Building a house with invisible bricks

Just had a cool little revelation and I wanted to write it down before I forgot.

I had received a couple words from God about 5 months ago that, in paraphrase, said, "Persevere in prayer, because you are building a mighty tower." The main idea is that, in prayer, in fasting, in devouring the Word, in seeking God's face, we are building something; we are building on the foundation of Christ something eternal (see 1 Cor 3). This is the essence of our life on this earth; to build something that will stand through the fire and be an eternal reward.

What makes it so difficult, among other things, is the fact that we often don't see what we're building until months or years or even decades down the road. Just think about Paul; he invested heavily in a number of churches, and yet those churches appeared to slip very quickly into deception, selfishness, and perversion (see Galatians, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, etc, etc). So he did not, in life, see with his eyes the kingdom of God that he was building on earth. Same thing with Abraham, who did not see in his lifetime the multitudes of descendants like the stars. The life of David is another fabulous example of someone building towards eternity, but not seeing until very late in his life the kingdom he worked so hard to attain.

It is the same today for us. We are called to live lives of faith, which means building a kingdom that is on the inside. We are building with invisible bricks. But what does the bible say about invisible bricks? Check out Rev 21:

18The wall was made of jasper, and the city of pure gold, as pure as glass. ... 21The twelve gates were twelve pearls, each gate made of a single pearl. The great street of the city was of pure gold, like transparent glass. (NIV)

The New Jerusalem is made out of transparent gold. This is deeply profound. What does transparent mean? It means that you could see right through it. It's almost like it wasn't there, except for the fact that it was deeply saturated with the presence of God. This is an incredible message for anyone struggling in the place of prayer and fasting and seeking God's face. When we're building something eternal on the foundation of Christ, a la 1 Cor 3, we're actually building the New Jerusalem, the eternal dwelling place of man and God in full communion. This is both deeply encouraging and provoking. May the light of God's glory saturate the invisible tower of His Kingdom that you are building, in partnership with God, in your heart, even today.