Yup, Word Press congratulated me! Four years today! To celebrate, I’m re-blogging my first post with a bit of tweeking to fit the season.
We just celebrated the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul. It was he, who said in a letter addressed to the Roman church (Rom.5:20), “Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more” Well, here’s the vision, as it was told to me. I want you to picture it so that you feel it with your heart:
You and I squeak in, passing through those towering Pearly Gates. People of all ages overwhelm even our enhanced understanding of the generations descended from Adam and Eve. We can’t wait to embrace them. We know them intimately. Instantly, we know their stories. These are those who lived Salvation history.
“What was it like?”, we ask over and again? These, after all, are those who walked dry shod through the walls of water escaping Pharaoh’s chariots. Here, too, are the masses who had pressed upon the Christ. They’d witnessed the manner and miracles of Jesus. Some has eaten the bread and fish He’d multiplied. Others admitted that they had shouted, “Crucify Him.” Others had stood along the way as He pushed on to Calvary. The martyrs from all past centuries were among the most joyful. They now rejoiced that their blood shed for Christ seeded the proceeding eons to bear fruit in such as we.
For all our eagerness to express our gratitude to them and give glory to God, they pressed the more upon us, for their need is to know our stories. “Tell us,” they asked, “how black did the times become when men who pretend to knowledge denied life in the womb. How dark were the days in which the hearts of mothers died, choosing to bring forth corpses instead of living children. You, who lived with blindness and deafness, how did you survive? Like Peter, was it repentance that re-ignited your flame? How did you find courage walking the Valley of the Shadow of Death? How bright was the Light that brought you home?”
That Light is shining now, on everyone. Who will guide the blind and who will lead the thirsty to the Living Water, if not you and me.
It’s time once again for
Be Holy! 