When the Lord restored the Zion....... (Ps 126)

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When the Lord restored Zion,
we were like those who dreamed.
2 Our mouths were filled with laughter,
our tongues with songs of joy.

If there is one thing I need, it is to have God "show up." I don't post much in "the chapel" for a number of reasons. I just thought this issue was worth posting about.

Most of the time I and Christendom are arguing a set of abstract principles to those who do not wish to believe. This is an empty task. If there is one thing I need, it is for God to "show up" to his people, so that He is once again a living, thinking, communicating acting PERSON, and not just a dessicated hulk of a belief that we cling to out of ... I dunno... habit, reasoned belief, culture, memory.... maybe all that and a bit more.

When that happens, it is like .... "this is so good it cannot possibly be true" and it is like the best dream..., the kind you never want to wake up from. Sometimes coming to God is like waking up from a grey, sterile, empty vapid dream and you come out of the insubstantial, swirling mists of the husks of a so called "life." I get that. It is also true that when God comes to his people, there is a joy and fullness and vibrancy of pure ENERGY OF LIFE that it is almost overwhelming. Christianity certainly is not ALWAYS like that, but if there is not some element of the romantic, the mystical, the "dread of the holy" and what Paul calls the internal calling of our hearts to "Abba, Father"... then we have cause to question our faith, no matter how orthodox and biblically sound it may be.

So, the number one element of this is in v2. We laugh. Laughter can be lots of things. It can be about things that are incongruous, funny and weird. It can be about jokes on any number of subjects. It can be surface sneering and mockery and ridicule (the only laughter hell knows). However the laughter of God is the kind when you see reunions of people who are genuinely fond of each other. They laugh. Out of pure joy. Nothing "funny." Just a bubbling out of a stream of goodness, celebration, happiness and just "I want to swim in this moment" kind of emotion that comes bubbling out in laughter. That is the kind of exuberance that awaits us in eternity and busts in to our drab colorless existence here when GOD SHOWS UP to supercharge and energize our lives.

The number two element is... we sing. The mark of the church of Jesus Christ is a joy which cannot find expression except thru song. I remember working with tribal people who knew NOTHING of the gospel, the bible, or Jesus in Colombia. They would come to the base where we were studying their language to translate the New Testament into their language (Wycliffe Bible Translators). The interesting thing to me is although they did not understand one word of what we were using to worship (they did not even speak Spanish, and we worshiped in ENGLISH), they were irresistibly drawn to the services. When I asked, the guy who worked with them just said "they like the music." The profundity of that hit me and has stayed with me over the years. You don't have to understand it to smell it. It is the fragrance of heaven.

So, my prayer on this Sunday a.m. is NOT for the unbelievers here (I do pray for them), but for all of us who do believe, and who need God to show up, and be real in and to us. I think the first step in that is just to ask.

The best pic of this comes from a cucumber plant on my porch. The sun, and lack of water, had just completely wilted, drooped, sagged and dragged this plant earlier this morning. It looked like my soul so much of the time. Dry, empty, and really only worth yanking out and throwing out.

Here is what it looks like 2 hours after watering. Not perfectly restored, but CLEARLY ALIVE.
Hope that is you and me todayd3ceef07-320b-4e24-a00d-03537a116dc6.jpeg
 
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