Glory! Glory!

While out at the cemetery in the very late part of the afternoon which was also the very early part of the evening, I noticed midst the sorrow that took me there, a sunset so beautiful it was beyond description.  I stood there for a moment in a place littered with tombstones that told the stories of lives lived, simply overwhelmed by the unfolding orange glory in the sky.  Most likely anyone who saw it from their corner of the world stopped and took a second look as well.  I only know to say it was glorious.  Perhaps, it was even beyond glorious.    

But, hardly had I paused to see and allow its glorious light to settle in my soul when it was gone.  Oh, it was glorious indeed, but unlike the glory of the heavenly place, it was a fleeting moment of glory.  Heaven is surely such a different dimension of life.  Heaven's glory is not fleeting, but eternal.   Who can imagine living immersed in a glory that does not end, one that forever shines resplendent and full of majesty, one that bears such an imprint of the God of the great throne room that those sainted souls who see want to bow their knees and lift their voices in surging praise to the One who has brought them to a glory of which we mortals can only catch glimpses in the creation around us.   

It is good to know that Jesus said to His disciples and all of us as well, "I go to prepare a place for you."  (John 14:2)  And how we are comforted by that holy dialogue in Revelation when the ones robed in white are pointed out to John, the Apostle and writer.  As John beholds, those angels speak saying, "These are those who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb...and...they are before the throne of God....and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."  (Revelation 7:14-15, 17).  To read the Word is to be blessed with a vison of glory that  so greatly transcends the pale glory of the evening sunset that it hardly seems right to speak of them in the same breath.  Thanks and praise be to the Holy One who plans to take us Home.