Heaven

Lilies and Sparrows

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When I was a teenager I sometimes worked in the hay fields during the hottest part of Summer. The farmer would pass ahead of us through the fields gathering and baling the loose hay and we followed behind piling the bales on a truck and then stacking them in the barn. The fragrance of the freshly cut hay still lingers in my memory as well as the 1554287255655_image.jpg

view from where I rode on top of the pile.  From there I could look out and see the tiny flowers that had nestled under cover of the tall grass, now uncovered in all their startling beauty. 

In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told us not to be concerned about the details of our life. He said that we could trust Him to take care of us just like He took care of those wild flowers in the field. Then He talked about sparrows. Maybe he choose sparrows because they have no colorful feathers, mighty talons or majestic wingspan.

1554287664847_image.jpgThey are ordinary just like us and Jesus said that God watches over every one of them and even notices when they fall.

With Good Friday and Resurrection Sunday on our horizon, let’s think for a moment of how Jesus was doing more than just telling us not to worry. He was also reminding us that we could trust God even during the worst moments of our lives just as He did. At the cross they stripped Him naked and gambled for His clothing; but today He wears a robe of light and is clothed with the sun. And on that same dark afternoon He fell to the ground like the sparrow and they took and laid Him in a tomb. Though only a few saw the place where He was laid; God had not forgotten. He knew exactly where to send the angel to roll back the stone on Resurrection morning. In one miracle moment the Spirit breathed the breath of life into Him and Jesus walked out to comfort Mary Magdalene; to bring peace to Peter and John and the assurance of faith Thomas.  Today He freely offers any of us who will believe a gift greater than lilies and sparrows. He promises that if we follow Him we will find our own eternal place in His home and at His side forevermore!

 

 

Our Great Hope

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That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, He Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses Matthew 8:17 KJV

Did you know that God is so intimately concerned with our physical needs that He has even counted the number of hairs on our head? We have a great hope that whether in this life or in the next; God will heal every disease, restore all that is broken and renew our youth like the eagles!

Whether sitting in a wheel chair in a nursing home or confined to a bed with a tracheotomy tube in order to breathe, Jesus offers the hope of complete and entire healing as one part of His promise of eternal life. That promise may be overlooked or forgotten by those in perfect health, but God does not forget. The same Jesus who was moved with compassion for lepers, the blind and the lame has promised to wipe every tear from our eyes. He not only has compassion for our aches, pains and disabilities but the Bible tells us that He took all of these onto his shoulders and carried them.

If we continue reading in the chapter of Isaiah that Matthew quotes we see in the very next verse that it is by His stripes that we are healed. God is so very concerned for every one of our pains and infirmities that He allowed a whip to fall across the shoulders of Jesus. As He was wounded again and again we were being healed. Weak arms will be lifted, failing voices will sing again and deaf ears will hear the shepherd’s voice! When the things of earth have passed we will stand strong and eternally young in the presence of our ageless King!

The New People

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For the entire ten years we lived in a rural Pennsylvania community we were considered the “New People”. I felt better when I learned that there were other “New People” just up the road from us.  They were from New Jersey and had lived there since the 1950’s!

In a more serious light the hysteria and anger over “New People” (Mexicans, Arabs, Muslims, Asians) has culminated in the most recent massacre in New Zealand. How we as Christians to respond must be linked to how Jesus responded to hatred and prejudice.  Jesus loved the immigrant, the stranger and amazingly so even His enemies. Jesus was not angry with Samaritans who had come from another place and worshipped differently than Jews.  Jesus did not protest about the brutal Roman rule or even agitate for the removal of Herod, who had murdered his cousin John the Baptist. Maybe Jesus was accepting of the “New People” because he knew what being rejected felt like. 20171231_232022

He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.  He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. John 1:10-11 NKJV

Change can be difficult and unsettling, especially if we feel we are threatened by those new and different circumstances. But no matter what situation we find ourselves in the only true place of peace and acceptance is not in being surrounded by “Our People”. Real peace comes as a result of being adopted into God’s family by the blood of Jesus Christ.

I was thinking how last Wednesday a friends of ours; who is one of those,  “New People” became a U.S. citizen. He and His family eat different food, speak a different language and has a different culture.  But today Raj and I both have exactly the same rights, responsibilities and privileges. In the same way, when Jesus laid down His life on the cross to pay for our sins, we gained the privilege of citizenzenship and includsion in the community of God. Yes as His children,  we may always be treated as the “New People”; but God calls us His own. How much more should we  be ready to embrace whoever He has allowed to live just down the street in our town?

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For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Philippians 3:20 NKJV