Nehemiah 11:22-12:47
Make time for thanksgiving. That is what the energetic new community in Jerusalem were doing by going back to the Mosaic laws about allocating some Levites as singers. And it led them into joy. The more we thank God for what he has done the more joy we will feel sloshing around in our life. So I think we should intentionally allocate a portion of each of our resources to pure unadulterated thanksgiving. Maybe the resource we most need to allocate is time - making time to get in worship on a Sunday and at housegroup and on our own as well. Maybe we need to sett an alarm or configure our screen-saver or get together with a friend or buy some worship albums or start keeping a journal. These could all be ways that we develop and strengthen mental patterns of thankfulness to God. For he really has done amazing things for us. Tiny things and huge things, temporary things and everlasting things. And the more we deliberately remember those things and the more we deliberately thank him for them the more joy we will feel. And the more joy He will feel too.
Revelation 21:1-27
This is our great hope. This is what we cry out for like our own bed and shower after a long week of camping. And so it is worth us really thinking on it. Because the bed is super-comfy and the shower will really ease our aching back. The shower is not just a dribble. The hope is not in vain. I think the biggest attack on this hope is to make it seem like a super-spiritual, out-of-body floaty-sunny fantasy land that is so far from our experience that we cannot accept it at all. So here is the antidote to that poisonous thought - the hope of Revelation is not for us to go to heaven. The hope of Revelation is not that we will float out of our bodies and out of this earth to some hovering utopia in the skies. No. The hope of Revelation comes down out of heaven. It doesn’t stay there and we certainly don’t go there. God comes down to live with his people. The New Jerusalem comes down to the earth. Now the earth will have been transformed - it will have been made new and perfect and fully redeemed in every way - but it will still be something that we could only describe as ‘earth’. I appreciate that we cannot possibly grasp the staggering beauty or awesome detail of what the earth will look like once the old order has passed away but it seems like it will have nations and kings and people who can make and bring things of splendour to the Lamb. Because ultimately our faith is one that started in Eden and started with God saying the universe was good. We believe in a creator God who made all things and who will re-make all things. He will re-make them so they look similar but different, the same but renewed. Like a populated, thriving, swirling, life-infested Eden but better. So if you start to feel sick of camping and bored of feeling half-washed then do not despair. The hope is coming. The hope is real. And the hope is good.
Proverbs 31:21-31
“When it snows she has no fear for her household; for all of them are clothed in scarlet”. What??
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