Thankful for God's promise of restoration

God uses the rhythms of life to reflect His eternal plan.  As I age, my awareness increases.

For instance, we are now in the season of death.  

The leaves have fallen from the trees, 

most of them, 

and those that have not

hang withered and brown, 

or frostbitten.  

The fields are bare, raked clean after the harvest.  

Flowers have gone to seed.

Here and there, fallen fruit lies rotting on the ground.

Nothing is growing.  Cold has arrived, manifesting in a crystalline coating that sparkles on the lifeless remains of plant matter.  Soon, all the decay will be covered decently in a burial of white snow.

How fitting that this is the season, now when the days are at their shortest and the dark creeps around us before we can get safely home for the evening, now the small white lights of Christmas appear, strung across porches and glowing at windows.  Baby Jesus came to challenge the darkness, a tiny human child, born in a secret place, God's most amazing weapon, cloaked so humbly that hardly anyone realized what was happening.

This tiny baby was the beginning of the fulfillment of the greatest promise, the promise of restoration.

Patiently, God planted and waited
and nurtured and waited
and watered and waited
and fertilized and waited
and waited.

Of course, for God, waiting is different.  For God, a thousand years are like a day.  For us, an hour is like a thousand years.  We have a hard time waiting for God to complete His perfect plan.  But He promises that He will.  He promises that He is making all things new.

Behold, He says, I am making all things new.  (Revelation 21:5)

What you sow

does not come to life

unless it dies.

And what you sow 

is not the body that 
is to be,

but a bare kernel,

perhaps of wheat 

or of some other grain...

What is sown 

is perishable;

what is raised

is imperishable.

(1 Corinthains 15:36-37, 42)

Jesus taught us: Truly, truly I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. (John 12:24)

We will come to life.  We will be raised.  We will bear fruit.  We will be imperishable.  Actually, we are currently raised with Christ, and bearing fruit through His Spirit.  Although our bodies are not yet imperishable, our souls are.  We, who have faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus, are on a triumphant trajectory toward eternal glory.

He is restoring us, and we will be restored.

Joy comes in the morning. (Psalm 30:5)

As through Adam darkness and death entered and permeated creation, so through Christ the flow is reversed and light and life will reign forever.

Every tragedy, every single calamity, every tear, every ache, and every pain will be transformed into a reason to praise Him, a demonstration of the love of God, and the power of God, and the glory of God.

If then, you have been raised with Christ,

seek the things that are above,

where Christ is,

seated at the right hand of God.

Set your minds on things that are above,

not on things that are on earth.

For you have died,

and your life is hidden 

with Christ in God.

When Christ,

who is your life

appears,

then you also

will appear

with Him in glory.

(Colossians 3:1-4)

I am thankful for God's promise of restoration, and I am thankful that God always keeps His promises.