Easter is my favorite holiday. Many give it some love, but most seem to enjoy Christmas a lot more. I am not opposed to Christmas; I think the condescension of the Son of God into the flesh is an amazing event in history. Who would think that an all-powerful God would do such a thing. A more sensible approach seems for him to simply squash the transgressors the moment they transgressed. This indeed seemed to be the promise in Genesis to Adam and Eve: “…for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” 1 Yet God did not kill the man and woman. Instead, he bid his time and then condescended into the flesh of a man, the man Jesus bar Joseph of Nazareth. Why would God–whose names and titles include Almighty2, Sovereign3, Adonai4, and others5–do such a thing? A God of incredible love6, but also a God of incredible justice and wrath7.
This Easter season, my church Artifact has been focusing on understanding and living out the kingdom of heaven that Christ brought to us8. This past week, we were challenged to answer five questions, and I intend to answer them, for my part, here. More will be coming over the next few weeks, and I hope to make a consistent effort in answering them and would love for you to post your thoughts as well.
3 Comments
Ryan,
Love your use of the scripture in your answere. I really enjoyed our discussion tonight and I am going to spend some time going through the scripture you have marked here and then I will offer a more thorough response.
chad
OK here are a few more thoughts.
On your personal reflection I have two thoughts.
First, (andI gathered this from our discussion last night) it is not so much prayer that we need but meditation. Prayer is often chatter and noise, but I think we could all use times of silence and/or listening. Times of immersion in the Word. Times of allowing God to speak to us, not for us to make requests from God.
Second, I would warn against being so negative of our own impact. We all should want to make an impact and should never feel satisfied with how much we are doing. So this can lead us to become Martha instead of Mary. Paul in 2 Corinthians 3 talks to the church about them being their letters of recommendations. I think those whom we have influenced may be more qualified to answer the question of our impact than we are. They are living testimonies of our influence “…written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God…”
I agree with you, Chad. Your explanation of what is needed in the first part of your response is what I meant by prayer (Luke 6:12, 11:1, and others). I don’t usually think of prayer as always talking, though that is often what I end up doing.
On your second point, I also agree. I think there is a difference, though, in a negative view of our impact and a joyful conviction that one’s impact is not what it ought to be. I’ve experienced the latter. I have nothing but joy in realizing I could do more. It’s been freeing for me, and I am excited to spend more time with the Lord so that I may be more like Him and thus impact more for Him.