What Just Happened? (02/08/26-02/09/26)

As you read verse 9, what image does your mind form of the event?  What is happening here?  Does Jesus just, I don’t know, jump off in a leap that never seems to terminate?  Is it like Neil Armstrong on the moon, but with even less gravity?  Is He like a balloon let go, rising and rising, riding the wind until He is too distant for eye to discern?  I have to say, that on reading this passage, that was rather the image forming in my mind; not of a balloon per se, but more the image of a hawk or eagle soaring the heights.  Have you ever stood watching one of these birds, straining to keep it in view until it becomes impossible, and their location is lost in sky and cloud?  This I can imagine of the scene before us.  But this, I must recognize, is the mind doing what it does:  Trying to fit present wonder into the knowledge of past experience.

But this is not the description we are given.  I suppose it’s natural enough to come to such a sense of events.  We have, after all, that glorious promise from Isaiah 40:31, which used to be there on the carrying case for my bible back in the day.  Those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength, and mount up with wings like eagles, running without tiring, and walking without becoming weary.  What a promise!  And after yesterday’s dealing with the snow yet again, clearly not yet our present condition.  It remains future.  Still, on wings like an eagle.  Perhaps like me you can recall dreams from younger days when one could soar through the imagined landscape in such fashion.  Perhaps those dreams are not so fantastic as all that, but in fact are glimpses of our future state.  Who knows?  The point remains, though, that so far as this passage is concerned, something quite different is in view.

I had thought to find some confirmation for my perceptions in such translations as the NIrV, which offers that, “they watched until a cloud hid him from their sight.”  But again, not what the words impart.  We have a number of terms being employed here to describe the action.  He was lifted up, or taken up.  Here, the word is in passive voice.  It is an action being done to Jesus, not one achieved by Himself.  While the NASB offers that a cloud received Him out of their sight, there’s really something singular happening here.  First off, it is a cloud, singular, not clouds more generally.  Second, this receiving is indicated in active voice.  The cloud is the actor, not just stage dressing.  And this matter of receiving is more, as Wuest takes pains to express in his translation, coming under Him to bear Him up.  This is a load-bearing cloud.  Who ever heard of such a thing?  What, in all experience, could prepare for such a sight?  And it comes under Him to bear Him up and away!

Perhaps one could envision a tornado, which certainly would have sufficient power to cause such lifting, but then, were that the case, there are words suitable to describe it more clearly, and Luke, careful as he is, would certainly have employed the more precisely descriptive word.  No.  This is new.  This is unprecedented, and as such, words become insufficient to fully and properly describe what just happened.

Those two who come to explain events likewise speak of His departure in passive voice.  He has been ‘taken up from you,’ taken aboard that cloud, as it were.  Now, let’s not go into Chariots of the Gods territory.  No need for aliens here.  We already have God Incarnate.  The nearest we get to an active role for Jesus in what is happening is in the statement that He was departing, which is at least in the middle voice.  But given the weight of all the other verbs here, I think the best we can say in that event is that He allowed this to transpire, did not interpose Himself to stop it.

Again, for all that we look upon this scene with the benefit of having read the whole story and knowing how it turns out, we have to set that aside, to try and experience it as these men of Galilee were experiencing it.  Here was yet another unprecedented occurrence, something never before seen, and unlikely to ever be seen again.  What would you be doing in their place?  I dare say, you’d be doing the very same thing, staring at the point where He did finally disappear from sight, and waiting to see what happens next.

These men had been through such a roller-coaster ride of highs and lows, witnessed so many things, just in the last month, that would overwhelm our senses were we in their place.  And now, here is Jesus, the impossible man, doing the impossible once more, lifting off into the sky, riding a cloud, and passing from their sight.  The scene, at least as presented here, does not exactly set the stage for this as final act.  In his coverage of this event at the close of his gospel, Luke includes some details not noted here.  “He led them out to Bethany and, lifting His hands, He blessed the, and while doing so, He parted from them” (Lk 24:50-51).  Okay, so he adds some detail there, but also omits the explanation of what that departure entailed.  Sounds like He just headed out without them, but no.  They would hardly have accepted such a thing at this point, would they?  His departure in Luke is His ascension here.  What is perhaps more shocking is that Matthew and John make no mention of this at all.  But I digress.  My point here is that it’s no wonder they stared.  They didn’t yet know what was actually happening.  There is no notice, at least in Luke’s coverage, that the heavens were once again rent open, in order that He should pass.  The greatest oddity – well, hard to say, really, which is greater – is that cloud apparently dipping down to give Him a lift, like some sort of heavenly Uber.

They were still getting used to having Him back with them.  Things had changed, to be sure.  It was no longer constant company, no longer the same discipleship program they had known previously.  But at least He was back and explaining things once more.  Yes, He had just given them an assignment, but it wasn’t the first time He had done so.  It was, however, the first time He had taken flight like this, and they could be forgiven for wondering what came next.  What would this impossible man do now?  What, exactly, was this all about?  It needed these two men to explain the point to them.  And they, I note, are as much in wonder as these men to whom they have been sent with explanation.  Though, for them, the wonder is that they don’t get it.

So, what just happened?  Jesus didn’t just float off.  He didn’t soar away into the distance until He had disappeared from view.  I mean, He did, sort of, but as a cloud-rider – yet another impossibility.  And that just makes the distance that much greater before He had been lost to sight.  After all, one presumes the cloud was bigger than a footstool.  Perhaps not, though.  It’s not as though Luke gives us anything to go on as regards its size.

But stand amazed with them.  All of history has been spun out around this central axis point, not unlike the arms of our galaxy spinning out from the central core of that black hole.  The distinction is that history is spun out across time in both directions to its farthest extent, and its spinning out encompasses not only time but meaning.  All that has transpired from the first moment, when God created the heavens and the earth from formless void (Ge 1:2), when that first light blinked on in the expanse of sidereal heaven (Ge 1:3-4), was spun out from this moment, this forty day period encompassing the crucifixion, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus.  All that has transpired since, and all that shall transpire up unto those closing moments of which Peter speaks, and which John tries to describe for us, when this present order is folded up like a scroll, and the New Jerusalem come down – God’s kingdom firmly, fully, and finally established on earth: All of this spirals out in the opposite temporal direction from this same central point of Light.  He lives!  He has conquered death.  He has righted the course of things made wrong by Adam’s sin.  Oh, we can look around us and see plenty that seems to be returning to the chaos of that formless void.  The world, it seems, has gone made.  I would argue it’s not just appearance, but reality.  The more man has sought divorce from God, the further into madness he has spiraled.  But God has not.  Unlike Artemis the great, with whom we shall have brief encounter much later in the text, His being does not depend on belief.  Quite the opposite.  Belief depends upon His being, and on that basis discovers meaning and order in this mad world, and finds a compass by which to navigate its currents true so as to reach that farther shore which is our true home.

You know, scientists still seek that big bang to explain existence.  And should they ever manage to find it, they will have yet to explain it.  “It just happened,” isn’t an explanation of any sort, let alone a properly scientific explanation.  But here it is.  It’s not at the beginning, it’s in the middle, just as it seems there lies a black hole at the middle of our galaxy.  Though, as I understand black holes (which is to say not much at all, honestly), it should be slowly sucking the galaxy in, not spinning it out.  Perhaps it overate.  I don’t know.  But here?  Here is all of history expanding outward in every direction from this explosive, central moment.  And because of this central moment, there is meaning.  Because of this central moment, there is hope.  To take the old song, God has made a way where there was no way.  Behold the impossible Man!  Behold Him and rejoice.  Behold Him and receive Him as both Savior and Lord, for He is both.  He has redeemed, and He has long since earned the right to command.  Happy the man who complies and relies on this Rock, Christ Jesus!

Anchored in History (02/09/26)

Now, many throughout the history that has unfolded forward in time from this crucial moment find the moment itself unbelievable.  Perhaps this is why Matthew leaves off at the commandment delivered, making no mention of this fantastic moment.  It is, after all, the stuff of fantasy, exceeding even the porous borders of science fiction.  Jesus resurrected was hard enough.  He has included wonders, to be sure.  Mention of the tombs opened and dead men roaming the streets would already be enough to challenge the willingness of modern man to accept his writing as history (Mt 27:52).  He does not specify whether these were ghostly, spirit forms, or shambling zombie forms.  Either way would be hard for us to accept as real.

But here’s the thing.  This is not some mythological tale concocted by committee.  Indeed, the variance in details lends greater credence to the testimony.  This isn’t something cooked up in advance to con the rubes.  Peter makes the point explicitly.  “We did not follow cleverly devised tales when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.  We were eyewitnesses!  We heard God the Father Himself proclaim as to this Jesus, ‘This is My beloved Son with whom I am well-pleased.’  We heard this with our own ears atop that holy mountain when we were with Him there” (2Pe 1:16-18).  Hear John as he begins his first epistle.  “We heard Him.  We saw Him with our own eyes.  We touched the Word of Life.  He was manifest before us, and we bear witness to what we have seen when we proclaim to you eternal life.  That life was manifested to us, He who was with the Father and yet was with us.  What we have seen and heard is what we proclaim to you” (1Jn 1:1-1:3a).  Paul adds the detail that there were “more than five hundred at one time,” who saw Him post-resurrection (1Co 15:6).  Now, I confess that I had that relocated to the Ascension in my thinking, but that is not in fact what he says, only that “He appeared.”  And that, before other events, so strike that from my view of events.  Still, His resurrection is so thoroughly attested.  Bear in mind that at the time Paul wrote that statement, most of those witnesses were alive and well and available to confirm what he said.

Beyond that, we can easily observe that the Apostles, those selected as eye-witnesses, were just that.  They were those who had been there at the baptism of Jesus, when the Holy Spirit descended, and the Father pronounced His pleasure in the Son.  They were there at the crucifixion, when the skies were darkened, the veil of the temple rent top to bottom, earthquakes occurred, and the dead walked the streets.  They were there when that tomb, sealed by a boulder rolled downhill across its entrance, and guarded by a Roman military contingent, turned up empty, not robbed, but the grave clothes neatly put away on the shelf where the body should have been.  They were there when He stood among them in the upper room where they had retreated in fear.  And He ate with them.  He talked with them.  He made Himself available to touch and confirm His physical presence.  They knew how unbelievable these things were.  They had found them unbelievable.  And they recognized the need for sound witnesses to the events they were to describe.  As they sought a replacement for Judas, Peter stressed this very point (Ac 1:21-22).  No wonder, really, that Paul had such a challenge defending his position as Apostle.  Had he been there at the baptism of Jesus?  We have no mention of it.  And were it so, I would expect he would mention it in establishing his credentials.  Was he there at the crucifixion?  Quite possibly.  Many from the temple had come out to mock.  There’s little reason to suppose he wasn’t among them.  But again, he makes no mention of it.

Back to my point.  There were witnesses, and these witnesses, though few, were more than sufficient to establish the validity of their testimony.  And God saw to it that they were sufficient.  The signs and wonders which accompanied their testimony were needful in a way that perhaps no longer applies.  I don’t intend to dismiss the possibility that such gifts continue.  I do, however, note the singular challenge these twelve faced, trying to convince a credulous world of the veracity of their claims.  Just think how many other religions were popping up.  Asia Minor, it seems, was full of them.  Men went off to a cave, poisoned by the air, came back barely alive, but spinning out visions, and poof!  Here’s another religion born.  And many of them had similarities to the true history told be these Twelve.  Many a religion had as its god one who died and came back to life.  Greek mythology and Roman mythology both had at least one deity with that feature.  Egyptian mythology had it.  Canaanite practices had it.  So why put any more credence in this one?  The signs and wonders gave concrete reason to believe the possibility of that message they bore being truly true.

There were witnesses.  These weren’t private matters or privileged information.  It didn’t require elaborate rites of passage before one could be let in on the secret knowledge.  Everything was laid out from the outset, open to question, open to inspection, and supplied with sufficient cause for belief and acceptance.

Simply stated, what Luke unfolds for us in this book is not some new mythology.  It is not an elaborate hoax.  It is real history.  His record as a historian has been repeatedly challenged, and just as repeatedly vindicated by the evidence.  Hard, archaeological evidence.  It hasn’t required devoted theologians spinning out theories to explain apparent discrepancies.  Cold hard rock has made those apparent discrepancies dissolve, as historical record confirms the historical record of Luke and Acts, and through these, confirms the rest.  Jesus really was born of a virgin.  Jesus really did live and teach in Galilee.  Jesus really did die on a cross, tried by the very real Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, betrayed by the very real Judas Iscariot, tried before the tribunal (however corrupt in its execution) of the Sanhedrin.  Names are named.  Dates certain established.  These things happened.  His death was confirmed.  His restoration to life was confirmed by more than enough witnesses to satisfy a court of law.  His ascension was every bit as real.  His existence in heaven, seated on His throne, pleading our case before the altar in the heavenly temple, is every bit as real.  His return, whether in our lifetime or yet at some far distant date, is every bit as certain.  All of history is His story, and His story unfolds precisely according to the long-established plan of the Trinity; planned before the beginning, right down to the details of yours and my salvation and maturation in faith.  He knows.  He’s got it all covered.  And He does not lose.

Thank You Father for the enormity of this assurance.  Thank You that You have indeed established a record of trustworthiness, given us plentiful cause to believe and to trust.  You have been faithful longer than there has been a creation to be faithful to.  You are unchanging, unchangeable, and perfect in holiness, love, righteousness, justice, mercy, so many things.  And You have called me Your own.  Wonder of wonders.  I look at the mess even of the last weeks and cannot fathom why You should bother.  But You have bothered.  You have loved me in my unloveliness, and have undertaken to make me whole.  Oh!  How I rejoice to know that You are yet at work in me both to will and to work for Your good pleasure.  Find me malleable.  Find me ready and willing.  And if You don’t find me so, make me so.  You are able to make me stand.  I am not able to stand alone.  So, thank You again, for I know You are with me and I know You shall remain with me, that I may, in due course, come home to You to be with You forever.  Oh, glorious day!  Even so, Lord!  Even so, come.  Bring history to its successful conclusion that men may rejoice in Your magnificence, and these present trials may become less than a memory.

Two Men (02/10/26)

If the world would need confirmed witnesses in order to receive the truth of these events, so, too, those who were appointed to be said witnesses.  For all that they had been with Jesus these last three years, and for all that they had enjoyed times of deeper teaching with Him, there was so much they still did not truly understand.  And this event of His ascension was high up on the list of things not understood.  Without the report of these two witnesses, sent to confirm what He had taught them of the necessity of this very event, they would quite likely of been thrown off once more.  I’ve noted the roller-coaster of emotions they’d been experiencing in recent months, one could fairly say in recent years.  This could have been the breaking point, had they been left to stare in wonder.  But God was with them.  Our theme is once again in evidence.

Jesus had told them of the events that were coming.  He had told them that His crucifixion was a necessary part of God’s plan.  He had told them, as well, that He would survive His death.  But human beings are what they are, and they simply could not accept this.  For all that resurrection was a shared belief in much of Israel, and for all that they had seen Him raise Lazarus from out of the grave, the mind simply would not accept the evidence and extrapolate from it.  His death threw them.  His return shocked them.  And now, just as things are getting back to something more nearly like normal, He has departed, and in a fashion unprecedented.  They don’t get it.  Perhaps, given time, they might think back upon the example of Elijah taken up in chariots of fire to be with God.  They might.  But again, that’s stuff known in head-knowledge, but hardly known of experience.  Honestly, were such a thing to happen to us today, I doubt many of us would just accept the evidence of our eyes, even prepared as we are.

Thinking forward, if our understanding of the Rapture has in mind the disappearing of the faithful from the earth in a flash, or if it takes from Paul’s description and sees a literal lifting up into the clouds ala this scene with Jesus, how many of those who remain do you suppose would simply nod and accept the evidence of their eyes upon witnessing that event?  I know we want to think that it would be undeniable.  And it would be.  It’s not like those absences would go unnoticed.  Now, whether they would lead to catastrophic events as vehicles and such are left with no one in the driver’s seat, I cannot say.  It’s a time of judgment for those who remain, so maybe God would be inclined to let carnage unfold as a result of His retrieving His own.  But it feels a bit off to me.  Still, it’s His call.  It’s His story.  But my point is this:  For those who remain, the human mind being what it is, there will be a strong propensity for manufacturing an acceptable explanation for what just happened.

You could look, I suppose, at how different factions view events in the news of late.  People see the same videos, the same evidence, but come away with wildly differing beliefs as to what they have just seen, and neither, having formed their opinions, seems capable of receiving even the possibility of any other explanation.  The mind is a powerful thing, but it is readily deceived into believing patent nonsense rather than accepting evidence that is too far afield from prior experience.

All this to say that Jesus takes pains to ensure that they do understand.  He sends emissaries to explain, “two men in white.”  This choice of description really plays down the event, to my thinking.  Okay, so two guys in white tunics happen along.  Hey, you’re out in public, even if it’s the relative remoteness of Mount Olivet.  It’s not a private enclave, a gated community or some such.  People may pass by, and what of it?  And I wouldn’t suppose that white clothing was all that uncommon.  After all, you take wool, or flax, or cotton, and make cloth of it, it will tend toward that color.  And dyes would be expensive, one would think.  However, Luke, perhaps intent on keeping the focus on Jesus, plays down his description.  He doesn’t simply say, two angels appeared.  It’s not like he’s unfamiliar with angels, or too rational of mind to give them credence.  His account of Jesus’ birth is full of angelic references.  He acknowledges Gabriel, the angel, sent to inform Zacharias of his son (Lk 1:19), and Mary of hers (Lk 1:26).  He notes the angelic visitation which sent the shepherds off looking for this Jesus (Lk 2:9), not just one angel, though one primarily spoke, but a multitude (Lk 2:13), praising God.  But here, it’s just two guys in white.  No names, no display of unearthly powers, just the white robes.  That’s all they have to indicate their origin and position.  And it is enough.

Now, there is a primary factor, I think, to be found in their number.  Recall that for Jewish law, truth is established on the basis of two or three witnesses.  (Dt 19:15b – On the evidence of two or three witnesses a matter shall be confirmed.  2Co 13:1 – Every fact is to be confirmed by the testimony of two or three witnesses.  Heb 10:28 – Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.)  That last, particularly as it echoes the context of the first, gives us even greater cause for their presence here at this moment we are considering.  What these men were being tasked to do would indeed be construed as setting aside the Law of Moses.  It’s that very reason which set Saul so firmly upon the intent to destroy them before he became one of them.  Something new had come.  The Law of Moses had not, in fact, been set aside, but rather, fulfilled and transcended.  There is that in what we read for men’s group this week.  “When the priesthood is changed, of necessity there takes place a change of law also” (Heb 7:12).  “There is a setting aside of the former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness, for the Law made nothing perfect, but also a bringing in of a better hope, by which we draw near to God” (Heb 7:18-19).  Change was needed.  The old wineskin of Law could not contain the new wine of grace without destroying both.  Such a spiritual earthquake would not survive on the basis of a few uneducated men, nor would they, with their respect for the religion of their upbringing, readily undertake to cause such an earthquake without significant proof of God’s involvement in it.

So, two men in white, their robes testifying to their purity as well as their position.  These are not random strangers, but heavenly messengers.  I have to believe the whiteness of their robes was of a nature not found in nature.  And it is designedly intended to put them in mind of other events, for some, events of prior experience.  Three of them had seen Jesus in a moment of such transcendent whiteness.  Now, I don’t suppose these angelic visitors are glowing in that same fashion, but there is something in their apparel and their appearance that strikes a chord with them, marks them out as belonging to that other realm.  For the others, perhaps there might be recollection of the occasion of the Lord’s visit with Abraham to inform him of the child to come to him and Sarah.  It was the Lord who spoke, but there were three present.  In this moment, the Lord has spoken, but there are again three present.  And those other two are as clearly part of His contingent as in the case of Abraham.  However it is that they understood who these were, they did.

And on the testimony of these two, the truth of the thing they had just witnessed was firmly established, to the satisfaction of the Law, and to the satisfaction, more critically at the moment, of their own powers of reason.  He has not just wandered off.  He isn’t just taking a joy ride through the skies, and He won’t be circling back to land among you again just now.  He’s “been taken up into heaven.”  That wording, it’s like being pulled aboard the train as its departing, or pulled out of the water to stand on the deck of a passing ship.  I think perhaps the latter is more apt.  Jesus had been, as it were, awash in the sea of an earthly present, but it was not and is not His natural habitat.  God rent the heavens and came down in the form of this man born to a virgin child of Galilee.  God once more rent the heavens and hauled Him back into heaven from whence He came.  This, of course, fulfills Jesus’ prophecy regarding them seeing Him as the ladder between earth and heaven.  “Truly, truly, I say to you, you shall see the heavens opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man” (Jn 1:51).  Indeed, He is Jacob’s Ladder.  And here was that ladder extending into heaven.  And here were angels come down.  Coincidence?  I think not.

But the message was delivered, and the message was received.  Jesus is in heaven.  He has taken up His place on the throne.  But note the gospel hope.  He will be back, this very same Jesus, and not another like Him.  And when He comes back, it will be in the same way you just saw Him go.  It won’t be another occasion of some child born in some backwater village.  It won’t be another man among men.  It will be this Jesus riding in on a cloud just as you saw Him ride out.  And we know from His own testimony that when finally that day comes, there will be no question about it.  There will be no doubt of its occurrence, and no need for somebody else to come tells us He has arrived.  The whole world will see it and know it.

Fear not, little ones.  God is with us yet.  He has not forgotten us here.  He has not abandoned us here.  He has not come back already and we missed our flight.  No!  Your faithful Shepherd knows His sheep and calls them.  And they hear Him.  They follow Him.  They know Him and trust Him.  This is our story.  It is our story because it is His story.

On Earth (02/11/26)

These two men we have been considering address their words to what are to them a known party.  “Men of Galilee!”  This is another clue that we are not just dealing with a pair of passing locals.  Locals might recognize the country dialect of these Galileans.  It was apparently distinct enough to make their background evident, kind of like how we would recognize a voice as coming from somebody raised in a southern state, being from up north, or how others would recognize our New England background by hearing us talk.  They might not know which state, but that it’s an out-of-town accent would be evident.  But these know where.  Men of Galilee.  We know who you are.

Perhaps they knew as well how Galileans were perceived by men of Jerusalem.  These were the backward folk.  They weren’t Samaritans, but honestly, they weren’t all that far removed from them, either.  Galilee was, after all, ‘the Region.’  It was Galilee of the Gentiles, a place where Jew and Gentile lived in much closer proximity, and perhaps in greater harmony, than you would find in Jerusalem.  Here was where the Hellenized Jews were found.  Here was the Jewish life influenced by Greek culture, and to the purists in Jerusalem, that was a great offense.  Add that they were uneducated.  I don’t know how fully educated the average Jerusalemite would have been, but come into the circle of religious leadership and education was important, certainly.

The background of that region has become somewhat familiar to me over the years of studying the Bible.  And as I consider the central role the events of Jesus’ life play in the course of history, and how God has orchestrated the whole of history to focus on that central event, I find it particularly telling that He chose Galilee of the Gentiles, not Jerusalem of the Jews, to be the place where so much of this played out.  Jesus was a Jew, to be sure, but He was also a Galilean, born in the region of greatest cultural variety, to a family raised in this region of great cultural variety.  Eerdman’s observes that here, not only did you have the Hellenistic influence of the Greeks, but also the influences of Phoenician and Syrian practices.  Here, too, I suppose, one could expect residual effects of that period of division in the kingdom of Israel.  So, let’s just say that opinions in regard to Gentiles might be a bit softer here than would have pertained in Jerusalem.  That’s not to say that Law had been diminished in their eyes, but in application, there may have been just a bit more mercy.

What I had not realized previously, or at least it had not registered with me, is that after the fall of Jerusalem, when the prophetic judgment of Jesus was proven true, Judaism had to relocate.  The city was no more, for all intents and purposes, the temple clearly so.  What to do?  Curiously, they apparently relocated into Galilee, and it was here that the Talmud took form.  I don’t know if calling it ironic is appropriate, but I do find it interesting that this proud religious crew found it necessary to relocate into the homeland of their nemesis.  Come back to Nathanael’s comment to Phillip.  “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” (Jn 1:46).  And, of course, the invitation that followed.  “Come and see.”  And here was the remnant of Judaic leadership relocated to this place from which no good thing could be expected.  I don’t know.  It just strikes me as somehow humorous, and all the more so as I consider God’s hand in events.  “Come and see.”  They came, but would not see, refused to see.

But these men of Galilee, they saw.  They saw things those Pharisees and Sadducees had claimed to long for, but refused to accept.  They saw, and they believed.  The evidence was overwhelming.  It would take the tutelage of the Holy Spirit to sort the meaning for them, but they believed.  This Jesus, whom you crucified, is indeed the Son of God, and He is currently seated on His heavenly throne.  Repent, therefore, and be saved (Ac 2:36, Ac 2:38).  Come and see.  And that invitation still goes forth, and the God of Creation, maker of history, still proves Himself true, giving man ample reason to believe.  And still, for all that so many have rejected Him to His face, He loves us enough that He gave His only Son to die for us, that we might live to Him.  Amazing.  This is love, says John (1Jn 4:10):  Not that we loved God, but that He loved us.  He sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.  And John’s conclusion?  “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1Jn 4:11).

So, let us stand with these men of Galilee, whatever our background, whatever the world’s opinion of us, and behold the Son.  Let us see and acknowledge this One Who rent the heavens and came down, this One Who alone descended and ascended, our eternal High Priest and King, who reigns forevermore.  Yes, bow down to Him.  Love Him.  Hear Him.  Obey Him.  He is Lord of all.

In Heaven (02/12/26)

These two men have a message for our friends from Galilee.  Jesus has been taken up into heaven.  Now, linguistically, we run into a bit of difficulty because surprisingly, Greek has but one word to encompass sky, sidereal space, and the unseen abode of God, which I take to be Paul’s reference in speaking of the third heaven.  It’s all one word.  Whether we are considering the dimension in which birds fly, clouds drift, and planes soar, or we are considering the stars and galaxies at which our telescopes stare, or this place known only by reputation, it is the same term that Scripture uses in speaking of it.  Even in these three verses, we have the term used, it seems evident, for two very different things.  They were gazing, staring really, at the sky into which they had watched Jesus departing in, and these two witnesses inform them that Jesus has been taken aboard, as it were, in heaven from whence He will at some point return.  Indeed, even in their comment, we have both forms.  Why are you looking into the sky?  That can’t refer to heaven, for who could look into it?  But if we take the later references as likewise addressing only the sky, then the Apostles ought to expect that cloud to come zooming down fairly immediately to deposit Jesus back on the ground.  It would also have rendered the entire deal little more than a stunt – an amazing one, to be sure, but still a stunt.

No, Jesus has been ‘taken up from you into heaven.’  I am still amazed that so momentous an occasion has so little coverage, and that in such plainspoken language, almost downplaying the wonder of it.  But then, I come back to a thought I find I have often when we get these glimpses of the indescribable.  It’s there when we find Isaiah in the heavenly throne room (Isa 6), or Ezekiel’s visions (Eze 1), or John’s experience (Rev 4).  These descriptions, as awesome as they are, leave us with little to hold onto.  We read their descriptions, but there’s no concrete reference by which to establish a picture in our mind’s eye.  It doesn’t help that some of the materials to which things are likened are not such materials as we are familiar with.  We may have handled some bits of jasper, but most of us probably wouldn’t know it if we had.  And honestly, the pictures I see of jasper stones leave a pretty wide range of possibilities as to appearance, even as to color.  Sardius, at least per a quick search, appears to be more generally brown or amber colored, but not necessarily so.  And even with that, I see some pictures that show what is little more than polished rock, others that show a more transparent, jewel-like composition.  All to say, we have a description, but we don’t really have a picture.  And no wonder.  As I have often observed, how is one to describe the indescribable?  How do you convey in words a scene the likes of which you have never before seen?  There were wheels with eyes all around.  What does that even mean?   They had four faces, or four heads.  How does that work?  What does it look like?  I don’t know!  I just know it is something far and away outside of my experience.

Such mysteries naturally pique our curiosity.  We are not fond of unknowns.  And we can even make it a question of pious inquiry.  This is God’s home, after all, and loving Him, we’d like to know more about Him.  Further, by His promise and His arrangement, this is to be our home as well, and we’d kind of like to know where we’re going, how to pack, what to expect.  But He hasn’t told us, not in any great detail, certainly.  We know the important parts.  He shall be there.  It is a place utterly glorious, so glorious, really, as to defy description in the terms we finite beings have in our employ.  But it shall be to us a place of eternal happiness, wherein we shall behold our beloved Savior and King as He truly is.  This we know, for He has told us.  “It has not appeared as yet what we shall be.  We know that, when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him just as He is” (1Jn 3:2).  John had seen a glimpse of that on the mountaintop, but only a glimpse, only a part.  Moses had seen God’s backside, and that, only as it passed the crevice in which he was withdrawn.  And that was enough to change his visage for a time!  Yet he did not die, and that in itself was a miracle of godly mercy.

This we know.  And we know there is a temple there, for Scripture speaks of Jesus’ death and resurrection serving to cleanse that temple as well as the earthly.  We know there is a throne in heaven, for on several occasions, we are given glimpses of it.  And we know that Jesus is now seated upon that throne, set there by the Father to rule and to reign over Creation.  We know that no evil is permitted entrance into that realm, no sin, nor any residual effect of sin.  It is a place where every tear has been wiped away, every regretful experience expunged from memory.  Nor can any temptation gain entrance.  There, we shall be free of the trials of this life.  It is a place of eternal rest, where we shall be with our God and enjoy Him forever, growing, somehow in our knowledge of Him across all time.  Oh!  Blessed hope!

Much of the world around us views our interest in heaven and heaven’s God as no more than a coping mechanism, a fabrication of the mind by which it seeks to deal with the unpleasantness of life.  And to be fair, in certain straits we may very well express a readiness to be gone from this mess and home where all is as it should be.  We are not alone.  I think, for instance, of Paul, stuck in a Roman prison house, wondering what is to come.  “I am hard-pressed!  On the one hand, to depart and be with Christ is very much better.  On the other, if I remain, it will be to your benefit” (Php 1:23-24).  Serve the kingdom here, or be home in the kingdom?  Tough call.  For most of us, I expect that what makes it tough has more to do with what’s familiar and what remains something of an unknown.  For Paul, and I suppose for all who center their lives on Christ and His mission, it has far more to do with what will serve that mission best.  But it’s hard to maintain that mindset that, “to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Php 1:21).

All that being said, the hope of heaven is not some fabricated coping method.  Yes, we recognize that present injustice requires that there be a supreme Justice to balance the books, as it were.  We recognize that life is not without meaning, nor man a mere accident of cosmic rays playing across undifferentiated molecules.  Man is a creature of reason in a reasonable universe.  He explains things because things are explicable.  He invents things because the means of their invention can be discerned.  He establishes meaning, discerns meaning, requires meaning.  And if he is wise, he discovers the basis for all meaning in God Himself, Who has set all things in their order.  We may not be able to apprehend His purpose in every nuance of unfolding history.  We may not perceive the good in such things as strike us as ill fortune.  We may even wonder at times how a good God could permit such events to transpire.  But then, we aren’t God.  He is.

The thing is, He has revealed Himself, declared Himself.  He has done so in the orderly and infinitely varied nature of the universe He created.  He has done so in the very nature of man, who has been created in His image.  More directly, He has done so through the written revelation of His work, His character, and His commands.  This is Who I Am.  This is what I require of you.  Here are good and justice defined.  Here is the way in which you ought to live, how you should deal with one another, and what you should do when things fall apart.  It’s all there.  There is explanation for why the world around us is such a mess, why we fail to love one another as we ought, why we are beset by wars and greed and every other sort of sinfulness.  And there is hope.  God knows.  God sees.  And He will in fact repay each according to their deeds.  That is at once a great comfort and a great concern.  For we who believe are not any less capable of sinning against others, and if against others, then of necessity against God.  We have plenty for which to give account, and if that were the whole of it, we should be utterly despondent as those who know with certainty that God is Who He says He is.

But we have this certain hope within us, that all of these present injustices will be set to rights when comes that final day.  Now, we speak of it as a final day, but it is only final insofar as this present order is concerned.  In reality, it is as much a first day as a final one.  Here begins the soul’s full experience of eternity, for better or for worse.  The wise man, seeing that day ahead, and knowing it to be entirely unavoidable, seeks to prepare for it now.  That preparation is not the stuff of the survivalist, stacking away canned goods and ammo.  No, it is seeking as best we may to live as we ought, seeking to live such that we are doing right by all men, and doing right by God, seeking Him in open and earnest confession when we find ourselves once more falling far short of the mark.  We seek to live in the present with an eye to that glorious future, in hopes not so much of earning our place therein, but in demonstrating here and now that place already reserved for us by the gift of His grace.  “I go to prepare a place for you, and I will come again to receive you to Myself, to be with Me where I AM” (Jn 14:2b-3).  That wasn’t just for the Apostles.  The promise stands, an inheritance assured for all who believe and trust in the One by whom we must be saved.

Some have sought to posit that heaven and hell are little more than the conditions we create for ourselves here in this life.  And in fairness, we are capable of making life something of a living hell.  We are capable, as well, of giving it the feel of heaven on earth.  My wife and I were reading a bit last night from a book concerned with deepening the love relationship.  But the author, for the moment, is focused on the euphoric phase of falling in love, when everything is wonderful, and nothing negative can enter our thoughts.  Now, his point is that this, while natural and to a purpose, is not the reality of love, but more an innate, call it primal urge.  But you know, I look at that description, and I look at how our life in heaven is described, and I incline to think that this is more a case of the soul’s hunger for that heavenly vision.  These periods of euphoric love are as a foretaste of what we shall experience.  But we continue to live in the present, in the fallen state, and as such, it is but a foretaste and cannot be sustained.  There remains the hard work of loving from the confines of our finite existence.  And let me just say that failure to put in the hard work of loving our spouse can indeed make life to be rather hell on earth rather than a foretaste of heaven.  It is not the only way to make life such a torment, but it is perhaps one of the fastest and easiest ways to do so.

But be that as it may, both heaven and hell are a reality, and both are a reality far wider in scope than anything we can properly grasp in our finitude.  Eternity eludes us in this present form.  We get the concept, but we cannot possibly get the sense of it.  We cannot perceive it.  We can barely conceive of it.  Yes, yes.  God is infinite.  He has always been and always shall be.  We can state this, but it remains beyond us to truly comprehend the implications, or what that must be like.  How are we to properly understand this Being who exists entirely of His own will, with no dependencies, no linear timeline, no time?  Here is One who knows the end from the beginning, so far as I can discern because He experiences both as one, along with all that from our perspective transpires in between.  Here is one for whom time, distance, dimension, really have no significance.  We know He is, and we know He is as He is, but we do not, cannot know just what that is like.  I see I am arriving at my segue to the last part of this study.  “Now we are children of God, but it hasn’t yet appeared what we shall be.  All we know is that we shall be like Him when He appears, because in that moment we shall see Him just as He truly is” (1Jn 3:2).  We don’t know what that’s going to be like, but we know it’s coming.

We don’t know just where it is that we are to go, but we know it’s not here.  I am struck by that description Luke gives of the baptism of Jesus, when “heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended” (Lk 3:21-22).  Heaven breaks through on occasion, tears through the fabric of the universe around us, not in some permanent fashion such as an earthquake might tear through some region, but as a temporary pulling back of the curtain, or a tent door opening to allow passage from without to within, or from within to without.  The two, heaven and earth, remain separate realms, whether the one exists somewhere out beyond the borders of the universe, or whether it is more a parallel realm interwoven with our own, but of some other dimensions undiscernible to us, who can say?  We will, I suppose, know in due course, but we don’t know now.

A stray thought occurs to me as I consider this.  You know, we have this current scientific mystery regarding the theoretical (at least I believe it’s still theoretical) necessity of some dark matter to satisfy the equations which describe the universe we see.  There is a need, it seems, for some unseen, unsensed something to explain the behavior of what we can see.  Would it be all that surprising to discover that this unseen something, which science opts to call dark matter, is in fact this other realm, this perfect, third heaven in which God has His eternal abode?  I wouldn’t stake anything on that idea, but I thought I’d throw that out there.

Let’s get back to what we can and do know.  There is a heaven, wherever and whatever that may be.  It has broken through into our world on occasion, as God determined it necessary.  These breakthroughs have been witnessed by real men in real history, the events recorded in real words for our benefit.  We’re not talking myth and legend.  We’re talking history.  We’re discussing things for which witnesses remained at the time of writing who could confirm or deny what was written.  We know there is a God in heaven, and He has spoken.  Those insisting that He hasn’t stopped speaking are not entirely wrong, only in their chosen application of that idea as an excuse to set aside what He has said previously.  He speaks and He speaks consistently.  He is Truth, and Truth does not change.  He is Perfect and has no reason to change.  What He told you was true yesterday remains true today.  What He told you was sin yesterday remains sin today.  His standards don’t shift with the tides of popular opinion.  His standards pass judgment on popular opinion, and will, in due course, hold every popular opinion, and the outworkings of such opinion, accountable.

So, yes, we know there is a heaven and there is a God.  We know there lies ahead when heaven shall in fact touch down on earth, establishing in full a realm into which no evil, no sin, no sorrow, no temptation may enter.  We know, too, that outside the borders of that domain lies a darkness impenetrable, a region utterly devoid of God’s presence, and of any goodness, any kindness, any hope.  This may be more difficult to explain than heaven itself.  If God encompasses all, how can there be a place where He is not?  But somehow, there is, and that place will make the smoke and the stench of Gehenna seem like nothing.  Think of the absolutely most miserable, soul-crushing place you can imagine.  Then amplify it and amplify it again, square the impact repeatedly.  You still won’t have touched the misery of that other eternal outcome reserved for the devil and his agents, the reviler and the evil-doer.

“But, beloved, we are convinced of better things concerning you” (Heb 6:9), you who have heard the Lord’s call and have, inevitably yet volitionally responded.  We know this much as regards our future.  Heaven shall be our home, and we shall indeed behold the glory of our God and King in full.  That vision to which John encourages us should indeed encourage us.  It should also motivate us.  As he himself continues in that place, “And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure” (1Jn 3:3).  No, we do not arrive at perfection, not in this life.  But we set ourselves purposefully to the task of improving.  We do so not for fear of being punished otherwise.  We do so not as seeking to earn our passage.  We do so for the love of Him Who has called us and made us His own.  We do so because He first loved us, and we desire to love Him as we ought, not just that euphoric falling-in-love ecstasy, but the hard stuff of loving as we ought, learning to speak His language in our own words and actions.  And that, dear ones, might just be a bit of heaven on earth.

What Now? (02/13/26)

It may not seem as though a passage such as this offers much by way of application.  We are not, after all, likely to observe Jesus live and in person, let alone riding the skies in this fashion.  We are not likely to experience angelic visitations, as heavenly messengers come to explain the significance of something we have witnessed.  Yet we have wonder in our lives, don’t we?  We have, I should think to a man, experienced the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives, His whisper in our mind’s ear.  We have likely experienced, in one way or another, His direct involvement, perhaps even intervention, in the events of our lives.

But it’s not the experience, the thrill, the sense of wonder with which I am concerned at present.  We see the impact of this most significant of wonders upon those who saw it.  They stood agape, staring into the sky, and wondering what would happen next.  This, I think, is the problem with a faith built solely on seeking signs and wonders.  Should we gain the experience of them, they wind up not really informing our faith, just stirring our emotions.  The meaning evades us because the things we see are too far beyond our experience for them to make sense.  The meaning is lost in wonder.  So, yes, they stared.  Yes, they perhaps tried to imagine what Jesus would do next to amaze them.  But they didn’t understand, apparently.  Even if they had been hearing Him well as He explained Himself, still they wouldn’t understand.

It’s the sort of thing that nothing can really prepare you for, rather like the death of a loved one.  That may not be the best of parallels to choose, but it’s what comes to mind.  You know this one is nearing the time to depart.  You know it is inevitable.  You may even feel it would be for the best, given what they are dealing with, whether the ravages of chronic disease or merely the standard decay of aging.  Assured of their faith, you may be fully convinced that they will, with their passing, be gone to a much better place.  But however much you have tried to prepare yourself for the shift, however much you may have explained to yourself the good that would come to them in leaving this life, when the moment comes, it still hits full force.  It still hurts.  It still wrenches our emotions, leaves a hole in our experience, a wound.

Jesus, of course, wasn’t dying.  He’d already done that.  It didn’t stick.  This was different.  And yet, in many ways it was the same.  There was a hole in their experience.  His absence hurt.  In this moment we are observing, the Holy Spirit has not yet been sent forth to fill that hole.  There is just the ache of absence, and the dawning realization, perhaps, that this time, it was permanent.  They would not see Him again, not in this life.  But in the moment, in this brief snippet of time into which Luke allows us to glimpse, there is no clarity.  They don’t know what He has just done and they don’t know what He’s got planned for an encore.  They don’t know what it’s going to mean for them, whether depths of sorrow or heights of joy.  They’re stunned, utterly at a loss.

We, in some sense, stand with them, witnessing this scene.  We have the benefit, of course, of having that which remained future for them as part of our historical record.  We know how things turned out.  We know what this meant, at least for certain values of knowing.  We have already heard these two messengers.  We have heard the Apostles in what they spoke when understanding finally came, and the Holy Spirit gave them speech.  We have tasted and seen that this Jesus, whom they have just seen taken up into heaven, is very much alive and well, and fully engaged in the lives of His brethren.  We know, with as much assurance as these eye-witnesses would come to have, that He will in fact be back.  It may be in our lifetimes, it may not.  It might be today, for all that.  Or, it might not.

Some of us get terribly caught up in seeking to scry out the moment.  Some live in an almost painful expectation of imminent return.  It’s hard to tell, sometimes, whether the pain is at the thought of His coming too soon, or at the thought of His delay.  We are not the first to experience this anxious longing or anxious concern.  Scripture addresses it, as we saw in the epistles to Thessalonica.  And yet, many are very much submerged in the Thessalonian experience as they seek to live in faith.  Others, I fear, become lackadaisical about it, certain it won’t happen in their lifetimes, and perhaps convinced that it won’t happen at all.  At any rate, they live as if it won’t, barely demonstrating the least concern for living out this faith into which they have been purchased.

It’s hard to shake the influence of James, as Table Talk is walking us through that book this year.  His emphasis on evident faith, showing in works which accord with faith and give proof of it, is convicting.  I hear of conditions in Malawi, and I know of the potential issues with offering material support in that culture.  And yet, to offer prayers and nothing more when I know I have the capacity to help at least a little…  The same pressures of conviction apply where my wife’s ex is involved, as he cares for their handicapped son with no particular means of support.  His transportation has failed, and yes, we could no doubt underwrite his purchase of some other vehicle, or pay towards his food.  And something in me rises up and says no, I did not sign on to be his support as well as supporting our children, my wife, my church, myself.  But something else hears James loud and clear, and says, what should you then do?  If your love stops at the border of, “I’ll pray for you,” and let’s be honest, oftentimes, love stops at the claim that we will, but in reality, we may not give it a further thought without something reminding us of your plight.  The email comes in from the prayer chain and rather than stop and spend time in prayer, we glance briefly at it, maybe toss of a quick note to God, maybe little more than acknowledging the request, and move on.  Delete.  It’s forgotten.  Others, I know, are much more organized and purposeful with their prayers, notes taken, times scheduled, the list reviewed regularly and set before God.  Thus far in this life, that is not me.  But God may yet change me in that regard.

The larger point is this, though:  However near we have come to the experience these men are having, however we have come to know that this Jesus is real, alive, and truly Lord of all, what are we doing with it?  We know He’ll be back.  How is that impacting your day to day life?  We call Him Lord.  But do we in fact treat Him as such?  We sing the words.  “If You say go, we will go.”  But will we?  Or will we, like those examples Jesus gave as warning, list off the reasons why we must delay for the present.  Sorry, Lord, but I’ve got these new purchases I need to deal with.  I’ve got these new relationships I need to develop.  I’ve got things to bury.  The stuff of this life is my current focus, and when that’s done, maybe I’ll follow You.  But the stuff of this life will be there until it isn’t, and when it isn’t, it’ll be too late to follow.

Listen up!  He will come back.  If indeed you are among those He has called by name and made His own, you will be with Him forever.  That ought to be a thing to anticipate to the uttermost.  We ought to be standing with John and saying, “Even so, Lord!  Come quickly!”  That’s not to say we dismiss matters of this life.  That’s not to suggest we just hole up and wait.  No!  We are left to be in this world, to be His emissaries to this world.  We are left, by His command, to walk out our faith in Him in this life, to live as we claim to believe.  If we truly recognize that this Jesus, of whom we read in the pages of Scripture has in fact been taken up into heaven and is even now seated upon His throne, and also even now entering into the Holy of Holies to pray for us, it has got to change everything.  How could it not?  How could we come to such a belief, such a realization, and not be changed to the uttermost?  He is God, and He has loved me.  He has loved me enough to wrest me free of my former ways.  To be sure, the ways I had taken to following were leading nowhere good, and more than likely to an untimely death.

Now, I have to pause and state plainly that in reality there is no such thing as an untimely death.  God sets the time, and things happen as He determines.  Still, from our experience, our point of view, it often feels as though this one or that passed far too soon.  It may very well feel like our own old age has arrived far too soon.  I know I often feel this way, that I have too much of life to pursue yet to be looking towards the exits.  I see others whose life has been so full of pain, from whom age and wear have already taken so much, that I rather wonder why they hold on to this world.  You know what lies before you, why cling to this?  Heaven awaits, so why?  But who knows?  I may very well be just a stubbornly anchored in this life when my time nears.

All that aside, Jesus is, and that changes everything.  He isn’t some historical man of renown, like Caesar or Plato or Da Vinci, or whoever else may stand out to you.  He is absolutely a real man who lived a real life in real history.  But He is so much more.  He has not ceased to be.  These others have.  Hmm.  Can I actually say that?  There awaits a resurrection from the dead for saint and sinner alike.  But Jesus, you see, has already passed through.  He is already a resurrected Man.  He is also, as He ever has been and ever shall be, wholly God.  He IS.  And in His ISness, He has made us His own.  The Father of all has given us as a gift to His Son, and His Son is determined to honor that gift to the uttermost, by presenting us whole, utterly cleansed of every least stain of sin, on that day when He comes to fulfill His kingdom on earth.

So, how shall we then live?  How shall we now live?  We, who know that in due course we shall know Him as He truly is, and enjoy Him forever, how ought this to inform our present day?  How will this demonstrate in our actions today?  In my workplace, what does it mean that He is?  In my home life, what gives expression to my experience of that reality?  How does it change my interactions with my wife, with my daughter on those occasions when we talk, with others with whom I come into contact?  How does it demonstrate in my dealings with strangers at the store, on the highway?  It ought to change everything.  Arguably, it has to change everything.  And yet, everything, as we well know, continues, and we often just continue along with it.

I honestly don’t have answers here.  I have concerns.  I sense the necessity of the shift, but I do not feel the shift.  This same Jesus will return.  This King of kings whom we know to be in heaven, and yet, let’s be honest.  We’ve never seen Him.  We cannot point to any concrete experience of Him.  Even in that moment of my conversion, the voice of God whispering in my head, I cannot rightly claim as a concrete experience.  It was convincing.  I’ll give you that.  It was absolutely convincing when combined with those days that followed, and nothing could ever convince me otherwise.  But it is still a far cry from, “what we have heard, what we have seen, what we have handled, touched, concerning the Word of Life manifested to us” (1Jn 1:1-2).  Yet, the reality of His being is just as important, for all that it is less directly the stuff of experience for us.  He is Lord.  His Word is Law, albeit that His Law is Love.  His grace is extensive, infinite as He is infinite, yet His grace is His to impart or not as He sees fit.  What He has given He can, with all justness, withdraw.  He is bound by nothing but His own oath, His own essential character.

We like to think that we are likewise self-determined.  We are not.  We are moral agents, with moral culpability for our choices, but we are not self-determined.  We are not automatons, but we are not self-determined.  Our being is dependent as His is not.  And if we truly grasp that reality, then once gain we must ask, how should I respond?  How should I spend my days?  How should I speak?  What should I do?  In every moment of the day, I am His.  Paul spoke truly when he said, “my life is not my own.  It is no longer I that lives, but Christ lives in me.”  If we are able to say this along with him, then it must be that this Christ who lives in me is evident.  And if He is not, I must seek to repent in truth and in full, that He may.

God, I know I have a long ways to go with this.  Even as Jan and I work through a difficult patch in our relationship, a patch made difficult, I must confess, largely by my own inattention, I know too well how readily I can just slide into familiar pathways, decide things have calmed down and I can get back to just being who I am.  But who I am is not who I am.  I am Yours.  And in too many ways, on too many occasions, I submerge that reality in favor of being a jerk.  This ought not to be.  I know it.  You know it.  I am not who I was.  And yet, so much of who I was continues to be who I am.  And I would have it otherwise.  You would have it otherwise.  Lord, I want this to change.  I want it evident that I am Yours.  I want You clearly visible in me, not as slogans, not as an article of clothing or jewelry, but as my character is formed after Your character, the imprint of Your presence impossible to miss in the expression of my being.  Would You please work with me on this, and grant that I would be working with You?  Keep me attentive, caring, soft-hearted and moveable to Your prompting.  I want to be ready and active in Your service when You come.  I want to be ready and active in Your service all the days remaining to me until that time.  Have Your way.