Two reasons why death & resurrection are a big deal

Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?"
John 11:25-26

Every time that I read this account and get to these words of Jesus to Martha I get a chill of compelling excitement that runs up and down my spine. I can't help it. This is Jesus Himself dealing without he most personal and devastating of human tragedies. This is what He came to do about death. And it is moving beyond my ability to describe.

I feel strong emotion here because everybody has been a Martha, and everybody will be a Lazarus. The tears come because I have stood in Martha's place before Jesus myself. I have lost someone (actually several someones) that I love and have felt helpless as I have seen death claim a family member. And everything that Jesus did set up this conversation. He knew Lazarus was sick, yet tarried in coming to visit His friend. He did not even make the burial. But here Jesus is compelling the family that He is "the resurrection and the life", asking them to believe in the hardest of moments.

I am also moved because I stand in Lazarus' position (at least partially). I will die one day. The older I get, the closer that day comes. We all will die some day. And what I do with this question Jesus posed to Martha is key. Do I really believe that my faith in Jesus as the resurrection and the life will give me eternal life? Absolutely! It is what all my life and what all my life rests on more and more every day. It is really hope based on a knowledge of my Savior and His great love.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Testing out blogging mobility from an iPad

Call me whatever you want, but I just ditched my laptop for this with a keyboard dock. For the kind of computing I now do, it makes sense. SO anyway, anybody want to buy a used Toshiba P100 17 inch HD screen laptop? I custom built it back in the day. I will sell it, a nice backpack, Windows 7 ultimate and Office 2007 for a grand total of $400.00.

Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Shawnee, KS

Jesus… on following Jesus

My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand.

John 10:27-29

 

These are comforting and encouraging words for one who has chosen to follow Jesus. But what is remarkable is the context and the audience to which Jesus spoke them. The context was one of confrontation by the enemies of the Lord. And Jesus spoke these words, not to His disciples, but rather to His distracters. These people were actively opposing Him… the text says they did not believe (John 1:25-26). So I gather that these comforting words were actually meant to convict and discomfort those who do not believe in Jesus.

 

Why do I want to invest the earliest moments of my day in hearing from Jesus? It is because of the promises of these words in John 10. I want to hear His voice… and I do when I read His Word. I have never had the mystical need for anything else because I have found so much “mystery” and “clarity” in the pages of scripture, particularly in passages like this one where Jesus says stuff like this!

 

And the security of being one of HIS sheep is superb. Nothing can take me from Him. Nothing can steal me away from the grasp of my God and Savior! I listen to God, I know Him and I follow Him. He gives me eternal life and nothing can separate me from that, or from Him!

 

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Salvation & Judgment

Jesus said, "For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind."

John 9:39

 

I am trying to understand this statement in the light of an earlier statement that Jesus made to Nicodemus. He has said that the Son came into the world NOT to condemn it, but to save it (John 3:17). How does that square with this statement? I believe the answer is found in the audience of each statement.

 

In John 3, Jesus is dealing with an inquisitive seeker who has come to Him to find questions answered about eternal life. And the salvific purposes of God for the world flow from that conversation. The world has the potential for salvation by Jesus. Generally, God’s grace is offered freely to the entire world. But some will receive it while many will reject Jesus.

 

The John 9 conversation (at least at the end of the chapter) is directed to those who have see Jesus testify to His deity. They have seen a man born blind testify to His deity. They have seen a man born blind testify to Jesus’ work and power. And they continued in blind unbelief because to change would destroy their incorrect theology. That is why judgment would come. They refused to accept their sinful beliefs. Even in this statement, Jesus makes it clear that blind people (those lost and spiritually dead who believed Him) would see, and those who thought they saw (spiritually self-righteous who refuse to repent) would be blinded by Him. That is the difference between John 3 and John 9.

 

Technorati Tags: Christianity,Discipleship,Religion

The Deity of Christ is essential to Christianity.

Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am."

John 8:58

 

This is an undiminished claim by Jesus to be God. He was appealing to the oldest roots of Judaism in this claim. He used the covenant name of God as revealed to Moses (“I am”) and He claimed to exist before Abraham, the father of the nation of Israel. It is very clear that the authorities understood what Jesus was claiming because they take immediate steps to stone Him for His blasphemy (John 8:59).

 

This is the part of Jesus that people still want to resist. It is OK to keep Him as a moral leader, as a great human or an enlightened teacher. But to ascribe to Him the authority and reality of God (which He claimed and demonstrated) is not what post-modern inclusivism wants to do. Instead, the system attacks the gospels as a trustworthy account of His life and teaching (leaving us with nothing by which to know Jesus) and blames His followers for deifying Him.

 

But Jesus clearly changed lives, backing up this claim. And those who saw Him and say and do what only God can do chose instead to hate Him. Why should it be different today? Accepting Christ as God and Savior has always been a personal commitment that is ridiculed by the world. But His is my salvation and life, and I know this!

 

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another reason for controversy

The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify about it that its works are evil.

John 7:7

 

Jesus was controversial because He showed that the natural ends to all the work of a collective of fallen, depraved sinners was evil. He was not about reinforcing some spark of goodness in depressed humanity. He was about confronting sin all around Him. Not arrogantly, for sinners were drawn to Him, but truthfully, so that people could repent and follow Him. The worst sins were done by those who disguised sinful motivations and selfish pride in beautiful religious clothing.

 

The context of this statement shows tragic human depravity at two extremes. The first is personal depravity represented in the brothers of Jesus. They sinned in refusing to believe in Jesus (John 7:5). And they were pressuring Him to go to the Feast of Booths in Jerusalem to make a huge public spectacle of Himself. They were motivated by pride.

 

The second extreme, also characterized by pride, was found in the Jewish leaders who challenged Jesus all throughout John 7. They did not believe in Him either… but their reasons for rejection were viewed as “good” even “religious” reasons. They rejected Him as well. His teaching had the unnerving affect of eliminating their profitable market share and destroying their religious livelihood.

 

So there are two evils to guard against in my heart. The first is my own tendency toward prideful lack of faith, wanting to take all actions, even decisions of faith, into my own hands. The second is my tendency to look “holy” by public religious spectacle, rather than to let God make me holy through private obedience and submission to Jesus. Both of these are evils that Jesus exposes in the world and in me. Only by faith, trust, and obedience to Him can I find that Jesus will heal me of them.

 

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Stop eating candy!

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.”

John 6:35

 

Jesus is my soul’s satisfaction. What He offers is complete and full life in exchange for believing and following Him. He is what my soul longs for at all times. But so many times I have sought to satisfy soul hunger with lesser things. I settled for a handful of candy when I could have had a gourmet feast!

 

Many things promise to satisfy soul hunger, but never really do. Money can’t by happiness. Material things just always deteriorate in need of life-sapping maintenance. Position in life does not deal with the deeper questions of the soul. It just postpones them, only to have them return in great, fearful intensity at the hardest moments. Relationships can be fickle. Lusts and longings still remain.

 

But Jesus satisfies as the relationship that orders and strengthens all the others. He is the strong anchor for the soul so that my heart does not drift from the place of satisfying joy.  He provides what I need, so that I am not enslaved by passions, possessions, power, prestige, or position. I am truly and fully aware of how Jesus alone truly gives me what I long for… a satisfied heart!

 

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