The day of His appearing will come at last!

You know what I thought of today?

I thought to myself, "Self, your homework will always be there. You could spend all day on homework, and only be a little bit farther along than when you started. But you do not have everyday this week to spend many hours with the Lord."

And so the finishing of Luke grabs my attention and makes me scramble for my hymnbook and these words:

'"Man of sorrows,' what a name
for the Son of God who came
Ruined sinners to to reclaim!
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

"Bearing shame and scoffing rude
In my place condemned He stood
Sealed my pardon with His blood!
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

"Guilty, vile, and helpless we,
Spotless Lamb of God was He;
'Full atonement!' Can it be?
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

"Lifted up was He to die
'It is finished' was His cry.
Now in heav'n exalted high!
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

"When He comes our glorious King,
All His ransomed Home to bring
Then anew this song we'll sing,
Hallelujah! What a Savior!"

Who can believe those things that happened? "The sun's light failed" for three hours. The temple curtain was split. Men beat their breasts in sorrow and remorse at what had happened. "Truly this was an innocent man."

who now lives outside the temple and brings innocence to us whose heart's light failed and joy in hope to us whose lives consisted of sorrow.

"Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has been raised!"

Do you ever just feel sad and that's all?

As I sit here "studying", I get sidetracked easily. My mind just needs to know. I'm learning, but not the test material; and part of me wishes I could just learn without tests.

But no matter, the thoughts that strike me tonight are ones of longing. All of them. And all of them about different things. Longing for the people I love to stop making stupid decisions. Longing for the Lord Jesus. Longing for unity with Him. When I won't have to look at Him through this dark glass, but see Him face to face.

There is a certain thing that I eagerly expect. It might be the one thing I don't ever question. It's so deeply ingrained in me- whether taught or not, I do not know - that I cannot deny it for more than a moment. It is the hope that there is more to this life than what we see now. If this is the end, nothing makes sense. Evil, hunger, pain, sorrow, breakups, people crushing others beneath their feet...I question all those. I question God's justice there. I question my beliefs. I question everything I have always known. But I cannot question the hope of Heaven. I may forget about it for a time, but when it enters my mind, there is no turning back. There is Heaven. There is resolution. There is beauty beneath all the drudgery.
I don't know what Heaven will be like. I know that it won't be most of the things that we picture it being; we simply can't fathom complete goodness. Even our best thoughts of what good entails are tainted by a mind that sees dimly. But as I try to ponder the unponderable, I feel at home.

Resolution. No more battles. No more struggle. No more.

My heart longs with the very deepest longing for the fulfillment of the hope of heaven.