Day 43
My Ultimate Hope
I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. [Revelation 21:2]
Joni Eareckson Tada, who was paralyzed in a diving accident as a teenager, talks about the day she got married:
I felt awkward as my girlfriends strained to shift my paralyzed body into a cumbersome wedding gown. No amount of corseting gave me a perfect shape. Then, as I was wheeling into the church, I ran over the hem of my dress, leaving a greasy tire mark. My paralyzed hands couldn’t hold the bouquet. And my wheelchair, though decorated, was still a big, clunky machine. I certainly didn’t feel like the picture-perfect magazine bride. I inched my chair out to catch a glimpse of Ken in front. There he was, tall and stately in his formal attire. I saw him looking for me, craning his neck to look up the aisle. My face flushed, and I suddenly couldn’t wait to be with him. I had seen my beloved. The love in Ken’s face had washed away all my feelings of unworthiness. In his eyes, I was his pure and perfect bride… How easy it is for us to think that we’re utterly unlovely — especially to someone as lovely as Christ. But He loves us with the bright eyes of a Bridegroom’s love and cannot wait for the day we are united with Him forever.
The Bible speaks of our resurrection and reunion with Christ as a wedding feast! In today’s passage, the wedding metaphor is expanded to include the day all of creation — heaven and earth — is reunited with God perfectly. That day is our ultimate hope! And that’s what we’ll focus on this week.
Even though we know we’re loved and accepted just as we are, the wedding will bring about a transformation:
No more struggle with sin.
No more suffering. No more tears. No more loss.
Reunion. Reward. Restoration.
This is the great hope, to which every other kind of Christian hope points! As Joni says, “On that day I will dance!”
Question to Consider
What do I know about the Bible’s promises of resurrection hope for me?
Prayer
Lord, thank You for the promise of resurrection, and for the reunion and restoration and release that go along with that hope!
