Message Minute (Beauty in the Darkness)

"The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it." - Revelation 21:24-26

In 1941, composer Olivier Messiaen was imprisoned in a Nazi concentration camp. Despite brutal conditions, he composed "Quartet for the End of Time" on broken instruments. Hundreds of prisoners and guards listened in freezing cold temperatures to what would be called "the most ethereally beautiful music of the twentieth century."

This captures our calling perfectly. We're people of the future living in the present. New creation is breaking through the cracks now, starting with us. We work in the present world—amid chaos and suffering—for a glimpse of the future world set free from evil and death.

As we do whatever we do, people will see our work and maybe start to notice that something new is brewing. If you are feeling now like this life does not matter, know that once you are in Christ, everything done in His name has eternal significance.

Nothing good is wasted. Nothing true is lost. Nothing beautiful disappears.
Give yourselves fully to the Lord's work. Create beauty. Love sacrificially. Build for the Kingdom.

Reflect: Where can you create beauty or hope in a dark place this week?

Prayer: Father, make us ambassadors of Your coming Kingdom. Help us bring glimpses of heaven to earth through our work, our love, our lives. Until all things are made new. Amen.