Three of our five house guests departed yesterday, one on an airplane back to Wyoming (our daughter) and the other two taking a leisurely scenic drive through some of the beautiful mountains and canyons of Utah on their way home to Michigan (my husband's sister and her husband.) My sister-in-law was excited about seeing new places on this trip home; my brother-in-law was a little concerned about the high winding mountain roads he is sure to encounter. Since this is all new territory to them, they were well-armed with both GPS and Road Atlas, their path clearly highlighted on the latter….modern-day pilgrims.
All of this reminded me of the road trip that we are all on, whether we realize it or not….a road trip that leads us from this life to the next and final everlasting life…into a new territory where death is never to be found again….at least for some. It's all a matter of taking the right road.
The early disciples found their path clearly illuminated for them: when Jesus, who had died a torturous death on the cross and been buried in a sealed tomb (John chapter 19), appeared in physical bodily form – alive! - three days later (John chapter 20); He walked and talked with them for 40 days, cooked breakfast for them on the Tiberian shore of the Sea of Galilee, and ate with them (John chapter 21), verifying for them that His was indeed a physical body needing nourishment as did their own bodies. A body that the disciples could touch, even though He was able to appear and disappear in ways not possible to mere men! (John 20:19 & Mark 24:51). Yet He was no apparition, no ghost, but Jesus Christ risen from the dead, alive and in the flesh….a new and glorious flesh that would never die again!
What tremendous joy and excitement they experienced realizing how real and true it is that death had really lost its sting (I Cor. 15:55)….there was nothing to fear…only something wonderful and amazing to look forward to….life everlasting in the presence of God….these old and decaying bodies transformed by the power of God from dead and dying to alive and living… for eternity….all because they chose the right road: Jesus Christ – "the Way, the Truth and the Life" (John 14:6).
I am reminded of how diligently they strove to remain on the right road; how nothing would cause them to detour from that road: neither beatings, nor imprisonment, nor hunger, nor rejection, nor loss of everything they owned, nor death itself (2 Cor. 11:25). For now they knew absolutely that they were, in this world as we know it, only pilgrims on a temporary road trip as was Abraham (Hebrews 11:8-16). And that anything and everything they might encounter was only a temporary and meaningless thing compared to the glory and joy of what was ahead. They never took their eyes off the horizon that lay at the end of the road: eternity.
But what fascinates me most is their JOY during the journey.
A friend of mine recently heard someone preaching about the joy of the Lord, which is our strength (Neh. 8:10). I, and perhaps my friend as well, always looked at that "joy of the Lord" as joy that comes FROM the Lord, but this preacher spoke of it as the joy OF the Lord Himself…in other words, the LORD'S JOY, not ours. So that His is the JOY, and ours is the STRENGTH that comes from His JOY. The preacher then went on to say that the JOY OF THE LORD is us leading others to Jesus, us reconciling others to HIM; after all, we are to be ministers of reconciliation, reconciling men to God through Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 5:18-19), Who is the ONLY "WAY" to God the Father (John 14:6).
Thus, if I understand it correctly (and I have only begun to study this out), as we lead others to the Lord, the Lord rejoices in that (Zeph.3:17, and we are strengthened (even as small children are when their parents are happy and not angry with them) encouraged to go on and to work harder in the fields that are white with harvest (John 4:35). Strengthened and encouraged to face whatever we encounter on our path for the joy of the Lord. This explains the strength that the early disciples had, the same strength that is available to us today.
But they were also excited. They themselves were filled with joy (Acts 2:46). And I think it was because they had been (and us also) spiritual prisoners kept in dark cells on death row, fearfully anticipating the executioner because they were unable to keep the law fully. And now suddenly they had been given not just a reprieve or stay of execution, but full pardon and release back into life…and that life was unlike anything they had ever known before…full of miraculous things of God Himself. The thing that gave them this full pardon and release was called MERCY and GRACE….the MERCY that God showed to us by giving us His only Son Jesus Christ as the full atonement for our sins if we would only receive Him as such, with hearts full of gratitude for His gift; the GRACE of God displayed in Jesus Christ who willingly laid down His life for us, as we are also to do for others.
Our path is clearly highlighted on our road map to eternity. There is nothing to fear for God's perfect love has cast out all fear (I John 4:18). And the joy of life now and everlasting is prominent in us pilgrims who are on the right and only road to the Father…. though Jesus Christ, His Son!
"And I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them." Isaiah 42:16
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