About someone I don't know, but who I know is at peace.
- I trot once more, but my vessel no longer can bear the strain.
- For forty days and forty nights I have sailed the seas of sand.
- Yet even in the searing of the day it is woefully dark.
- Paradox wrings control of my mind.
- No water has touched my lips, no bread has slid down my parched gullet.
- Yet even still I walked, the Word of the Lord my bread, His Spirit the firm foundation and the rock from
which living waters have sprung forth.
- My hands buffer my jagged descent and meet the flaming kiss of the desert sands.
- I hear that I am without hope, but whoever speaks is a liar.
- I know my promise.
- The anchor that I have clutched onto as the will of the waves has sworn with a bloodcurdling gravel to
devour me whole.
- Still I am, in the jaws of the beast.
- Yes I know my promise: that a day draws near when God shall be with us, Emmanuel. I will dine with Him, we
will speak face-to-face, and by some means this vessel of flesh shall endure to testify and to proclaim the
Word of the Lord. A glorious blessing-- I thank You Father.
- I stagger to my feet. "A little longer," He says.
- His Word drips like honey, covers me like a spotless robe. Peace is with me.
- Yet-- with the sweetness of honey a bitterness is company. Something hidden from me. Just a little longer.
- I open my eyes.
- Vision floods my mind. The material and spiritual in strange, harmonic union.
- Though something is hidden from me there is no veil over my eyes.
- In the distance I see something I haven't in too long to recall. A man in the physical world.
- Upon the fabric of my soul a message is written. Once again my spirit springs to speak.
- My pace quickens from stagger to walk, but as I grow closer he becomes no more clear.
- As I draw near he notices me, he turns to meet my gaze. But I no longer know where his gaze is, or how many
of him there are.
- Life comes forth from my lips. Breath for his benefit. A gift.
- I know not his response, as I recognize I have given the last of myself, like the sweet serenade, the fond
farewell with which a melody departs.
- In the blink of an eye, I am absent from the body and present with the Lord.
- O, Glorious!
Refs:
- Hebrews 11:32-40
- (02-05) Matthew 4:1-11, Mark 1:12-13, Luke 4:1-13
- (06) Deuteronomy 8:3
- (06) Matthew 7:24-27, Luke 6:47-49
- (06) Exodus 17:5-6
- (06) John 7:37-39, Isaiah 58:11
- (13-14) Revelation 6:9-11
- (14-15) Revelation 10
- (25) 2 Corinthians 5:8