Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Eden... There is a longing in my heart... to be Kiss again
When God created the universe He spoke it into existence.
But, when He created us - His children, His image - He got His hands dirty. He dug His fingers into the clay and formed us from the earth. Kneeling down over the man-formed mound of dirt, God placed His lips on Adam's and breathed life into him. "And man became a living soul."
Our anthropology doesn't start with "the Fall" it starts with "a Kiss." We are the descendants of Adam. We are God's very image walking around on legs ... all of us. The good, the bad and the ugly - His image!
The problem is, we've been infected with a virus called sin, and that virus has been passed down from generation to generation. But our Heavenly Father has found the cure and delivered it Himself: a blood transfusion. His blood. It was the only way He could reconcile His creation back to Himself.
Yes, we may not be perfect, some of us still feel very much like a sinner, but we are NOT sin. And neither are you. We are the image of God.
Broken? Yes.
But His image, nonetheless.
And He didn't think we were "good-for-nothing," in fact, He sent the best He had to rescue us. He came Himself. "He thought it not robbery." He felt good about the deal: His life for ours.
I believe inside the DNA of every human there is something that remembers Eden. A faint recollection of footsteps crushing leaves beneath them in the cool of the day ... our hearts jumping for joy as we ran to our Father.
He always came in the cool of the day. You could count on it. He never missed. He would throw us in the air and catch us (like parents have been doing with their children ever since). He walked with us and talked with us.
Then we were infected. We sinned. All of a sudden we knew we were naked. We felt ashamed. We grabbed fig leaves to cover ourselves, and we've been grabbing them ever since. But fig leaves always crumble in the fall.
After we sinned, He still came in the cool of the day. We hid. But He still came. He didn't come because of our goodness, or because of our sinfulness. He came because we were His.
7 years ago, someone very dear once prayed for me and said she saw a vision of me as a little girl in a garden, holding tightly hand in hand with a Man... She could hear us chatting excitedly, laughing and giggling away, skipping side by side. I was contented, at peace and perfectly loved by Him. She whispered to me," Carol, God want you to know that you can be happy! You will be happy! Just like what I saw in my vision!" Something broke inside of me that night...a dam was broken and out flow a stream of the purest sparkling refreshing water that runs through the desert of my heart... You see, deep down in my heart I could not believe I can ever be happy again.
Every now and then something will remind me of HOME. It's almost like a "thin place" - where the veil between this life and the "other side" almost become one - the dark glass clears for a second. And for a brief moment things make sense.
Something tells me our greatest days are ahead. And, it's going to be wonderful ... beyond comprehension. A thousand Walt Disney's couldn't imagine it. I know it's there. I know it's real. I know it's home. And everything will be clear. Perfectly clear.
Where we're headed is even better than Eden. It's The New Jerusalem. Where, once again, we will hear His footsteps in the cool of the day. The God who came for us ... walked with us ... delivered us ... and brought us back Home.
Eden... There is a longing in my heart... to be Kiss again
When God created the universe He spoke it into existence.
But, when He created us - His children, His image - He got His hands dirty. He dug His fingers into the clay and formed us from the earth. Kneeling down over the man-formed mound of dirt, God placed His lips on Adam's and breathed life into him. "And man became a living soul."
Our anthropology doesn't start with "the Fall" it starts with "a Kiss." We are the descendants of Adam. We are God's very image walking around on legs ... all of us. The good, the bad and the ugly - His image!
The problem is, we've been infected with a virus called sin, and that virus has been passed down from generation to generation. But our Heavenly Father has found the cure and delivered it Himself: a blood transfusion. His blood. It was the only way He could reconcile His creation back to Himself.
Yes, we may not be perfect, some of us still feel very much like a sinner, but we are NOT sin. And neither are you. We are the image of God.
Broken? Yes.
But His image, nonetheless.
And He didn't think we were "good-for-nothing," in fact, He sent the best He had to rescue us. He came Himself. "He thought it not robbery." He felt good about the deal: His life for ours.
I believe inside the DNA of every human there is something that remembers Eden. A faint recollection of footsteps crushing leaves beneath them in the cool of the day ... our hearts jumping for joy as we ran to our Father.
He always came in the cool of the day. You could count on it. He never missed. He would throw us in the air and catch us (like parents have been doing with their children ever since). He walked with us and talked with us.
Then we were infected. We sinned. All of a sudden we knew we were naked. We felt ashamed. We grabbed fig leaves to cover ourselves, and we've been grabbing them ever since. But fig leaves always crumble in the fall.
After we sinned, He still came in the cool of the day. We hid. But He still came. He didn't come because of our goodness, or because of our sinfulness. He came because we were His.
There's an ache inside of me that longs for Eden.
7 years ago, someone very dear once prayed for me and said she saw a vision of me as a little girl in a garden, holding tightly hand in hand with a Man... She could hear us chatting excitedly, laughing and giggling away, skipping side by side. I was contented, at peace and perfectly loved by Him. She whispered to me," Carol, God want you to know that you can be happy! You will be happy! Just like what I saw in my vision!" Something broke inside of me that night...a dam was broken and out flow a stream of the purest sparkling refreshing water that runs through the desert of my heart... You see, deep down in my heart I could not believe I can ever be happy again.
Every now and then something will remind me of HOME. It's almost like a "thin place" - where the veil between this life and the "other side" almost become one - the dark glass clears for a second. And for a brief moment things make sense.
Something tells me our greatest days are ahead. And, it's going to be wonderful ... beyond comprehension. A thousand Walt Disney's couldn't imagine it. I know it's there. I know it's real. I know it's home. And everything will be clear. Perfectly clear.
Where we're headed is even better than Eden. It's The New Jerusalem. Where, once again, we will hear His footsteps in the cool of the day. The God who came for us ... walked with us ... delivered us ... and brought us back Home.
The very One who started it all with a kiss.
