A Year of Happiness

Today--January 13, 2011--is the one year anniversary of Mimi's homegoing, her coronation, her entering eternal life.  Jesus came and took her with Him back to heaven just as He promised in John 14:3 "And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also."  She often talked about seeing Him "face-to-face" and now she has!

        We're well aware of the sorrow we've felt this year because of her absence and that sorrow remains, but let's focus today on her and what kind of a year she has had.   We don't know what it's like to be spirit without a body but God and the angels are spirits and they manage very well, thank you.  It's a different realm.  Spirits can see and hear and communicate and love and sing praises to God.  They are invisible to the human eye, but not to each other.   This is a mystery which we will eventually understand ourselves when we, too, go to be with the Lord. 

        So what sort of a life has Minnie had this past year?  We can imagine many things, but much of it would probably simply be just that, imagination.  A better question is: what has God revealed in His word that gives us some glimpse of her life--and what eventually will be yours, too,  if you know Jesus as Savior?

        "I go to prepare a place for you," Jesus said.  So Jesus had already prepared a place for Minnie.  And what a wonderful place it must be--perfectly suited specifically for her because "the Lord knows them that are His"--and everything about her.  So the place is wonderful because God created it but it's even more special because it is individually created just for her.  "A place for you"--doesn't that sound welcome?

        That prepared place is mentioned in another passage:  1 Cor. 2:9
    "But, as it is written,    "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard,
        nor the heart of man imagined,
    what God has prepared for those who love him"—

        Because we know the character of God and the creativity of God and the grace of God and the promises of God and because we see the providential hand of God everyday in our own lives, we are well assured of how well the Good Shepherd of the sheep takes care of those who are His.  But we also have a lot of scriptures that tell us what we have to look forward to, just as Minnie is presently experiencing.   And one of them is Rev. 14:13

    And I heard a voice from heaven saying, "Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on." "Blessed indeed," says the Spirit, "that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them!"  God Himself said it twice in the same verse, Minnie is "blessed," she is "blessed indeed."  And what does it mean to be "blessed"?  It means that you are "favored of God."  It means that you are happy, really happy and satisfied and content such as you never fully experienced in this life.  "fully"--that's the word.  We've had a "foretaste of glory divine," but now Minnie is experiencing it in its fulness.  Jesus prayed to the Father that His followers "may have the full measure of my joy within them."   Minnie has that now.

        And Jesus' prayer to the Father continued, "Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world."  John 17:24 ESV  What must it be like for Minnie to see Jesus in His glory?  We've just caught a glimpse of His glory and it's totally changed our lives.   And as we "behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ,"  we are "being transformed into His image with ever-increasing glory" by the Holy Spirit who lives within our bodies as His temple.  But Minnie has actually seen Him now and scripture tells us what the effect of that was on her:  "we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is." 

1 John 3:2 "I will behold thy face [and] I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness." Psalm 17:15

          Let's do what Minnie showed us how to do every day:  "let us rejoice and be glad in it."

                                                                                              Bill Burnside (for Minnie--and for you)

Today seems an appropriate day to share with you that romantic chapter in "Mimi’s Journey," "Courtship and Marriage"  This is a pdf attachment with a lot of pictures.  Write me a comment and ask for the chapter and I'll send it to you with pictures as a .pdf file.