“I commend the enjoyment of life because there is nothing better for a person under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany them in their toil all the days of the life God has given them under the sun.” Eccles. 8:15
Heavenly Father, thank you for being honest about what we are to expect life to “feel” like between the resurrection and return of Jesus. As we head towards the Day of all things new, we still inhabit a cosmos of all things broken. Life “under the sun” is shorthand for a life of the “already and not yet.”
Jesus’ kingdom has already arrived in part, but not yet fully as it will be. Beauty and brokenness, magnificence and messiness, floral bouquet and blood-drawing thorns will co-exist and co-mingle until Jesus returns. The same relationship that yields moments of unspeakable joy and deep intimacy still generates very speakable irritation and canyon-wide disconnect. This shouldn’t shock us, but we must steward the tension carefully—bringing the wisdom and riches of the Gospel to bare on a daily basis.
Yet, Father, through all the raptures and ruptures on our journey Home—in our highs and lows, during our most Gospel-sane moments and the stretches in which Gospel-amnesia takes over—on the days we are most like Jesus and the days we are most like unconverted, nap-less, whiny 4-year-olds… in all of it, you intend enjoyment and gladness to be our traveling companions all the way Home.
Little Abba-gifts we didn’t see coming show up at the front door of our hearts. Unexpected “grace-bombs” dropped on us from heaven at just the right time. Out-of-season daffodils, Spirit-kisses from the Scriptures, a meal with friends that whispers the soon arrival of wedding feast of the Lamb… thank you Father. Pain-free, disappointment-void, all-brokenness-gone days will fill our eternity. Until then, we already have everything we actually need in Jesus. The not yet is gonna get here right on time. So Very Amen.
