What is the greatest potential which this day holds? The greatest potential is not that we might see one soul come to Christ; this is certainly immense among all human privileges, but it is not the single greatest possibility for today.
A physical healing for you or one close to you is a monumental occasion but it cannot rest atop this list either. An answer to a long awaited prayer would be a relief to our souls – yet this also falls short of what I’m seeking to say here. You see, our lists of great events could lengthen yet none of those events deserves to perch atop the crowning potentials that could occasion themselves on this day of great grace. What then should be our deepest thirst, our highest aim and or most sought-after delight?
That whatever occurs in us, to us, around us or through us…the glory and fame and name of Jesus Christ would be experienced and magnified.
All of the things listed in the first paragraph are beautiful potentials. Salvation and healing and answered prayer are hugely important to man. Yet we must recognize that these titan events are merely means to an even more glorious end. The yearning for the Christian is that their Master would be known and, therefore, this one thing rests at the top and inhabits the core of all our desires: the glorification of God before the eyes of man. Christ must be known, magnified and experienced. This is not some subjective, vague notion. This is the most precise and abiding aim of all the redeemed. Our souls are ill at ease until they echo the glorious name of Jesus Christ.
Let us pray for salvation. We should petition for healing. Fools we would be if we prayed but expected no answer to those prayers. Yet, if God should approve nothing we seek then let us be empowered to rejoice that He will be glorified in His delays and denials. May His relentless investment in us yield the fruit of our ongoing happiness in Him alone- not primarily in what He does but, rather, in who He is. May we laugh in the wash of grace instead of wallowing in the stain of our sin. Let our songs engulf our complaints, let our Bibles saturate our parched hearts. May the love of the brethren eclipse our innate pettiness as our pointing fingers become helping hands. Holy Spirit, empower us to ask the Father what He desires in this day before we present our presumptuous lists of demands. As we ask, let us first have sought. Before we knock, let us linger at the threshold and remain amazed that we have been allowed to ever find the door in the first place. While we tremble in the shadow of our needful pangs, may we remember that He already knows what we will request.
He is an unspeakably glorious God and I am convinced that my greatest joy in Heaven will be the ongoing revelation of all that I never knew of Him while on earth.
Never forget that He is greater than the current understanding which we posses of Him. Heaven will be as a book we have never seen, much less read – no man knows even the title of it yet but we have graced to meet its Author. He will reveal His supremacy to us for the endless ages and our ecstasy will own us forever as we will be unspeakably stunned at His impossible glory and greatness. We will then wonder how and why we ever struggled with this issue of His goodness and reliability.
In approximately seventeen hours, I will rest my head on bedtime’s pillow. Will His great glory have remained situated all day at its rightful place atop my list? Let us wait and see.