Jesus, Joy of Heaven - Jesus, Joy of Earth - Part 1

A while back I wrote a series of blog posts on a song called The Big Rock Candy Mountains. It is a fun song on the surface, but beneath that surface the message is absolutely toxic and hellish. The gist of my posts is that the writer of the song looks at heaven as an elevation and proliferation of the delights that he enjoys here on earth. He looks forward to cops with wooden legs, streams of alcohol, hens that lay soft boiled eggs, and other seemingly lovely gifts. Of course, a heaven like that is a cheap facsimile of the real heaven and the real joy of it all. It is easy for me to get taken up in the "what" of heaven. I long for the peace that it will bring me. The fact that my sinful rebellion will be over, finally, for good. Even hearing (I hope) the Lord himself say, "Well done, good and faithful servant." will be joy heaped upon joy as I lay any crowns I may have received at his feet proclaiming his praise and admitting that I just did my duty. It all sounds so wonderful and, knowing the grandeur of it all, why wouldn't my imagination be captured by it?

But it all lacks one thing. It lacks the who, the true Joy of Heaven himself.

It all sounds so spiritual and so different than the paradise articulated in the The Big Rock Candy Mountains. But that is only the surface. A single sixteenth (maybe even a thirty-second or sixty-fourth) of an inch deeper and it is all the same. Longing centered in all of these heavenly things mentioned in the Bible is still a focus on the "what" and "how". It is all still devoid of the "who". Jesus is preparing a place for his children not in an effort to get me all excited about the place but for me to be filled with love for a God that would do such a thing for me. Allegiance to a God with my hand out for more stuff is nothing of interest to him. God is singularly focused on himself and I am glad that he is. It is for my ultimate good that he is. That focus he wishes for me will not be supplanted by even the splendor of heaven for its splendor and joy does not rest in anything other than himself.

Now I admit I am not even sure what that means. I'll know much more about it when I get there. But I need to re-orient my gaze once again to my God who extends his best grace to me.