Are you in darkness? Jesus is the light of the world.
“John 12
Belief and Unbelief Among the Jews 37 Even after Jesus had performed so many signs in their presence, they still would not believe in him. 38 This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet:
“Lord, who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?”[h] 39 For this reason they could not believe, because, as Isaiah says elsewhere:
40 “He has blinded their eyes and hardened their hearts, so they can neither see with their eyes, nor understand with their hearts, nor turn—and I would heal them.”[i] 41 Isaiah said this because he saw Jesus’ glory and spoke about him.
42 Yet at the same time many even among the leaders believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they would not openly acknowledge their faith for fear they would be put out of the synagogue; 43 for they loved human praise more than praise from God.
44 Then Jesus cried out, “Whoever believes in me does not believe in me only, but in the one who sent me. 45 The one who looks at me is seeing the one who sent me. 46 I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.
47 “If anyone hears my words but does not keep them, I do not judge that person. For I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world. 48 There is a judge for the one who rejects me and does not accept my words; the very words I have spoken will condemn them at the last day. 49 For I did not speak on my own, but the Father who sent me commanded me to say all that I have spoken. 50 I know that his command leads to eternal life. So whatever I say is just what the Father has told me to say.”’
I am afraid of the dark. As a child it paralyzed me. As an adult I’ve worked past the fear, and I carry a flashlight. All of us with phones carry a flashlight. Jesus can be our spiritual flashlight.
Jesus being light and bringing light into our lives is one of the things that can make us uncomfortable. There are things done in darkness, or memories hidden in dark corners of our hearts, things done by us, things done to us that we want to stay hidden. Hidden and forgotten.
Jesus came to expose those things not to shame us or hurt us, but to forgive us and free us from the pain and the stench and the mess and the clutter.
Some of us are hoarders of bad memories.
I challenge all of us today to let the light of the world into our darkest corners so that cleansing and forgiveness can begin.
“I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.”
” Now there were some Greeks among those who went up to worship at the festival. 21 They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, with a request. “Sir,” they said, “we would like to see Jesus.” 22 Philip went to tell Andrew; Andrew and Philip in turn told Jesus.
23 Jesus replied, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. 24 Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. 25 Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26 Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.
27 “Now my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour. 28 Father, glorify your name!”
Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.” 29 The crowd that was there and heard it said it had thundered; others said an angel had spoken to him.
30 Jesus said, “This voice was for your benefit, not mine. 31 Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out. 32 And I, when I am lifted up[g] from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” 33 He said this to show the kind of death he was going to die.
34 The crowd spoke up, “We have heard from the Law that the Messiah will remain forever, so how can you say, ‘The Son of Man must be lifted up’? Who is this ‘Son of Man’?”
35 Then Jesus told them, “You are going to have the light just a little while longer. Walk while you have the light, before darkness overtakes you. Whoever walks in the dark does not know where they are going. 36 Believe in the light while you have the light, so that you may become children of light.” When he had finished speaking, Jesus left and hid himself from them.”
The horn button principal. I have A 57 chevy pickup. His name is Rusty. For close to 30 years before I had my truck, I had a 57 chevy truck horn button. It sat on a shelf in my garage. I wanted a truck. I had horn button. When anyone asked about the horn button I would say “I’m growing to grow a 57 Chevy pickup from that horn button”. A long time passed. Finally one day I gave away the horn button. That ended my dream. Or so I thought. Several years went by but around my 50th birthday I got a letter from an uncle saying he had a 57 Chevy truck that he wanted to give me. It was the same person that I had given the horn button to. The day I got the truck I also got the horn button back. I had planted the seed and it germinated and grew into a truck.
The principle is that you have to let the dream die so that it can come back to life. Bigger and better than you could hope for.
Jesus literally planted himself in the earth for us. He died and was buried and came back to life changed. The people who were following him had an idea of who and what Messiah would be. It was wrong or at least incomplete. Messiah wasn’t coming to set Israel free from Roman oppression. Messiah had come to set mankind free from sins oppression. Jesus had to die, the incorrect or incomplete messianic dream had to die so that Jesus could become the real and only hope of freedom from sin.
“25 Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26 Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.”
“12 Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. 2 Here a dinner was given in Jesus’ honor. Martha served, while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him. 3 Then Mary took about a pint[a] of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.
4 But one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, who was later to betray him, objected, 5 “Why wasn’t this perfume sold and the money given to the poor? It was worth a year’s wages.[b]” 6 He did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.
7 “Leave her alone,” Jesus replied. “It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial. 8 You will always have the poor among you,[c] but you will not always have me.”
9 Meanwhile a large crowd of Jews found out that Jesus was there and came, not only because of him but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. 10 So the chief priests made plans to kill Lazarus as well, 11 for on account of him many of the Jews were going over to Jesus and believing in him.”
Mary gave Jesus the best she had. She gave it freely and extravagantly. “And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.”
I don’t have a personal example of this. I can’t say, “it was like that time I…..” I say this to my shame, I am a stingy person. And worse yet, Jesus doesn’t get my reserved best, he gets what I have left at the time. Like right now, I’m scrambling to put thoughts together. It’s like my spiritual life’s feast is a Charlie Brown thanksgiving, toast pretzels and popcorn.
I come to him, just as I am, spent, tired and empty and he still loves me. I long for the day when I can present him me at my very best, but in the meantime he takes me as I am, worn out, broken, used up, confused, distracted and let’s me rest with him. Then he tells me he loves me.
He just wants me, he just wants us to be with him.
In our little town at this time of the year there is a ginormous lighted cross at the top of a hill over looking our region of Washington State.
Why is it it there? It’s a sign, it reminds us of an execution that took place about 2000 years ago. A man named Jesus was hung on a cross, literally nailed to a wooden cross, and left there to die. It’s recorded that some men would hang for days. Because of the flogging he received before being nailed to the cross, he died in a few hours. The Jewish leaders of his day had conspired to have him killed. They succeeded.
Gods master plan wasn’t interrupted by the cross of Jesus. Gods master plan was the cross of Jesus. Don’t think for a minute the Jews conspiring to kill this man was an accident. Jesus knew ahead of time what was coming. He knew he would die a death that pain itself was the killer. The victim is slowly suffocated by pain. He knew. And yet he loved us so much, he did it anyway.
Matthew 16
“16 The Pharisees and Sadducees came to Jesus and tested him by asking him to show them a sign from heaven.
2 He replied, “When evening comes, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red,’ 3 and in the morning, ‘Today it will be stormy, for the sky is red and overcast.’ You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.[a] 4 A wicked and adulterous generation looks for a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of Jonah.” Jesus then left them and went away.”
The sign of Jonah. Jonah was in the fish three days and three nights. Jesus would soon be in the earth 3 days a 3 nights. The fish couldn’t hold Jonah and death will not, did not, can not hold Jesus.
If you added up what Jesus had done in front of these people to this time in his ministry, like feeding 5 thousand the another 4 thousand with a bag of bread and some fish, healing every person who asked for it, raising the dead back to life, walking on water, calming a storm, all of this had already been displayed, then they asked for a sign from heaven.
What nudge are we waiting for in our generation? It’s always Gods love that draws us in. God loves us. He showed us his love in the sign of Jonah. That Jesus was swallowed up by death but he defeated it. He didn’t need to beat death, he is God, but he knew we needed it because death waits for us all. At death we must cash in our chips to pay for all of mistakes, our sins, our selfishness but we don’t have enough. Our pockets are empty at the grave but Jesus not only beat death, he paid for our sin too. His perfect life sacrificially given up pays for it all.
My photo is grainy and blurry, forgive me. If you live in Ephrata look up to the top of Beasley hill tonight, you will see it, there’s a sign there, a sign for each one of us. It’s a cross. God loves us so much that he sent his son to die in our place.
“38 Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. 39 “Take away the stone,” he said.
“But, Lord,” said Martha, the sister of the dead man, “by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.”
40 Then Jesus said, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”
41 So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”
43 When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.
Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
The Plot to Kill Jesus 45 Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him. 46 But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. 47 Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin.
“What are we accomplishing?” they asked. “Here is this man performing many signs. 48 If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our temple and our nation.”
49 Then one of them, named Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, spoke up, “You know nothing at all! 50 You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”
51 He did not say this on his own, but as high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the Jewish nation, 52 and not only for that nation but also for the scattered children of God, to bring them together and make them one. 53 So from that day on they plotted to take his life.
54 Therefore Jesus no longer moved about publicly among the people of Judea. Instead he withdrew to a region near the wilderness, to a village called Ephraim, where he stayed with his disciples.
55 When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, many went up from the country to Jerusalem for their ceremonial cleansing before the Passover. 56 They kept looking for Jesus, and as they stood in the temple courts they asked one another, “What do you think? Isn’t he coming to the festival at all?” 57 But the chief priests and the Pharisees had given orders that anyone who found out where Jesus was should report it so that they might arrest him.”
This story was hard for me to write about. I couldn’t get images of rotting flesh and Zombies out of my mind.
The weird thing is that I have personal experience with being clinically dead. I was in a car accident when I was 11 and was without pulse and not breathing when I arrived at the hospital. My mom arrived just then, saw me and asked some doctors who had just checked me and were walking away if she could talk to me. They said ” it doesn’t matter now”. My mom touched my leg and I started coughing. The doctors spun around and started working on me again. I remember being above my body in the hallway and the return to the pain of being damaged but in flesh.
Jesus spoke to Lazarus. “Come out” and the mound of flesh and bones that was rotting inside a cave came back to life and walked out of the grave. The same voice that had said to pre-existing darkness, ” let there be light” and light came into being, reanimated the body of his friend with 3 words. “Lazarus,come out.”
We are all dead in our sins.
“2 As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh[a] and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved”.
We are all dead in our sins but we don’t have stay that way. Jesus speaks to each one of us and says “(your name here), come out”.
Toilets are nasty. They are filled with all kinds of bacteria and germs and ugly nastiness. Even after cleaning them they are still a host for filth. In the part of the world I live in even the cleanest of toilets get a hard water ring at the water level from the deposits in the water. No Matter how much I clean my toilet, it is still just by the nature of its function, contaminated and dirty.
The Bible says our hearts are like that, desperately wicked. Dirty. nasty.
The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?
Jeremiah 17:9
There are no exceptions.
As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God.
Romans 3:10-11
I was doing my semi-annual toilet bowl scrubbing which doesn’t take a lot of concentration so my mind was free to drift. I’ve been reading Philippians and there are a couple of spots that ring in my head, not because I have these areas licked, but because I stumble over and over them.
“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.”
Philippians 2:3-4
“Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose. Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, “children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.” Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky.”
Philippians 2:12-15
I generally do value others better than myself. But there are some that I just have trouble raising their value in my eyes. These are usually the same people that ask me to do stuff I don’t want to do and I respond with both grumbling and complaining.
If I could fix the first part, valuing them above myself, the second part, doing what they ask of me without grumbling or complaining, would probably fix itself. I think it goes back to my toilet like heart.
What am I to do?
There was a king over Israel who had dalliance with a beautiful woman. The woman was married. Her husband was a soldier deployed to a battle front. The woman got pregnant from the one night stand. She told the king. He had the soldier brought home so he could hide the pregnancy in the marriage bed. It didn’t work. The soldier was too honorable to enjoy his wife’s company while his men were in battle. So, the king sent him back and had him killed by the enemy. He then took his widow into his home. All cleaned up and tidy. No one was the wiser. But God knew. And the king knew. And the toilet bowl of his heart would not come clean until he confessed his sin. So the king wrote this, we know it as Psalm 51.
“Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight; so you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge. Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb; you taught me wisdom in that secret place. Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice. Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity. Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me. Then I will teach transgressors your ways, so that sinners will turn back to you. Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, you who are God my Savior, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness. Open my lips, Lord, and my mouth will declare your praise. You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise.
Psalm 51:1-17
When I sin, My course of action must be similar to the kings, I must confess, tell God what’s really in my toilet bowl heart and repent, change direction, and ask to be forgiven.
What can wash away my sin?
We sing a song about it. The chorus goes something like this:
What can wash away my sin?
Nothing.
Nothing.
Nothing…..but the blood of Jesus.
Through confession and repentance I bring my filthy toilet bowl heart to God and he washes it with the cleansing blood of his son Jesus and my heart is clean again. Not for long. Just like the toilet in my house, my heart gets dirtied so I go back to God and forgives me yet again.
Everyone can have their toilet bowl heart cleaned by the blood of Jesus, even me, even you. We just need to confess that we need it, repent and ask for God to clean us. He wants to help us because he loves us people with toilet bowl hearts.
Back in 2019 I suggested to our grow group that we do a study “Anxious for nothing” that Max Lucado has prepared. It is on how to deal with anxiety.
The study focuses on Paul’s letter to the Philippians 4:5-8.
I highly recommend this study. I have mentioned it in my posts before and do so again today.
Why mention it again? Well, because taking that course and studying those verses hasn’t meant that I am now anxiety free. In the last 2 months Life’s anxiety dial has gotten cranked to 11. The course doesn’t teach us how to avoid anxiety, it teaches us how to deal with it when it comes. The way to deal with anxiety is given in the verses in Philippians. “Let everyone see that you are considerate in all you do. Remember, the Lord is coming soon. Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus. And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.” Philippians 4:5-8 – NLT
There are 2 parts of this that I keep forgetting. The first I keep forgetting, and it is essential for my heart and soul and spirit, is yes to pray about everything, AND be thankful for all that God has done already. I forget to be thankful.
The second part I forget to do is to fix my thoughts on the good things. “what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise”
I keep peeking into the news, looking for bright spots but get sucked into blood clots, and death Rates and who gets it worse, etc. just writing those things kicked up the anxiety levels. But the news is not my reality.
My reality is this: I’m sitting in a warm-ish basement, on a very comfortable couch, I’m listening to my sprinklers sprinkle my lawn, my dog snore, the birds sing, a heater in my bathroom heating where there is a flush toilet AND at least another couple of days supply of toilet paper.
Not everyone reading this has life this good. Some have it worse and some have it better. I need to maintain an attitude of thankfulness to God because he is God. I owe him my very existence.
There are good things to think about and I have to actively guard my thoughts to focus on the good. I recently saw a Facebook post of a proud father helping his son rope a calf. There was a lot of motion and action and determined concentration for everyone involved. It’s like that. Active motion. Thoughtful and mindful thinking. Concentration. I have to police my thoughts like that young man policed his calf.
So here I am confessing I failed- again. I’ve been worried and anxious. I have been ungrateful. The Forgive me father. Thank you for all that you have done in my past and are doing right now in my present and all that you will do in my future. Help me stay in a state of gratitude and thankfulness and to be amazed at all you have done and are doing all around me and even inside me.
“Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2 (This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.) 3 So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick.”
4 When he heard this, Jesus said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.” 5 Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 6 So when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days, 7 and then he said to his disciples, “Let us go back to Judea.”
8 “But Rabbi,” they said, “a short while ago the Jews there tried to stone you, and yet you are going back?”
9 Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Anyone who walks in the daytime will not stumble, for they see by this world’s light. 10 It is when a person walks at night that they stumble, for they have no light.”
11 After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”
12 His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.” 13 Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.
14 So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, 15 and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”
16 Then Thomas (also known as Didymus[a]) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”’
There are a couple of things that happen here that make me scratch my head.
Jesus said that the sickness wouldn’t end in death but Lazarus dies. But it doesn’t end there.
Lord willing I’ll talk more about that tomorrow.
The second thing is that John mentions a thing about Mary washing and anointing Jesus’ feet as if he had already told us about it but it doesn’t get written in until the next chapter.
I have often felt that in the story of my life I only play a minor supporting role. In the credits of “Peters life, the movie” towards the end, right before they thank the caterers and the city of Ephrata there will be “and Peter Loeffelbein”.
I think lazarus’ sister Mary may have felt that way about her life but her simple act of ministering to Jesus was so well known that John could reference it before he had written it.
I think this says our service to Jesus may be more significant than we know. He remembers it all.
Do the right thing and do it for the right reason and for the right person.
Do it for Jesus. And keep doing it because he remembers it all. Keep serving him. Love people. Serve people. Keep going. He remembers it. He remembers us. It is significant.
“Then came the Festival of Dedication[b] at Jerusalem. It was winter, 23 and Jesus was in the temple courts walking in Solomon’s Colonnade. 24 The Jews who were there gathered around him, saying, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.”
25 Jesus answered, “I did tell you, but you do not believe. The works I do in my Father’s name testify about me, 26 but you do not believe because you are not my sheep. 27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all[c]; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one.”
31 Again his Jewish opponents picked up stones to stone him, 32 but Jesus said to them, “I have shown you many good works from the Father. For which of these do you stone me?”
33 “We are not stoning you for any good work,” they replied, “but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.”
34 Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I have said you are “gods”’[d]? 35 If he called them ‘gods,’ to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be set aside— 36 what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, ‘I am God’s Son’? 37 Do not believe me unless I do the works of my Father. 38 But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.” 39 Again they tried to seize him, but he escaped their grasp.
40 Then Jesus went back across the Jordan to the place where John had been baptizing in the early days. There he stayed, 41 and many people came to him. They said, “Though John never performed a sign, all that John said about this man was true.” 42 And in that place many believed in Jesus.”
Are you one of His sheep?
I am. Of course that is a metaphor. I’m not really a sheep. I am a follower of Jesus and I have accepted his offer.
I got to a point where I realized that I had done things that had stained me. No matter what I did I could not wash away the stains. Jesus offered to wash away my stains but he did it with his blood. By dying the death I deserved to die he paid for and in a sense, washed away all of my stains.
In that transaction I became his sheep. One of many. Will join me and become one of his flock? There is no better shepherd than Jesus. Since he died and rose again death no longer has a hold on him or on me. My body will die but my spirit will live forever. I can never be “snatched away” from Jesus.
Walks in the cemetery (and four weird things about that)
Isaiah 26
Covid-19 has me self quarantined in my home practicing social distancing and working from home. My home is house built in 1940 in the downtown of a sleepy little rural community. I have an office set up in my basement. It is cool and damp and I feel a little weird working from 6 feet underground.
I take a walk on my work breaks. Within a 2 minute walk I can reach 3 church buildings. Within a 5 minute walk I can reach a cemetery. During my work breaks walks I have been walking through the cemetery. I read once that a cemetery is a good place for a writer to gather names for fictional characters. (It’s true, i found the name James Bond on a head stone. Do you suppose Ian Fleming walked through this cemetery?) So as I walk I’ve been reading the names and also noting the dates of life. The oldest death dates I’ve seen so far are from 1918 and I wonder if they were victims of the Spanish flu. That would be ironic for me to visit a grave of a victim of a flu pandemic because I am home, isolating myself, trying to avoid a flu pandemic.
Another irony that I saw in this cemetery is a man with the last name Wood that has a giant cedar tree growing out of his gravesite. Really has nothing to do with the topic, just a fun fact.
I am avoiding sickness and death by visiting the repository of a town’s dead. Weird thing one. Avoiding sickness and death by visiting a cemetery which is a collection of death sites.
We’ve been watching a TV series where the main character doesn’t believe in an afterlife. We meet him because he is avenging the murder of his wife and daughter. His job before their murders was as a spiritist or a psychic, faking connections and deceiving people into thinking they were conversing with their dead loved ones. His supporting character is a believer in the afterlife. She wears a cross. The main character frequently states, “there is no such thing as a psychic”. In his view there can’t be because there is no afterlife. You can’t talk to the dead, they are dead.
Then there’s the cemetery. His wife and daughters remains rest, slowly decaying in the ground. The last couple of episodes of the series he loses a friend and co-worker to a gun shot wound. She is laid to rest in a cemetery.
Weird thing two. People who don’t believe in an afterlife.
Back in reality, in our real world, If we’re lucky we will end up in a grave with a grave stone. I read a story about New York City’s Covid 19 victims. They are dying so fast that they can’t do individual graves. The unclaimed bodies have been unceremoniously dumped in a trench in a “potter’s field”. No gravestones, no funerals, no mourners.
Weird thing 3. Death.
Speaking of mourning, but the other kind, This morning my suggested bible reading guide took me to Isaiah chapter 26. Isaiah the prophet believed in a God who offered an afterlife. “Lord, they came to you in their distress; when you disciplined them, they could barely whisper a prayer. As a pregnant woman about to give birth writhes and cries out in her pain, so were we in your presence, Lord. We were with child, we writhed in labor, but we gave birth to wind. We have not brought salvation to the earth, and the people of the world have not come to life. But your dead will live, Lord; their bodies will rise— let those who dwell in the dust wake up and shout for joy— your dew is like the dew of the morning; the earth will give birth to her dead.” Isaiah 26:16-19 – NIV
Believers in the God of the Bible believe that death is not the end. We believe that God is the God who gives life to the dead.
During Jesus’ time on earth he was questioned by the Sadducees. They did not believe in life after death and they brought Jesus a question that they thought proved their point.
“That same day the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to him with a question. “Teacher,” they said, “Moses told us that if a man dies without having children, his brother must marry the widow and raise up offspring for him. Now there were seven brothers among us. The first one married and died, and since he had no children, he left his wife to his brother. The same thing happened to the second and third brother, right on down to the seventh. Finally, the woman died. Now then, at the resurrection, whose wife will she be of the seven, since all of them were married to her?” Jesus replied, “You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God. 30 At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven. 31 But about the resurrection of the dead—have you not read what God said to you, 32 ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not the God of the dead but of the living.” When the crowds heard this, they were astonished at his teaching. Matthew 22:23-33 – NIV
In Jesus’ answer notice the tense of the verb. “I am”, am being the present tense of to be. In contrast God did not say “I was” as in “I was the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob ” but he said, “I am the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob”. Abraham Isaac and Jacob died and yet continue to exist.
I serve a God who gives away eternal life. Of all the gifts a person could get, eternal life is like way up there, top ten for sure. I joke, it is the ultimate gift. He also gives another gift which is a tie for ultimate gift-ness, and it has to be given first. That gift may not seem as big of a deal but it’s required that we get it before we can get the gift of eternal life and that gift is? Complete and total forgiveness. Past and present and future sins forgiven upon confession. What an awesome gift. For those of us who have the attitude of “I ain’t so bad…never killed anyone…” We will discuss this more in the future but everyone is guilty of killing at least one person. That one person? Jesus. I killed Jesus. You killed Jesus. How? It was our sin that brought Jesus to the cross. For my sins Jesus died. Still feel like you ain’t so bad? It’s probably who we compare ourselves to that gives us the smugness and feeling of superiority. “I ain’t as bad as my neighbors.” “I ain’t as bad as Fill in the blank”. Let’s just switch the focus off of known sinners and all compare ourselves to the true standard. The standard is Jesus. He is the spotless lamb of God. Sinless and perfect in every way! Next to him my merit badges seem to disappear.
Weird thing 4. God loves me enough to allow his son to die for me.
I need forgiveness. I want every lasting life.
So here I am, sheltering in place in my basement. Already 6 feet under. (In my basement). And yet I am alive. Visiting a cemetery to avoid death, knowing some people believe death is the end even if God said it isn’t, just knowing death will eventually grab me, but having confidence that my sin is forgiven because I killed a guy, who in turn forgave me and gifted me with eternity with him.
Make sense of this if you can. Be encouraged if you will. Be forgiven and gifted with eternity if you want.
Easter. It’s not about a dead guy. It is about a guy dying. Same guy. A guy died. He just didn’t stay dead.
For me growing up my life was like, “What’s that? The church doors are open? Well then, we must attend. “ My mom.
Optional for guests. Mandatory for minor children.
It was Good Friday. We were on our way to church-again.
Tradition tells me, We will be late. When we do arrive, We will smell of French fries, coffee and cigarette smoke. It was the perfume of the cafe my parents owned and operated.
We attended a Lutheran Church so the services were predictable; 3 hymns a 20 minute message and liturgy.
Sometimes there was a bonus.
Sometimes after service, there was food in the fellowship hall in the basement.
Good Friday service In 1978 was just such a night. The service was somber but then there was food and noisy fellowship afterwards. The meal and fellowship were winding down and my family was getting ready to leave. I had left something in the pew upstairs above us so I clambered up the stairs to grab it. The lights in the sanctuary were off, just the back lights by the alter and the cross on the wall. This year someone had added a rough wooden cross and it was standing on the platform between the pulpit and the lectern. The ladies of the church, two of them were ceremoniously draping the cross with a black cloth.
It suddenly hit me. This guy Jesus? The one we talked about, the one that had performed miracles. He healed. He delivered. He set free. He forgave. He brought back to life. That guy. He seemed so friendly. But tonight, for me in my understanding, he was dead.
He was dead. Even though there had been almost 2000 years elapse since it happened, the weight of the news hit me as though it had just happened that afternoon. I was washed over with grief and sadness.
I don’t recall the rest of that years Easter holiday. In general, If I’m remembering it right, Our Pastor, a fantastic old school bible preacher Joe McGaw didn’t use the term Easter, he called it resurrection day. If I had been listening, maybe the Good Friday service and the resurrection day service would’ve brought me into faith sooner. I had other things to preoccupy me though, I had guys to hang out with, a pretty girlfriend, a 57 Chevy truck that wasn’t going to restore itself. I was busy. Too busy to connect the two pieces.
A few years went by and it all started to make sense. Well, not in a worldly way of making sense. But i understood that I was a sinner. God hated sin but he loved me. He sent Jesus to die, and that death, Jesus sacrificially dying for me, brought God and I back together. All of my sin was washed away by the blood that Jesus spilled dying for me.
Then 3 days after he died, death could not keep him any longer and he rose. The tomb was emptied by him, walking out of it.
“For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus,who gave himself as a ransom for all people. This has now been witnessed to at the proper time.”
Jesus died. I am so sorry and yet so grateful. Jesus died But he didn’t stay dead. He rose from the grave.
Easter Sunday is a few days away. Resurrection day. We celebrate this event and would love for you to join us. We attend Ephrata Foursquare Church. Our service is st 10am. This year we are offering a pancake Breakfast at 9 am. Most Christian Churches will be celebrating this Sunday so if you can’t make it to our service, please just pick one and join us in the celebration.
Whether or not you come to church, I hope that you will come to understand and believe the truth about Jesus.
“Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.
It’s April 15th, in America that means income tax day, Where we pay the government our taxes due for the year. Some do it willingly, some begrudgingly, some avoid it or deny it all together.
Looking at a Roman coin, Jesus said to give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and give unto God, what is God’s. The coin had caesars likeness pressed into it. Each of us, each person on the planet has an image pressed into us. We are created in God’s image.
Give unto God, what is God’s.
C.S. Lewis wrote this in his book The Screwtape Letters. The Screwtape Letters is written from the demonic point of view. The Enemy then is God.
“Screwtape acknowledges the truth about ownership:
Even in the nursery a child can be taught to mean by ‘my teddy bear’ not the old imagined recipient of affection to whom it stands in a special relation (for that is what the Enemy will teach them to mean if we are not careful) but ‘the bear I can pull to pieces if I like’. And at the other end of the scale, we have taught men to say ‘ my God’ in a sense not really very different from ‘my boots’, meaning ‘the God on whom I have a claim for my distinguished services and whom I exploit from the pulpit- the God I have done a corner in’.
And all the time the joke is that word ’Mine’ in its fully possessive sense cannot be uttered by a human being about anything. In the long run either our Father or the Enemy will say ‘Mine’ of each thing that exists, and specially of each man. They will find out in the end, never fear, to whom their time, their souls, and their bodies really belong- certainly not to them, whatever happens. At present the Enemy says ‘Mine’ of everything on the pedantic, legalistic ground that He made it: Our Father hopes in the end to say ‘Mine’ of all things on the more realistic and dynamic ground of conquest.”
Whose are we?
We get choose. God has already bought and paid for us through the death of his son.
On this April 15th tax day, To whom do you belong?
On this day about 2 thousand years ago three guys hung from crosses on a hill outside of Jerusalem. They weren’t tied to the cross, they were nailed, through the hands and feet. Two of them were thieves, the third was a man named Jesus.
We have a record of his Jesus’ last words. The last thing he said was, ” it is finished “
“When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.” (Jn 19:30)
What did he mean?
He meant that the job of paying for all of the sin in the world, all the wrongs, all the hurts and hates, the stains on the souls of men that could not be removed by men had been removed by God.
This is no ordinary man this guy Jesus. He is the very, the only son of God.
Much to our relief he did not stay dead. 3 days later he rose from the dead. He is alive! Jesus is alive.
He died to finish the plan of our salvation and he rose from the dead to give us eternal life.
Three guys hung on crosses to their deaths. One guy said “It is finished”. And so it is.
Do you want to be forgiven and made clean this Easter? All we gotta do is ask.
Grow up. You never have to tell a tree or a tomato what to do They just do, past tense is grew. Grow up. Kids do it, baby goats that is. They grow up. They give up teats for grassy treats. Grow up. Tulips do and daffodils too. Oaks, and pines and peaches and vines. Grow up. Babies of the human type Hopefully will learn to wipe As they grow up. They wobble and bobble and work so hard To master the gate and get out in the yard But grow up? Sometimes yes and sometimes no, Sometimes fast and sometimes sooo sloooow. Grow up. What is needed How can we help To mature the inside little whelp? I have parts of me that are eighty-one Tired, broken, worn and done. I have parts that never heard That little command of just two words Grow up. What does a baby need to walk? What does a baby need to talk? Time and practice and some teacher(s) And cheering squad filling the bleacher(s) We build up endurance We build up our muscles With every failure With every tussle Grow up. Get stronger Grow up Last longer Fall fail then stand up Fall fail then man up repent and Confess and show God the mess and by his compassion and grace He will wash shame off my face And allow me to grow up.
” 11 We have much to say about this, but it is hard to make it clear to you because you no longer try to understand. 12 In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! 13 Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. 14 But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. Therefore let us move beyond the elementary teachings about Christ and be taken forward to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from acts that lead to death,[a] and of faith in God, 2 instruction about cleansing rites,[b] the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. 3 And God permitting, we will do so. Hebrews 5:11-6:3 NIV
No matter how good my shower head is ( and we have a doozy, a brand new $24.79 Walmart unit) a thorough cleaning of my outsides will not clean up my insides. Humans cannot be cleaned from the outside in. We must be cleansed from the inside out.
Matthew 15 starts out with Jesus telling us about this.
“15 Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, 2 “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!”
3 Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? 4 For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’[a] and ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’[b] 5 But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is ‘devoted to God,’ 6 they are not to ‘honor their father or mother’ with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. 7 You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:
8 “‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
9 They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.’[c]”
10 Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen and understand. 11 What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”
12 Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?”
13 He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. 14 Leave them; they are blind guides.[d] If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.”
15 Peter said, “Explain the parable to us.”
16 “Are you still so dull?” Jesus asked them. 17 “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18 But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20 These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.”
With humans we have this heart condition. It is deceitfully wicked. Kind of like a snowflake. The lovely pure white snowflake at its very center is a speck of dirt or dust. At our center, in our heart where we decide things, is a selfish center that we can’t fix or change ourselves. We are hopelessly imperfect. We need a heart change.
The problem with this selfish heart is that it keeps us separated from God. Jesus came to begin the heart change. First, his death and resurrection covers us with a perfection coating that restores our relationship with God. Then he begins to work on our heart. We get a new heart but our nature wants to go back to the “me first” selfishness and there will always be that struggle.
The word for this process is sanctification. It is The ongoing work of being conformed to the image of Jesus.
If we are following Jesus, if we have confessed him as Lord of our lives and believe he has been raised from the dead, then we can be sure that God the Holy Spirit is busy and active, dutifully Cleansing us from the inside out.
What would it be like to grow up without parents? I know that some children do. It would be so sad and lonely. So many things I learned from my parents just through example, just by being around them, honesty, working hard, love, how to care for people, how to respect the property of others, how to forgive, how to resolve conflict, how to worship God, how to know that there is a God, and on and on. I know about God because my parents told me. Not everyone gets that foundation.
( thank you mom and dad)
Matthew 14 has the story of the feeding of 5000 men, not counting women and children, with 5 loaves and 2 fish.
“13 When Jesus heard what had happened, he withdrew by boat privately to a solitary place. Hearing of this, the crowds followed him on foot from the towns. 14 When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them and healed their sick.
15 As evening approached, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a remote place, and it’s already getting late. Send the crowds away, so they can go to the villages and buy themselves some food.”
16 Jesus replied, “They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat.”
17 “We have here only five loaves of bread and two fish,” they answered.
18 “Bring them here to me,” he said. 19 And he directed the people to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the people. 20 They all ate and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. 21 The number of those who ate was about five thousand men, besides women and children.”
The thing that stuck out to me as I read it this time is that Jesus said, “you give them something to eat.”
The disciples would be shown that what they had was enough because God can multiply, he can make it enough.
Personally this story says that I don’t have to have it all figured out. Mary and I are moving out past our comfort zone and I don’t know what the month of May will hold for us. What will our address be? I don’t know. Can I trust that the God who has supplied all of my needs so far will continue to be my Father God and supply me? Probably. The God who feeds 5000+ with 5 loaves and 2 fish is still working miracles today.
There are many people who don’t know about this miracle working God. I think Jesus is saying to those of us who know Him “you give them something to eat, you give them something to believe in in, you tell them about me”.
If that scares you like it scares me, the overwhelming need for God on this planet, we should remember the miracle, he used what they had and made it fit the situation. I guess we should look at the need and then ask the God of miracles to provide so we can tell our story.
Just like there are orphans growing up without parents, there are spiritual orphans living life without knowing about our Loving, miracle working God. The biggest miracle he has performed is forgiving all of our sin.
Forgiveness is available today to all who will ask.
“13 They brought to the Pharisees the man who had been blind. 14 Now the day on which Jesus had made the mud and opened the man’s eyes was a Sabbath. 15 Therefore the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. “He put mud on my eyes,” the man replied, “and I washed, and now I see.”
16 Some of the Pharisees said, “This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath.”
But others asked, “How can a sinner perform such signs?” So they were divided.
17 Then they turned again to the blind man, “What have you to say about him? It was your eyes he opened.”
The man replied, “He is a prophet.”
18 They still did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they sent for the man’s parents. 19 “Is this your son?” they asked. “Is this the one you say was born blind? How is it that now he can see?”
20 “We know he is our son,” the parents answered, “and we know he was born blind. 21 But how he can see now, or who opened his eyes, we don’t know. Ask him. He is of age; he will speak for himself.” 22 His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jewish leaders, who already had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. 23 That was why his parents said, “He is of age; ask him.”
24 A second time they summoned the man who had been blind. “Give glory to God by telling the truth,” they said. “We know this man is a sinner.”
25 He replied, “Whether he is a sinner or not, I don’t know. One thing I do know. I was blind but now I see!”
26 Then they asked him, “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?”
27 He answered, “I have told you already and you did not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you want to become his disciples too?”
28 Then they hurled insults at him and said, “You are this fellow’s disciple! We are disciples of Moses! 29 We know that God spoke to Moses, but as for this fellow, we don’t even know where he comes from.”
30 The man answered, “Now that is remarkable! You don’t know where he comes from, yet he opened my eyes. 31 We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly person who does his will. 32 Nobody has ever heard of opening the eyes of a man born blind. 33 If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.”
34 To this they replied, “You were steeped in sin at birth; how dare you lecture us!” And they threw him out.”
It was one of the most miraculous things that Jesus did. He healed a man born blind. The Pharisees couldn’t see past the broken sabbath rule.
Jesus has come to heal.
They were annoyed with Jesus because he did heal. I am annoyed because he hasn’t healed yet, not completely. My grandson Jonah is getting better but it’s slow. I know 2 mothers who are bereft and bewildered because he didn’t heal their children’s cancer. Their babies had babies so now there are children without parents and parents without children.
God is not a genie that we control him. He is a loving father who knows best. We do not know but we ask believing that he can heal and that he will act.
I’m rambling. I went to my uncles funeral on Saturday and met my new granddaughter on Tuesday. Meanwhile 2 friends lost their kids to cancer. Life and death continue.
There is an eternity that sits just at the edge of our last breath. When we stop breathing we cross the border.
Jesus has come to forgive our sins and give us eternal life. Our bodies will die. We don’t know when or where or how. But we know it’s coming.
Jesus called himself many things. He said he was the gate, he was the good shepherd, the way the truth and the life, the vine, the son of man, the I am, among others.
Jesus said more than once that he came to save sinners. He dined with a tax collector named Zacheus and said this, ‘”For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”
I spent the first 20 years of my life “knowing” I wasn’t good enough for God. I went through bouts of struggling to be good and then failing and falling and rolling around in my failure.
Then one day that all changed. Because of where and when it happened it had to be the Holy Spirit that broke through. I was in the back room of my parents restaurant, it was Sunday so we were closed. I was getting breakfast for my very pregnant new bride, ( honeymoon baby) and the verses from Ephesians 2 came to life in my head and my heart.
“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
I couldn’t earn Gods love and mercy. I already had it through what Jesus had done dying for me on the cross. Salvation, Gods love, it is a gift and I cannot deserve it, we cannot deserve it. We just need to receive it.
As I began to study the Bible with fresh eyes I saw many other verses that confirmed what I saw in Ephesians.
One of my favorites is in Romans 5.
“6 You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
9 Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! 10 For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! 11 Not only is this so, but we also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”
While we were still sinners Jesus died for us. He wasn’t waiting until we were good enough. He meets us where we are, in our sin and fallenness.
The blessings we can receive from God don’t stop with salvation. If God did not hold back his only son, what else will he give us so that we can succeed in telling the world about Him?
These verses from Romans 8 also confirm our salvation in Jesus and Gods gracious and generous heart towards us to share our story with the world.
“28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who[i] have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.
More Than Conquerors 31 What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34 Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36 As it is written:
“For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”[j] 37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[k] neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Jesus called himself many different things, they all boil down to one thing, he is the one sent by God to save us, save you and me. He said it in many different ways so that in case we didn’t catch it in one story we might get it in the next. Jesus came to save sinners. We are all sinners. We can be nice people and still be sinners. It’s in our deep down human nature. Only Jesus can fix it.
Today would be a great day to receive Jesus’ gift of forgiveness and eternal life.
One truth about Jesus and my life following jesus.
He won’t quit.
He will not give up on me.
He has plans for me and he will keep building toward that goal.
Even if I tear down what he’s doing as he’s doing it.
He will not quit on me.
This is true for all of us.
It is true for me and it is true for you.
Another thing that I believe is true for every follower of Jesus. At one time all of us will experience a version of what the apostle John experiences that he recorded in Revelation
“Then I saw in the right hand of him who sat on the throne a scroll with writing on both sides and sealed with seven seals. And I saw a mighty angel proclaiming in a loud voice, “Who is worthy to break the seals and open the scroll?” But no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth could open the scroll or even look inside it. I wept and wept because no one was found who was worthy to open the scroll or look inside. Then one of the elders said to me, “Do not weep! See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed. He is able to open the scroll and its seven seals.” Then I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain, standing at the center of the throne, encircled by the four living creatures and the elders. The Lamb had seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth.” Revelation 5:1-6
There has to be a time when we see Jesus as the lamb slain. We have to see Jesus as the sacrifice for our sin
And.
And we will see him as the Lion of Judah. Lions are the king of The jungle. Jesus is the king. Is. Not was. Jesus is the living King.
Romans 10:9-10 “If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. Romans 10:9-10
These verses show us this same thing, Jesus as Lord, the lion, the king, and we believe that Jesus is the sacrificial lamb, that he died but now lives forever. The lamb that had been slain standing in the middle of the throne.
I encountered Jesus in these two ways. And now he promises to complete the project he has started in me.
“I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. Philippians 1:3-6
My prayer for any and every person who reads this is that they will see Jesus as the Lion and the lamb and that they will do as I am doing, stumble on toward completion.
I do wood working. My favorite part of any project is the design and build part. I dislike the finish work part. The tedious sanding and coat after coat of paint. The filling in of nail holes and all the other things that go into “finishing”. Jesus loves it all, every part of the process, he doesn’t tire of it, any of it.
Where am I in my own finish process? I don’t know.
How do you see Jesus? Is he your Lion? Is he your Lamb? He wants to be both.
I was thinking about a person I know that did some really bad stuff. I mean besides me. This person hurt people, changed people, damaged them forever and was never caught. He died free. He will burn in hell. Unless….
I will also burn in hell, unfortunately all of us are destined to burn in hell…….why? We are all sinners. It’s like we are all deposits in a pit toilet and each of us wants to say “I’m not as stinky as that pile of poo over there” pointing with our little poo finger.
We are all poops in the same pile. All of guilty of some sin and so all sinners. We are all destined for the same place unless…..
Unless what?! Get me out of the septic system and out of the fires of hell!
I can’t.
But Jesus can.
He paid for all of our sins. Even the sins of that guy that I want in hell. But if Jesus has forgiven him then I must also forgive him. So I do. And I hope that he heard about Jesus before he exhaled for the last time.
Where are you with Jesus? Have you accepted his gift of forgiveness yet?
You stink but so do I. We all do. Get that taken care of please.
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