It is for us that Jesus died; it is for us He rose again and it is for us that He prays and He works. Why would a king work for a slave? Because in dying He set us free and we are no longer slaves of this earth. Why would a king die to set a slave free? Because He is a true King and ruler, one who loves His people and does everything for them. He shows us our failure and mistakes so we can fix them before it’s too late and He helps us fix them. Sometime He allows us to fail so we can learn from our failure and fall on Him who rises us up again. He never leaves us and comes to us even from the depth of death He rises again and comes for us. Love is the message we were given and the message we share. Because love is what this world needs and Jesus is love.
Tag: Jesus
At the cross
The flowers in the photo above are called crown of thorns. Which I felt applied well to this weekend.
Crosses were used for executions often during the days of Jesus. Few deaths held as much fear as those planks of wood; it was slow and painful and humiliating, absolute suffering. I imagine being there, among the observers. Standing before the cross, staring up at the dirt and blood coated feet of the man hanging there, my stomach turned with sickness. The scent of sweat and death lingering in the air always and the spot never clear of it. Birds hungry from days in the desert circle above, chattering to one another, or to the people below, no one can tell. Agonizing moans and cries emanate from the accused and their loved ones, mixed with taunts and mockery from those who had nothing better to do than to watch. One man stands out among the other two, His pain seems deeper and His situation more controlled. He wears a crown marking Him a king, His sign reads, “hail, king of the Jews” but what king would hang on a cross? Blood pools beneath Him and His sorrow I can begin to feel. Then He looks at me and I am amazed by what I see. Eyes so filled with pain and sorrow are smiling with love. His being there feels like it holds a great purpose and suddenly the sky grows dark. The birds have scattered in fear and a great crack is heard from somewhere within the village. Looking back to the man I see with a broken heart that He is gone. Until a warm hand slips into mine and I look to see Him standing next to me smiling down with that same love I saw before. He leans over and whispers in my ear,
“You are worth this sacrifice.”
We are worth the sacrifice of suffering and death to the one who gave it all for us. Jesus gave up His kingdom, gave up His dignity, gave up what we would refer to as His pride; He gave up His blood, gave up His flesh and gave up His life, because He deemed us worthy. We are not worthy on our own, but because Jesus decided we are worthy that makes us worthy. He sacrificed because He loves us. He took the keys from the devil, unlocked the gates of hell and set the captives free because suddenly their sins were paid for and forgiven. He rose from the grave as an unmatched sign that He is king and He has conquered death. It may sound crazy, a battle between good and evil where one supreme power controls it all, but the crazy thing is it’s real, it’s happening and we are a part of it. When Jesus comes back I want to be found sitting at the foot of the cross. Where do you want to be found?
The fourth man
Every time we go through a fiery furnace, if we have faith , we will see we are not alone. When we go through troubled times we have to have courage that God will be with us. We will be privy to the world standing astonished at the glory of our God. Our bounds will be broken and we will walk freely, He will break us from all fear and we will be cleansed. God knows what we are going through. Even if we are going through fire God is with us, even if we feel alone we have a friend standing with us. A friend who looks like a son of the gods, because guess what? He IS God’s son.
Leprechauns
Leprechauns are invisible faerys born out of Irish folklore. If you catch one you get to make a wish or get his pot of gold, it depends on the legend you follow. Many times however leprechauns bring misfortune instead of great wealth, they’re jokesters, tricksters, and their fun doesn’t usually bring anyone else fun.
Have you ever tried to find one? Searching the great outdoors for little, invisible, green men. You can search and search but you’ll never find him, they are masters of deceit. Now where little green Irish faerys can be fun and amusing, we know another mischief maker who likes to play nasty tricks while staying out of sight; he’s called the devil, or the chort, or the dark prince, no I’m not talking about Dracula! The real devil, and yes he is real, is not someone to make light of, without Jesus we would be in great danger of him all the time. He likes to make us chase after pots of gold too and when we think we’ve found one he pulls a nasty trick on us and we find ourselves far from God and dwindling in despair. The devil uses all sorts of wicked intentions to get us off track and draw us into his web. Like Frodo in Shelob’s lair we need a loving friend to brave the treacherous climb, sacrifice himself and save us. If it hadn’t been for Sam’s agápi for Frodo the ring would never have been destroyed, if Sam hadn’t been willing to risk sacrificing his own life Frodo’s quest would have ended right there, so close to the goal that they could see it. Jesus saved us from similar webs, webs of desire, deceit, disease and also death. Jesus did sacrifice Himself to save us from the devil who was toying with us, Jesus set us free. If it wasn’t for Jesus our quest of life would end at the first struggle, if it wasn’t for Jesus we would be lost, if it isn’t for Jesus we would be looking at the goal of our struggles and not be able to continue to the prize. Jesus saved, saves and will always save.
Jesus paid it all, all to Him I owe, sin had left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow. Don’t search for trouble, search for Jesus, He’s the one you want to hold on to.
Love is?
We all know the song. ‘Wherever you go, whatever you do I’ll be right here waiting for you. Whatever you say, though my heart breaks, I’ll be right here waiting for you.”
That song easily applys as a love song from Jesus. No matter what we do or say, even if it hurts Him He will never stop loving us. How many times do we break His heart? How many times do we make Him cry? He never holds it against us and keeps on loving us. He waits for us to come back to Him and He holds us close against His heart and tells us it’s going to be okay. That’s what true love is. It’s not flowers, it’s not chocolate, it’s forgiveness, and no one knows forgiveness like Jesus. He took our sins upon Himself and made it so we could be forgiven, that’s amazing! We keep falling away and He keeps reaching out to catch us when we call. No matter what He loves us, truly loves us.
Nightmares
Fear ye not and see the salvation of the Lord- Exodus 14:13
How many of us have been in a situation where we were completely and totally terrified? Where, as Victor Hugo puts it, we ‘breathed fear’?
The times when uncertainty overtakes reason, and possibilities, (no matter how irrational), come storming into our minds and filling us with complete fear. We become an embodiment of fear, and thus we become an embodiment of evil. Fear is not of the Lord, fear is of the devil, when we become filled with fear we become filled with the devil.
Is it a sin to fear? I would say no, it is a lack of faith, but fear is a very hard thing to overcome and should not be categorized with other, more controllable emotions. All emotions are part of us but fear is placed in us, it is caused by something. Like hearing a thump in the office when you’ve just watched a really creepy movie, out comes fear. Or when you see a massive spider crawling up your pant leg, fear, (or fascination, some people like spiders). You were fine and then something happened to make you afraid. There are much much bigger fears too. The fear of losing a loved one, the fear of financial insecurity, the fear of dying and so on. Some fears are completely overpowering and take hold of their victim in a life altering manner. Fear always has a cause. The devil loves to see us afraid, it puts us off our gaurd and makes us unstable, then he can really get to work. God warns us about fear because He knows how overwhelming it can be. He tells us not to be afraid,
“easy for you to say, you control all and see all,” we respond,
but don’t forget that Jesus knew fear that few of us can imagine. God almighty, one who sees all and knows all, most powerful being EVER, was so afraid He sweat blood. We must not ever downplay the fear Jesus felt because He is God, His fear was very real. Jesus understands. He knows your fear and He doesn’t judge. He has a nail pierced hand reaching out, He’s saying “walk with me, I will protect you and go through this with you, you are never alone.” We never need to be afraid, we have a right to be afraid, but Jesus makes it unneccsary because we are not alone, we have God with us and legions upon legions of angels ready to fight on our side; with God numbers are never a problem, His army is always greater and always stronger and we always have Him because He always has us. So fear not because Jesus has overcome the world and He can help you overcome the causes of your fear.
Setting your mind
In one of my favorite movies the main character loves the song ‘country roads’ and rewrites the lyrics to it. The new version has a line that says:
Determined to live alone but fearless, my constant longing is to be courageous. Loneliness is bottled up inside, going down this path that I must try.
It’s a beautiful description of who she is. She knows herself and is willing to allow that to be enough for her. She knows her path is lonely but she takes it anyway with determination to contain that feeling and not allow it to control her. She is fearless and longs for even greater courage. These simple lyrics could apply to many of us. We all have a path to travel and we all have struggles along the way; some we can foresee others we can not, it’s how we handle these struggles that define us. Will we take them on like a ship breaking through a squall, heading for the light? Or will we shrink back inside our cabin and hope that it all goes away? Maybe we try to run from the storm, but we know that that never works out, just ask Jonah. However we face our troubles, however we take on our paths, God knows what He’s doing. He saw these squalls even before you were born, and He also saw a way through them. Some people fear asking for courage because they think that it will add turmoil to their lives, but lives will have turmoil whether you ask for courage or not. Isn’t it better to have already built up your courage before the big struggles come? If you haven’t then those times when you feel you’ve hit rock bottom will be harder to overcome. It’s not easy to look down the road ahead, feel the wind grab your hair, feel the hard path beneath your feet and take off your fear like a cloak throwing it over your shoulder, stepping off the threshold of your comfort zone at a run and smiling about it. Those who have done so have had the chance to touch their stars, yours are still waiting for you. When you look at those who have left their fear behind and taken hold of their path you will see a person scarred. Their cloths may seem torn and their skin marred by the hard falls, but you will also see a brilliant smile of triumph on their faces and when they walk by they drip of starlight, because they have touched the heavens. Why? Because they trusted God would lead them and never doubted His perfect, guiding hand. Do you see starlight in your future? Your future as an accountant, a plumber, a teacher, a doctor, an electrician? You don’t have to be an artist to gleam, you just have to give what you are meant to do everything you’ve got and trust that every time you fall a nail pierced hand will be there to help you back up.
A touch without a feel
When we are going to church, praying, reading our Bible but we feel nothing; we are touching God but not feeling Him. We all go through these ‘cold wars’ where our fire for God has burned low, if not completely out but it’s when we stop fighting during these wars that we are in trouble. We must fight to feel God again, to regain our connection to Him. We must push harder and seek deeper lest we lose all touch and feel of Him. We must fight until our ‘cold war’ heats up and we are on fire for Him again. So we must keep reaching out and touching God with the knowledge that He is reaching back; and though our grip keeps slipping we must try again and again until we feel His hand holding us.
As the old song goes, ‘reach out to Jesus He’s reaching out to you.’ Don’t be afraid that you’ll never find your fire again, just keep diligently searching and you will eventually see that Jesus never left you no matter how cold you felt. He was always there waiting for your flame to rekindle and burn again, and yes, He was praying for you through the battle and helping you every time you let Him. So burn on little candle and let your light reach all around you starting them on fire too. If you put enough candles together soon you have a blazing inferno and that light will continue to reach until the world is on fire for Jesus.
If only they’d look closer, they’d find out there’s so much more to me.
Don’t you ever wish that people would look closer, that they wouldn’t judge simply from an off hand meeting? People don’t see the real you until they take the time to get to know the real you. Jesus looks closer right away, he never judges even after He sees the true man/woman behind the mask, He loves you no matter what you are like. If only people could be more like Jesus, often times you wont know what the person is like until they feel comfortable to bring down their barriers and stop hiding behind the front they put up. True, some will prefer the false you and like you less once they get to know you, but others will like you even better when they see the true, genuine article. Don’t be afraid to look closer at people before you decide if you like them or not, Jesus wasn’t, He has always seen us with all our flaws and loves us even more for them, because the flawless can’t be refined.
Not just a misfit
Remember the island of misfit toys in Rudolf? The place to go when no one wants you because you don’t fit in. I realized recently how much I can relate to those toys. How often I feel like I just don’t belong and it made me wonder how many other people feel that way? I exspect many do. The world is made up of categories and either you fit in a category or you don’t really fit anywhere; but God didn’t create those categories people did. God didn’t make us to fit in a box and be stacked with all the other boxes labeled the same, He made us to stand out. God made us Rachel, Lauren, David, Ryan, Max. He didn’t make us athlete, equestrian, book worm, mathalete those are just parts of us, the whole is so much more than a category. Some of us don’t have a category to climb into and maybe that’s because God has made us too unique to be just one thing. God loves His misfit toys because they are the ones who will go on to shape the world the way God wants it. They will go on to be the next David Livingston, Martin Luther King, Peter, Mosses, Hur. Some people may only have a very small role to play in the big picture, but that role will be significant and amazing. God has made sure of that! Even if you never realize what you’ve done, we all will have done something amazing in God’s plan by time we are through here on earth.
So embrace being a misfit, it’s the misfits that change the world.
Carried in the cross 