Menorah: God’s Love at the Speed of Light
Menorah: God’s Love at the Speed of Light.
Love has come to us at the speed of light. Beaming from heaven’s glory, coming in radiant waves from light years away. Love continues to arrive at 186,000 miles per second, at 670 million miles per hour. Love can circle the earth seven times in one second. Nothing in creation moves faster than love at the speed of light. The light of eternal love is the world’s only constant quality, the one unchangeable fixture in the universe. Love at the speed of light. Coming right at us, face-to-face.
Creation: Unwrapping His robe of light at the dawn of time, the Father of Lights sang out, “Let there be light!” The Sun of Righteousness joins the morning stars and rejoices as the deep, empty darkness fades. The Consuming Fire declares that everything created will contain a flame from His eternal light. So light becomes the first creature, the main ingredient hidden in everything, the purpose of creation, that all things would reflect the light of His glory. The light humor of Creator God displayed in the Lightning Bug and the Flashing Fish, the Fiery Plankton and the Bermuda Fire Worm, the Blue-Ringed Octopus and the Firefly. Even the dust of the earth contains his light. Made in His radiant image, even the human body emits light. Eternally living in unapproachable light, the Lord God has invested His light as the one fixed material in His handiwork. In creation, Love came to the world at the speed of light.
Incarnation. For those living in the deep shadows of death, Love once again has come to us at the speed of light. Since God so loved the world, He declared that light would shine in the darkness, and He beamed onto us the Light of the World. Go and be the Light of the world, the Father said to the Son, and the darkness will not overcome You. In Your light, life will conquer death. Bright truth will outshine the dim counterfeits. Radiant grace will burn away the fog of dis-grace. So arise, dear world! Shine out! Wake up from your long night of darkness, for your Light has come to you! The glorious splendor of the Lord has dawned upon you! Look! Though the darkness of night has covered over the earth, it is a thinner covering now that is destined to disappear forever. The thick darkness over the peoples has holes of light cracking through the night, for the Sun of God is rising upon you! The light has come, and it continues to arrive at your doorstep, it keeps coming in waves upon you like the ocean waves on the shore. Love comes to you at the speed of light from the heavenly glory. Blight has turned to light. Because of the Light of the world, we can expect love, love, and more love.
Jeremiah 22/31 – Love, Love, and More Love || Bible in Song || Project of Love
Children of Light. Light from light from light. The Father of Lights emits the Son of Light, who radiates Children of Light. The children of light move in step with the Light of the world, loving others at His speed, the speed of light, faster than anything and everything. The Word of the Light is a lamp onto our feet and a light to our path. The followers of the everlasting Light will make His righteousness and saving justice a light to all peoples. His light will blaze forth when we pour ourselves out for the least, the lost, and the lonely. We will cast beams of His light when we spend ourselves for the afflicted and the oppressed. Our lights shine brightest when we clothe the naked, feed the hungry, visit the prisoners, care for the fatherless, befriend the aged. Wherever the deep darkness of evil and death abound, the bright light of Grace and Truth abounds even more. God continues to enlighten us, we who are simply sparks from the Consuming Fire of love. As lights of the world, those in darkness can look at Light’s children and expect love, love, and more love. At the speed of light.
Re-Creation. The everlasting light of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, will literally light up the new heaven and the new earth. There will be no need for the sun, because God Himself will provide the light from His own glorious Being. All the children of light will join the Source of Light and become one light with Him, the flames uniting with the Fire to blaze forth at the speed of light. We can finally approach the unapproachable Light in His fullness. We will put on our garments of light, our radiant robes of righteousness. Our smiling faces will reflect the shining face of the world’s Light.
The Love-Light of God’s Smiling Face.
“Lift up the light of your face (‘panim‘) upon us, Yahweh. Let your light-filled presence smile on us. You have given me greater joy than those who have abundant harvests of grain and new wine.” (Ps. 4:6-8).
The Righteous Brothers Turn On Your Love Light
The Bottom Line. When lovers of God in Scripture (whether Moses, David, the psalmists and prophets, or the New Covenant saints) earnestly sought to be with God, to be in God’s presence, their love words tended to be about seeking God’s face. They were in the midst of declaring their love for God in an almost breathless desire to be with God intimately, as if in a love affair with the Almighty, desperately yearning for God’s presence like a lover with the beloved. Turn on your love-light, Lord, I want to give myself to you, they are saying. This type of love language tells us something, doesn’t it? That perhaps romantic love between husband and wife reaches its fulfillment in the love affair God wants with each of us. There’s a good chance that marital union between a man and woman is a profound foretaste of something even greater… God’s intense desire to be with the people He has created. The earthly marriage relationship is the best picture God could provide of the ultimate marriage in heaven celebrated at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. The sacrament of marriage is evidently an appetizer in the full feast in our destiny with Him. Intimate human love on earth is not meant to completely satisfy the lovers, but instead be a joyful and meaningful picture of our union with God in heaven, which starts right here on earth. To seek ultimate fulfillment and satisfaction in human romance is destined to be unsatisfying, because it’s not intended to be the final experience of ecstasy. As beautiful and glorious as it is, marriage is the warm-up act for the main event. There is no marriage in heaven, since the eternal purpose of marital union has reached its fulfillment in God. Marriage is God’s way of telling us that He desires a deep union with each of us, that He yearns for an intimate fellowship with each person He has created, if only we would say Yes to His proposal. God wants to spiritually marry each of us, to enjoy a mutual indwelling with each of us, in which He is inside of us, and we are inside of Him. Two-as-One, somehow inside of each other.
“May the Lord bless you and keep you; May the Lord make His face (‘panim‘) to shine upon you and be gracious to you; May the Lord turn His face (‘panim‘) toward you and give you peace (‘shalom‘).” (The Blessing of Aaron, Numbers 6:23-25).
“Panim” (paw-neem) = The Hebrew word usually translated as presence, countenance, or front, or in front of. The root word means to incline towards or to turn to. Panim is recorded over 2,000 times in the Hebrew Bible (OT), and is a very significant idea all through Scripture. The face of God in the Hebrew sense was a poetic attempt to describe the personal presence of God, since God is a spirit and does not have a body, and so doesn’t have a literal face. The face of God in the Hebrew Bible, then, was a substitute word for the intimate presence of God, the entire Person of God.
“Shalom” = The ancient Hebrew word translated as peace: completeness or wholeness, as in the joining together of opposites; integrity, as in the effective holding together of separate pieces; to give/restore harmony; fulfillment; health; security; abundant well-being; the state of having the vitality needed to thrive and flourish; tranquility; freedom from disquiet and disorder; reconciliation; resolution of conflict/war; healing of division; prosperity. The Greek word for peace in the New Testament is “Eirene,” and means the same thing as “Shalom” in the Hebrew Bible.
U2-Elevation live in Chicago 2005 (2005 Vertigo Tour)
Love Songs. It’s easy to see how human love songs are mirrored in Scripture by spiritual love songs to God. There is very little difference between a love song to a person and a love song to the Lord. Notice on the love songs included in this article how easily one can redirect the lyrics towards heaven in a love song to God. The best human love songs are actually rooted in spiritual songs expressing the passion of a love affair with God.
Nina Simone: To Love Somebody (Live in Antibes, 1969)
Seeking His Face. Being in the light of His presence with His face shining on us in love speaks to the level of intimacy we enjoy with the Lord. When we seek the face of God, we are saying that we earnestly want to be closer to Him. When we seek the face of God, we are asking for a more intimate sense of His presence. When God hides His face, He is in a sense turning His back and becoming less intimate in His relationship with us. But God doesn’t turn His back on us unless we first turn our back to Him. And even if God hides His face, He is still present. When God hides His face, He is, in His wisdom, deciding not to be as close as He could be. There is an eternal with-ness of God that is a part of His nature. He will not completely withdraw His presence, He will not hide His face, but he may withdraw His intimacy for a time if that is what is needed. As David and other psalmists in the spirit of David said countless times in his psalms, seeking God’s face is a life-long quest for growing intimacy with the Lord God.
Ben E. King / All Star Band – Stand By Me (The Prince’s Trust Rock Gala 1987)
How else can one say this? David and the other psalmists were in love with God and continually sought His intimate presence. If His presence seemed threatened, they felt vulnerable and bereft, like jilted lovers. For God to hide His face was an unthinkable tragedy, a catastrophe, a fate worse than death. “Do not hide your face from me, or I will die, like those who go down to the pit.” (Ps. 143:7). For David and the others, that wasn’t a lover’s hyperbole, that was the simple truth. The psalmists’ holy land was in his heart, where he could passionately bask in God’s presence and spiritually gaze upon the face of his Lover in worship.
Moses and Yahweh, Face-to-Face. “So the Lord Yahweh spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend.” (Exodus 33:9,11); “But since then there has not arisen in Israel a prophet like Moses, whom Yahweh Lord knew face to face.” (Deuteronomy 34:10). The face-to-face interaction between Yahweh and Moses, most would say that this biblical term is a metaphor, a figure of speech, that means “presence to presence.” In other words, God and Moses were intimately present with each other. Face-to-face is a way of describing the strong bond of deep friendship that God and Moses enjoyed. Face-to-face conveys a two-way relationship, with no third party involved. It meant one Person was able to personally communicate clearly and directly with another person. It’s not unlike another phrase we use and know not to mean literally… a “heart to heart’ conversation. Of course, our hearts are not actually interacting with each other. Face-to-face is similar to that, in which there is the implication of deep personal contact. Moses reported a similar figure of speech in Numbers 12:8, when the Lord said, “With Moses I speak mouth to mouth.” With Moses I can have a meaningful conversation, says the Lord.
Aaron’s Blessing. “May the Lord make His face to shine upon you.” That thought in Aaron’s blessing could be put in other words like this… May the Great I AM, the Lord of Life, shine His face upon us in friendship. May His eyes light up with fondness when looking upon us. May He deepen our intimate friendship with Him, our spiritual union with Him. May the radiance of His presence shine on us by taking pleasure in us, like a lover with his beloved, or like a loving parent smiling in pleasure when with his or her child. May the face of the Lord smile upon us, revealing His divine approval. May His shining presence reveal the light of His glory to us in a personal way. May His shining face upon us be like the brilliant sun shining on the surface of the earth to bring about growth and blessing. May your face pulsate with heavenly light, Lord, and be the love-light of our world. May we see a smiling face when we see God in the holy ground of our heart.
A Love Affair with God. It seems that the psalmists brought the yearning for God’s face to another level entirely, from the desire for a strong friendship to a practically a spiritual lust for a love affair with the divine. Look at the profound desire for God in so many Psalms, and the language sounds remarkably similar to the expressions of love between a man and a woman. In many passages, the psalmist’s desperate desire for God sounds identical to what two romantic lovers would say to each other in their intimate moments, with an almost erotic intensity… I am desperate for you; I faint with longing to be in your presence; I pant for you with a desperate thirst; I just want to see your face and be in your presence; I want to give myself to you. The lover of God seeks the light of His face with the same zeal that a lover seeks the face of his beloved. How many times did the psalmists yearn for God to turn on the love-light of His face, to shine the love-light of His face onto His zealous lover? As crazy as it sounds, when a believing person expresses a fervent love for God, it is only in response to our God who took the first step by expressing His spiritual hots for us.
Robert Palmer Addicted To Love Song And Lyrics – YouTube
“How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of Hosts! I languish, yes, I faint with longing to enter the courts of Yahweh. With my whole being, body and soul, I will shout joyfully to the living God! Even the sparrow finds a home, and the swallow builds her nest and raises her young at a place near your altar, O Lord of Hosts, my King and my God! What joy for those who can live in your house, always singing your praises.“ (Psalm 84:1-4).
John Prine – Glory of True Love – Fair & Square – YouTube
A Desperate Desire. David and the other psalmists seemed to know instinctively the secret to a flourishing relationship with God. Desire Him in a deep way, in a way that is like spiritual lust. Find your fulfillment in the Lord’s intimate presence. Develop a hunger to personally experience God in an increasingly meaningful way. It’s only right that David, “the sweet psalmist of Israel,” (2 Samuel 23:1), has the last word at this point: “Glory in His name! Shine and make your joyful boast in Him, you lovers of God! Let’s be joyful and keep rejoicing no matter what! Seek more of His strength! Seek more of Him! Let’s always be seeking the light of His face and alert for His presence!” (Psalm 105:3-4).