Just last week, while sitting in our living room, chatting with hubby and our oldest daughter, something caught my eye.
A bright light was calling my attention away from those in front of me. As I looked beyond my daughters head to the night sky outside the window I was transfixed to the moon. It seemed so much brighter in it’s fullness, illuminating the clouds the as they quickly passed over it, providing a peek-a-boo experience for my eyes.
I was transfixed, mesmerized by the wonder of it’s brightness, it’s beauty.
“I will display wonders in the sky and on the earth”
Joel 1:30
Why, in the prophesies of the coming Messiah, would Joel tell us that God will display wonders in the sky and on the earth? (and the words that follow remind us that they are not all beautiful visions). Why not just say that the saviour is coming and leave it at that?
Maybe it is because we humans are pretty rooted to our earthly lives.
Maybe he knows that it takes some effort to get our attention.
Like the brightness of the moon, that pulled my eyes, my full attention from my earthly loves, God needs to use the extraordinary to get our eyes, our attention, when he is about to do something extraordinary … and the birth of a saviour, a redeemer, the propitiation or the reconciler by his blood, is the most extraordinary of all.
“Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.”
“Taking up her shawl, Mary went to the cave entrance and gasp at the night sky Was it her imagination that one star shone more brightly than all the others? It was like a shaft of light breaking through the floor of heaven and shining down on the City of David. Had not the prophet Joes said the Lord would display wonders in the sky and on the earth when the Saviour came?” (From the book Unafraid: Mary, by Francine Rivers).
itsawonderfilledlife 