GlocalNet

When I was in Lisbon last week I visited this church.  It’s probably one that Columbus saw.  The Portuguese were explorers extraordinaire!  I saw this tomb holding the remains of just such an early explorer.  It was inside the Cathedral part of the church.  It was very ornate.  Here, recognized and revered by the church.  There, under spires and stained glass, hundreds and hundreds of years old, in an honored place, in a magnificent tomb, is the explorer. 

Then Omar and I begin to visit an archeological dig that had been there longer than anything. They unearthed the skeleton of a second century teen-age girl who was, for some reason, thought to be a martyr of the early church.  Her body had been in an ordinary tomb, but, for some reason the box her body was in had not collapsed, so her skeleton was still in tact.  Paul ends the book of Romans desiring to go to the farthest point in the world to tell the Good News of the love of Jesus.  He mentions Spain.  In his day that was the farthest reach.  So, 150 years after he’s gone, someone, a young 15 year old girl, followed Jesus.  It cost her her life. 

The contrast between the two graves and two people were incredible.  Inside a church building was an ornate tomb for an explorer called “Christian.”  Outside in the mud was an unearthed body of a young girl, follower of Jesus, who didn’t die as an old man, but as a teenager.  For one reason, she was a “Christian.”  The old man conquered with a sword, the young girl was conquered by love.  The old man was acknowledged and revered by the church.  The young girl was forgotten and unknown to the church.  The old man profited from following God.  The young girl lost all in this life, for following God.  The old man, got a lot of treasures in this life, a lot of recognition.  The young girl will have her treasure with God, now, and it will last eternally. 

I love the verse in the Bible that says the first will be last and the last will be first.  This has to be why, because God has a different way of judging people and seeing the hearts of people. 

Father, I ask you, give me the heart of that young girl, to love deeply, courageously, eternally, sacrificing all, not worrying a minute about my own welfare or that people would know that I ever existed.  May my greatest joy be in you, and in you alone, in knowing you, and being in your presence.  I ask you, Father, to raise up a generation of young men and women who will love you and show it, not with swords and guns, but with service to others and worship to you, whose very spirits are seen not in anger, frustration, or futility, but in love, hospitality, and hope.