LIFE THAT LIVES ON
Did you ever ponder about those who live in Heaven - what are they doing and what about everything they did on earth? Does it all just stop? Do their talents, giftings, hopes and dreams die with them or does eternal life mean that life really does go on? Are they like the angels as stated by God, unfettered in their movements? Over the past months, I wondered what John and Johnny were doing. That seemed rather normal as I do believe they are fully alive.
Over this past year, I was able to handle our finances well, take care of my home (bi-fold door coming off its track, flappers needing replacement, and various other maintenance items) even when I felt emotionally depleted. I did ask the Lord, how that could be, especially when my emotional bank account was rather low. He replied, “I am still answering John’s prayers.” I was overwhelmed with delight - wow, He, the God of the Angel Armies, was still answering John’s prayers. That meant, the prayers my husband prayed were ongoing and the answers were still forthcoming! John was concerned about what would happen to me after he left and went to live in Heaven. God, my Father, was quick to continue to make provision for me in response to my husband’s prayers.
How wonderful to know that prayers that have gone before us still are ready to spill out from the golden bowls before the throne of God in Heaven. This means that when we read the Bible, those prayers that the fathers of our faith wrote, even Jesus Himself, especially in John 17, are still being answered. They are unrestricted by time! Our prayers are unrestricted by time! How marvelous for us that we can read all the prayers the Lord Jesus Christ prayed for us and know that He will answer them so the Father will be glorified in the Son in us.
It is time to take the limits off God answering prayer and see it from an eternal perspective, not in our own selfish “do it now” attitude. How many times have we felt that God did not hear our prayers because we placed a time limit on Him. Let’s read and reread John 14-17 and be encouraged by the love the Lord Jesus shows us as He comes to the end of His life in a body of flesh which is about to be sacrificed for our redemption, healing and eternal life.
I still wonder what John and Johnny are doing, but one thing I know is that their good works follow them (Rev. 14:13) and their prayers are still effective and producing results as the Lord faithfully answers them. That is something to make one rejoice in a big way!
English Standard Version
John 17:20 - 23
“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. “
