The sweet love of God
John the Revelator |
“The
Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show to His
bond-servants, the things which must soon take place; and He sent and
communicated it by His angel to His bond-servant John.” -
Revelation 1:1
In
songs and sermons, Christian talks or environments, we often use the biblical expression
“through faith and not vision”, but I must admit that oftentimes I have
wondered at the literal meaning of this expression. I have often thought “what’s
wrong with vision, when you already have faith?” And while I read the opening verse of the Book of Revelation, the book with probably greater
visionary content than any other book in the Bible, my mind is made clear about the beauty of this statement.
Beginning
from the Book of Genesis and on with all the books in the Bible, God always has
something to tell humanity - something all new or the renewal of a promise, the assurance
of a blessing, or the warning of an eminent punishment. It is as He felt He needed to
share with us who, as the song says, are nothing more than “a flower quickly
fading, here today and gone tomorrow.” He, the timeless sovereign of the
universe, chooses to reveal us His plans, his wishes and feelings - to us,
whose future is uncertain even as regards our very next day on earth.
How
sweet is the knowledge that God has never chosen, in any moment of human
history, to leave us in the dark about the things He intends to do. Starting
from the creation, when the Lord well informs man on the sure consequences
that would follow if he failed to obey, in the hundreds of occasions the Bible
tells of God making His plan known, and up to the revelation of the things yet
to come, God has found such a loving way to further show His love for mankind:
He has made known to us everything we need to know, just like a good friend,
though under no obligation, chooses to share with his friends the things he
plans to do.
The
confidentiality that God shows in a book like Revelation is simply a sure seal of the
loyal friendship He has towards us. Here stands the beauty of Christianity as opposed
to all human efforts to approach God. We do not follow a capricious, impulsive
or mystical God, but a God Who chooses to call us friends and reveal everything
to us. In the person of the Lord Jesus, the whole of God’s character was revealed
to us. In His Word, the whole line of God’s plan from the past to the future
has been submitted before us. What excuse do we have for not believing?
The
details of an ever-approaching future, or the tasting smell of the glory
awaiting us in heaven, show that we do not, or at least need not, go through life each with his or her own different vision of the things to expect of God. The Bible
reveals God in all the abundance of His knowledge in the measure we can
appropriate. Let it be our encouragement every day to go to God in prayer,
submission and faith that He will always reveal His will for us, for all things
big and small in the lives of each and every one of us, and may our heart
always be obedient to follow Him, the one Who never fails and Who never likes
to do things secretly. He Who delights in including us in the great things He
has done and is about to do. He Who has not spared us the view of paradise,
will He not be always faithful and openhearted to make us taste what is the
good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God?
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