The Rainbow comes and goes,
And lovely is the Rose,
The Moon doth with delight
Look round her when the heavens are bare,
Waters on a starry night
Are beautiful and fair;
The sunshine is a glorious birth;
But yet I know, where’er I go,
That there hath past away a glory from the earth.
–William Wordsworth
Something has gone missing from the Earth.
It has sprung wings and flown away, and we did not notice it until it was gone. Like the Shekinah Glory vanishing unnoticed from Israel’s Temple.
“Ichabod!” a mother named her son when the Glory of God had departed from her people. And it has not returned.
What do we do in the absence of glory? We mourn with Wordsworth:
There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,
The earth, and every common sight,
To me did seem
Appareled in celestial light,
The glory and the freshness of a dream.
It is not now as it hath been of yore;–
Turn wheresoe’er I may,
By night or day,
The things which I have seen I now can see no more.
Mourn we do. But can we hope for the return of glory? Can we look for the day when we say with the Psalmist, “Lift up your heads! The King of Glory is coming in!” (Psalm 24:7-8)?
Yes, yes we can!
This is what Jesus said: “Did I not say to you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”
So, do you believe?