In the beginning, when God made Adam and Eve he explained that they would bond together so tightly that they would become "one flesh." Another place he said that a man should leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife.
And when Carla and I got married, the preacher said, "What God has joined together, let no man put assunder."
A marriage relationship is the closest possible relationship a man and woman can have on this earth. It is the highest realization of love that we can know. That is why God uses marriage to tell us how intimate he wants to be with us.
In Revelation 19:7-9 John writes, "Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready. And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints. And he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are the true sayings of God."
You and I can become the spiritual wife of Jesus Christ. In Genesis you can read where a man "knew" his wife and she bore him a son....
That is the complete way that Jesus wants us to know each other. Completely and intimately. He wants us to understand that He is willing to send His Holy Spirit to actually dwell inside of us, to become a part of us, to control and direct us. To actually create a new life out of our old one.
You can see this in the verses above. The fine linen, clean and white that the "bride" wears is the righteousness of the saints. These saints are pure. That is what white worn by a bride signifies, that she is a pure virgin. She has saved herself for her husband on their wedding night. These saints are pure. They have not worshipped other gods. In fact, the marriage supper of the Lamb (Jesus) is a victory supper. It will take place in heaven after He has taken all the saints back with Him at His second coming. Just like a man sort of is the "victor" and has won the woman over all the other men who might have wooed her, the Lamb has married all these pure saints. And we together will have a victory supper.
David wrote about it in Psalm 23 "He preparest a table for me in the presence of my enemies." This is the table of the victory supper at the triumph of the Lamb. These saints have chosen HIM!! They are united in spiritual marriage to Him. They have become ONE with Him. They have His Spirit filling them completely. They have chosen to follow Him completely.
Thus the deepest love between a husband and wife is used by Jesus to begin to try to describe the incredible union that He wants to have with us. He loves us and wants us to become ONE with Him. And God sent Jesus to come and die for us, to enable us to reclaim the wonderful relation that Adam and Eve had before they sinned.
We will actually spend eternity being able to talk to our Maker face to face. And it will be a life of Joy, of fulfillment, of satisfaction. I want to "marry" Jesus, don't you?
Sincerely,
David A. Youngs
I recently saw a video in which dolphins were happily playing with rings of air in the water. You know, God made the dolphin to enjoy playing with rings of air, silvery vortexes in the water that they can create. Isn't our God a great God!! Even the animals play and have fun. Does our God really want us to have joy and happiness?
Of course He does. He created us to enjoy our lives. One of the very first fun things that Adam got to do after he was created and then God woke him up, was to look at all the animals God created. God actually brought each animal to Adam, one by one. Of course he was fascinated by them. He could see their form and function. He could sense their total and complete enjoyment of life.
Then God gave Adam the privilege as the first man of naming all the animals. You can read it right there in Genesis 2:19, 20 "19 Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field."
Imagine if you will all the fun and incredible pleasure seeing and naming all the animals must have been for Adam. Even today we go to the zoo -- to do what? To see the animals God created, because it is a lot of fun. And we watch nature programs on television. WHY? To see the animals that God created, and marvel at their diversity. So here is Adam, and God brings all the animals to him. What an incredible time that must have been!!
"Adam," God might have said, "Look at this big animal. What do you think about this one?" And Adam would say, "Wow, it certainly does have a long neck, and look at those long, long legs. It stands so tall God. Why did you make it stand up so tall like that with such a long neck?" And God would say, "just wait a minute Adam, and you will see why." And then the animal would reach WAY up in the air and way up in a tree and eat the fruit found in the top of the tree. "Now do you see why Adam? I wanted it to be able to get the upper fruit from the trees. You can reach the lower fruit, but this long legged, long necked animal that I created can reach the fruit way up in the tops of the trees so that fruit can serve its purpose too. "Oh yes, Jesus," said Adam with a happy chuckle. "Now I understand. I think I will call this animal TOP FRUIT EATER." And Jesus laughed and said, "that is a very good name Adam. Yes. That is what we will call it. Top Fruit Eater."
Of course Top Fruit Eater in the language of heaven sounds a lot like "gee raff full" in our language which today we have shortened and compressed so when we see a Top Fruit Eater we just call them a "giraffe."
That first day of Adam's life must have been a whole lot of fun. And that was only the very first moments of his consciousness. Yes, God created all his creation to be full of Joy, of Happiness, and of Life. And the good news is that when God restores everything back to the way it is supposed to be someday soon, His creation again will be full of joy, happiness, and life. And I believe that then God will bring the zoo to us too. "Look at this animal that I have made," Jesus will say, "What do you guys think about this one?" I want to go to heaven and see God's zoo with no bars, no cages, no limitations, and the animals will live forever--don't you? Because I am pretty sure that we are really going to have a lot of fun there. Lets go...
This is David Youngs sharing a moment in God's word.
Sincerely,
David A. Youngs