Even So, Come Lord Jesus Quickly come! Part 3

So I thought about how my husband and I use present day communication, our relationship is a wonderful and loving one but is forced to be different due to our separation. So we communicate through letters and email. Just like now with Jesus we communicate with Him through prayer. He is still alive and we are together, just like Mark and I are still alive and together, but out of necessity we relate differently than those three years together. I can’t see Mark but I know he is real and alive and I love him so much. Just like I can’t see Jesus, but I know He is alive and real and with me! Jesus has the benefit of being God so He can be with me in ways Mark cannot now. In fact, He has promised it as He was leaving us physically, He gave us directions and then promised He was not going to leave us,
The Holy Bible, New International Version. Pradis CD-ROM:Mt 28:18.

Mt 28:18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
Mt 28:19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
Mt 28:20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

It is funny, when my husband left he gave me all of his authority on earth in a power of attorney. He told me to take care of things and he would be back. Through letters, email and my memory he is always with me, what a great symbol of my Savior! As Christians we have such a hope and a future! Did you know that the next big thing to happen on God’s time table is the rapture of His children? Did you know that all other prophecy has been fulfilled? We are now just waiting abated breath for the return of our bride-groom!!! That is it! Pretty soon we are going to be out of here! So like the next big thing on my earthly time table is the return of my groom that is the next big thing in my walk with the Lord. Now I will keep growing in Him and life is never dull with my adventure guide the Lord! However, the next prophecy to be fulfilled is Jesus coming to get us!!! Isn’t that exciting? It means that I desperately try to stay unexcited about earthly things, all these will pass away, He is forever and He is good and He is coming back! It was this realization that made my excitement for the Lord’s return even more real and alive! As excited as I am about Mark how much more excited should I be for my Savior and the Lover of my Soul!!!
Jesus fulfilled 300 prophecies in coming and the prophecies that were given to us as signs of His return have all been fulfilled, except for the actual collection of us! So now I wait abated breath for both of Mark and Jesus!

Check out http://www.clarifyingchristianity.com/m_prophecies.shtml for more information about Jesus’ fulfilled prophecies!

Even So, Come Lord Jesus Quickly come! Part 2

The next day came and the reeling from the present the night before started to slow down and I was ready. Again I laid my heart and life before the Lord. I wanted Him to have all of me and to teach me all He had for me.
Not only did the Lord use my husband as an example of the first coming of Jesus but also the time Jesus was here with His disciples. Now do not misunderstand me, my Savior is Jesus and above all things. But God teaches by using not only His word but real life examples. Nature, the Universe and my husband all teach me more and more about Him. I am sure kids will do the same thing for me. So there I was, pondering the three years that Mark and I had together before he was again abruptly ripped from my life.
Sweet sweet memories washed over me! Mark and I camping, on road trips, morning coffee and the sound of my husband’s laughter. I love to hear it, always it is as if my heart stands still to hear. Funny enough, I’m not able to bring it forth very often but I try very hard all the time, my husband can vouch for that. Mark tends to think silently in his mind, that was funny, and that is all I get. Perhaps because I have to work so hard for it, the ripples of his laughter have the same beautiful sound to me as the ripple of the oceans’ waves kissing the beach gently in the evening. I remembered his blue blue eyes as he gave me communion during our wedding ceremony, wow, just like Jesus gave the disciples the Passover Seder!
I remembered all my hours and hours of college courses and Mark taking care of the world around me to make sure nothing fell apart. How my car never needed me to scrape the windscreen because magically the ice fell off, rather, Mark helped it off. How some way the trash always ended up in the end of the driveway when it needed to, how amazing!
Mark did it all and took care of me in so many ways and taught me so many things. For instance, life has obstacles but you have to see the beauty around the obstacles. He taught me that up hill climbs are fun and that is the way life is, sometimes you have to climb uphill, but the view from the top is so worth it. Mark taught me that there are always things to count as blessings no matter how ugly it looks. He taught me that getting up at 0500 can be fun and absolutely make the day! Yeah, I smiled and realized that this is what the disciples must have done in their darkest hours. When they were sitting in those prisons for trying to spread the Gospel that would set the captive free, they remembered our Savior, Jesus! The heard His laughter and felt His hug! They remembered the meals they shared, the morning coffees and all the great talks about God and life, love, liberty and the pursuit of Holiness!(Which by the way is a great book by Jerry Bridges) How sweet it must have been for them when the Holy Spirit inspired them to write the Gospels as writing it they were showered with memories of their time with Jesus! How they would have made sure they got it right, how carefully, prayfully and inspired they would have been to write it! I would, because so great a love, so great a God I would want every one to know exactly how great He was. Just like I so carefully write about a man named Mark and how great he is, how much more for our God and Savior! Not to mention they had the Holy Spirit guiding their words! It reminds me of the ode that John wrote about Jesus in the opening of his Gospel:

The Holy Bible, New International Version. Pradis CD-ROM:Jn 1:1.

Jn 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Jn 1:2 He was with God in the beginning.
Jn 1:3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.
Jn 1:4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men.
Jn 1:5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.
Jn 1:6 There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John.
Jn 1:7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe.
Jn 1:8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
Jn 1:9 The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world.
Jn 1:10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.
Jn 1:11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.
Jn 1:12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—
Jn 1:13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
Jn 1:14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Jn 1:15 John testifies concerning him. He cries out, saying, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’ ”
Jn 1:16 From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another.
Jn 1:17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
Jn 1:18 No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.

Sounds like an ode done in love and inspiration. So that is what I was to do in my darkest hours. Remember the beautiful Jesus, the amazing things He had done in my life and our amazing times together. Just like when I longed so hard for Mark that I was sure my next breath wouldn’t come I would bath in memories of him. So that is what I do, in moments of despair I remember He healed my eyes! In moments of loneliness, I remember that the Lord brought us together from two different states, held our courtship in two different countries and would bring us together again! I would dwell on the sweet moments I had had with Jesus and think of all the times He had carried me and lifted me up. Just like the disciples I would remember the sweetness with Jesus, and just like I remember Mark and it brings him near, it does the same thing with Jesus! Thank God that He is so gentle and so loving towards us! I knew with this special revelation that I was going to make it until my groom returned, both Mark and Jesus! But that is a future story . . .

Even So, Come Lord Jesus Quickly come! Part 1

I was smack in the middle of worshipping the Lord, when I say smack in the middle I mean it. There I was mid verse of one of my favorite songs when suddenly it hit me. What hit me is called different things by different people, some say revelation, some would say perspective, others would say I had for a second “God-vision.” This is where you see life and all its situations through His eyes and suddenly it either A) all makes sense, or B) you know why it is all happening. This event could be all of those things but my word for it is present, it was a present from the Lord. I had just been thinking,
“Oh, Lord, I want to go into the full time ministry, I want to minister to people, I want to teach those women younger than me about you. Like it says in Titus 2:3-4;

"Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God."

“I want, Lord, to share with them all you have shared with me! There are so many spouses left behind, Lord, and they need you to carry them like you have carried me! I want a cool picture to show them, just like this woman teacher just showed us!” I continued singing wondering what would be my story. Would I have just one or would their be multiples? The more I learned from these older women the more I realized that there is generally more than one adventure so that our myriad of adventures could be used to minister to multitudes of people walking a similar walk. You know when you are telling someone your trouble and they say,

“Oh, I have been there, it was so hard, I bet it is huge for you!” There is something in me that lightens! What? A sister who has walked a similar road! Then the sister in Christ begins to regale me with stories of how the Lord walked/carried her through it! We have our trials for a myriad of reasons, but to comfort a sister, what a privilege, what a joy! That was when it happened.
“You waited for Mark the first time, not knowing when you would get to marry him and live with him, for years!” I did, in fact it was four years that I waited, abated breath for my bridegroom to come to me. We were both in the military and did not want to marry after only a month long beautiful courtship so we prayed that God would keep our hearts together and bring us physically together some day and we prayed that for the next four years! When in the miraculous way God works Mark got orders to be at the same base I was. Mark wasted no time proposing and we were married! For the first time as I relived these memories the 10 Virgins parable made so much sense to me!

The Parable of the Ten Virgins
Mt 25:1 “At that time the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps fand went out to meet the bridegroom.
Mt 25:2 Five of them were foolish and five were wise.
Mt 25:3 The foolish ones took their lamps but did not take any oil with them.
Mt 25:4 The wise, however, took oil in jars along with their lamps.
Mt 25:5 The bridegroom was a long time in coming, and they all became drowsy and fell asleep.
Mt 25:6 “At midnight the cry rang out: ‘Here’s the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!’
Mt 25:7 “Then all the virgins woke up and trimmed their lamps.
Mt 25:8 The foolish ones said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil; our lamps are going out.’
Mt 25:9 “ ‘No,’ they replied, ‘there may not be enough for both us and you. Instead, go to those who sell oil and buy some for yourselves.’
Mt 25:10 “But while they were on their way to buy the oil, the bridegroom arrived. The virgins who were ready went in with him to the wedding banquet. And the door was shut.
Mt 25:11 “Later the others also came. ‘Sir! Sir!’ they said. ‘Open the door for us!’
Mt 25:12 “But he replied, ‘I tell you the truth, I don’t know you.’
Mt 25:13 “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour
The Holy Bible, New International Version. Pradis CD-ROM:Mt 25:1.

Please see Chuck Smith's commentary on this parable at: http://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/chuck_smith_c2000/Mat/Mat025.html

I thought what if during those four years I had not run to the Lord for more oil. When I said,
“God, I know that for me you have Mark, he is my one, or it is no one? It is either Mark or I am to walk this walk alone. Is it no one, Lord, we have been waiting many years?” God would say, “Wait.” He is a God of no wasted words that is for sure. So I waited, like the virgins with the lamps I started “saving” money, which to my young self meant not being in debt. I found a nice rental house ostensibly to get a dog, I had no idea that I was preparing for my groom! I got a wee car built for two, okay maybe three and if it was the right four people four, but that is it! Then by a miracle the day came, I got a phone call. It was a rare gift because on the other end of the line was the voice that I loved to hear any time it sounded. Due to Mark being deployed a lot phone calls seldom occurred;
“Danita?”
“Hello, yes!”
“This is Mark, I’ve been trying to reach you for days!”
“Oh, sorry, I’ve been out and about with the baby bro, what’s up?”
“I’ve got orders, I’m coming to you!” The world ceased to spin, my heart beat but it seemed to do it miles away and all I could hear was my breath going in and out. Stars seemed to collide in that moment and I said,
“Really!” And that was all I got out before the tear ducts burst forth their bounty and I became what I like to call blubbering.

The groom was coming, it was time to fill the oil, but what if I had not been prepared. What if I had given up and settled for less, settled for a lie, someone less! What if I had run out of oil!!!! I would never have had the joy of that moment! It is like those who decide that they aren’t going to believe in Jesus unless He walks up to them in bodily form and says, “Hiya, I’m the Messiah.” The Pharisees and the Sadducees said that and they never believed because they were not prepared to see Him the way He actually came. They knew that He was coming, He had been prophesied, they even knew the year, but they missed Him because they picked something less, they wanted power and saving from Rome, they weren’t thinking about their soul and the pit of Hell! So they picked someone else, they picked Barabbas, a murderer and zealot. They had trimmed their wick(their actions, they looked holy) but they had no oil(their hearts chased another). I said,
“God, thank you so much for showing me all this! How amazing, what a beautiful picture.” My Lord Jesus was being made even more real to me through my husband. Not only in the beauty of our marriage, in the freedom and grace, in how Mark loves me so unconditionally and supports me so freely in all my dreams. No, the Lord planned to use Mark to show me even more of Himself and to draw me into an even deeper love relationship with Jesus! How amazing!