Aufheben

"But the tent where they serve is just a copy and a shadow of the real one in heaven." Hebrews 8:5 (CEV)

So many things in this world capture our hearts. A summer breeze, a cool pool, a beach, palm trees, vacation at a hotel on the beach with palm trees, an escape to a mountain villa for the weekend, love. That last one gets everyone though. Love. Every single human being craves it, needs it, has to have it. It's the ultimate leveler for being human. Every one is on common ground with love. And not just parental love, filial love, philanthropic love, vague spiritual love; the one transcendent love that everyone wants, needs, desires is romantic love. It's overpowering in every single method, every single outlet of life, every application in the heart. Humans were made for this. And we are made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27).

How can we interpret this?

We image God. Genesis 1:27 says, " God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created them; male and female He created them." (NASB) How do we image God? In our gender. God, who is Spirit and does not have a body, we image him in our souls as male and female.

"God is Spirit, and his worshippers must worship in spirit and in truth." John 4:24 (NIV)

We live in a world were we are given images of what is to come with Jesus in eternity. We are given marriage in this world as an image of our marriage with Jesus. We are given our spouse to see an image of what we are seeking in Jesus, what we are to specifically complement in God's heart and worship in him forever as his spouse. We are given intimacy here on earth so that we can have the slightest foretaste of intimacy with Jesus. We are given vacations here and dreams of going to dramatic resorts in California or Fiji in the image of us ruling the world with Jesus and having the freedom to love and live the world he gave us as heirs, with us in his arms the whole time. We long for intimacy, badly, whether physical, spiritual, emotional, or mental, all throughout the day, because we are meant to be one in intimacy with Jesus all the time regardless of what we are doing. That's the beautiful part of having spiritual bodies in eternity with God, we can have intimacy with Jesus all the time. Physical intimacy requires husband and wife to physically be together, emotional intimacy requires at least both people to be within ear shot, mental intimacy does as well. Spiritual intimacy is a different matter. It is the combination of all three and mixed inside of us. God has proven he can be more intimate with us then the closest of earthly lovers can be, all the while he is physically spiritually present in heaven, not on earth. In eternity, our bodies will be spiritual. Spatial location will not have the same sense of importance, neither will temporal location. We can finally "get lost" in Jesus, in our Lover, without worry of what we have to do tomorrow. We won't have to get up and go off to the office or to school. We can truly rest forever in our Beloved's arms for all time. And rest we will in his arms. Peter Kreeft said, "This spiritual intercourse with God is the ecstasy hinted at in all earthly intercourse...Earthly sex is the shadow, and our lives are a process of thickening so that we can share in the substance, becoming Heavenly fire so that we can endure and rejoice in the Heavenly fire." (http://www.peterkreeft.com/topics/sex-in-heaven.htm) We really are in a process of learning things so that we can love God in intimacy with him all the time, truly worship him all day long, all night long, which is how it should be (No doubt among any Christians on the fact that God is and should be worshipped always). Eldredge sums it up in Journey of Desire as,

"To give yourself over to another, passionately and nakedly, to adore that person body, soul, and spirit-we know there is something special, even sacramental about sex. It requires trust and abandonment, guided by a wholehearted devotion. What else can this be but worship?...We worship sex, because we don't know how to worship God. But we will." (p. 134)

Knowing this, knowing the incredible intimacy/love/life/joy/happiness we have coming with Jesus and now what we can have with his Holy Spirit, how can we do anything other than worship him all the time? Out of this comes extreme joy. It's why Paul wrote:

"sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs....singing and making melody to the Lord in your hearts, giving thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ." (Ephesians 5:19,20; NASB)

Jesus wants us to be spiritual intimate with him at all times while we are here on earth, so that we can rejoice in the spiritual love and intimacy he will have with us his spouse in heaven. And then, we can rejoice in him in everything we have with him in our love relationship. The Wedding of the Lamb is described by God as being the image of the most intimate experience we know on earth, the consummation of a wedding. And it's not just the new things Jesus has made for us in our new home with him in the Father's house. It's the old as well. It's what we have in our intimacy with him right now. Just as intimacy grows in marriage with time, so it does with our relationship with God. Our spiritual intimacy with him here and now only increases our joy and happiness and pleasure with our Spouse in heaven. What God has planned for us is truly beyond our dreams. But we can add to it with our love and worship of him here and now.

"The mandrakes give forth fragrance, and over our doors are all choice fruits, new as well as old, which I have laid up for you, oh my beloved." Song of Songs 7:13 (NASB)

Jesus has planned the most incredible honeymoon for his spouse; and over the door to the bridal suite, the one that's in the villages with the vineyards that he will take us away to for our honeymoon with him (Song of Songs 7:11-12) are all the pictures, the love notes, the tears cried over wishing we could be with him and he with us, our entire relationship with him and how we worshiped and loved him. The consummation of the marriage is not just being happy to be with God finally in paradise. It's the consummation of our courtship with the Prince Jesus here and now.

It is this that Jesus calls us to begin with him. To begin and continue our love relationship with him. To worship him as our God. To love him forever. Forever and ever :)