To hear this Morning Devotion, please click Better than expected
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It’s really a good thing when somebody says he or she is preparing a nice meal for you and that you should be at his or her place at a certain time.
Not having to cook is good.
Not having to clean up is even better.
Knowing that somebody wanted to bless you is better yet.
And then, when you show up and you find the meal to be WAY better than anything you’ve ever eaten, now that is the best!
You pinch yourself and than ask, “Is this really happening?” For you didn’t know that food could taste SO good.
Even if the above hasn’t happened to you, I know that you can conceive of its possibility.
To a far greater extent, this is the idea that I gleaned from a passage in my One-Year Bible reading today.
Here is what stirred me so:
“What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived — these things God has prepared for those who love Him” I Cor. 2:9
I have seen some incredibly beautiful settings and things and people during my life with some of them nearly taking my breath away.
I realize, though, that world travellers and super-model photographers have seen a whole lot more beauty than have I.
Yet, even the person who has seen the most beautiful that the world offers has seen nothing compared to what awaits believers in heaven.
Now that is saying a lot.
To see a majestic bald eagle soaring above a Smoky Mountain ridge with the backdrop of a brilliant blue sky and trees in fall colors is spellbinding.
To see a young set of parents joyfully cuddling their newborn on a picnic blanket at a lakeside park is even more compelling.
Compared to heaven, though, such pictures fall far short of the threshold established by the glorious perfection of God’s presence.
The fact is that nobody — other than the Apostle Paul — has seen anything close to the awesome glory and beauty of heaven.
And even Paul’s experience, recorded in 2 Corinthians 12, was only a faint glimpse from an extra-dimension distance.
If heaven is so amazing, then don’t you want to make sure you spend forever there?
I certainly do.
That’s why I obeyed the Gospel years ago with my verbal and baptismal confession of Christ and that’s why I strive to become more like Him as the years pass.
I want to see more people joining the ranks of those “who love Him” so that they will receive an eternity of blessing beyond what any eye has seen, any ear has heard or any mind has conceived.
Hmmmm…. I think I’ll start planning a meal that will hopefully far exceed the expectations of the invitees.
If they declare that the meal was beyond their expectations, that will provide a good trigger for my mentioning of I Cor. 2:9 and of how God yearns to bless forever those who live for Him.
This is my prayer.
Perhaps it will be yours, too.
As always, I love you
Martin
