory the way we are, and His Words are telling us and revealing to us how we will be changed in just the twinkling of an eye. So many people are seeking immortality here on earth; they are filling their lives with meaningless earthly treasures that will never satisfy the soul, no matter how hard they try. Sometimes it’s difficult to accept the fact that life is passing us by and that death is approaching; yes, our bodies will cease to exist one day, but our soul is immortal. God not only promises life beyond the grave, but He also promises life during life, not just an existence but a life that’s worth living.
– Melody
