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The Dream Fulfilled

04/29/2007 - Over the Rainbow, Romans 8:18-39

When I was a little boy, maybe seven or eight years old, I can remember watchingThe Wizard of Oz on television. That was long before videos and DVD's, but we did have television back then believe it or not! And as I recall the movie seemed to come on about once a year, usually on a Sunday night in February. And it would be a special night for our family as we gathered around our black and white television set and watched it together. The set itself wasn't actually black and white. The picture was in black and white.

And I can still remember the year we got our first color television set. And not long after that somebody told me that in The Wizard of Oz there's this scene where the black and white picture turns to color when Dorothy opens the door of her transplanted house and discovers that she's not in Kansas anymore. She's in the magical Land of Oz where everything black and white turns to color. And sure enough, the next time I watched the movie I saw Dorothy open the door and when she did I felt like we both had discovered a whole new world of plants and flowers and trees and birds all in living color. It was amazing!

In watching the movie growing up there were parts of The Wizard of Oz that made me laugh like when the munchkins sang, "We represent the Lollypop Guild, the Lollypop Guild, the Lollypop Guild. And in the name of the Lollypop Guild we wish to welcome you to Munchkin Land."

There were parts of the story that made me afraid like every time the Wicked Witch of the West would appear and give her hideous laugh or when the flying monkeys landed in the Haunted Forest and snatched Dorothy away to the wicked witch's castle. That was scary.

And there were parts of the story that made me tear up like when Dorothy would sing, "Somewhere over the rainbow, way up high. There's a land that I heard of once in a lullaby. Somewhere over the rainbow, skies are blue. And the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true. Someday I'll wish upon a star and wake up where the clouds are far behind me. Where troubles melt like lemon drops away above the chimney tops. That's where you'll find me. Somewhere over the rainbow, bluebirds fly. Birds fly over the rainbow. Why then, oh why can't I? If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow, why, oh why can't I?"

That song, "Over the Rainbow," written by Harold Arlen became the signature song of Judy Garland's career. She would forever be asked to sing it at all her public appearances. The Recording Industry Association of America voted it the number one most popular song of the 20^th century. And when I read the lyrics this week I could see why. "Over the Rainbow" touches a longing deep within our soul for God's dream to come true because his dream is our dream too. I think it's so popular and timeless because deep within all of us is this intense desire for that day when all our troubles will melt away like lemon drops above the chimney tops. And we will be in a bright new world over the rainbow where bluebirds fly. And we'll fly with them.

That longing is universal. It is wired into every single person on this planet no matter their race, religion, color, or creed. It's the longing for Eden that we talked about last week. But not only is this longing the desire of our human souls it's the desire of all of God's creation, rocks and trees, animals and plants, stars and planets are all longing to be over the rainbow.

As one theologian, Anthony Hoekema, put it, "The kingdom of God … does not mean merely the salvation of certain individuals nor even the salvation of a chosen group of people. It means nothing less than the complete renewal of the entire cosmos, culminating in the new heaven and the new earth."

This morning we continue our series called The Dream Fulfilled: Glimpses of the Kingdom with a teaching I've called "Over the Rainbow."

Last week we addressed the question "Is this world our home?" And we did it against the backdrop of the horrible events that happen in our world every single day. And often when heartbreaking tragedies occur we say to ourselves, silently if not out loud, "Lord God, get me out of here. Beam me up. Take me home."

In fact, there's an old gospel song that says, "This world is not my home, I'm just passing through. My treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue. The angels beckon me from heaven's open door. And I can't feel at home in this world anymore."

The last verse goes, "Just up in Glory Land we'll live eternally. The saints on every hand are shouting victory. Their song of sweetest praise drifts back from heaven's shore. And I can't feel at home in this world anymore."

I think what we're learning in this series is that yearning is deep within everyone of us, but the lyrics of that song are only half true. As believers when we die we will pass from this earth into that other dimension called heaven. And it will be a wonderful place free from all the troubles we know down here. But we won't live there eternally.

Instead, we'll be there only until Jesus comes back to this earth. And when that day happens our bodies will come out of the grave and be reunited with our spirits and we will live on this earth again. Only it will be a renewed earth, a restored earth, a resurrected earth. This earth is our home. But like Dorothy, when we open door, what was once black and white will now be in living color and we just might say, "We're not in Kansas anymore!"

We do feel like we're just passing through, but not because our home will never be here. But because our eternal home is not here right now. It was and it will be some day, but it's not here yet. And until that day comes we groan with all creation for the redemption of all things.

The apostle Paul has some amazing, Spirit driven insight into the future of this world and the implications of that for us right here, right now in his letter to the church at Rome. If you have a Bible turn with me to Romans 8. Romans 8 is that great chapter about the renewal of all things.

Follow along as I read Romans 8:18-25, I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. ¹⁹The creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. ²⁰For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope ²¹that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. ²²We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. ²³Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption, the redemption of our bodies. ²⁴For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? ²⁵But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

The whole cosmos, Paul says, every square inch of creation is on tip toes waiting for God's children to be revealed. It's like every molecule in the universe is holding its breath waiting for the curtain to rise and the final act to begin. And it all starts when you and I and all the followers of Christ, the children of God, are fully revealed. And when will that happen? That will happen when God's people are resurrected from the grave and put on display before a wide-eyed universe. That's what all of creation is waiting for, our adoption, the redemption of our bodies.

Anyone who has every adopted a child knows that it's often a long, difficult, frustrating process that demands enormous amounts of patience. But when that child is finally in your arms he or she is worth every bit of the struggle. And Paul is saying that our adoption into God's family will finally be complete when our bodies are made new. But in the meantime, we have the first fruits of the Holy Spirit living inside us. In another passage, Ephesians 1:14, Paul says that the Holy Spirit is God's deposit guaranteeing the redemption of our bodies to the praise of his glory.

You see, the resurrection of God's people will be like the first pitch of a brand new ball game, the first note of a great symphony, the kickoff of a whole new era. And why is that so important to the rest of the universe? Because the liberation of this world can't happen until our resurrection occurs first because God's people and God's earth are inseparably connected.

Remember the very first man "Adam" came from "Adamah," the Hebrew word for dirt or ground. And so when Adam sinned and fell under the curse so did the very dirt we walk on and everything else that God had called "very good." We're all connected in that sense. But when God resurrects his people and sets them free he will resurrect this earth and set it free as well. So just like we groan, "How long, O Lord, how long?" So creation, like a pregnant woman past her due date groans, "How long, O Lord, how long until I give birth to this new creation?"

John Piper writes, "What happens to our bodies and what happens to the creation go together. And what happens to our bodies is not annihilation but redemption …. Our bodies will be redeemed, restored, made new, not thrown away. And so it is with the heavens and the earth."

Do you ever sense the restlessness of creation? Do you ever hear it groan in the howling of the wind or the raging of the sea? Have you ever felt the loneliness of the forest or heard the longing in the cry of an animal in the wild? The fury of the tornado that ripped Dorothy's house from the ground and took it to Oz, the devastating destruction of a tsunami in south Asia or a hurricane like Katrina, the rumbles of an earthquake in the mountains of Pakistan, the blazing inferno of a sweeping forest fire in Southern California these are all groans of a world that longs to be set free, labor pains on an earth that can't wait to give birth.

And despite the vestiges of beauty and color and joy that are all around us, we know that there is something terribly wrong with this earth that needs to be fixed. Not only do we feel it, but creation feels it too.

In his book Simply Christian, N. T. Wright puts it this way, "We admire the grace and power of an Alpine avalanche in a faraway glacier, but our mood changes rapidly if we see a village lying helpless in its path. We stand mesmerized watching ocean waves roll in to shore, each one a miracle of smooth curves and crashing power, but enjoyment turns to horror before the nightmare of a tsunami …. The Christian tradition has said, and indeed sung, that the glory belongs to God the creator. It is his voice we hear echoing off the crags, murmuring in the sunset. It is his power we feel in the crashing of the waves and the roar of the lion. It is his beauty we see reflected in a thousand faces and forms. And when the cynic reminds us that people fall off crags, get lost after sunset, and are drowned by waves and eaten by lions; when the cynic cautions that faces get old and lined and forms get pudgy and sick - then we Christians do not declare that it was all a mistake. We do not avail ourselves of Plato's safety hatch and say that the real world is not a thing of space, time, and matter, but another world into which we can escape. Instead, we say that the present world is the real one and that it's in bad shape. And we tell the story of a good Creator longing to put the world back into the good order for which it was designed. We tell the story of a God who completes what he has begun and a God who comes to the rescue of those who seem lost and enslaved in the world the way it is now."

The power of Christ's resurrection is enough not only to remake us, but also to remake every inch of the universe - mountains, rivers, plants, animals, stars, nebulae, quasars, and galaxies. Deliverance is on its way and there is hope, like spring time after a long, harsh winter. In fact, Martin Luther said, "Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection not in books alone, but in every leaf in springtime." The new earth is coming as sure as springtime follows winter.

But until that time comes this is what the apostle Paul wants us to know and to count on. Look at verse 26, In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. ²⁷And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God's people in accordance with God's will.

We're not alone in our struggle. All of creation is struggling right along with us and waiting for the day of liberation to finally come. But in the meantime, the Spirit of God is here to help us. We don't always know how to pray do we? But the Spirit of God does. He groans too and prays for us in ways and with words that we don't even know about. He doesn't pray that all our problems would disappear and our life would be filled with comfort and convenience. No. He has a broader agenda. He prays that God's will will be worked out in our lives. And what's his will? His will is that you and I would become more and more like his son Jesus.

That's what he says in verses 28-30, And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. ²⁹For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. ³⁰And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

God's guarantee to those who love him is that in all things he's working for our good. What is it that has you buried or off balance this morning? A relational struggle? A physical one? A financial challenge? A job loss? Perhaps the death of loved one? We had two of those this week. God wants to use it all to make us more like his son. And then one day he will fulfill his promise to glorify us at the resurrection, the same way he glorified Jesus at his resurrection. And nothing we do or don't do can stop him from fulfilling that promise. Nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Look at verse 31, What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? ³²He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? ³³Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies.³⁴Who then can condemn? No one. Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. ³⁵Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? ³⁶As it is written: "For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered." ³⁷No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. ³⁸For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, ³⁹neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

What hope we have! We are more than conquerors through Christ who loves us. The best is yet to be for the child of God. We don't look forward to death. We look forward to life. Our glory will far out weigh our suffering. One person who's experienced more than her share of suffering in this life is Joni Eareckson Tada. As a teenager she was paralyzed from the neck down when she dove into the Chesapeake Bay and hit bottom.

And in one of her books she writes, "Somewhere in my broken, paralyzed body is the seed of what I shall become. The paralysis makes what I am to become all the more grand when you contrast atrophied, useless legs against splendorous resurrected legs. I'm convinced that if there are mirrors in heaven, the image I'll see will be unmistakably 'Joni,' although a much better, brighter Joni."

"Somewhere over the rainbow, skies are blue. And the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true. Someday I'll wish upon a star and wake up where the clouds are far behind me. Where troubles melt like lemon drops away above the chimney tops. That's where you'll find me. Somewhere over the rainbow, bluebirds fly. Birds fly over the rainbow. Why then, oh why can't I? If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow, why, oh why can't I?" We will, Dorothy, we will fly like bluebirds. Just wait.

"There's no place like home. There's no place home. There's no like home."

FOR MORE INFORMATION about Valley View Community Church, feel free to contact us at info@valleyviewseek.org or call 610.631.2707.