In The Spirit - The One Year Heaven on Earth Devotional

Read: Revelation 4

Instantly I was in the Spirit, and I saw a throne in heaven and someone sitting on it. Revelation 4:2

IN WORD

“In the Spirit,” John saw the throne in heaven—and “someone” seated on it. You don’t see such things in the flesh. Natural eyes don’t have the capacity for spiritual realities. Our senses feed our brains with information, and our brains fit the information into categories. But there are no categories for heavenly visions. Throughout this vision of the throne room, John uses phrases like “had the appearance of” and “looked like” because human languages have no words for what he saw. The colors were too dazzling, the shapes and sounds too indescribable, the dimensions too unfamiliar. Human assumptions can’t take in such a scene; only the Spirit can provide the means to take it in.

Scripture tells us we have access to the throne room of God (Hebrews 4:16), but most of us access it blindly. Must it be that way? Not necessarily. The more we depend on our natural senses, the more we “see through a glass, darkly,” as Paul put it (1 Corinthians 13:12, KJV). But the more we are “in the Spirit”—not just as our position in Christ, as is always true, but in practical experience—the more we will get glimpses of throne-room realities. The door in heaven is open to our spiritual senses if we learn how to tune in to them in the Spirit.

IN DEED

People who believe heavenly glimpses are impossible will never have them unless God sovereignly imposes them. But those who hunger for the presence of the one on the throne as though seeing His dwelling is a viable possibility will find Him coming into focus frequently. If our goal is to intellectually process the Word without relying on spiritual revelation, we’ll end up with rationales. But if we are saturated in the Spirit’s presence, our minds will grasp what normal reason could never discover on its own. All of heaven will open up to us. And the one seated on the throne will pour His deep, transforming truth into our hearts.

ADDITIONAL READING: Ephesians 6:18

No one can understand spiritual mysteries by carnal reason.

THOMAS BENTON BROOKS