If I had to choose one place to be at sunrise every day for the rest of my life on earth, it would be walking the shoreline of an ocean that faces East. There is something about watching the sun rise over the crashing waves and reflect its light across the water as it bursts forth over the horizon that brings praise and anticipation of Jesus’ glorious return one day.
It makes me think of David dancing before the Ark of the Lord when he says, “…I will celebrate before the LORD. I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes.” (2 Samuel 6:21-22) A strange verse to be reminded of you may think, but the setting makes me want to dance to praise music every time and anyone watching from afar would think me an undignified nut job.
I can only imagine that this, on a much greater scale, is what we as believers will feel the day King Jesus returns for his bride.
Back in early June as I was on my sunrise walk on the beach, I was talking with the Lord and telling him how much I enjoyed just walking and talking, being in awe of the beauty of his creation. He replied, “This was my original design.”
And it was. (Not that he would be wrong).
Many times in my life I’ve read the verse in Genesis, “The man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden” (Genesis 3:8) and wondered, “What did Adam and Eve do before the fall, what did their day look like?” It says Adam was put in the garden to work it and take care of it, but if you think about it, there was no toiling to his work (their work, once Eve arrived).
Imagine a garden with no weeds, no aphids, no mildew… And afternoon walks with God. Imagine conversations that don’t include your relational problems, ailments, work issues, stress or worry because sin has not entered the world. Instead, you are just with the Lord, admiring his creation, talking with him and learning from him about all things, not going to him because you have a need but because you desire his company and want to worship him in his majesty.
I feel like sometimes we forget what his original design was because we’ve gotten so used to life in a broken world. It was never his desire, but it came about because of choices made. The same reason we still live with so many challenges—choices made, ours or others, both now and in the garden of Eden.
But that didn’t change the heart of the Father and his desire to walk with us, to talk with us, to reveal his love and goodness to us. And instead of giving up on us, he created a way back to perfection with him.
It’s the place he has been leading us to once more since the original fall of man in the garden. Back to his original design, restored and redeemed by the blood of Jesus, the Lamb of God—made whole once more by his righteousness.
I look at the progression of the Bible from Old to New Testament and see intimate relationship with God being restored little by little over time. First with and through certain individuals on behalf of the masses in the Old Testament, then to every individual as Jesus went to the cross and rose again and gives everyone who says yes to him the Holy Spirit.
The situations are always different, but the question always the same—”Do you want to follow and trust me or trust in your own knowledge?”
Just like Adam and Eve, all are given the same choice, the tree of life (Jesus), or the tree of knowledge of good and evil (self and the world).
I love the end of Revelation when John is describing what the Lord shows him that we get to look forward to.
“22I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. 23The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp…27Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life” (Revelation 21:22-23,27).
“Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb 2 down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. 3 No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. 5 There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever” (Revelation 22:1-5).
It is standing in the rays of the rising sun that I see just a fraction of the glory of God that awaits us in his perfect presence. It is the original design.
He wants all to return to that same design, the reason for our continued wait, because He is “not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).
I love this verse because it reveals the heart of God and his desire that ALL choose him, he doesn’t want anyone to perish, and yet it is our choice, not his, to make.
We do not know the day or the hour, we do not know the number of days we have been given on this earth. We only know that there is a choice to be made, and to not make a choice is still a choice.
So, as we wait, I pray that it is our heart too that all should come to repentance, and that our light burns brighter, and our love demonstrates the same love of Jesus.
Leave a Reply