pastorjohnb

Thoughts and musings on faith and our mighty God!

Tag Archives: restore


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Bold Trust

Reading: Jeremiah 32: 6-15

Shelter is one of our most basic needs.  To have a place to call home provides stability and a sense of well-being.  Your day is different when you know you have a place of refuge and a place to lay your head down at the end of the day.  As the Babylonians assaulted the city, the words of Jeremiah’s prophecy echo in their heads.  They know they will be defeated and carried off into exile in Babylon.  The Israelites future is scary and full of unknowns.

Into this scene steps Jeremiah’s cousin Hanamel.  God has told Jeremiah that Hanamel is coming to sell him some family land in his hometown.  Buying land seems an odd choice when they about to be uprooted and carried off to a foreign land.  But God had told Jeremiah about Hanamel’s visit so he goes ahead and buys the land.  Most of us would have said, “Let’s just wait and see how this thing with the Babylonians turns out”.

But Jeremiah is banking on God’s promises.  He knows that the Israelites are God’s chosen people and always will be.  He knows God’s promise that one day “houses, fields, and vineyards will again be bought in the land”.  It may be ten years or four hundred years.  It does not matter because God’s word is good.  One day God will restore Israel.

At times God will ask us to step out into a place where we must trust what we know about God.  Perhaps God is asking you to do so right now in your life.  If not now, know that God will.  This is because trust is an essential element in our relationship with God.  In this place of trust we begin to say “your will” instead of “my will”.  As we sense God’s call to step out in faith may we each do so, boldly trusting in God alobe.


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Presence

Reading: Psalm 77: 1-2 & 11-20

Psalm 77 begins with, “I cried out to God for help; I cried out for God to hear me”.  In this opening line we can feel connection.  Whether recent, long ago, or present, we have all had occasions to cry out to God and to lay out great need at His feet.  When we find ourselves at the end of our hope, we desperately reach out to God and beg Him to hear our prayer.

Then the psalmist goes on remind himself of all that God has done.  In this way we too can recall times we have been in God’s presence in our past and can again rejoice in the blessings we have and are currently experiencing.  Then he goes on to recount God’s goodness and the many miracles God has worked in the past.  In the midst of a difficult time it is important to think on God’s love, goodness, and power.

As the Psalm concludes, the writer recalls God’s leading of the people.  God still desires to lead us each day of our lives as well.  God seeks to be an active and engaged participant in our lives.  In times of stress or trial it can be easy to forget God’s role in our lives.  Even in those times that He seems to be absent, He is always ad near as our next prayer.

God’s desire is to heal and save the world.  The master plan is to make all things new again.  There is hope in our faith.  We do go through dark moments in our lives, but we also dance in God’s light and love.  May today be a day of dancing.  And even if the dance is slow and mournful, may it also be bathed in God’s presence.


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New Creations

Reading: John 14: 8-17 and 25-27

In today’s passage, Jesus promises the disciples the gift of the Holy Spirit.  Like most of us, Philip wants the gift now.  He asks Jesus to show them the Father.  And in a familiar pattern, Jesus patiently explains that He has been showing them the Father all along.  Jesus explains that the words and the works are because the Father is in Him and He is in the Father.  Then Jesus tells them again of this gift of the Holy Spirit.  With this gift the disciples will experience the indwelling presence of God and Jesus within them.  And not only will it be in the disciples, but the Spirit will allow them to do even greater works than Jesus did.  The presence of the Holy Spirit is just one more step in bringing the new creation into being.

Jesus was also a step.  In His example and in the works He did, Jesus began the process of making all things new.  In His teachings He showed a new way, a better way – the way of love.  In truly loving others, we reveal the true nature of God.  Jesus also began the new creation by restoring people.  For some it was a physical restoration: the blind see, the lame walk, the mute speak.  For some, like the lepers, there was also an emotional healing as they were restored to the community as well.  For still others, the restoration was the first steps to returning to a relationship with God.  Jesus was making all things new, providing a glimpse of what the new heaven and earth will be like.

Jesus continued this work with the gift of the Holy Spirit to the disciples at Pentecost and to all who have called on Him as Lord and Savior ever since.  The same Spirit dwells in each of us, giving us the power to reveal the new creation that is in motion.  Through our lives, words, actions, and deeds, people in our lives can begin to see, understand, and experience what Jesus offers: to be made a new creation.  May we be willing servants in the building of His kingdom here on earth.


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Promises

Reading: Revelation 21: 1-6

Our world and sometimes our lives can be filled with pain and death and oppression and injustice.  Sometimes these are things we must endure and get through.  Sometimes they are things from afar that we may be able to alleviate through our engagement with the causes or by providing relief in some form.  And sometimes they are things we see from afar and are powerless to affect the pain, suffering…

In Revelation we read that in the new heaven and earth, all will be made new.  Coupled with the promise that there will be no more pain, tears, death, or mourning, the vision is for a place where all is good, where happiness and joy abound.  It will be a place where all are content and where God’s love fills everyone and everything.

Sometimes, when one is locked in a deep struggle where there seems to be no hope and where there seems to be no way out, this promise of all things being made new is all one has to hold onto.  We are reminded that God’s word is trustworthy and true.  One day all will be made new and right.  God also reminds us that He is the beginning and the end.  This also means that He created each one of us and that He longs for us to return to Him, to dwell with Him.

When these are our promises, we can always look to the future and find at least this sliver of hope.  In our lives we will draw on these promises from time to time.  We will also have opportunities to share these promises with others.  May we ever look to our everlasting God and ever seek to share His promises with the lost and hurting.


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Follow

Reading: John 10: 22-30

The Jews in the temple ask Jesus a question I think we ask often.  We may not always ask it verbally but I think we certainly do with our decisions and actions.  They ask Jesus if he is the Messiah.  Is he the one coming to redeem Israel, to restore them to their rightful place amongst the great nations?  They are looking for Jesus to do something grand.

His response perplexes: “You do not believe because you do not belong to my sheep”.  Believe that you are the Messiah?  I’m sure they are thinking something along these lines: ‘Rid us of these Romans and make Israel great and then we will believe and then we will follow.  For now though, we’ll just do our own thing.  Yes it is nice that that guy can now walk and that that guy can see and that you fed all those people.  Really neat stuff (for them), but when will you really start leading, doing really important stuff (for us)?’

We are sometimes a lot like them.  Yes Jesus, I love you and believe in you and want to dedicate my life to you, but first I need to…  Yes Jesus, I will serve and follow you, but first would you…  We like Jesus, but too often on our terms and conditions.  Like the Jews in the temple that day, we expect or maybe even demand something grand from Jesus.  Then we will be all in.  Then…

And Jesus says to us: my sheep follow me.  It is not about what I can do for you.  It’s about what I do to you, about what I do in you.  The miracles, they just show that I am who I say I am: the Son of God, the Word made flesh.  Follow me, be my sheep, do what I did: love, serve, sacrifice, forgive.  The you will be my sheep.  Then you will know a peace that passes understanding.  Then you will begin to live eternal life.  Follow me.


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Wouldn’t We?

Reading: John 13: 21-33

“One of you will betray me”.  That must have been quite the bombshell.  These twelve men have  invested three years of their lives in following Jesus.  They have stuck with Him, certainly at a personal cost to their families and other relationships.  It has been a sacrifice in other ways as well.  Yet at twelve have remained with Jesus to this point.

In our hearts and minds, we each think we are devout to Jesus.  Until we are not.  How often our faith life is moving along solidly and in an instant we have said or thought something that brought instant conviction?  Surely not I, Lord.  As life is cruising along well and we feel connected to the Son, we do something and the remorse and guilt come flooding in.  Surely not I, Jesus.

In most cases when we have been tempted or stumble into sin, we recognize it quickly.  When we are sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit, we realize our sin quickly and repent and seek forgiveness and restoration.  Then and there we are brought back into a right relationship with God.

We all are never really far from, “One of you will…”. And like the disciples we can also get lost in our own worlds.  When we ourselves are wrestling with temptation or sin or when we have sinned and are struggling with the guilt or our own inability to forgive ourselves, we can be like the eleven – so lost in the ” Is it I?” question that we do not notice the evil around us.  The eleven were so inwardly focused that they did not notice Judas leaving.

If we were there we would have noticed and gone after him.  Wouldn’t have we?  Wouldn’t we?  Maybe.  It is too easy to think of someone who used to come to church.  In our own struggles may we realize that all struggle.  In this realization, may we become more aware of our brothers and sisters in Christ, being vigilant to love and care for one another.  May we each seek out and help the lost or wandering sheep back into the flock.


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Prayers and Promises

At times we wrestle with a deep ache inside.  Sorrow and dreams that never come to be are two of the things in life that we all face at times.  It can be that moment we realize we are not going to make the team or get that position or promotion.  It can be when a relationship ends or when one we love passes on.  The deep ache inside is very real.

Hannah longed for a child.  Peninnah, the other wife, had borne Elkanah children and was more than willing to point this out to Hannah.  Elkanah loves Hannah more.  Peninnah’s unfulfilled dreams was to be the love of Elkanah’s life, but she was second in his heart.  To soothe her ache she lashed out.  But the ache remained.  Human solutions and efforts do not heal such aches.

Hannah chose instead to bring her ache to God.  In prayer she poured out her heart to God.  In faith she turned to the only one who can truly bring us the healing we need.  God heard the prayers of His faithful servant.  God’s response filled Hannah’s ache and brought her hope.

God may not bring us the job or the child or the spot on the team.  He may not restore the relationship and seeing our loved one who has gone on waits for us to join them in eternity.  But God does respond to the prayers of the faithful servant.  If we allow How to, He will restore, heal, and pour His love into us.  The promise is not to give us all the desires of our heart.  The promise is to be present, to dwell in us, to fill us with His love, to give us what we need.  For this great love, thank you God.

Scripture reference: 1 Samuel 1: 4-8


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Just Like Ruth

Ruth was faithful to both Naomi and to God.  She is a great example of the self-giving love we are all called to offer others.  Ruth puts the needs to Naomi far above her own.  In the end, she finds another who offers her this same kind of sacrificial love.  It is no wonder that Ruth and Boaz are part of the family tree that will one day produce Jesus.

In marrying Ruth, Boaz offers both her and Naomi kindness, protection, security, and a sense of belonging.  For two women living as widows with no kin to care for them, this must have been a great relief to them.  But this was not just some act of God.  Boaz was drawn to Ruth when he saw her in the field, working hard to glean grain for herself and Naomi.  He was drawn to her even more when he heard her story and what she had done for Naomi.  Ruth remained faithful and through this both her and Naomi’s lives were redeemed.

Our faith journey is much like Ruth’s story.  At times we will experience suffering and walk a hard road.  But we will not be alone, God will be there too.  At times we too will offer ourselves to another, giving our sacrificial love to them, following the example of Ruth and of Christ.  At times we too will experience redeeming love as God will enter into our brokenness.  In times when we most need God’s redeeming love, it will be there to redeem and restore us.  And just as Boaz stepped in and negotiated for Ruth, Christ will step in and intercede for us before the throne of God.  And just as Ruth was faithful, so too must we be faithful.

Each day we are called to offer ourselves to God and to others, living as His example of sacrificial love.  May it be this day.

Scripture reference: Ruth 4: 13-17