Monday, 3/16/2015

“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.” ~ Mark Twain

DEUTERONOMY 28-30

Moses defines very clearly the path to destruction and the path to life...

15See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. 16For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess.

MARK 15:27

The end...

37With a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last.

38The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. 39And when the centurion, who stood there in front of Jesus, saw how he died,^c he said, “Surely this man was the Son of God!”

JOURNAL

"It's the end of the world as we know it"...good tune from my long past high school days.  It was the end of life as they all knew it.  The Messiah had come and been crucified.  The worldly life and ministry of Jesus in the flesh was over.  The chief priests were still in power. Rome was still in power...in the worldly sense...nothing had changed.  From the perspective of the world this was a blip in history...another radical crucified...another man with great hopes dashed in a bitter death. 

Who would ever imagine that this blip in history would change the world.  Yet 2000 years later this blip in history changed everything.  It is a reminder that what seems insignificant to man, can have effects that ripple centuries into the future.  It is the reason that we trust God and not man.  It is the reason that the logic of our present world does not always apply.

Years ago...my heart was called to trust in God.  I didn't understand it, didn't know what it all meant.  I just knew that I longed to belong and that the world never really met that longing.  In today's world, discipleship really doesn't make sense...there are no guarantees of worldly riches or protection from pain and suffering or escape from human death.  What we get is beyond understanding, beyond logical reasoning, beyond the promises of an imperfect world...it is the joy, hope and grace found only in the intimate love of God.

50I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye... (I Corinthians 15:50-52)