I love this quote..."The pessimist says his cup is half empty, the optimist says his cup is half full, and the child of God says his cup runneth over." It makes me smile every time I hear it, to picture a beautiful cup just overflowing with the fullness of God, like one of those old mall fountains with the bubbler right in the center. Remember those? Today many folks have something similar on a much smaller scale in their homes to create the soothing sound of a babbling brook (or to make a lady who has had four c-sections need to pee. Not sure which.) Anyway, as a kid I used to love to stare at those big mall fountains, wondering where is all that water coming from?? I found them very magical until, one day, I was old enough to see the clear plastic tube in the center of the spout, and it was then that I realized that the unending magical flow of water was just an illusion. While I still found them neat to watch, the magic was gone. I was merely looking at man's creativity. Cool, but anticlimactic.
I'm a lot like that kid still today, however as a grown up, one thing I marvel at is wealth. I admire it from afar, wondering just how some people seem to have an unending, magical flow of luxury, accomplishment, privilege, and convenience. While I admit that I don't actually know anyone who fits that description, if I even turn on the TV or walk down a check-out lane, I am bombarded with wealth. I wouldn't say I am really envious of it, but I do marvel at it. Anyone else ever feel that way?? Or am I the only one who wonders what extreme wealth would be like? Like, is the flow really unending? Do they bathe in their money? When a bill gets old and soft, do they just let the servants shine the floors with it? Or is it all an illusion? Is it merely man's creativity; an anticlimactic facade behind which to hide? No matter the answer, it is intoxicating, alluring, and utterly amazing that some--an elite few, but nevertheless, some--people live like royalty.
I'll never live like royalty...or will I?
I was thinking about this very thing today in the shower. (Anyone else do some of their best thinking in the shower?) I was thinking about how a mere year ago we were drowning in debt until the Lord, and only the Lord, orchestrated a complete turn-around of our finances through two big--HUGE--completely unexpected and unearned blessings. Huge. Unearned. Undeserved. So totally from God. I was giving Him glory and praise, wondering what He would do next to surprise us, since He has already proven that He is in the business of surprises, and it occured to me:
I am already royalty.
I know I already knew that. I've read in Romans and other places that I am adopted by God as His daughter through my faith in Christ. I know that as a daughter I am also an heiress. I know it says in 1st Peter that we are a royal priesthood. I know. But, today in the shower, I knew. It hit me afresh like a ton of bricks. I am His. I am an heiress.
No matter what He does or does not do with me, my life, or our finances down here on this earth, I am royalty. My cup is overflowing! I am privileged and accomplished. Not by my own merit, since I don't want to boast, but by His merit. He has this huge banquet table already set, and my seat has a placecard bearing my name! My name. Me. The dork. Me!
"But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy." 1st Peter 2:9-10
"He who was seated on the throne said, 'I am making everything new!' Then he said, 'Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.' He said to me: 'It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son.'" Revelation 21:5-7
I knew there was a reason I always loved those mall fountains! I am royalty, bathing in my riches, drinking from the spring of the water of life. I may have said it before, but God stuns me.
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