After a few days in Rio my friends and I started wondering when we would get to see the city’s most famous landmark, the Christ the Redeemer statue. The clouds that are common in the tropical summer of Brazil were covering the statue from our sight and having arrived in the cidade maravilhosa for a Youth Conference Committee meeting, I was anxious to see the towering Redentor before I got busy.
Thankfully we didn’t have to wait for too long; having chosen a day with the least cloud cover we made our way to the top of the mountain. It was impressive. In the remaining days as we travelled through the city on many occasions we would look up and remark ‘today we can’t see Jesus, again he is covered in the clouds’.
It did make me reflect. For too many people today Jesus is still ‘up there in the clouds’, aloof, distant, hidden and elusive. Yet this is exactly what the Lord doesn’t want. He descended from heaven to be with us and to take us there for eternity. If the clouds seem to be covering your view it may be you are looking up instead of looking within. For it is in our heart that He dwells and speaks. As we open up in genuine prayer He will show us the ‘clouds of sin’ that may be blocking us from seeing Him and the power of His love and truth.
Lord, as Lent approaches, may my desire for that ‘something deeper’ in my heart lead me to search for a more intimate relationship with you since you are not in the clouds but the Lord who is near and richly blesses those who call on you (cf Rom 10:12)