Living in the "It is Finished"

He said, “It is finished!” Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. John 19:30 (NLT)

I’ve been sick. One day I realized that I was dizzy. You know, room spinning type of dizzy that makes you nauseous. It started about 2 weeks ago and has made life a little difficult. I waited a couple of days and went to the doctor. They diagnosed it as vertigo and gave me some medicine. It didn’t help. I waited a few more days and got worse. I went back. This time, they realized I had a sinus infection and prescribed medicine.

During this time, it was really hard for me to spend what I call quality time with God. Praying was hard. I tend to pray either journaling or kneeling. Both of those things set off the vertigo. I had a hard time reading. Honestly, some days I had a hard time thinking. What I could do was just pray short prayers talking to God about everything going on here and there as I tried to make it through my day. That’s it. That’s what I did.

This morning, I was reflecting on the last two weeks. I’ve felt God’s presence strongly. He’s answered my prayers and spoke to me about different things. I’ve had peace. As I pondered this, I was grateful. I was grateful that it doesn’t matter if I follow my routine. It doesn’t matter if I spend 5 minutes in prayer on and off throughout the day or if I spend an hour in concentrated prayer. It doesn’t matter if I read my Bible here and there or if I spend an hour in it. God sees. He sees me.

He isn’t up there checking some list. He isn’t saying “You are not doing this right.” He is drawing near to his child (all of his kids) inviting, encouraging and responding.

It reminds me of why we celebrate Good Friday. When Jesus died he said “It is finished.” All my striving to earn God’s favor was finished. All the activity I think I have to do to get there (where ever that is), done. Jesus took all that away. He sacrificed his life so I would know that no matter what was happening, I was loved.

I want to live my life in the “It is finished.” I want to remember that while I am called to be in relationship with Jesus, while because I love him I want to live my life for him, nothing I do earns his love or guarantees my place in the Kingdom. That was already done so many Fridays ago.

Living in the “It is finished” is living free. Don’t you want to live in the “It is finished” too? There is a peace in that place. Living in that peace is how we were meant to live.

God Only Knows

For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16 (NLT)

There is a song by King and Country called God Only Knows. The words are

God only knows what you've been through
God only knows what they say about you
God only knows how it's killing you
But there's a kind of love that God only knows

These words keep going round and round in my head. God only knows…..

Lately, I’ve been talking to some folks about hurts they’ve had in their past. Seems like everyone has some - some hurts are way more painful than others but we all seem to carry some pain. I am always saddened by how much we as a human race hurt each other.

God only knows….

And the other thing only God knows is the sadness and pain that comes from loving the human race. The kind of love he offered in Jesus was a love that God only knows. The kind of sacrifice for our well-being was of a caliber that only God would know.

God only knows…..

Another thing God knows is you. He knows you so completely and intimately. He knows that you are worth every bit of it. You were worth every step toward the cross and every moment on it. You were worth it all. That is the kind of love that God only knows.

Unanswered But Answered Prayers

He went on a little farther and bowed with his face to the ground, praying, “My Father! If it is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.” Matthew 26:39 (NLT)

Dink. Dink. Dink. Dink. That was the sound coming from my phone. I was in the ER. Earlier in the evening I went in and my symptoms were getting worse. Somewhere in the chaos I asked my husband to put me on the prayer chain. He did and the Dink, Dink, Dink was the response of the prayer warriors responding.

Shortly after my situation spiraled downward and I became critical. Honestly, I don’t clearly remember all that happened after that but I knew I was being lifted up and God was in the middle of it…..because of prayers. When I woke up the next morning (which is a PRAISE! in itself), I looked at my phone and there were all the text message responses of people answering the call of prayer. As I worked through all that had happened, those prayers gave me strength.

Today, as I pondered Good Friday and Jesus death on the cross, I realized that we could turn to him in prayer because the prayer he prayed in Gethsemane was not answered. God did not take the cup from him and Jesus did not turn back from his mission.

Humanly, he did not want to walk through what he had to walk through but he did. Because he walked through it, we can pray and know we are heard. Because he said “Yes” to the plan, we know that he loves us. We know he cares about us. We know that there is nothing he would not do to help us.

Today, I am especially thankful that because of Jesus’ death on the cross we can pray and know we are heard. I am praising His Name because there is no doubt in our minds that He hears us. None whatsoever. We know this because he prayed that prayer and when it wasn’t answered, He went to the cross anyway. For us.

A Minute In It - Recognizing God

A minute in Gods' word will change your life.  Take a moment to read the passage below and answer the questions at the bottom of the post.

24 Then the soldiers nailed him to the cross. They divided his clothes and threw dice to decide who would get each piece. 25 It was nine o’clock in the morning when they crucified him. 26 A sign announced the charge against him. It read, “The King of the Jews.” 27 Two revolutionaries were crucified with him, one on his right and one on his left. 29 The people passing by shouted abuse, shaking their heads in mockery. “Ha! Look at you now!” they yelled at him. “You said you were going to destroy the Temple and rebuild it in three days. 30 Well then, save yourself and come down from the cross!” 31 The leading priests and teachers of religious law also mocked Jesus. “He saved others,” they scoffed, “but he can’t save himself! 32 Let this Messiah, this King of Israel, come down from the cross so we can see it and believe him!” Even the men who were crucified with Jesus ridiculed him. 33 At noon, darkness fell across the whole land until three o’clock. 34 Then at three o’clock Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” 35 Some of the bystanders misunderstood and thought he was calling for the prophet Elijah. 36 One of them ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, holding it up to him on a reed stick so he could drink. “Wait!” he said. “Let’s see whether Elijah comes to take him down!” 37 Then Jesus uttered another loud cry and breathed his last. 38 And the curtain in the sanctuary of the Temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. 39 When the Roman officer who stood facing him saw how he had died, he exclaimed, “This man truly was the Son of God!” Mark 15:24-39 (NLT)

Over Jesus life and during the crucifixion, how many people witnessed what he did?
In the text above, who was it that recognized him as the Son of God?
Over the years, Jesus helped many people. Why didn’t they see that he was the Son of God?
What was it that made the Roman officer see God at this moment?

A Minute In It - The Reason For The Season

A minute in Gods' word will change your life.  Below is the text from Isaiah 53. Take a minute it read it and remember why we celebrate the Christmas season. Jesus came for a reason.

1 Who has believed our message?
    To whom has the Lord revealed his powerful arm?
2 My servant grew up in the Lord’s presence like a tender green shoot,
    like a root in dry ground.
There was nothing beautiful or majestic about his appearance,
    nothing to attract us to him.
3 He was despised and rejected—
    a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief.
We turned our backs on him and looked the other way.
    He was despised, and we did not care.

4 Yet it was our weaknesses he carried;
    it was our sorrows[a] that weighed him down.
And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God,
    a punishment for his own sins!
5 But he was pierced for our rebellion,
    crushed for our sins.
He was beaten so we could be whole.
    He was whipped so we could be healed.
6 All of us, like sheep, have strayed away.
    We have left God’s paths to follow our own.
Yet the Lord laid on him
    the sins of us all.

7 He was oppressed and treated harshly,
    yet he never said a word.
He was led like a lamb to the slaughter.
    And as a sheep is silent before the shearers,
    he did not open his mouth.
8 Unjustly condemned,
    he was led away.[b]
No one cared that he died without descendants,
    that his life was cut short in midstream.[c]
But he was struck down
    for the rebellion of my people.
9 He had done no wrong
    and had never deceived anyone.
But he was buried like a criminal;
    he was put in a rich man’s grave.

10 But it was the Lord’s good plan to crush him
    and cause him grief.
Yet when his life is made an offering for sin,
    he will have many descendants.
He will enjoy a long life,
    and the Lord’s good plan will prosper in his hands.
11 When he sees all that is accomplished by his anguish,
    he will be satisfied.
And because of his experience,
    my righteous servant will make it possible
for many to be counted righteous,
    for he will bear all their sins.
12 I will give him the honors of a victorious soldier,
    because he exposed himself to death.
He was counted among the rebels.
    He bore the sins of many and interceded for rebels. Isaiah 53 (NLT)

It Was Enough

50 And Jesus said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”

Mary was about to do the unthinkable. She was about to anoint Jesus feet in the middle of a group of men who would call her out and make her look foolish. They would disparage her and humiliate her. As she walked toward the house where Jesus was, why didn’t she stop and turn around. What kept her focused on the task she knew she needed to do? What made her want to thank Jesus for his forgiveness in her life?

She had not yet witnessed the one act that sealed her forgiveness. The act of Jesus death on the cross. She did not see him bowed in Gethsemane pleading with the Father to provide another way. As Jesus bowed there, crying out to God, truly not wanting to walk the path that was before him, pleading – please take this cup, this suffering that I am about to do, from me. Mary didn’t know that what caused Jesus to surrender was her. I imagine as he knelt there that he saw her face. He saw yours and mine. As he knelt there not wanting to walk the path before him, each and every one of us flashed before him.

 Mary also didn’t know what he would go through on the cross. As he hung there and our sins were being piled onto him, she didn’t see or understand the pain. Not just physical pain, which he surely had, but the separation the sin caused between him and his Father. As Jesus hung there, each and every sin was laid on him. Every single sin each one of us and every single person in the world has ever committed. Jesus didn’t look up in the middle of all that and say “Wait, this one sin that Elaine committed, I can’t take that on. And look, that one sin from Peter, Mary or Sarah, no, I won’t die for those.” He died for it all. The big ones and the little ones. But, Mary didn’t know all that yet.

As the people started talking Jesus said “Do you see this woman?” He didn’t mean physically. He meant her heart. Do you see what she has embraced about me? And then he turned to her and said “Your faith has saved you. Go in peace.”

Friends, we are not saved because we do good things.  We are not forgiven because we are sorry for the bad things we’ve done. We are forgiven only because of the utterly complete death on the cross.  That’s it.

 Like Mary, we must embrace that. We must have faith that Jesus’ death on the cross was enough. We must live like we believe that we are completely, 100% forgiven.  If we believe that, we too can live our lives in peace. Let’s not let our past sins cause us to miss out on the life of forgiveness and joy God has for us. Let’s leave our mess at the cross knowing because of Jesus death, we are forever forgiven.

Your Job Description

Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear.  For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. Philippians 2:12-13 (NLT)

When I first see the line “Work hard to show the results of your salvation,” I balk. Your salvation is by grace and grace alone through Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross. So what does this mean?

Let’s start with verse thirteen. “For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.” First and foremost, God is in it. He is active in your life and in your heart. He is prompting you, filling you with the desire to do what he’s calling you to do.

This is where our work comes in. We have to do what he says. The words “work out” here mean “to complete, to accomplish”. The process starts with God’s prompting, moves to us obeying said promptings and is finished with grace because let’s face it, we don’t obey perfectly.

That process, that relationship ends in our salvation.

The Bible is very clear. This whole Christianity thing is about being in a relationship with God. It’s about living life with God working in us and following his leading. If we were going to put together a job description for Christians some of the Job Responsibilities would be:

• Listen to God every day and do what he says

• Read the instruction manual and follow it

• Share what you’ve learned with other people so they can learn too

• Other duties as assigned (my personal favorite)

Do we have work to do as Christians? Absolutely! But let’s not confuse our role in the relationship versus the saving sacrifice of our Lord, Jesus Christ.

It's For Your Own Good

For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16 (NLT)

Last week I had the occasion to sit in a criminal court room. I watched the accused come forward one by one.  Mostly, the cases were continued. Then a woman stepped up. Her lawyer asked for a continuance.  The judge noted that she had not fulfilled the requirements that were set forth in the last hearing. Apparently, she did not pass a drug test that she should have passed. 

He said he was reluctant to grant a continuance but instead wanted to revoke her bond. The lawyer argued. The judge asked if she would be willing to submit to a drug test (urinalysis) today. She said no.

The judge revoked her bond. She looked very distraught as the Sheriffs came in to place the hand-cuffs on her. My heart was racing as I watched this unfold. Then, the judge said something that made me pause. He said "Miss, I am doing this so you don't die."

It dawned on me in that moment that this is what God does with us. He allows us to face our consequences and even sometimes increases them so we will pay attention. He wants us to have eternal life.  

And I imagine, as Jesus was hanging on the cross and God's heart broke that he said "We are doing this so they won't die."