Friday, July 26, 2013
What Incredible Passion
The night before Jesus died
he prayed passionately in the garden of Gethsemane, “My Father! If it is possible, let this cup
of suffering be taken away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.”
(Matthew 26:39 NLT) We often understand
that to mean that Jesus, in his human weakness, would like to have avoided
Calvary, but, because of his love for us, He proceeded to give His life. That may be the long and short of it. If so it is the greatest story ever told.
But, this could have been an
even greater love story than we realize.
The night Jesus prayed in the garden he was under so much emotional and
spiritual pressure Luke says, "He prayed more fervently, and he was in
such agony of spirit that his sweat fell to the ground like great drops of
blood." Medical doctors have
identified this condition as very serious and even deadly. Suppose he was near death and was not praying
to get out of dying, but, rather, that he would not die prematurely.
I picked up this idea by
reading Hebrews 5:7 from The Living Bible: " Yet while Christ was here on
earth he pleaded with God, praying with tears and agony of soul to the only one
who would save him from [premature] death. And God heard his prayers because of
his strong desire to obey God at all times. (TLB)
If the devil could have
killed Jesus in Gethsemane, he could have foiled God's great plan of
salvation. But Jesus was committed to
the task; He was ready to lay down his life.
We see this same determination at several other junctures in Jesus' life:
·
When Herod tried
to kill him as an infant, God and his parents kept him alive.
·
When a crowd of
people tried to kill him, he walked through the crowd.
·
Near the end of
his ministry he avoided crowds because it was not yet time to die.
The Living Bible goes on to
make these side comments: "Christ's longing was to live until he could die
on the cross for all mankind. There is a strong case to be made that Satan's
great desire was that Christ should die prematurely, before the mighty work at
the cross could be performed. Christ's body, being human, was frail and weak
like ours (except that his was sinless). He had said just a few moments before,
"My soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death." And can a human body
live long under such pressure of spirit as he underwent in the Garden, that
caused sweating of great drops of blood? But God graciously heard and answered
his anguished cry in Gethsemane ("Let this cup pass from me") and
preserved him from seemingly imminent and premature death: for an angel was
sent to strengthen him so that he could live to accomplish God's perfect will
at the cross."
What incredible passion The
Mighty God in Christ exhibited toward mankind.
What tremendous passion He still has for you. There is an innumerable multitude of true
stories that follow a plot similar to this:
·
Someone comes to
a desperate place in their life.
·
They find a place
to sincerely cry out to God, asking Him if He is real.
·
God uses the
Bible, people, circumstances, visions, dreams, songs... to make Himself real
·
They respond by
expressing their faith in God through repentance and baptism. (Acts 2:38)
·
God fills them
with His Spirit and they speak with other tongues just like 3000 people did on
the first day of the New Testament church. (Acts 2)
Passion marks the lives of
such believers. But it is no wonder believers are so passionate toward God - He
was first passionate toward them. He
refused to take the easy route and so should true believers. People should look at believers and say,
"What incredible passion!"
Friday, July 19, 2013
It Sneaks Up On You
I
am not against sports. Exercise and
competition can be healthy and fun. I do
find it interesting that while the sports scene enjoys a great public image,
the side effects of playing sports can sneak up on us. Consider these statistics gleaned from a
variety of sources:
·
High
school athletes account for an estimated 2 million injuries and 500,000 doctor
visits and 30,000 hospitalizations each year.
·
More
than 3.5 million kids under age 14 receive medical treatment for sports
injuries each year.
·
Annually
over 20 million Americans suffer a sports injury.
·
As
many as 20 percent of children who play sports get hurt, and about 25 percent
of their injuries are classified as serious.
·
14
years ago it was estimated that baby boomers suffered more than 1 million
sports injuries which cost over $18.7 billion dollars in medical expenses in
1998.
Violating
God's directives for living is another one of those things that can sneak up on
you. Before a society realizes it, their
casual attitude toward:
·
marriage
- results in half of our children not having two parents
·
the
sanctity of life - makes abortion one of the leading killers in our nation
·
alcohol
- costs us billions of dollars, thousands of lives and untold physical and
emotional injuries
·
God
- puts Him so far from the center of our culture that many people will never
even have an opportunity to explore a relationship with Him (this may be the most tragic consequence of
all)
The
good news is that it only takes a few simple routine choices to change all of
this. The reader can deduct those needed changes from the list above. Contrary to the popular misconception that
sin is fun stuff God doesn't want us to enjoy, I would contend that sin is the stuff
that steals our wholeness and joy. But since sin sneaks up on us, it is
sometimes an unidentified culprit.
When
people choose to obey God's directives good things begin to sneak up them. Strong families, valued lives and responsible
lifestyles do not come naturally, but they can come abundantly if we will pay
attention to the Designer's operating instructions. God's principles just keep on giving. Be assured,
your diligent pursuit of life according to God's directives will cause
great blessings to sneak up on you and your family -- for generations to come!
Tuesday, July 02, 2013
God Blessed America
The
wind was gusty, but you couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day. It was 90 degrees in New England, the sky was
blue, and we were standing on a grassy knoll in the shadow of a massive
monument just a few blocks inland from Plymouth Rock. The National Monument sits on 10 acres. It is the world's largest
granite monument and the third tallest statue in the United States. Yet, few if any of our group had ever visited
the site. So a good number of us had driven several hours so we could gather at
this special site to pray for God to Bless America.
I
learned about "The Monument to our Forefathers" from Kirk Cameron who
produced a documentary called "Monumental", in which he researches
the history of the Pilgrims and then features the monument and its symbolism.
In the film he shares this opinion: "America is the richest, freest nation
the world has ever seen. But as a father of six, I look around and all signs
tell me something is sick in the soul of our country. And history tells me that we're headed for
disaster if we don't change our course now."
The
massive monument, which took thirty years to build and was dedicated in 1989, now
belongs to Massachusetts, and illustrates how America was founded on the
principles of morality, education, law and liberty. In the stone are carved
words like, peace, evangelist, mercy, justice,
and faith. It includes symbols such as the Bible and the ten commandments. It
is an 180 ton testimony against the fallacious claims that our country was not
founded on Christian principles.
America
became the world's most prosperous and powerful nation, not because the people
were better, but because the foundation was sound. For centuries we served as a beacon of liberty
to the world. Unfortunately, because of stubbornness and rebellion against
God, we have slipped from our foundation. As a result we are seeing increased
ramifications such as political corruption, fiscal calamity, family breakdown
and social unrest. God has blessed America, but because we, as a nation, banned God from government and education we
have begun to forfeit our place in the world and may have even jeopardized our
survival.
So,
as we gathered on that beautiful day, we repented for America and prayed for
restoration of morality, mercy and justice as defined by God. Of course we realize that God stands
perpetually poised to pour out His blessings on any nation that will adopt His
ways. But, since He has limited His
power by giving man free will, the real logjam is in the hearts and minds of
people. We prayed that Americans, and
people of every nation would chose to live by the foundational principles our
forefathers lived by, so that their families and communities and nations might
reap the many benefits.
God has blessed America. God will bless America, in direct correspondence to how much America blesses God.
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