Insightful Musings on the Scriptures
by
Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67
Greetings, dear ones.
Not much left of this year. I’m still unsure if I will be in bed before it ends. We plan to be hanging out with some old friends this evening, and it remains to be seen if we will hold up till midnight.
Laced through this last chapter of Revelation are references to Jesus’ return. To this John adds, “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus” (22:20). I hereby add my own “AMEN!”
Stay in His grace and blessing.
Love, Dad/Ray.
On this last day of the year, I’m pondering this last verse in the Bible. I’m preferring to take it as a statement of fact rather than merely a complimentary closing that John throws in—just an add-on expression of well-wishing—like “Merry Christmas!” or “Happy New Year!” I find substantial support for this view in Scripture. And it makes a lot of sense that His grace would be an ongoing supply available to “God’s people.” I base that confidence on a description Jesus gives of Himself in this very chapter—“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End” (22:13). I take that to mean that He Who has no beginning and no end is the Author and Overseer of everything that has a beginning and an end. That would include everything within the dimension of time. And that would include me—and you. I had a definite beginning (3/27/44), but my end is still to be determined. It can’t be very far away. In the mean time I am very dependent upon “the grace of the Lord Jesus.”
The glorious good news of the Biblical Gospel is this—that although we humans have a beginning and an end, our end does not need to be THE END. If we but “believe in Him” and embrace His gracious love Gift that puts us into the classification of “God’s people,” we are made to enter the mind-boggling dimension of “everlasting life” (John 3:16)—so that our end actually becomes an endless beginning—the beginning of endlessness. Add perfection to that and you have a view of heaven that won’t quit.
To be sure, we face a lot of uncertainties with this New Year. Let’s do so leaning on the certainty and adequacy of “the grace of the Lord Jesus.”