“How much more will your heavenly Father give…to those who ask Him?” Luke 11:13
Over the past little while two of my best friends have been in the trenches as well as their families, caregiving for their loved ones. It’s been a challenging month for them at best, but being a spectator instead of participant I was able to watch how God was moving, preparing, and comforting both the loved ones and their caregivers. Our group held an ongoing prayer meeting for each family with big expectations and numerous requests. Through the weeks the prayers shifted to align with where we felt the Lord’s will was leading. Yesterday, the world became just a bit dimmer but Heaven became brighter by two lives. It made me reflect on my own loved ones who have planted gardens of their own in Heaven. It made me consider the sadness in my own heart with their absence. But then as I was reading my passage this morning this small verse tumbled off the page into my heart like diamonds spilling from a velvet bag.
Our loved ones are experiencing face to face ‘how much more.’ They no longer see things in part, but they see the fullness of God, not by faith but by true sight. The heavenly descriptions written in ink are being lived out in reality with their sight, smell, hearing, touching, and tasting.. How much more they are experiencing God’s light…the warmth on their faces…the beauty of God’s surroundings. What a question to ask our grieving hearts this morning! The Bible is clear of our transitioning loved ones. How much more we ask? Revelation 22 tells us a fraction of 'how much more.'
More than our polluted waters, they are splashing in ‘a pure river of the water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God.’ More than our sinful world, they are living out from under the curse of the evil one, sin and sickness. More than the beautiful paintings of the greatest artist, they are seeing the actual face of God. They will never reach for another lamp to turn on or a switch to flip, for ‘There shall be no night there: They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light.’ How much more they are reigning with God than they even reigned in our families.
When grief strikes the heart whether it’s been a day or a decade, Revelation invites us to peek into the place where our loved ones now reside and read for ourselves ‘how much more’ our heavenly Father is giving them. My grandmother had a beautiful image of how she saw my granddaddy after he died. She told me that when she thinks of him she pictures that he just got up from one side of the table and went and sat down on the other side next to Jesus. 'How much more!'
“Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, God Himself will be with them and be their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away… ‘Behold, I make all things new.’” Revelation 21:3-4
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