A Glorious Land!
Psalm 85:9

† In Jesus Name †

May the grace of God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ help you look forward to the glorious day of Christ’s return!

• What No Eye has seen… but is revealed!

I can read our theme verse for lent a thousand times more, and it will still leave me in awe of what God has promised us.

Hopefully, you will always rejoice when the expectation is laid out before you. You think about what God has waiting for you – because you love Him – because He loves you.

More incredible than the most awe-inspiring, beautiful thing you have ever seen. More amazing than anything you’ve ever heard, more mindblowing than anything you’ve ever imagined…

That’s what is waiting for us… when God brings all His people together on the day of Jesus Christ.

That is what Lent and repentance prepare us for as well. We realize what we need to leave behind… because of what is waiting.

• The picture of that day

Listen again to the description

Surely his salvation is near to those who fear him, so our land will be filled with his glory. ¹⁰  Unfailing love and truth have met together. Righteousness and peace have kissed! ¹¹  Truth springs up from the earth, and righteousness smiles down from heaven. ¹²  Yes, the LORD pours down his blessings. Our land will yield its bountiful harvest. Psalm 85:9-12 (NLT2)

Once or twice I have mentioned that what God saves us for is more important than what he saves us from. The psalmist starts to help us picture it…

God’s love and truth meet…. This means hatred and falsehood no longer exist…

Righteousness and peace kiss – meaning injustice and every kind of fighting – from family disputes to workplace arguments to gang battles and war – will be long forgotten…

Oh! How I long for that day!!!

These interactions are incredible, as we see God pouring down His blessings – and a harvest is huge – not of plants but of souls!

What an incredible picture of God creating something for those He calls His people!

It will be a glorious day when God’s love overwhelms everything – and we see reality the way God does!

• It isn’t heaven on earth

The challenge here, of course, is that while this promise is ours, the cross of Christ making it guaranteed for those who trust and depend on God, we really don’t see it yet. We see the brokenness that leads the psalmist to cry out,

⁴  Now restore us again, O God of our salvation. Put aside your anger against us once more. ⁵  Will you be angry with us always? Will you prolong your wrath to all generations? ⁶  Won’t you revive us again, so your people can rejoice in you? ⁷  Show us your unfailing love, O LORD, and grant us your salvation. Psalm 85:4-7 (NLT2)

Can you hear the despair in that cry? Can you hear a heart – much like our own – that is tired of the world, that is tired of the brokenness caused by sin… that needs healing, that needs to be revived?

That needs the hope that is only found in the cross of Christ – where injustice and conflict are dealt with, as God pours out His wrath on Jesus… so that we can live for eternity with Him.

I’ve said before that repentance is a change of mind – that God works in us. We know about where we are – and where we’ve been… tonight I Hope you see where we are heading… to a glorious land where God has prepared a place for you and me…

AMEN!!