And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
John 8:32
As we slowly begin to take up our lives again following the past year of shut-downs, masks, and social distancing have we learned anything from our experiences this past year?
Are you still attempting to “do it your way” or have you realized that God is in control and that God wants the very best for you?
God is in control. If you truly believe that then you must trust that He is working out His plan for your life.
Even if you cannot understand what is going on right now, can you trust that God knows what is going on and that God has you exactly where He wants you to be?
Of course this only applies if you are listening to what God is telling you and you are allowing Him to lead you in the way He wants you to go. Then you can trust that you are where He wants you, even if it isn’t where you would have chosen to be.
If you are keeping your focus on God, if you are reading your Bible, meditating on His Word, spending time in prayer, listening for the whisper of the Holy Spirit and obeying what He tells you – THEN you can trust.
But don’t expect an easy road because God doesn’t promise easy, He only promises that the struggles will be worth it.
That is the law of life. What comes easily goes easily. The things we struggle for we value and appreciate. The rewards of life come not to those who have their hands out, but to those who are willing to sacrifice in order to gain their objective. There is much talk about giving people freedom, and people asking to be made free. The simple fact is that freedom cannot be given. It is something for which every race and nation has to struggle. It is not something which can be bequeathed, but something which is attained. One can no more give people freedom than one can give character.
From the commentary on Joshua 17:15 – The Interpreter’s Bible –
What will this year bring? I don’t know.
I do know that God has a plan for my life and that He has a plan for your life also.
Whose plan are you going to follow?
And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve;whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.
The dreams they had dreamed were not what they’d seemed
Now that He was dead and gone
The garden, the jail, the hammer, the nail
How could a night be so long?
Then came the morning
Night turned into day
The stone was rolled away
Hope rose with the dawn
Then came the morning
Shadows vanished before the sun
Death had lost and life had won
For morning had come
The angel, the star, the kings from afar
The wedding, the water, the wine
Now it was done, they’d taken her Son
Wasted before His time
She knew it was true, she’d watched Him die too
She’d heard them call Him just a man
But deep in her heart she knew from the start
Somehow her Son would live again
Then came the morning
Night turned into day
The stone was rolled away
Hope rose with the dawn
Then came the morning
Shadows vanished before the sun
Death had lost and life had won
For morning had come
I love to watch each new day dawn. On the farm in Missouri I would sit on the front porch as the sky began to lighten, knowing that it was already shining on my family on the east coast. The shadows would flee as the sun came over the horizon until it finally rose above the trees across the pasture.
Light will always banish the darkness, even on a cloudy day. With every sunrise I am reminded of God’s faithful presence, every day. I may not see Him or even sense His presence but I KNOW that He is with me every moment of every day, Just as I know the sun is shining in the sky above the clouds.
This song written by Chris Christian, Gloria Gaither, and William Gaither is Easter to me.
The next day, the one after Preparation Day, the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate. “Sir,” they said, “we remember that while he was still alive that deceiver said, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ So give the order for the tomb to be made secure until the third day. Otherwise, his disciples may come and steal the body and tell the people that he has been raised from the dead. This last deception will be worse than the first.”
“Take a guard,” Pilate answered. “Go, make the tomb as secure as you know how.” So they went and made the tomb secure by putting seal on the stone and posting the guard.
Matthew 27:62-66
What a Sabbath day that must have been for the disciples of Jesus.
Shock and dismay over the execution of the one they had followed for three years.
Fear over what the future held for them.
Did they dare to go to the temple to worship?
Or did they remain in sequestered in that upper room, waiting for a knock on the door from the authorities, seeking to arrest all of them?
Even though Jesus had told them that He would be killed, they were not prepared.
It was the darkest of days for them – BUT – Sunday was coming!
It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour, for the sun stopped shining. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, intoyour hands I commit my spirit.” When he had said this, he breathed his last.
The centurion, seeing what had happened, praised God and said, “Surely this was a righteous man.” When all the people who had gathered to witness this sight saw what took place, they beat their breasts and went away. But all those who knew him, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things.
Now there was a man named Joseph, a member of the Council, a good and upright man, who had not consented to their decision and action. He came from the Judean town of Arimathea and he was waiting for the kingdom of God. Going to Pilate, he asked for Jesus’ body. Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was Preparation Day, and the Sabbath was about to begin.
The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. Then they went home nd prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment.
Luke 23:44-56
Oh, the pain of this day for those who loved the Lord.
Even though He had told them what was coming, they didn’t understand even when they saw the cross and heard the sound of the nails being pounded into his body.
The one who called Lazarus from the tomb was now himself – being laid lifeless in a tomb.
They were in shock, unable to penetrate the darkness of grief which enveloped them.
When the hour came, Jesus and his apostles reclined at the table. And he said to them, “I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I tell you, I will not eat it again until it finds fulfillment in the kingdom of God.”
After taking the cup, he gave thanks and said, “Take this and divide it among you. For I tell you I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.”
And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me.”
In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you. But the hand of him who is going to betray me is with mine on the table. The Son of Man will go as it has been decreed, but woe to that man who betrays him.” They began to question among themselves which of them it might be who would do this.
Luke 22:14-23
When I come to the Communion table and hear those words from my Lord:
This is my body given for you.
This is my blood of the new covenant, poured out for youand for many for the forgiveness of sins.
Do this in remembrance of me.
I think of Oswald Chambers teaching that God wants us as broken bread and poured-out wine.
The following is from My Utmost For His Highest, the reading for September 30th:
We make calls out of our own spiritual consecration, but when we get right with God He brushes all these aside, and rivets us with a pain that is terrific to one thing we never dreamed of, and for one radiant flashing moment we see what He is after, and we say – “Here am I, send me.”
This call has nothing to do with personal sanctification, but with being made broken bread and poured-out wine. God can never make us wine if we object to the fingers He uses to crush us with. If God would only use His own fingers, and make me broken bread and poured-out wine in a special way! But when He uses someone whom we dislike, or some set of circumstances to which we said we would never submit, and makes those the crushers, we object. We must never choose the scene of our own martyrdom. If ever we are going to be made into wine, we will have to be crushed; you cannot drink grapes. Grapes become wine only when they have been squeezed.
I wonder what kind of finger and thumb God has been using to squeeze you, and you have been like a marble and escaped? You are not ripe yet, and if God had squeezed you, the wine would have been remarkably bitter. To be a sacramental personality means that the elements of the natural life are presenced by God as they are broken providentially in His service. We have to be adjusted into God before we can be broken bread in His hands. Keep right with God and let Him do what He likes, and you will find that He is producing the kind of bread and wine that will benefit His other children.
Do you sometimes feel like the sheaf of wheat under the flail – being beaten until the grain falls out?
Or maybe you are the grape being crushed until the juice flows.
Take heart God is preparing you for service in His kingdom!
Now the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread were only two days away, and the chief priests and the teachers of the law were looking for some sly way to arrest Jesus and kill him. “But not during the Feast,” they said, “or the people may riot.”
While he was in Bethany, reclining at the table in the home of a man known as Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head.
Some of those present were saying indignantly to one another, “Why this waste of perfume? It could have been sold for more than a year’s wages and the money given to the poor.” And they rebuked her harshly.
“Leave her alone,” said Jesus. “Why are you bothering her? She has done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them any time you want. But you will not always have me. She did what she could, She poured perfume on my body beforehand to prepare for my burial. I tell you the truth, wherever the gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.
Then Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve, went to the chief priests to betray Jesus to them. They were delighted to hear this and promised to give him money. So he watched for an opportunity to hand him over.
Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a fraction of a penny.
Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything – all she had to live on.”
On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple area and began driving out those who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves, and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. And as he taught them, he said, “Is it not written: ” ‘ My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations’ ? But you have made it a den of robbers.’ “
The chief priests and the teachers of the law heard this and began looking for a way to kill him, for they feared him, because the whole crowd was amazed at his teaching.
When evening came, they went out of the city.
Mark 11:15-19
The temple was a place of worship and the court of the Gentiles was the only area where the non-Jews could gather for prayer and to worship. The Jewish authorities had allowed this area to become a market place with all the noise and the smells. Can you imagine trying to worship in these conditions?
The religious leaders were already unhappy with the influence Jesus was gaining over the people with his teaching and his miracles. This confrontation made them angry. He was threatening their way of life.
Jesus does not allow for “business as usual.”
Jesus calls for change.
The world tells you that you must look out for your own interests.
Jesus tells you to put others first.
The world tells you to get all you can.
Jesus tells you to give all you can.
The world tells you to get your enemy before he can get you.
Jesus tells you to love your enemy and do good to them that curse you.
As your journey through this Holy Week consider your faith walk, ask the Lord to show you what needs cleaning up.
As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethpage and Bethany at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two of his disciples, saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and just as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone asks you, ‘ Why are you doing this?’ tell him, ‘The Lord needs it and will send it back here shortly.’ “
They went and found a colt outside in the street, tied at a doorway. As they untied it, some people standing there asked, “What are you doing, untying that colt?” They answered as Jesus had told them to, and the people let them go. When they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks over it, he sat on it. Many people spread their cloaks on the road, while others spread branches they had cut in the fields. Those who went ahead and those who followed shouted,
“Hosanna!”
“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”
“Blessed is the coming kingdom of our Father David!”.
“Hosanna in the highest!”
Jesus entered Jerusalem and went to the temple. He looked around at everything, but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the Twelve.
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