Story ~ Finding God's Glory in the Face of his Son

Sometimes, when my meditation on God’s word leaves me overwhelmed with wonder, I find it helpful to express these things through the hearts of two brothers growing up in Father’s House. Here is such a story, expressing thoughts about this overwhelmingly wonderful verse from God’s book,

For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. (II Corinthians 4:6)

          No matter how many times the Little Boy had met with Paul in these early morning walks, each morning seemed new in its own way. Their walk to the Garden surrounded them with the sensation of silence, and coolness, and fragrance, all quietly waiting for the awakening day.

          As the two Brothers settled into their favorite bench under the Big Tree, enjoying the last morsel of fruit they had picked along the way, all was ready for the sharing of thoughts and feelings that had become a very important part of their lives.

          “I’ll tell you what Father wants most for us, okay?” Paul encouraged.

          “Wants most FOR us, or most FROM us?” the Little Boy mischievously clarified.

          “The FOR always comes before the FROM,” Paul grinned in response to his Little Brother’s insecurities.

          “Well,” the Little Boy drawled in exaggerated thoughtfulness, “I s’pose I would like to hear what Father has in mind for us.”

          “Actually,” the Little Boy sighed as he let go of his momentary goofiness, “I know that I would LOVE to know what Father has for us. I already know it is good, at least up here in my head! But there is something in my heart longing to know what Father desires for me. It is like I know it is way bigger than I know, but I don’t know how to attach to it so it feels real to me.”

          “The wonderful thing about all of this,” Paul encouraged, “is that Father has factored in everything we need both in the gift that he gives us, and in the way that he speaks of these things for us to learn them.”

          “That sounds far more thoughtful than anything I have ever experienced from anyone else,” the Little Boy sighed.

          “Ah yes,” Paul affirmed, “you are not alone in your loneliness! We all come together knowing that none of us have ever met anyone like Father. And, as we get to know him, we discover that we are finding him in each other, and the way we do things together, and the way it feels to talk about him, and to remind each other about him.”

          “You mean, like the way you’re doing?” the Little Boy smiled.

          “Yes, Little Brother,” Paul grinned back. “Just like we’re doing.”

          “So, what does Father have for us that I need to know about today?” the Little Boy settled into learning from his Older Brother once again.

          “I want you to let yourself go back,” Paul began, “way back to the very beginning.”

          “Ah… but I wasn’t there,” the Little Boy playfully remonstrated.

          “Yes, yes, my difficult young student!” Paul responded. “I know that none of us where there. Nevertheless, it is time to put on your thinking cap and picture the beginning. There is something we learn about Father in the very first words he spoke to the world he was creating.”

          “We know Father’s very first words?” the Little Boy asked wonderingly.

          “Well,” Paul shaped his thoughts for clarification, “I don’t think there is a way for us finite, temporal, children to ever know the ‘first’ words spoken by our infinite and eternal Father.”

          “So, what do you mean that Father spoke his first words to creation?” the Little Boy wondered.

          “I want you to picture in your mind that Father was about to bring space, time, and matter into existence, and he chose the very first thing he would do, and the very first words he would speak to do what he was thinking,” Paul encouraged.

          “Okay,” the Little Boy focused on thinking about what that might have looked like.

          “So,” Paul continued, “the very first words Father spoke in order to start his work of creation were, ‘Let there be light!’”

          The Little Boy sat silently trying to fathom what that moment of creation was like. As he became conscious that Paul had paused to let him follow along in his thoughts, he begged his Older Brother to continue. “And what happened?” he pleaded.

          “Well, there was light, of course!” Paul tousled his Little Brother’s hair.

          “That’s it?” the Little Boy queried.

          “Yes,” Paul affirmed. “Father spoke to the formless emptiness and called out, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ and everything to do with light came into existence.”

          “You mean there was suddenly a sun shining, and the moon, and the stars, filling the universe?” the Little Boy asked.

          “Uh… no…” Paul clarified, “the only thing that happened was that there was light. The light was created as a thing of its own. He brought everything to do with light into existence. How light fills space, and travels through time, and is organized into matter, all came into existence because Father told it to do so.”

          “Think of it this way,” Paul encouraged. “Father is Light.”

          “Yes, I kinda understand that,” the Little Boy acknowledged.

          “So, everything he made is an expression of things about him,” Paul continued.

          “That makes sense,” the Little Boy understood. “I mean, it kinda makes sense in a way that I know is very tiny beside all the sense it could make!”

          Paul smiled, “Yes, Little Brother, we all know what that feels like. In fact, that feeling kind of intensifies the better we get to know the Triune.”

          “Hmmm…” the Little Boy considered, “I guess that even makes a bit of sense! Now, how is it that Father made light, but not anything that was shining the light?”

          “I’m not going to claim to have this all figured out,” Paul admitted. “It is like something we know is too big for us to truly comprehend. After all, it is Triune-sized in every dimension we can imagine, so it isn’t so much that we fully comprehend it, but more that we accept that it is the way Father did things.”

          “I guess there is going to be an awful lot of that in a man’s lifetime,” the Little Boy considered.

          “Yes,” Paul affirmed, “and that is why we have our Forever Home waiting for us so we can enjoy getting to know Father’s foreverness forever! If you know what I mean!” Paul laughed with a playful joy that made the Little Boy long for more.

          “Of course I don’t know what you mean!” the Little Boy smiled back. “And yet,” he softly added, “I do know what you mean.”

          “What I’m trying to get to,” Paul directed, “is that we must consider our Father, in all the fellowship within the Triune, speaking out a command to the darkness, ‘Let there be light,’ and suddenly there came forth out of the darkness the existence of light in all its space-time-and-matter glory, exactly the way it was in Father’s mind.”

          “So, you want me to consider how powerful Father is to be able to do that?” the Little Boy asked for clarification.

          “Ah, yes,” Paul affirmed, “but even more than that, I want you to think about our powerful, unstoppable Father, who can call into existence all that he thought in his mind, and the first powerful, unstoppable, impossible-to-fail words into the dark nothingness was, ‘Let there be light!’”

          “Okay,” the Little Boy pondered, “it isn’t just that he was able to DO that, but that he was about to do THAT!”

          “Exactly,” Paul encouraged. “He is the Triune who called light out of darkness, and light came forth as though there were no darkness at all!”

          “Hmmm…” the Little Boy considered, “it seems like you are leading me into thoughts and feelings that are so far beyond words that I can only think the feelings, and feel the thinking, and know that I’m only on the edge of thinking and feeling what that would have been like.”

          “Okay,” Paul encouraged, “that is such a good place to start!”

          “Now,” Paul began setting the stage for the next scene, “we have this Father who has spoken to the darkness and commanded light to come forth, and we suddenly have all of space, time, and matter flooded with the glory of material light that matches the spiritual light of the Triune.”

          “Oh man,” the Little Boy smiled in wonder as he tried to keep up with what Paul was describing. “To barely know what you are talking about already feels so… AMAZING!”

          “Yes, my friend,” Paul smiled as big as the Little Boy had ever seen. “Now let’s bring that home.”

          “Please do,” the Little boy trembled with wonder at what Paul could have meant by bringing this glorious picture home.

          “Now we have in our minds that the Triune have expressed themselves in Father’s resounding voice speaking to the darkness and calling forth the light,” Paul summarized, “and now we must consider that they have done the same thing with us.”

          “Whoa…” the Little Boy expressed, overwhelmed by the sudden connection that was too big for words. Tears came to his eyes as his longing heart realized things it had so struggled to know.

          Paul let the quiet stream of the morning carry their thoughts in its wondering current to destinations that were never in their hands. Although he loved to contribute and share in the Triune’s work of teaching their household the glories of what everyone meant to each other, he could never think that the work was his to do. A little paddle stroke of words here and there were such a small contribution to the gracious flow of Triune goodness. And yet it was Father’s joy and desire that all his children feel their place in his wonderful and wonder-filled work. For the Triune to carry their children into the heights and depths of their glorious love, they would bring all their Beloved to share and interact with each other even as the Triune had always done among themselves.

          “Say more,” the Little Boy quietly pleaded. “What have the Triune done with us that is like Father calling the light out of darkness?”

          “They have shone into our hearts!” Paul softly emphasized.

          “Hmmm…” the Little Boy wondered, “so… when I feel darkness inside me, it is a problem with me, not with them.”

          “Yes,” Paul affirmed.

          “But…” the Little Boy gathered words to express the thoughts that were swirling through his mind, “if Father called light out of darkness, and we see this light every day, why isn’t my heart filled with light just like the universe filled with light at Father’s command?”

          “Consider it like this,” Paul directed. “Why is it that there are daily periods of darkness?”

          “Because it’s night time, silly!” the Little Boy teased.

          “Yes, but what is it about night time that makes it dark?” Paul continued.

          “Oh, I see,” the Little Boy understood. “It’s because the sun is on the other side of the earth.”

          “Which means?” Paul encouraged.

          “Um…” the Little Boy considered, “it means… that the earth is between us and the sun?”

          “Right,” Paul affirmed. “So, the reason we can feel darkness inside us when the Triune is shining so gloriously…?”

          “Something is between us and them?” the Little Boy cautiously offered.

          “That’s right,” Paul encouraged. “It can be that there is something as big as the earth between us and the light, and that’s why we just can’t see how brightly the Triune is shining into our hearts. Other times it is a season of discouragement we go through that is like a big, dark rain cloud blocking out the light. And then there is what happens when we go inside on a bright sunny day, and we don’t get the full exposure to the sun, or when we pull the blinds shut so we can take a nap, and the light doesn’t come into our rooms.”

          “I guess there are a lot of reasons why we don’t feel the light,” the Little Boy considered.

          “Yes,” Paul agreed, “but one of those reasons is never that the Triune is not shining. They are always light, so they always shine. And, they are always love, so they shine into our hearts in the most loving ways, and with the most loving desires to fill us with their love and light.”

          “I want to feel that,” the Little Boy concluded. “In fact, I want to feel that all the time!”

          “One day,” Paul encouraged, “we will live in the presence of the Triune’s light in a way we can never fully experience here in the world, not even in Father’s House. In fact, in our Forever Home, we will be in such constant fellowship with the Triune that there will no longer be a need for the sun, and the moon, and the stars, because Father himself will be our light, and Big Brother will be the lamp that shines Father’s light into our hearts forever.”

          “Hmmm…” the Little Boy considered. “So, in our Forever Home, Father is the Light, and Big Brother is the Lamp?”

          “That’s right,” Paul affirmed.

          “So, what about now?” the Little Boy wondered. “Is there some kind of difference between Father and Big Brother now?”

          “Absolutely!” Paul smiled. “When the Triune shines into our hearts, they are shining the light that will give us the knowledge of Father’s glory, but by seeing Father’s glory in the face of Big Brother.”

          “So, we see their glory together, at the same time?” the Little Boy tried to understand.

          “Yes,” Paul affirmed, “but in their relationship as Father and Son.”

          “So,” the Little Boy considered, “the Father shines his glory like calling light out of darkness before there was a sun, moon, and stars?”

          “Right,” Paul encouraged.

          “And the Son shines his glory like a lamp,” the Little Boy continued, “like the sun, moon, and stars shining the light that already was there.”

          Paul smiled bigger than words.

          “So,” the Little Boy continued thinking his way through what he was learning, “Father has light in himself that is somehow shown to us when we look at Big Brother?”

          “Yes,” Paul nodded.

          “And there’s no shortage of this light in them,” the Little Boy observed, “but there is often a shortage of light in me.”

          “We all experience it like that,” Paul admitted.

          “So, the solution to the darkness I often feel inside me,” the Little Boy suggested, “is to spend more time with Big Brother?”

          Paul’s face shone with joy as the Little Boy came to understand the significance of relationship with and within the Triune.

          “Yes,” Paul affirmed, “as we come to Big Brother’s light, Father’s light shines into the darkness just as fully as the first light came bounding out of the darkness to join the Father’s light.”

          “I’ve certainly never thought about light obeying Father,” the Little Boy admitted.

          “Father is light,” Paul expanded the picture, “so the light he made obeyed its source, its creator, because that is what it was made to do.”

          “So, what do I do now?” the Little Boy wondered.

          “I suggest we go and find Big Brother,” Paul encouraged, “because he holds the secret to the Triune’s light. If you see his light, you will see Father’s light.”

          “You mean, like a lamp that shines the light that already is there, but we can’t see it without the lamp shining it?”

          “Yes, my bright student,” Paul smiled, “Big Brother’s lamp has been shining Father’s light for the whole world to see, and so those of us who are in Father’s House ought to be the ones who see it best!”

          “Agreed!” the Little Boy affirmed as the two Brothers stepped out from the shadow of the big tree into the surrounding light of the morning.

          “I’m feeling very hungry,” the Little Boy announced as the two Brothers made their way back to the House.

          “I suspect breakfast is ready by now,” Paul replied. “And today,” Paul instructed, “while you are enjoying your breakfast, be sure to keep your eyes on Big Brother’s face.”

          “Because that’s where Father’s light is shining,” the Little Boy smiled hopefully.

© 2015 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com

Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers.)