Day 13, On The Road To Pentecost: HOLY HOLY HOLY

Revelation 4:1-11

From Easter morning to Pentecost Sunday, we are continually called to look into the face of the resurrected Jesus and lay out our lives before Him so that He can pour the very life of God into us.  In the first century the church lived, first of all, in the in-between time.  Jesus was risen but the Holy Spirit had not yet been given.  For fifty days following His resurrection, the believers met and prayed and reflected and dreamed.  During these days Jesus revealed Himself to be alive to many people.  Today, we know that during these fifty days the believers were moving toward the dramatic and cosmic size pouring out of the Holy Spirit, but they didn’t.  Today, we journey aware that in every conceivable way, God was at work then, and God is at work now.

In our world we need to get glimpses of the resurrected Lord because He is with us today in a different way than He was with the first believers.  Today He is the suffering, crucified, and now living Lord of lords and King of kings.  Today we see Him high and lifted up, the Sovereign of the universe.  The apostle John helps us see Jesus.  In his vision on the island of Patmos, John sees Jesus “sitting on the throne.  His appearance was difficult to describe but John says, “Around the throne were twenty-four thrones; and upon the throne I saw twenty-four elders sitting, clothed in white garments, and golden crowns on their heads” (vs. 4). The throne was the center of activity and many things were happening all around the throne.  What we most need to see, however, is these words to the One on the throne,

HOLY, HOLY, HOLY IS THE LORD GOD, THE ALMIGHTY, WHO WAS AND WHO IS AND WHO IS TO COME…. Worthy are You, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and because of Your will they existed, and were created. (Revelation 4:8, 11)

We need to see Jesus in His fulness today.  In our troubled and troubling world, we need a Savior, not just someone who can get us out of the mess, but One who can enter into our stories lead us forward as One who has taken on life at its worst, all the way to death, and then burst out of the grave alive forevermore. An old gospel song by Alfred H. Ackley (1933) says,

I serve a risen Savior; He’s in the world today, 

I know that He is living, whatever men may say. 

I see His hand of mercy, I hear His voice of cheer; 

And just the time I need Him, He’s always near. 

He lives, He lives! Christ Jesus lives today! 

He walks with me and talks with me  

along life’s narrow way. 

He lives, He lives, salvation to impart!   

You ask me how I know He lives within my heart. 

 He lives within my heart.