An hour in church
I saw it again today! I’d lost the sight of it but not the reality. In fact I’d lost sight of it for longer than usual. Because economic disaster and the suffering and starvation of many people had dominated my thoughts and the vision had grown faint
I had gone to church reluctantly, weary after a virus infection, I wanted to sit and read my Bible at home (with emphasis on the ‘sit’)
The sight broke on my vision slowly, like when a mist clears and the mountains become visible again. I was listening to the words of the prophet Micah, what does the LORD require of you, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? Listening to the preacher’s brilliant interpretation of that as a requirement that we love Tenderly, Trustingly and Tenaciously, when all at once it appeared to my inner eye. The concreteness of the walls and pews remained, but I saw the Kingdom (realm) of God.
The mists began to clear as I listened to the exposition and as I looked at the citizens: first the little children being the kingdom of God in grade school, then the young people, learning by living the ways of the kingdom. I saw the old and sick carrying their testimony to the goodness of God. I heard what many of us hear: the innumerable host who lived and died before we did: they were singing. in an ecstasy of realized hope, about the powerful love and mercy of God. There was the echoing resounding voice of a prophet reminding me that the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdom of our God and the good-will of God will be the chosen life-style of all its citizens, and that this is our future. Hope returned! God longs to do good to us and the only obstacle to his life changing power is our own fear of the changes he will bring.
Like Paul, I only saw dimly, as though I were looking through a thick glass But I also felt it all around me in the intensity of the worshippers, in the knowledge that their loving-living will spread the kingdom in ways we never thought possible to times and places beyond our imagination.
The church has only one hour a week to teach us the kingdom but after that comes a week of living and being the citizens of the kingdom. The kingdom of God, the realm of Love comes within us when we accept and live out the good-will of God to all people. What a difference an hour makes.
I had gone to church reluctantly, weary after a virus infection, I wanted to sit and read my Bible at home (with emphasis on the ‘sit’)
The sight broke on my vision slowly, like when a mist clears and the mountains become visible again. I was listening to the words of the prophet Micah, what does the LORD require of you, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? Listening to the preacher’s brilliant interpretation of that as a requirement that we love Tenderly, Trustingly and Tenaciously, when all at once it appeared to my inner eye. The concreteness of the walls and pews remained, but I saw the Kingdom (realm) of God.
The mists began to clear as I listened to the exposition and as I looked at the citizens: first the little children being the kingdom of God in grade school, then the young people, learning by living the ways of the kingdom. I saw the old and sick carrying their testimony to the goodness of God. I heard what many of us hear: the innumerable host who lived and died before we did: they were singing. in an ecstasy of realized hope, about the powerful love and mercy of God. There was the echoing resounding voice of a prophet reminding me that the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdom of our God and the good-will of God will be the chosen life-style of all its citizens, and that this is our future. Hope returned! God longs to do good to us and the only obstacle to his life changing power is our own fear of the changes he will bring.
Like Paul, I only saw dimly, as though I were looking through a thick glass But I also felt it all around me in the intensity of the worshippers, in the knowledge that their loving-living will spread the kingdom in ways we never thought possible to times and places beyond our imagination.
The church has only one hour a week to teach us the kingdom but after that comes a week of living and being the citizens of the kingdom. The kingdom of God, the realm of Love comes within us when we accept and live out the good-will of God to all people. What a difference an hour makes.
Labels: church, hope, kingdom of God
posted by Jessie Coates at 7:26 PM
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