A Taste Of Heaven

"I'm getting a taste of heaven!" That's what I thought to myself last night.

I had returned to a place I'd once known. A place where a number of people loved me. A place also where certain people had scorned me and disliked me. Rejected me. Mistreated me.

It was extremely awkward to return to that place, but circumstances were such that it was the right thing to do. So I came.

Those who still harbored ill will? They were around. But they stayed away.

Those who loved me? They came as if like moths to the flame. They showered love on me, rejoiced that I had returned, and I in turn rejoiced to see them and exchange affection with them. it was a night full of delighted faces and warm hugs.

"I'm getting a taste of heaven!" It was a sudden realization that burst into my thoughts about 20 minutes into the experience. Then, a little bit before the evening was over, someone else said it to me, though I had not said the words out loud to anyone at all.

"It's like a taste of heaven!" she exclaimed.

You took the words out of my mouth, my friend. Indeed, you took them out of my head!

And what a taste it was. For those things and people that hurt us will not follow us into the Kingdom of God. But all that is good and right — those who love the Lord — we will rejoice together in his presence with a fullness of joy that cannot be imagined now.

But we can occasionally get a taste.