"For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain." Philippians 1:21 (NIV)
In part one of "Day 20" I talked about living. Today I'm talking about dying.
I am someone who has had depression. I am someone who believes in Jesus. Therefore, death has always had a certain appeal to me. Now, I know that I've gone to unhealthy levels with my longing for heaven, but at the same time, there IS a part of all believers that longs for our ultimate home.
First and foremost...I get to be with HIM.
I can physically be in His direct presence forever. I will never have to leave, ever, ever, ever.
I can remember as a child when I felt God's presence for the first time. I felt perfect peace. I felt perfect strength. I felt perfect joy. There was a wonderful delight to know I wasn't alone. I knew that being with Him was exactly what I was made to do. I was fulfilling my purpose. I had tasted who He was and I have sought to fill my belly with His presence ever since.
"Taste and see that the Lord is good;
blessed is the one who takes refuge in Him." Psalm 34:8
When battling depression, those moments of His presence were often harder to find. There were times I absolutely couldn't find Him. The lies I was believing about myself and the world were screaming so loud I did not have the ability to see Him there. But I had tasted. And I knew exactly who I was trying to get back to.
(If you have never experienced what it is like to be with God, I urge you to find out. You don't have to go to church, either. Go to your bedroom. Talk to Him. You may feel like you don't deserve His loving favor, but He likes to give it anyways.)
Secondly, I will see beautiful things. Like Pinterest, but better.
I don't picture heaven as this boring place where I float on white fluffy clouds covered in my white fluffy robe playing on my white fluffy harp and wearing my white fluffy halo. I am going to live with the same God who created the Appalachian fall. I am going to live with the same God who created the Caribbean ocean. I am going to live with the same God who created the variety that is human beings.
I live in Alaska. I see majesty daily. But with Him, I'll get to see His creation, without the sting of sin on it. When sin entered the world, it touched everything. Sin fractured everything. Struck by the awe of the Grand Canyon? We should see what would have happened before sin touched the earth. This monument is a fraction of what it was meant to be. And when I am with Him, I will get to see the way it was meant to be. Wow.
A third detail I look forward to, is having eternity.
I shall now attempt to blow your mind...
We've often heard how God has a plan for the future. He knows what is coming into your life. He has a plan for you. How does He know? Because He can see past and future as if it were present. How does He see it? Because time is just another part of His creation. It is like the tree in your yard or the eyeball that helps you read. It sounds crazy to our brain that has never experienced a lack of time. But think about it, within the last century, scientist have just begun to scratch the surface on the study of time. We now have the fields of Theoretical Physics and Quantum Physics. Now there are the household names of Einstein and Hawking. (Also, Sheldon and Dr. Sam Beckett, but I digress.)
God is outside time. The Hebrew word for God means that "He is." When they say that He is eternal, they don't just mean never ending, the also mean never beginning. He is OUR beginning and he is OUR end.
He IS the creator and I don't believe He will ever stop creating. He is creating all over this world through us. He creates through me. He continues to create through you. And when I step into eternity with Him, I will finally not have time breathing down my neck. I am infinitesimally slow and there it won't matter. I can perfect whatever story I'm writing to the dot and tiddle. I will be able to write a drama performance without the next chore on my to do list hassling me. I can create with Him.
To be honest, my thoughts on this subject are a bit futile. Because the Bible says I can't even begin to imagine how good it will really be.
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