The bruised bride

In my vision I saw a highway stretching to the west, with mountains in the distance. I knew the mountains were the Rocky Mountains.

I saw a figure coming toward me, walking along the ditch. She was a bride, but her dress was torn, ripped at the knees and elsewhere. Her knees were bloody.

Her makeup was smudged, her hair messed up and her face scratched.

The sense was that this bride, this precious had been kicked out of the wedding car. And this stirred within me the compassion of Christ for his bruised and battered bride--those precious ones who have not experienced so much of His love and grace in the church as of the condemnation and wounding of the self righteous and proud.

The sad fact is many have come through church bearing wounds and unfed. They have, in their hearts and minds, lost their beauty. But they are still the bride, still beautiful to the groom.

And they will be restored.

For thus says the Lord God; Behold I, even I, will both search my sheep and seek them out. As a shepherd seeks out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered; so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.

And I will bring them out from the people, and gather them from their countries, and will bring them to their own land, and will feed them on the mountain of Israel by the rivers, and in all the inhabited places of the country. I will feed them in a good pasture, upon the high mountains of Israel shall their fold be; there they shall lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed upon the mountains of Israel. (Ezekiel 34:12-14)

P.S. As Faye and I were considering our move from Manitoba to Alberta, I was extremely anxious during a scouting trip to look for a house. A realtor gave us a tour of the communities surround Calgary and I remember going through Okotoks, turning toward Black Diamond/Turner Valley, climbing a hill and then at the top of the hill, looking to the mountains, I saw the road in the vision. And my anxiety vanished.