Living as people of the future
Our goal during Vision Season
November 24 - December 31, 2024
Get so thrilled about the prospect of Christ's return to earth
that we light up like people who see dawn coming
To SYNC with the vision of Christ's return means that we dance to his "Vision Rhythm," the rhythm of happy feet--triumph, relief, and joy. It's over! The Messiah won! No more crosses for us to carry. No more grit required.
Of all the discoveries we made season by season through the SYNC cycle, this one is the greatest--our discovery of the future arriving in us. Of all the SYNC rhythms, the Vision Rhythm is the most fun! Worth Season was faith in the dark. Vision Season is faith at dawn.
We see the dawn of the day when the entire mess this world has got itself into will finally be cleared up. All wounds healed. No new ones inflicted.
That's how things will be when the sun is fully above the horizon, when Christ the King is in charge of everything and everyone. He can and will deliver the perfect world that so many dictators have promised but failed to bring.
A delightful scramble
This Vision music is so thrilling that it may send us into more of a scramble than a dance, like kids hearing the music of an ice cream truck. They might not see the truck yet, but they know it is close by somewhere, and they move! They hurry out onto the street to flag it down as it approaches, yelling to their friends to come, too.
The kids didn't schedule the ice cream truck. They just took advantage of the fact that it came into their neighborhood. And that's how it is with the return of Christ. It was not an idea we dreamed up. It's a promise of God that we are scrambling to take advantage of.
We know this is more than a hope because we can hear the music; that is, we know that the power of heaven is already arriving and changing us inside.
Praying for a better world
As we realize that Christ's return is the completion of the process that started with the birth of a baby in Bethlehem, we start seeing ourselves differently. Christmas is just the beginning, and if we liked the beginning, we are going to LOVE the end! In the meantime, we will pray prayers like this:
King Jesus, Lord of the Future, Master of our destiny, thank you so much for promising to come back and finish this great campaign you started to connect, heal, and bless the world! Thank you for this vision of a world with no evil, abuse, or death.
Thank you that we don't have to kill anybody to make this vision come true, but, like trailers for a movie, we do get to show people a little of what is coming.
Finish what you have already started inside us. Fulfill your vision, Lord! Let your reign begin!
God, everybody wants a better future for the world but people can't agree on how to create it. Let us see your dawning glory and become people of the future.
May the people who see us see the kind of future you are creating. May they realize how it fulfills all the good things they already long for. And may they join your campaign and go to work alongside us. Your kingdom come!
How do we move with the Vision Rhythm?
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We say "Yes!" As we think of Jesus returning to earth in person, we say, "Bring it on!" We have no reservations. We will have no regrets. The worse things are now, the louder we say, "Yes, come King Jesus!" which is the second last verse in the Bible, Revelation 22.20. That is what the Author of the Bible wanted us to focus on--saying "Yes" to the final victory of the Messiah's campaign even before it happens. "SYNC me!" is one way of saying "Yes."
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We keep looking at the vision of the coming world with Jesus in charge. Those who have been destroying the world--the death-dealers, the oppressors, the abusers, the deceivers, the cheats--will be destroyed. The world will be totally safe. The King will be loved by all citizens, and he will connect, heal, and bless them in a way this world has never seen.
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We become trailers for the movie of the coming world. The trailers arrive in the movie theater before the movie does. The coming world, the King Jesus World, is not visibly here yet, but we are here already and we are visible. Our lives show what Jesus does to people when he takes over as King even though we don't totally understand what is happening to us or how his Holy Spirit is doing it. He keeps surprising us as we SYNC with him more and more.
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We don't naively expect everybody to like our vision. Our vision is about a coming King of the whole world, and power holders don't want to hear that. It means all their power is temporary and vulnerable, the exact opposite of what they want us to think. If our vision is true, their claims are not. They can either submit to the "King of kings" or they can fight against his arrival and be destroyed by "the sword of his mouth," that is, the self-fulfilling judgment he pronounces on them as he takes power (Revelation 19.21).
People of the future
Of course, God did not put us out there as trailers for his movie about the future because we were any better than anyone else to start with or because we worked hard and earned this privilege somehow. We were no more like God's ideal future than anybody was. Maybe we weren't like it at all!
But now that Jesus has injected his Spirit into us, we are turning into people of the future. We are looking more like the future all the time, thanks to him.
Seeing this, we should be twice as happy about Christmas as everybody else. Our faces ought to be shining, our hearts bursting, and our hands full of things to give to anybody in sight. We have seen a glimpse of the future. In fact, we have become glimpses of the future for other people. What an opportunity!
Vision Season is the time to re-SYNC with the Vision Rhythm and get totally carried away with it. Let's look back at the Christmas baby. Let's look ahead to the Coming King!
And let's act like the meaning of that has dawned on us--so happy every time we see a little of his future love, joy, and peace popping up inside us, so confident about life and destiny, and so grateful for that baby who started it all. He is the one who, as Coming King, will finish it all. Bring it on!
See the Jubilee Cards for other daily prayers for Vision Season (see under "Activities" or click here)