If I could live a fantasy, I'd be a wood-elf dwelling in Tolkien's legendary Rivendell. I cannot imagine anything closer to Paradise on this earth. A marvel of nature and high creativity, a haven of sacred beauty. Protected by stalwart stone cliffs, the water catapulting from dizzying heights and glittering millions of diamonds in moonlight. I would be intimately acquainted with all green and growing things and healing arts. The forest would be to me as a second skin. Life would be a graceful dance of starlight, rivers, trees, music, and wild things. Nothing would make me afraid, for I would be immortal, belonging to the Undying Lands, far wiser and stronger and skilled beyond the ways of mortal men. I'd be a fierce warrior and an even fiercer lover - binding myself to an immortal love that I would hold forever with a single heart.
But I am immortal. I am a citizen of the Undying Lands, an heiress to unimaginable wealth and glory, a vessel filled with light and hope and power far beyond the understanding of mortal flesh and mind. I flow with the rivers of Life that bring restoration to a dying world.
And if that were not enough, I belong to a Love that is eternal, unfading; higher, wider, deeper, and stronger than anything this world of flesh can contain. This Love is stronger than death and has the last word beyond time, space, flesh, and the grave. Nothing can ever quench my Love or separate me from Him! This Love will not let me go!
He died for me. He paid the ultimate price to make me His bride. But death could not keep Him, for He is the Author of Life itself! My Hero vanquished death, obliterated my sin that held me captive, and called me from the thrall of the dark lord into His Sovereign realm of life and love and light!
Now I am one with Him....forever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever....beyond the grey shadows of this fading world to the bright Undying Lands...to infinity and beyond!
"And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it. And His servants shall serve Him. They shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads. There shall be no night there. They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light. And they shall reign forever and ever.
"And the Spirit and the bride say, 'Come!' And let him who hears say, 'Come!' And let him who thirsts come. Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely."
-Revelation 22:3-5, 17
