Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread,"
The climax of the book of Revelation is not the reward that the saints will receive for their self-sacrifice in following Jesus, but the reward that Christ will receive for His great sacrifice.
It is a grand paradigm shift in thinking for us to get our minds off praying aboutourreward ("Lord, please be sure to save me and my loved ones"), and begin to think of Christ and the reward that He deserves.
Isaiah speaks of Him, "He shall see of the travail of His soul, and be satisfied" (53:11). It's like little children finally growing up so they can be mature and think of the "travail" of their mother in bearing them and of their parents in caring for them.
God's people cannot remain children forever. "Let us go on to full growth" to maturity (Heb. 6:1, 2, Darby Bible Translation), to the possibility, yes, to the blessing of being able to think of Him rather than always thinking of ourselves. This is the interesting turn that the story in Song of Solomon 5:2ff takes when the bride-to-be, warm and snug in bed on this cold rainy night can change her thinking from how much fun it is to snuggle under the covers, and begins to be able to think of her true Lover out there in the rain "knocking" on her door.
The famous "Laodicean message" has its setting in that little story, for Jesus concludes His last days' message with a quotation from that story: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock" (Rev. 3:20; taken from the LXX). The original story tells how she finally repents and gets up to let Him in; how long she left Him out there "knocking" it doesn't say; but when she got to her side of the door, she found him "gone." (In our case it's well over a century.)
We cannot always serve as the flower girl at the wedding, "the marriage of the Lamb" (cf. Rev. 19:7, 8). God's people in a corporate sense must become the "wife" at the wedding. And that must be the ability to appreciate "the travail" that the Bridegroom has gone through. With no trace of extremism, the remnant will learn to proclaim nothing “except Jesus Christ and Him crucified" (1 Cor. 2:2).
All that the little flower girl at the wedding cares about is the refreshments; the bride has begun to enter into the Bridegroom's thinking and to feel for him (at least, let's hope so; else there cannot be a happy marriage!). Those who have never learned to appreciate "the travail" of the Savior cannot be happy in His personal presence. Which is the practical truth of shutting oneself out of heaven by one's unfitness for its companionship. Let's use our last few moments of time in learning to understand.
--Robert J. Wieland
From the "Dial Daily Bread" Archive: October 9, 2007.
Copyright © 2019 by "Dial Daily Bread."
