From the very beginning of this
writing assignment I have struggled to try to describe the person you will
become in Eternity. As I have said in another place, you are going to be so
much more than a superhero. To compare comic book caped crusaders with the Elohim – angels, is not even a fair
measure of angels.
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| Orlando Bloom as Legolas Greenleaf |
Angels are given abilities are
above any of our superhero characters, and yet they will be less that what you will be! That
is mind-boggling. The challenge is to create a picture inside of your mind that
gives you the ability to grasp something of the wonder that GOD intends for you
to be. There is one model that millions of us are familiar with and in a way
long to emulate: Legolas Greenleaf.
In the misty past of my youth
people were only able to read the words of J. R. R. Tolkien in physical books.
Even that esoteric taste of the story was enough to fire the imaginations of
millions. Elves evolved from one-foot-tall pixies into magical warriors in our
imaginations. Their beauty and perfection, their graceful carriage and skill, their
wisdom and near immortality became something we longed for. Tolkien created “the
Man we men wanted to be.”
All of the LORD OF THE RINGS movies
were well made and they were true enough to the source material. More
importantly, Peter Jackson managed to captured the glorious highs and frightful
lows of our imaginations and put them on the screen for us to experience with
our own eyes. The settings alone drive thousands to cross the globe just to
experience the majesty of New Zealand. The country now reaps millions in
tourist dollars each year as a result of the movies that came from books about
Middle Earth.
I won’t go into the root basis for the
books in detail. It is enough to say both Tolkien and Lewis drew heavily on the
Bible. (Learn more about that here.) That’s not really Earth-shaking since even to an Agnostic, the themes of
the Bible resonate a deep understanding of men. Virtually every way a man can
screw up his life is recorded somewhere in the Bible.
Most people enjoyed the LOTR movies
in the first sitting. Most of those went back to watch it again or viewed the
movies at home or on a portable device. I know many people who will sit through
the movies yet again despite having watched an uncountable number of times
before – even when they have to sit through commercials.
One thing I often hear is they like
to get lost in the characters. By now they are so familiar that most can name
them with no prompting. Personally, I am still
struggling to name all twelve of the dwarves in the HOBBIT movies – (I just
recently mastered the seven dwarves of
SNOW WHITE!) – And don’t ask me to name Santa’s reindeer either.
But what is so wonderful about Legolas?
Legolas is just one of the elves we
see in the movies. He is the most knowable of the “Quendi.” He exhibits traits
that are miraculous to our eyes but seem perfectly normal to him. He is a
superb marksman with a bow, able to shoot farther than any other species in
Middle Earth with extreme accuracy. He is the sniper of the Fellowship.
Legolas – and by extension, all
elves – also displays remarkable physical gifts. He has telescopic vision, canine-level
hearing and graceful balance. Elves seem unaffected by cold or any of the
elements. Perhaps the most stunning of his scenes found Legolas strolling past
his compatriots as they weathered a mountain blizzard. Lightly dressed, Legolas
walked calmly into the howling winds on
top of the snow to scout the way ahead. Who didn’t want to be an elf at that point?
The ultimate difference between a
Tolkien elf and your resurrected body is – you will never taste death; not
again if you have before, not at all should you be caught up in the Rapture.
Legolas is a foreshadowing of your future God-given existence. What keeps him
warm in the cold, what keeps them all young and flawlessly beautiful is a
glimpse of the “shekinah glory” that once covered Adam and his wife and will
cover you when all of this is done.
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| "Body of Experience" |
So as you sit there in your earthly
vessel reading this – fatter than you want to be, wrinkled, going grey, perhaps
disabled in some way – take heart in knowing the body you will have, the one
that will be home to your spirit man for most of its existence will be perfect.
No wheelchair, no medication, none of the myriad of frailties the flesh is heir
to—none of that will come near you again. That is what you are destined to be.
And only the beginning of the wonders your Heavenly Father has in store for
you.
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