Not Yet, but Soon

Many ask me, “When will you do this or that?” My answer is always the same: not yet. I’m still waiting. I do not yet know what I wait for; I only know I’ll recognize it when I see it. It seems unbelievable that a feeling, a voice, and a spiritual certainty should be the signal to begin truly living.

I have lived my entire life with my eyes pointed to that day — the day we are with Him, when separation is cast to the outer reaches and unity is once again fully known. The ascension. When we are called to Him in the clouds. I long for it not merely as escape from suffering — perhaps a bit of that — but chiefly as homecoming. To be fully known and to know fully at the same time: that is what I long for. That hope will hold me through another day’s hardship.

My whole life has been a journey toward Him. I confess an eagerness in this final stretch, a soul-deep longing for what it will be like. Can you picture it? No more sorrow, no more scorching heat of the sun, no more sickness, no more pain, no more death, while the Father Himself shelters us and is our light.

I often ask, what will the Heavenly Jerusalem be like? I cannot picture it though I know the words of it. I know the walls are like clear gold, transparent. I know the Father and the Lamb dwell at the center, and from them flow the river of life. On its shores the Tree of Life bears fruit in season and its leaves bring healing. The walls lie foursquare with gates of pearl, never shut, for there will be no night; the Father at the center will be their light.

These descriptions come from the book of Revelation, and yet even knowing them I cannot form a full picture. I long for that place not for its physicality but for the realized reality of it — to speak face to face with the Father. The thought makes me shiver: terror and joy braided together. What will it be to live continually in His presence? What will it do to our souls? What will it do to our life together?

Perhaps life now is both purification and preparation for what we will one day witness. Perhaps we can rest more fully and faithfully in His design when we consider what has already been done and what is now unfolding.

So perhaps today is the day that people ask me about. Perhaps it is the signal I have been waiting for to begin truly living. Or perhaps living is already the long pilgrimage toward our shared retirement in paradise. I look to it carefully and with great longing, and I strive to live with intentionality toward others and toward Him.

As always, Dust

To you,

For you,

From Him,

In me.