This morning, an image came into my mind as I was worshipping God.

I saw people moving through this life, this linear, pale starter life that we live here on the earth, and every deed every word that they did or spoke was finding its place in eternity. 

The good moments were becoming part of their identity and taking up residence in their Heavenly self, but the wayward things were settling like dust falling to the ground. The dust floated down in to the dark, through a vast deep sea, past strange and giant sea creatures and found their way to the very bottom. 

Then I saw people living in a beautiful city. They went to cafes and laughed and enjoyed each other. Everything was as it should be and they truly knew each other. As they walked up to each other, they could see and experience the whole of all their good deeds, Life giving words, and the sweetness of knowing Jesus. They felt it and saw it as the very nature of the person before them. (1 Cor. 13:12)

Then I realized that some of them had had moments of war, hatred, enmity with the very people they were having coffee with, but those deeds and that side of their past was leagues below them in the sea, shed like dust, not just from memory, but from their very nature.

Psalm 103:12 says, “As distant as the East is from the West, that is how far He has removed our sins from us.” 

This image in my mind was so striking. I realized how much of my time and energy is spent on my “nakedness.” The fear of exposure of being truly known. How often do I not say what I feel or think, because of how it might be received? How much of my past do I conceal because of shame? Yet heaven holds none of that fear.

It is a place where our minds and our natures are truly clean, and we can see the good in each other, and know that they see that in us as well. We are free to be seen and known and to enjoy one another. Maybe I will begin to practice that today. 

This beautiful life is built upon Jesus. He is the foundation stone and the capstone to this city where the truly free will one day live. I hope to see you there.

Thank you, Jesus!