I wonder what the world would be like if each of us could see the spiritual realm as clearly as we see the physical one. What does the spirit world look like when an airliner crashes? While newscasters and safety experts examine details and determine causes, which they should, I tend to ponder what the spiritual scene would have looked like. Were there angels there to help?
What does the spiritual realm look like when a suicide bomber kills people in the Manchester arena or three angry young men mow down people on the London Bridge? What if they could see the demonic world? Would it help them sort out their decisions about death and eternity? None of us is promised tomorrow. Our society tries to deal with security, but it is impossible for any person to insure safety for others.
I watched the movie, The End of the Spear, which is the story of Nate Saint and four other missionaries who were killed with spears by the Waodani people of Ecuador in 1959. The book, Through the Gates of Splendor, written by Elizabeth Elliot, relates a similar story about her husband, Jim Elliot, who was one of the missionaries killed. I just looked them up online at Christian Book Distributors and read the first few pages of the book, The End of the Spear, by Steve Saint. Steve's aunt went to live with the Waodoni people, and later Steve took his own family to live in the jungle to bring the gospel to the same people who had killed his father. The man who killed his father became like a grandfather to his children and even baptized one of them. God's living grace flows through these stories!
Years ago I watched a documentary about making the movie, The End of the Spear. The Waodani people involved heard music coming from a ghetto blaster. In shock, they asked what it was. After hearing that it was worship music, they exclaimed that it was the same song that the people in the trees sang when they killed the missionaries. Five missionaries, who were willing to lay down their own lives to go into the jungles of Equador, must have had a glorious homecoming!
I wonder how my own life would change if I could see the spiritual forces around me. Wouldn't it be the perfect solution to a broken world? But it must not be, because Jesus didn't set it up that way. He wants us to walk in faith. This is not blind faith. He gives us plenty of evidence on which to base our faith. He gives us His Word and His Spirit to guide, comfort, convict and inspire us. If we submit our lives to Christ, we have an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade (1 Peter 1:4). We have trials and perils in this life, but Peter encouraged the churches with these words:
These [the trials and perils] have come so that your faith-of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire-may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
I wonder what it will be like when we see the thousands upon thousands of angels surrounding God's throne, and see Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who is our beloved Savior.
Sue Carlisle grew up on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming. An enrolled member of the Ponca Tribe of Nebraska, her passion is to encourage people to look at creation and see our awesome Creator. Sue is author of Walking with the Creator Along the Narrow Road (2013 Indian Life Books). She is a columnist for Indian Life. She and her husband Wes now live in Thunder Bay, ON.
