10 posts tagged “jesus”
I'll admit, I had to watch this video a couple of times to really understand it. I knew God used suffering for good, but I'd never thought of God as redeeming suffering. Sin, sure, but suffering, too? But the idea is begining to make sense to me, and I feel amazed and humbled by the character of God. (Watch the video here or on YouTube with links to the rest of this talk.)
Ah, to be posting again. Don't quite know what to write yet, as I did not know I'd have the opportunity to come to the library today and get online.
It's begining to quiet down here at the ol' library; I suppose the usually groups of loud -precious, but LOUD- kids have all gone home to homework and bed.
Speaking of young ones I had an awesome opportunity to pray with some kids last week. I went with some women from church to a free clinic, and we wandered around, helping where we could and praying for whomever was open to receiving.
A young patient aged 5 and named L caught my eye; he seemed so joyful. I asked his father if I could pray for L and then kneeled down next to him and talked with him for a bit. Then I asked him if he wanted to talk to Jesus with me. It was SO much fun, to talk with Jesus how I used to know Jesus as a kid myself. Very openly but simply, we went to Jesus, and Jesus and I showered this boy with the Truth that he is SO precious to the Jesus Who wants to make him feel better.
Praying for L, another boy, and a few other people, I left that clinic in such a good mood. I had entered God's presence, insecurely at first, but by the end quite, well, relatively, anyway, comfortably. I am so grateful for needy people. Not that I wish others to have needs, but by the needy being around, I'm reminded of the God Who wants to meet needs- and that only in complete awareness that I am needy can I receive help and healing. I was reminded that it was just a couple of years ago that I was very much in a needy position, several needy positions, in fact, including complete povery. Meeting L and the others, I'm reminded how important it is that I remain in a needy place and recognize that I NEED God so much.
Okay, it's getting loud here again. I suppose I'll get off of here. 'S ALWAYS good to write!
I love this commercial. I love the idea of running over all the labels and assumptions about who I am and what I can do based on this or that. I love screaming (well, in my head, anyway) "I define me!" "I will tell you who I am!"
I am also learning to appreciate, after tossing out the assumptions and labels of man, the freedom of not defining myself after all, but, instead, of letting myself be defined by my Creator. Because He created me, He knows who I truly am, and, in Him, I can be exactly how I was created to be. He may tell me what my gifts are and are not, why I think the way I think, why I feel the way I feel, how I should look on the outside, and how my heart is to look as He molds it and makes it more like Jesus.
I refute you who attempt to define what I am or who I am supposed to be based on my faults, failures, successes, personality, height, hair color, or diagnosis' and claim, instead, my worth and identity and definition in Christ. Respectfully and with love.
Exalt the Lord our God!
Bow low before his feet, for he is holy!
Psalm 99:5
Oh, Jesus, Your feet
May I lie here
and in peace
be still
May I be held here
and behold
the feet that I call home
I kiss your feet and taste iron...
17. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as if I were dead. But he laid his right hand on me and said, 18. I am the living one. I died, but look—I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and the grave.
Revelation 1:17-18
And today is Good Friday.
In prayer lately, at the mention of the name of Jesus, I sometimes sense really clearly, the suffering of the cross. At first, I saw His feet and what they must have looked like with nails driven through them. They are filthy and bloody. Were they swollen, as all his body's water and fluids were pushed down by gravity with no place for Jesus to lie flat until He rested in the grave? His feet look are so human, like any man's. But they are also the feet of God, and that amazes me.
Sometimes, I focus on his torso and the smell of sweat. Now, of course, I imagine the smell of blood permeated the air, and perhaps even urine. For after all that torture and suffering, I am sure the Romans gave Him no bathroom breaks. But it is the smell of sweat, for some reason, I sense the most.
Now, for the past few days, I've seen His hands. Nails driven through. I can imagine physically, the disgusting feeling of an entire body hanging from hands or wrists or whatever. I can feel the creepy feeling in my stomach of nerves being deadened or tingling. Just the horror that your body is not supposed to be in this position.
Oh, the pain of the suffering. And the pain of looking upon it.
The physical pain and the physical suffering that killed His body was probably little compared,however, to the spiritual pain of taking on every single sin of every single person in the world. I know the pain that even one of the millions of my sins inflicts my soul, and He took on not only my millions but every person's millions of sins. What was that like?
And then to have His Father reject Him. Forsake Him. The love between God and His Son is a passionate, great, and mysterious love, greater than any romance could ever be, and for that moment He was rejected by the One Who loved Him most and by the One Whom He loved the most. Everything Jesus did on Earth was for the Father and in the name of the Father. Everywhere in the Bible, God points to His Son. But at the moment of the Cross, God turned His back on His Beloved, and Jesus felt the pain of rejection no human has to feel. None of us has to be rejected by the Father now, because Jesus took it for us.
What conflicting emotions derive from such a thing. How is it that I feel gratitude for someone's such suffering? How can I be glad that He did this? But I am. For it is painful to be separated from the Father, the One Whom I was created to love and to be loved by. It is hopeless to be enslaved to sin, and now I am not.
So, thank you, Jesus, for the cross. And I am so sorry you had to do it. I am humbled by Your humiliation. Make me love You the way You love me.
Interesting the movie The Passion of the Christ. Everyone I know has such strong feelings about it, from those who were completely broken by the movie to those who adamantly refuse to see it. For me, this movie was one of the things God used to bring me back to Him during a time in my life when I was trying to walk on my own. I say trying to walk, because it was more like a slow, scarring slither on a bunch of rocks.
There is something about The Passion of the Christ that makes me want to see it over and over again. Not like a typical movie I like to watch a lot, like Elf or Girl Interrupted, where I pop popcorn and veg on the couch with friends or by myself. When The Passion of the Christ is playing, it's all I'm focused on.
When the movie begins, legalistic? instinct to mentally check the movie over for 'doctrinal correctness' kicks in; doctrinal correctness may be over-used in my spiritual life, but it's not always a bad thing. Eventually, my mind relaxes, as the heart of the movie just feels like Truth. I move into something like emotion mode, and emotionally, I am always in shock at first. Then I begin to feel so much when I watch it, this unidentified emotion that I think is Love. And pain.
Every time I watch it, I come away with something else, not so much because of Mel Gibson's excellent direction of the movie, but what must be the Holy Spirit's teaching of my heart. At my third viewing of the movie, I began to understand the difference between obeying out of fear verses obeying out of love. Would a Father rather his child follow Him (get saved) because the child was afraid of punishment (going to hell) or would the Father rather his child follow Him out of reverent love?
I found a journal entry from a couple of years ago I had written after just seeing the movie.
"I've seen The Passion a couple of times, and I want to see it again. I feel like I'm not getting the point of it enough. I don't feel bad enough about it or bothered enough about what Jesus did for me on the cross.
The pain and suffering one human life endures as the consequence of sin is horrible enough. I know this just by looking at my life. My life seems unbearable at times, and Jesus not only took on my sin, but literally billions of others.
Why? Wouldn't it have been easier after the fall for God to have said, "You failed" and turn His back. He could've started over, created a new planet and new creatures. Does He really love us that much. Does He really love me that much?
I think of this, and I cry. But not enough. I don't feel bad enough. I don't stop my sinning.
What does it mean when people say, "God broke my heart". Is it something like these thoughts, because if I truly thought about the cross, His pain, and my role in all of this, my heart would explode."
Galatians 5:1,13
1. It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.
13. You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love."
I had a dream several weeks ago. My entire family and I, my parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, and nephews, were all in Heaven. We and many others were standing by a road with people on both sides. We were waiting for something.
Suddenly, I realized what, or Whom rather, we'd been waiting on. It was Jesus.
We became so excited. I was so excited.
So excited, in fact, that I could barely squeeze out, "It's Jesus, it's Jesus!" I could barely breathe. I was holding onto the person's shoulders in front of me and bouncing up and down on the balls of my feet.
I was finally going to see Him, this man, this God, to Whom I've been praying to all my life. This Person Whom I've wondered about, One Whom I've loved more than anyone, yet Whose existence I have questioned at the same time. I was going to see Him, see God.
Then I woke up.
I wish I could be that excited about Him when I'm awake. I wish I could love Him like I did in that dream. Unashamed, doubt free, excited like a little kid, love.
