not of this world

Perspective comes from distance.  You can, perhaps, best appreciate a mountain when you are some miles away and it can be seen from the ground to the peak.  The view from a mountaintop is an awesome panorama of many square miles of ground, rivers, towns and farms.  This morning I was thinking about Heaven from a distance.  I suppose that is because Heaven seems to be some distance away.  It certainly is a different place than the world that is currently wrapped around us.  This seems to be reality and Heaven seems ethereal...the stuff of poets and wistful hopes.  I've just been reading John chapter 18 this morning, however, and I was reminded that Heaven is a real kingdom.  It has residents, defenders, messengers and royalty.  There is no concern about kingly succession in Heaven because the King is eternal.  When Jesus was brought before Pilate he was challenged: "Are you the King of the Jews?"  ³⁶ Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now My kingdom is not from here."  But then I remembered the end of Jesus' prayer right before He went to Gethsemane and I realized that Heaven is also in my heart: ²⁶ And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them."

 

In a sense, we who love the Lord, may be like a travel brochure for Heaven.  When we allow Jesus to shine through our personalities from the inside out we may provide a glimpse of that eternal Kingdom where He rules, where we are headed, and where there remains room for others.

 

blessings,

Rob Smith