Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh.
Blessed are you when men hate you,
when they exclude you and insult you and reject your name as evil,
because of the Son of Man.
Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, because great is your reward in heaven.
Luke 6:20-23
I have been reading in Luke lately and have been soaking up the words of my Savior. Sweet words that are a balm to my soul; words that go deeper than just letters on a page.When the Lord saw her {the mother whose son had just died}, His heart went out to her and He said, "Don't cry." Then He went up and touched the coffin, and those carrying it stood still. He said, "Young man, I say to you, get up!" The dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him back to his mother. Luke 7:13-15
"Tradition says that while Christ was hanging there {on the cross}, the angels drew their swords. They announced, 'We are going to rescue you.' God said, 'No,' and the Scripture says that God spared Him not." Billy Graham
As I read that passage this morning I could just about imagine Jesus as He walked the streets of Nain, when along came the weeping mother and the coffin. I didn't have to imagine the mother; I knew her all too well. Being the very Son of God, Jesus realized what she couldn't see at the time: that her son would one day rise again. Scripture says that Jesus' heart went out to her.
Those words were said at Trent's funeral, that one day Jesus would say to Trent, "Young man, I say to you, get up!" And Trent will rise, coming forth with a glorious, imperishable body.*
How Jesus' heart must go out to His hurting children. How hard it must be to be bound by sovereignty for the sake of greater glory for our Savior to have to wait to say those words. The pain He must feel to see mother's weeping, all the while knowing Himself the depth of their pain and the joy that is coming.
Do the angels draw their swords while the enemy appears to be conquering, while mother's cry the tears and fight back the doubts? Is the great cloud of witnesses that surround the believer amazed or disappointed for the level of our faith?*
I have often wondered what went on in the angelic realm the day that Trent headed down that ski slope: did the angels have to be restrained from rescuing this little one that they had been put in charge of*, not knowing fully, either, God's perfect and sovereign plan?
For God's ways are higher than our ways; higher than the heavens are from the earth.*
Luke reminds us to Rejoice - Rejoice! - and leap for joy. He tells the poor, and the hungry, and those who weep now that great is our reward in heaven, and that we should look forward to it; a reward so great that it's worthy of the weeping. Therefore, we go on rejoicing, trusting, and weeping day by day until we receive it and see face-to-face this mighty God who is wise enough to have ordained it all to be this way.
* Hebrews 12; Matthew 18:10; Revelation 20; Isaiah 55:9
