SEEING GOD A WORK

 “Great are the works of the Lord;
    they are pondered by all who delight in them.
Glorious and majestic are His deeds,
    and His righteousness endures forever.
He has caused His wonders to be remembered;
    the Lord is gracious and compassionate.
He provides food for those who fear Him;
    He remembers His covenant forever.”  (Psalm 111:2-5 NIV)

Like many Westerners, I suffer from what I call 'Hume Hangover,' a spiritual ailment named after the skeptical philosopher David Hume. I define it as the nagging difficulty of seeing God at work in everyday things.

As children of the modern university system, many of us are much more comfortable using the language of science and technology to make sense of the world around us. But God is at work upholding and unfolding His creation, even if we're not as attuned to that fact as we'd like.

I need to become more aware that God holds my hand throughout life. God wants to shake me out of my narrow thinking and have me embrace the supernatural more easily. Through His unexpected actions, God shows me that managing the mundane is well within His power. 

-- Matt Donnelly, ChristianityToday.com

#5591

THE FOOL SAYS…

When the famous preacher, D. L. Moody, was conducting evangelistic meetings, he frequently faced hecklers. In the final service of one campaign, an usher handed him a note. It was from an atheist who had been giving Mr. Moody a great deal of trouble. The evangelist, however, supposed it was an announcement so he quieted the large audience and prepared to read it.

Opening the folded piece of paper, he found scrawled in large print only one word: "Fool!"

Moody, however, was equal to the occasion. He said, "I've just been handed a memo which contains the single word 'Fool'. This is most unusual. I've heard of those who wrote letters and forgot to sign their names, but this is the first time I've ever heard of anyone who signed his name and then forgot to write the letter!"

Taking advantage of the unique situation, Moody promptly changed his sermon text to Psalm 53, verse 1, "The fool has said in his heart, 'There is no God!'" 

-- Source Unknown

#5590

THE EFFICACY OF PRAYER

“For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of His will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please Him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to His glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of His holy people in the kingdom of light.”  (Colossians 1:9-12 NIV)

Can we believe that God ever really modifies His action in response to the suggestions of [humans]?  For infinite wisdom does not need telling what is best, and infinite goodness needs no urging to do it.  But neither does God need any of those things that are done by finite agents, whether living or inanimate.  He could, if He chose, repair our bodies miraculously without food; or give us food without the aid of farmers, bakers, and butchers, or knowledge without the aid of learned [men and women]; or convert the heathen without missionaries.  Instead, He allows soils and weather and animals and the muscles, minds, and wills of [human beings] to cooperate in the execution of His will...  It is not really stranger, nor less strange, that my prayers should affect the course of events than that my other actions should do so.  They have not advised or changed God's mind -- that is, His overall purpose.  But that purpose will be realized in different ways according to the actions, including the prayers, of His [people]. 

-- C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) in “The Efficacy of Prayer”

#5589

PERSISTENT IN PRAYER

One day Jesus told His disciples a story to show that they should always pray and never give up. “There was a judge in a certain city,” He said, “who neither feared God nor cared about people.  A widow of that city came to him repeatedly, saying, ‘Give me justice in this dispute with my enemy.’ The judge ignored her for a while, but finally he said to himself, ‘I don’t fear God or care about people, but this woman is driving me crazy. I’m going to see that she gets justice, because she is wearing me out with her constant requests!’”  (Luke 18:1-5 NLT)

The parable of the persistent widow is one of the most pixilated pictures of prayer in Scripture.  It shows us what praying hard looks like: knocking until your knuckles are raw, crying out until your voice is lost, pleading until your tears run dry.  Praying hard is praying through.  And if you pray through, God will come through.  But it will be God’s will, God’s way.

The phrase used to describe the widow’s persistence, “she is wearing me out,” is boxing terminology.  Praying hard is going twelve rounds with God.  A heavyweight prayer bout with God Almighty can be excruciating and exhausting, but that is how the greatest prayer victories are won.  Praying hard is more than words; it’s blood, sweat, and tears.  Praying hard is two-dimensional: praying like it depends on God, and working like it depends on you.  It’s praying until God answers, no matter how long it takes.  It’s doing whatever it takes to show God you’re serious. 

-- Mark Batterson in “The Circle Maker”

#5588

THE LOVER OF SOULS

“The Lord your God is with you,
the Mighty Warrior who saves.
He will take great delight in you;
in His love He will no longer rebuke you,
but will rejoice over you with singing.”  (Zephaniah 3:17)

A gem dealer was strolling the aisles at the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show when he noticed a blue-violet stone the size and shape of a potato. He looked it over, then, as calmly as possible, asked the vendor, "You want $15 for this?" The seller, realizing the rock wasn't as pretty as others in the bin, lowered the price to $10.

The stone has since been certified as a 1,905-carat natural star sapphire, about 800 carats larger than the largest stone of its kind. It was originally appraised at $2.28 million.

It took a lover of stones to recognize the sapphire's worth. It took the Lover of Souls to recognize the true value of ordinary-looking people like us.

--Wanda Vassalo

#5587

THE CHARACTER OF ORDINARY PEOPLE

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”  (Galatians 2:20 NIV)

There are numerous Christians today who owe their faith, at least in part, to the writings of the Oxford professor C. S. Lewis. But throughout his teens and twenties, Lewis himself was a committed atheist. What led him to change his ways?

No single person persuaded Lewis to trust in Jesus Christ. Rather, it was the combined influence of many people through books, music, and personal encounters that made the difference. In “Surprised by Joy,” Lewis described the effect of simply encountering sane, responsible adults who believed in a [spiritual] world behind, or around, the material world.” He enjoyed G. K. Chesterton’s intelligence and sense of humor -- despite Chesterton’s Christian faith. He was both alarmed and fascinated when he met men who were much like himself but were actually “attempting strict veracity, chastity, or devotion to duty.” [At the time] Lewis himself was neither honest nor sexually pure, but he found himself respecting men who were committed to these traits without being passionless prudes. In Lewis’s case, the character of ordinary people proved more effective than hearing countless sermons. 

-- From “Beginning Life Together: God’s Purposes for Your Life” by Brett and Dee Eastman, Todd and Denise Wendorff, and Karen Lee-Thorp

#5586

DEMONSTRATING THE GOSPEL

Jesus said to His disciples, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.”  (Mark 16:15 NIV)

Anyone wanting to proclaim the glory of Christ to the ends of the earth must consider not only how to declare the gospel verbally but also how to demonstrate the gospel visibly in a world where so many are urgently hungry. If I am going to address urgent spiritual need by sharing the gospel of Christ or building up the body of Christ around the world, then I cannot overlook dire physical need in the process. 

-- David Platt

#5585

IN THE LIGHT OF EASTER

“Fellow Israelites, listen carefully to these words: Jesus the Nazarene, a man thoroughly accredited by God to you -- the miracles and wonders and signs that God did through Him are common knowledge -- this Jesus, following the deliberate and well-thought-out plan of God, was betrayed by men who took the law into their own hands, and was handed over to you. And you pinned Him to a cross and killed Him. But God untied the death ropes and raised Him up. Death was no match for Him.”  (Acts 2:22-24 MSG)

It was only in the light of Easter that the disciples understood Jesus' work and intention; they now realized that the Messiah had to undergo rejection and suffering, that He was to conquer not Rome but death and evil.  We have no reason to mistrust the New Testament assurance. The Easter message and the historical Jesus are joined by a bridge resting on many piers. Jesus proclaimed the good news of the presence of God who, like a forgiving father, seeks His lost children and grants even sinners the company of the Redeemer; the disciples preached the Gospel of Christ, who appeared as Saviour and died on the cross for sinners. In the Holy Spirit Jesus drove out unclean spirits and conquered Satan; from Easter onwards He was extolled as the Lord of all spirits, who gives the Holy Spirit to believers and in Him is ever present with them.

-- Otto Betz in “What Do We Know About Jesus?”

#5584

TRANSCENDING PRESENT POSSIBILITY

"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In His great mercy He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead."  (1 Peter 1:3)

Of all the mysteries our faith invites us to contemplate, the Resurrection is by far the most astonishing.  Not simply in the sense of being difficult to believe in a logical fashion.  That, in a way, is the very point of it.  The very idea of resurrection shatters all the categories of comprehension with which we make sense of our world. It draws us instead into a reality that transcends present possibility.  

-- Wendy M. Wright in “The Rising”   

#5583

IN SPIRIT AND IN TRUTH

"To them Jesus presented Himself alive after His passion by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days, and speaking of the kingdom of God."  (Acts 1:3)

When people say, "I'll be there in spirit" what they really mean is "I won't be there."   When modern people say of Jesus Christ, "The true meaning of the myth of the resurrection is that Jesus lives on in our hearts and thoughts" what they really mean is "Jesus is dead as a doornail."  The New Testament has no patience with such sentimental claptrap.   It bluntly denies that Jesus of Nazareth "lives on in our memories" in that watery, sentimental… way of speaking.   It asserts rather that Jesus of Nazareth rose in a glorified body that could eat fish, be touched, and break bread.   This seems terribly crass, crude, and physical to a world that wants to reduce all "spirituality" to odorless, colorless, platonic ideas.   But then the world tends to do this because it fears the biggest and dirtiest secret of all: death, which is a crass, crude and physical thing.   Jesus came to be with us in spirit and in truth.   And so, when He rose on Easter, He did not rise merely "in spirit" but in truth as well.   God defeated the stink, rot, and worms of death, not just the "idea" of it. And He proved it by saying, "See My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; handle Me, and see; for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see that I have" (Luke 24:39).   And because He really did rise bodily, we shall too, if we remain in Him. 

-- Mark Shea and Jeff Cavins 

#5582

EXPANDING FAITH THREE SIZES

“Afterward Jesus appeared again to His disciples, by the Sea of Galilee. It happened this way: Simon Peter, Thomas (also known as Didymus), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. ‘I’m going out to fish,’ Simon Peter told them, and they said, ‘We’ll go with you.’ So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing. Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus.”  (John 21:1-4 NIV)

Thinking all is lost after the crucifixion, some of the disciples go fishing on the Sea of Galilee -- a dismal, depressing, fishing expedition. Hot, naked, and exhausted, the disciples try valiantly to return to the way things were before they met Jesus. Suddenly a voice from the shore (big rock thrown here): “Catchin’ anything?” “Nah,” they shout back, more depressed than ever. “Then try the other side of the boat!” the voice yells again. Peter stands up to see who this wise guy is. Wait -- no, it can’t be -- but, yes, it is: the Lord! Suddenly Peter can’t move fast enough. He leaps into the water, and swims to shore, leaving the others to haul in a miraculous catch. His faith grows three sizes in a matter of minutes. The boundaries of what he thinks God can do explode, and his love and gratitude for what God is doing in Jesus Christ, Lord of Life, is simply too large to fit in the boat any more. 

-- Kenda Creasy Dean and Ron Foster in “The Godbearing Life”

#5581

ACCOUNTS OF THE RESURRECTION – Part 2

“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 died.”  (1 Corinthians 15:3-6)

The empty tomb and the accounts of the personal meetings with Jesus are even more historically certain when you realize they must be taken together. If there had been only an empty tomb and no sightings, no one would have concluded it was a resurrection. They would have assumed that the body had been stolen. Yet if there had been only eyewitness sightings of Jesus and no empty tomb, no one would have concluded it was a resurrection, because people’s accounts of seeing departed loved ones happen all the time. Only if the two factors were both together would anyone have concluded that Jesus was raised from the dead.

Paul’s letters show that Christians proclaimed Jesus’s bodily resurrection from the very beginning. That meant the tomb must have been empty. No one in Jerusalem would have believed the preaching for a minute if the tomb was not empty. Skeptics could have easily produced Jesus’s rotted corpse. Also, Paul could not be telling people in a public document that there were scores of eyewitnesses alive if there were not. We can’t permit ourselves the luxury of thinking that the resurrection accounts were only fabricated years later. Whatever else happened, the tomb of Jesus must have really been empty and hundreds of witnesses must have claimed that they saw Him bodily raised….

They knew that if it was true it meant we can’t live our lives any way we want. It also meant we don’t have to be afraid of anything, not Roman swords, not cancer, nothing. If Jesus rose from the dead, it changes everything. 

-- Timothy Keller in “The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism”  

#5580

ACCOUNTS OF THE RESURRECTION – Part 1

“When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so they could go and anoint the body of Jesus. Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they went to the tomb. They were asking one another, ‘Who will roll away the stone from the entrance of the tomb?’ But when they looked up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away, even though it was extremely large. When they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed. But he said to them, ‘Do not be alarmed. You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here! See the place where they put Him. But go, tell His disciples and Peter, “He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see Him, just as He told you.”’”  (Mark 16:1-7)

The accounts of the resurrection in the Bible were too problematic to be fabrications. Each gospel states that the first eyewitnesses to the resurrection were women. Women’s low social status [at that time] meant that their testimony was not admissible evidence in court. There was no possible advantage to the church to recount that all the first witnesses were women. It could only have undermined the credibility of the testimony. The only possible explanation for why women were depicted as meeting Jesus first is if they really had. N.T. Wright argues that there must have been enormous pressure on the early proclaimers of the Christian message to remove the women from the accounts. They felt they could not do so – the records were too well known. The accounts of the first eyewitnesses would have been electrifying and life-changing, passed along and retold more than any other stories about the life of Jesus. 

-- Timothy Keller in “The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism”

#5579

CHRIST’S RESURRECTION IS THE BREAKTHROUGH

"If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that He raised Christ from the dead. But He did not raise Him if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep."  (1 Corinthians 15:14-20 NIV)

Without the resurrection there is no gospel... The issue for Paul [in 1 Corinthians] cut to the center of the gospel: Quit preaching the forgiveness of sins if Christ was destroyed. Quit offering hope for a new life if Jesus is dead. Quit believing in eternal joy with God if Jesus was martyred and sent to sleep forever in the mists of Sheol. But, Paul proclaims, Jesus not only bled and died for sinners; He also rose again in victory and power. His offering of forgiveness carries divine authority. And of ultimate significance to us, His resurrection is the breakthrough, the pioneer work that leads the way. The same power that raised Jesus will raise us from the dead. If Christ is alive, as we believe, we too shall live... with our Savior.

-- U.M. Bishop Richard Wilke in “DISCIPLE: Becoming Disciples Through Bible Study” 

#5578

THE RESURRECTION LIFE

"There is an order to this resurrection: Christ was raised as the first of the harvest; then all who belong to Christ will be raised when He comes back."  (1 Corinthians 15:23 NLT)

It is true and important to say that the resurrection of Jesus proved both who He was and that the Father had accepted what He did for us. But these truths do not say enough. Jesus’ resurrection was not only proof of what He did, it is itself something that He did for us. Through His resurrection, Jesus became the new Adam, the first person to experience all that God had intended for humans since creation. He became the source of the resurrection life we enjoy now, and the guarantee that at death we too will enter fully into the same quality of existence. 

-- Mark Strom in “The Symphony of Scripture” 

#5577

IT WAS HIS CHOICE

Jesus outlasted, outmaneuvered, and outthought every group, every power. But not just that. Mostly He just out-loved everybody. For Jesus in the garden had one agenda that superseded the agendas of all the others: love. On Friday, Jesus died for love. He said it was His choice. It wasn’t Pilate’s. It wasn’t Herod’s. It wasn’t Caesar’s. It wasn’t the chief priests’. It wasn’t the crowds’. He said, “I lay down my life for the sheep. . . . No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of My own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again.” (John 10:17b-18)

The cross was changed from the symbol of a human empire’s power into a symbol of the suffering love of God. It was changed from an expression of ultimate threat into an expression of ultimate hope. It came, in a sense, to express the exact opposite of its original purpose -- that the power of embraced sacrifice is greater than the power of coercion. How did this happen? Jesus chose it. He chose to die on it. After Friday, neither the cross nor the world could stay the same. 

-- John Ortberg in “Who Is This Man?”

#5576

WHY DID JESUS HAVE TO DIE?

“For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit.”  (1 Peter 3:18 NIV)

To understand why Jesus had to die it is important to remember both the Result of the Cross (costly forgiveness of sins) and the Pattern of the Cross (reversal of the world’s values). On the cross neither justice nor mercy loses out -- both are fulfilled at once. Jesus’ death was necessary if God was going to take justice seriously and still love us. This same concern for both love and justice should mark all our relationships. We should never acquiesce in injustice. Jesus identified with the oppressed. Yet we should not try to overcome evil with evil. Jesus forgave His enemies and died for them.

Why then, did Jesus have to die? Even Jesus asked that question. In the Garden of Gethsemane He asked if there was any other way. There wasn’t. There isn’t. On the cross, in agony, He cried out the question, “Why!?” Why was He being forsaken? Why was it all necessary? The answer of the Bible is -- for us! 

-- Timothy Keller in “The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism” 

#5575

A UNIQUE DEATH FOR A UNIQUE MAN

“Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with Him to be executed.”  (Luke 23:32 NIV)

Though we find it hard and even repulsive to imagine, Jesus was only one of many people tortured to death by crucifixion. He had two companions at the brow of Calvary. But His experience on the cross included several added sobering features. A unique death for a unique man:

First, it was shameful. He was stripped of His clothing and pinned naked between heaven and earth. There’s no mention of the soldiers casting lots for the clothing of the other victims. He was ridiculed by the crowds and taunted by one of the criminals. Jesus suffered the humiliation of the sign posted over His head that attempted to mock His claim to be king.

Second, He was absolutely innocent -- and He could prove it! He was there by choice. The nails didn’t keep Him on the cross. His decision to remain there was stronger than His desire to avoid the pain. Think for a moment how tempting it must have been to have a self-pity party.

Third, Jesus bore the sins of the world -- including yours and mine -- on the cross.

Fourth, He sensed the forsaking action of God as His Father turned away from Him, covered as He was in our sins. 

-- Neil Wilson

#5574

HE UNDERSTANDS YOUR SUFFERING

“There they offered Jesus wine to drink, mixed with gall; but after tasting it, He refused to drink it.”  (Matthew 27:34 NIV)

Before the nail was pounded, a drink was offered. Mark says the wine was mixed with myrrh. Matthew described it as wine mixed with gall. Both myrrh and gall contain sedative properties that numb the senses. But Jesus refused them. He refused to be stupefied by the drugs, opting instead to feel the full force of His suffering.

Why? Why did He endure all these feelings? Because He knew you would feel them too.

He knew you would be weary, disturbed, and angry. He knew you’d be sleepy, grief stricken, and hungry. He knew you’d face pain. If not pain of the body, the pain of the soul… pain too sharp for any drug. He knew you’d face thirst. If not a thirst for water, at least a thirst for truth, and the truth we glean from the image of a thirsty Christ is -- He understands. 

-- Max Lucado

#5573

A RIDE LIKE NO OTHER

Jesus said, “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. Father, glorify Your name!” Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.”  (John 12:27-28 NIV)

Serious reflection on the Scripture references for Palm Sunday remind us that Jesus did not take a leisurely ride to town along a path strewn with palm branches. That first Palm Sunday saw the final ride on the high road of principle, obedience, and faith that would lead to the death of Jesus. The disciples may have wished otherwise, but deep in their hearts they must have known that this ride was like no other Jesus had taken and would bring the end of the life they knew as His followers.

We can be sure that Jesus knew that the shouts of “Hosanna” would give way to the cry of “Crucify.” He knew because He was fully human and was well acquainted with the temptation to follow the path of political correctness and the easiest way out. He also knew the shouts would change from “Hosanna” to “Crucify” because He was fully divine and could see clearly that His journey of incarnation was near the end. The coming humiliation and execution were now undeniable. His desire to be faithful was so overwhelmingly strong that He rode on in confidence and ultimate trust in God whom He knew intimately as Abba. There was no looking back with the question, “What if?” His focus remained on God and God’s will as He moved forward, propelled and sustained by His deep faith in God’s goodness and love. 

-- Norman Shawchuck and Rueben P. Job in “A Guide to Prayer for All Who Seek God” 

#5572