Our good friend, Debby Topliff, wrote some thoughts recently that I’d like to share with you (with her permission). She has been meditating and painting her reflections on the book of Revelation (more on that in a moment).

“Dear Clark and Ann,
We are excited with you - sitting on the edge of our seats so to speak-as we wait and watch to see God’s dramatic move in your lives. (Revelation intrigues me because it shows us the end of the story so we don’t have to be afraid.)

You may know I’ve had a foot problem - a metal joint in my big toe, a broken toe, and a badly sprained ankle after being thrown off a horse. Finally, after 3 years I am able to resume prayer walks with John and explorations in the woods and on the lakeshore. Praise God. But this bruising of the foot has made me think of the seed of Adam and Eve who would be bruised in the foot. I take this as a sign of humiliation… the enemy trying to stop us in our tracks, prevent us from moving forward.

Yet the promised one will smite the enemy in its head - the place of thinking, reasoning, deceiving. That’s why our battle is with the sword of the spirit, the Word of God. We fight against false ideas - we hold up the truth.

There is a marked contrast in the armor of God between the enemy’s flaming arrows shot from afar - and from a hiding place - and the sword of God us in direct, face to face and person to person contact. That’s why the Lord sends us into all nations - to take the truth face to face. And if they see our faces, the glory of God beginning to be revealed, if they see the truth spoken in love… then there is hope.

Blessings!

Debby

PS: After I wrote you I was thinking about the posture of humility - being forced to your knees - as the only way to victory over the enemy. Like Jesus, we must be faithful witnesses to the truth. We don’t have to defend ourselves. We may appear defeated, but we know the secret ending of the story.”

As I mentioned, Debby has been painting the images of the book of Revelation. You can view her talking about some of her work here.

(To view the clip, you’ll need “Windows Media Player”, which can be downloaded for free at Microsoft.)