pastorjohnb

Thoughts and musings on faith and our mighty God!

Tag Archives: spiritual


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Gifts, Love, Strength

Reading: 1st Corinthians 1: 3-9

Verse Five: “For in Him you have been enriched in every way”.

Paul is writing to a church he loves.  He writes to them to strengthen and encourage them as they live amongst a society that loves power, position, and money.  This sounds like the setting for many of our churches today.  The church in Corinth is apparently being a little judgmental and is having some disagreements within.  The church is also failing to treat all of its members equally as the wealthier members are being given better treatment than the poorer members.  This also might be a thing or two that we struggle with in our churches today.

Into the current reality, Paul speaks some Gospel truths.  He begins by thanking God for the grace that they have been given.  It is a grace that has fallen on one and all.  Paul then goes on to write, “For in Him you have been enriched in every way”.  Here Paul is speaking of both the spiritual gifts that each member has been given as well as of the strength that they can find in Jesus Christ.  In reminding them of grace, Paul is reminding them that God gives grace to all people equally.  Just as God gives grace freely to all people, God also loves all people equally as His beloved children – not loving this special person more and “that” person less.  In reminding them that each has a spiritual gift, he is reminding them that all have value as each gift is needed for the building up of the body of Christ.  Paul also knows that at times the walk of faith will be hard.  So he also reminds them that God is faithful and will keep them to the end.

Just as this passage was a great reminder of the truths of God for the church in Corinth, so too is it a great reminder for us, the church today.  This passage calls us to use the gifts that we have been given, to love others just as Jesus loved all, to lean not into our own strength but to lean into God’s strength instead, and to rest upon the eternal faithfulness of God.  In and through all of these things may we find our path today, loving both God and neighbor, as we are each called to do.


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Compassion

Reading: Matthew 14: 13-21

Verse 14: When Jesus landed and saw the large crowd, He had compassion on them and healed their sick.

Jesus always seemed to be in demand.  Once He began to teach and heal, there always seemed to be a group or a crowd gathered around Him.  He had interesting and sometimes challenging parables and His interpretation of the Scriptures and what it meant to have faith all seemed to center around love and hope and forgiveness.  There was a hunger for these things and Jesus offered them.  For each, there was draw to Jesus.  This day, many are seeking healing.  The people are seeking Jesus’ touch to heal them physically or spiritually or mentally.  So this day is no different than all the others.  Jesus is tired and seeks to withdraw to a solitary place, but the people follow along on shore.

“When Jesus landed and saw the large crowd, He had compassion on them and healed their sick”.  Instead of being mad or getting back in the boat and heading off someplace else, a tired Jesus has compassion.  He gets out of the boat and starts healing them.  We do not know how or what He healed them of, but we do know that He healed many because as evening approaches, the disciples come to Jesus with a practical concern.  Feeding the people – one more way to care for them.  But Jesus’ response challenges the disciples: “You feed them”.  Their answer: but, but, but.   Our answer would have been the same.  What can we do, Lord?

Instead of being angry with the disciples or seeking to walk away from them, Jesus has compassion.  He solves their problem too.  With five loaves and two fish, Jesus feeds the multitude.  His compassion never ends.  Even though tired and seeking solitude, Jesus heals many and as the day draws long, He feeds them too, tending to a physical need of the people.

Jesus continues to do all of this today.  In those times of hurt and pain, Jesus heals our brokenness.  He heals our physical or spiritual or emotional hurts.  He also provides for our needs – our daily bread and so much more.  Jesus offers us Hope and love and forgiveness today as He has compassion on us.  Whatever our need or our hurt, Jesus says to us, “Bring them to me”.


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Milk

Reading: 1 Peter 2: 2-3

Verse Two: Like newborn babies, seek pure spiritual milk.

In this short passage, we find an essential of our faith.  At times it often seems newborn babies always want to eat.  Yes, they do sleep for short periods of time and do require moments to get clean diapers, but when awake and clean again they want to eat.  The milk is good and warm and sweet and is pleasing.  Their little growing bodies need the sustenance.  In our faith journey, we should be like the newborn babe.  We should wake up each day craving and hungry for the Word of God.  It should be something we continually pursue so that our little growing faith can continue to develop.

A mother’s milk is good and warm and sweet and pleasing.  It is also just what the baby needs to grow well.  It is pure and contains the nutrients as well as other things that help spur their growth and improve their health.  After day two of life the baby does not begin to look for something else to sustain and nourish it.  The baby instinctively returns to its loving mother.  The Bible and the words contained therein are our pure milk.  We are to come​ to it day after day to grow in our knowledge of God.  Like a mother’s milk, the Word tastes good and warm and sweet and is pleasing.  It provides what we need to nourish our faith.  In this sense, it helps us to grow as believers.  The Word also strengthens us and encourages us in times of trial and distress.  The Word is our “pure spiritual milk”.

A good mother knows the baby must continue to drink pure milk to grow and mature.  Our Father knows the same is true for us concerning our time with the Word.  Both our earthly mothers and our heavenly Father give to us out of love.  Both nurture us along so that we can grow and develop and come to be all we were created to be.  For both our earthly mothers and our heavenly Father, we are grateful.


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Kingdom Builders

Reading: 1 Corinthians 2: 12-16

As followers of Jesus Christ, we receive the Spirit from God.  Through our baptism we become part of the family of God.  When we accept Christ as the Lord of our life, we are blessed with the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives.  It is the Spirit that helps us to discern and understand the things of God.  Through the power of the Holy Spirit we come to know the gifts and talents that God has blessed us with and how to use them for the glory of God.

Paul writes to the church in Corinth to encourage them and to spur them on to action.  Paul reminds them that when they allow the Holy Spirit to lead and guide them that they will speak not with human words and wisdom but instead they will speak words taught by the Spirit.  With the power of the Holy Spirit they will speak to others “expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words”.  God will fill them with “the mind of Christ” so that they are able to share Jesus’ light and love with others.

Both remain true today.  God has blessed every member of every church with gifts to be used for the kingdom.  As members of the body of Christ, we are called to help each other discover our gifts and talents.  We do this through fellowship, by getting to know one another, and by inviting one another to come along as we go forth to serve Christ in the world.  We also do this through prayer and study, allowing the Spirit time and space to reveal who God created us to be.  Once we know our gifts and seek the guidance of the Holy Spirit in the use of our gifts, then through the power of God we will be able to do great things for the kingdom of God.

May we each play our role well – both by seeking the Holy Spirit and by faithfully serving God with the gifts we have been blessed with.  May we each be kingdom builders today.


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Faith of a Centurion

Reading: Luke 7: 1-10

The centurion is a man of authority.  He has absolute command of the soldiers under him.  He tells one to go and they go; he tells one to come and they come.  He understands power.  The centurion has heard of Jesus and he recognizes that Jesus too has power.  The stories he has heard have been enough for the centurion to recognize the power Jesus wields.  The centurion also understands though that Jesus’ power is different than his own earthly power.  He sees that not only is it a different kind of power but it is a superior power.  The centurion who knows he has a lot of earthly power acknowledges that he is not worthy of being in Jesus’ presence.  The centurion is a powerful man with a lot of humility.

Jesus in turn credits the centurion with having great faith.  He goes so far as to comment that He has not yet seen such faith in Israel.  That is a pretty strong statement for Jesus’ followers and for the religious authorities to hear.  This Roman soldier has a faith superior to ours?  It would be a difficult question for them to wrestle with.

It is a difficult question for us to wrestle with too.  We say that God is all-powerful and can do anything, but do we really trust Him to do so?  We’ve heard the stories just like the centurion did, but do we have absolute confidence that Jesus can still act?  He brought healing to a sick servant who was miles and miles away without uttering a word.  Surely this kind of power can still heal and transform lives.  But do we have the faith of the centurion?  This day may we call upon the mighty and powerful name of Jesus to enter into our lives to bring us spiritual, physical, and/or emotional transformation.  In Jesus’ name there are no limits.  May we live faithfully today, trusting in this truth.


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Spiritual Life

Reading: Psalm 104: 24-34 & 35b

In the Psalm today we see the timelessness of the Holy Spirit.  The psalmist writes of the Holy Spirit coming and breathing life into all of the creatures of the earth.  We see a similar giving of life in Ezekiel 37 where the dry bones are covered in tissues and flesh but require the Breath or Spirit to come into them to give life.

At Pentecost, the life given is a spiritual life, not a physical life.  When the Holy Spirit descended on those first believers, they were physically alive.  But when the Spirit entered them they were born anew, not of flesh and bone, but of the Spirit of God.  They were each made into a new creation as they were filled with a power and presence unlike anything before.  The living and active presence of God was now here to dwell in the hearts of all who call on Jesus as Lord and Savior.  The physical sign of the flames that descended on each there that first Pentecost demonstrated that the Holy Spirit is not limited to one place or time and is not limited in its presence.

Just as the Spirit breathes physical life into all things, the Spirit can breathe spiritual life into all of humanity.  Just as the power and presence empowered the first disciples to take the message of Jesus to Jerusalem, Samaria, and across the known world, so too does the same Holy Spirit enable us to take the same good news out into the whole world.  Just as the first disciples allowed the Holy Spirit to set them on fire for sharing the good news, may we also be lit ablaze with the light and love of Jesus Christ as well!


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Powerful Words

Healing involves more than the physical.  It often includes the emotional and the spiritual as well.  Often getting “better” physically is easier than emotionally or spiritually because a prescription usually puts our bodies on the mend.  When we are broken emotionally or spiritually, the process of healing is usually more complex than a pill.

Yet when one is physically ill for a long period of time, it does affect your emotional and spiritual well-being also.  Try to imagine being the woman  in today’s scripture – afflicted with a bleeding problem for 12 years, unclean according to Jewish Law, broke because she has spent everything trying to get better.  Think what this has done to her mind and spirit.

Yet inside her still flickers a bit of hope.  She hears that Jesus is nearby.  She works her way through the crowd and sneaks up behind Him.  In faith she touches His cloak.  Talk about faith – “If I just touch His cloak…”  The bleeding stops.  She knows at once that she has been healed.  Imagine what that meant to her – able to be a part of society again, able to go into the temple, able to start to reassemble her life.  Jesus blesses her and sends her on her way.

“Your faith has healed you.  Go in peace.  Be freed from your suffering.”  Powerful words.  Powerful words spoken to you and me as well.  Words offered to us for our physical, emotional, and spiritual healing and wholeness.  Like the woman, we need to reach out to Jesus.  Like her, we need to go to Him in faith.  And like her, we too can feel His power released into our lives.  Go to Jesus.

Scripture reference: Mark 5: 25-34