by David Brenneman
When reading in Revelation this morning I was awestruck by something in Chapter 8. When John begins writing of the things he saw and heard, constant praise. adoration and worship is found to be happening all around him.
It's quite powerful and honestly loud...that in Chapter 8 we read not only of something significant but of something significantly missing.
Silence in Heaven for about a half an hour.
All praise and worship is quieted for about 30 minutes, which in and of itself is interesting since Heaven exists outside of time. But the perception by John was that it was 30 minutes.
It's astounding that in a place of holy worship of God the Father, God the Son and God the Spirit that silence would have a place in Heaven.
People may scoff at the idea of there being a God but history proves otherwise.
People may scoff at what Christianity is and wonder at how people could 'fall' for it.
People on the outside of a life in Christ can never understand what it is to be on the other side of living life.
Let's just speak to the last 250 years.
So much has happened that people never believed possible.
At the turn of the 19th century people had no clue what even the next 50 years would be like. In those 50 years alone vast transformation of cultures of economics of science and technology would happen. Being fully honest those people thought such things as being impossible. As I read once, any technology sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from magic. What people in the year 1900 would think of even a black and white television would consider that magic.
If they could get past that to looking at a color television to seeing videos of things people 'normally' do today they would think that witchcraft and magicians took over the world.
They would decry it all as "impossible!".
We look at the book of Revelation again.
Read through Chapter 8...the trumpets are about to sound...there perfect absolute silence as is only found in a perfect Heaven being interrupted by perfect blasts of angelic beings.
Nobody believed that a World War was possible in 1900. Yet it happened not just one time, but a second soon followed.
Countless smaller wars continue until today. It's now so commonplace that the news outlets rarely report on it.
In a great many countries Christian people are being murdered within 24 hours of coming to the truth in Christ Jesus. Not to much differently to those of the 19th century people today in denial of that happening. Much less that in a country like the United States that THAT could be a valid reason to be killed by itself.
Satan wants to silence Christianity. It speaks to his greatest failure.
When Jesus said "IT IS FINISHED!" that was it...Satan lost. From the moment that was spoken by Jesus, Satan's future was sealed. When Jesus arose from the dead, furnishing proof of that victory over sin, death and the grave...silence couldn't happen. The only silence came from Satan. He has been fighting every day since to find a way to silence those who keep proving that Jesus arose from the dead.
As I heard last night...how you view Jesus is how you will view people. If your view of Jesus is one where He's walking past people with His chin in the air you will be looking down on people and not helping them.
Whether or not those in the 19th century believed that war was coming on a global scale it did. God brought it, God allowed it, God directed it, God completed it. In surges humanity burst forth towards fulfilling Bible prophecy with each war, with each country that arose and those that fell. Your view on life should be to be aware, to be ever looking for Jesus to be coming back. Your view on people should be as though today maybe being that day. Your possessions, your achievements, your job, your health all are to be directed towards obedience in Christ Jesus. To telling others that Jesus loves them and that He died for them and is coming again.
Jesus made it simple...love God with everything in us from us through us and love people.
If you're one of those clinging to the idea of impossible things...consider it well that you are living in an impossible world from the viewpoint of those who lived in 1900.
Those people never dreamed that Israel would be a nation again...yet God did it.
People 10 years ago never dreamed that Jerusalem would be recognized as the capital of Israel...yet God did it.
God is indeed the God of the impossible.
You may think your life is too messed up, too dirty, too filled with being worthless. Jesus loves you anyway. He loves you enough to take your sins and cast them as far as the east is from the west when we come to Him for His free gift of salvation.
Silence where there's been unending praise and worship in Heaven is extremely powerful. It shows the vast significance of the seriousness of God concerning sin when every being in Heaven every human and angel is quiet.
Think about your view on life on Heaven on Hell. Think about it and look to Jesus and ask yourself if what He's offering is what you've been looking for all your life. You may think it's impossible but God says "Try Me!".
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