Archive for redemption
The Starting Point
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Sometimes the processes of our lives could be best represented by a circle. We start at a certain point, sure that we have all the answers, cocky, self-assured, ready to conquer the world and move aside all the poor fools who have so much less understanding than we do. However, life with its hard knocks and deep valleys, has a way of enlightening us and leveling the ground of our self-importance. We often find that we weren’t quite as “right” as we first thought. We come full circle and learn to see the wisdom in some of the ones who have gone before us in this journey called life. We experience hurt and pain. We are wounded.
And a most peculiar thing happens for those who open their hearts to learn. We find that our wounds have the potential of becoming a source of healing for others.
I suppose that we have two basic choices when life wounds us – and it always does in one way or another. We can shake our fists at the pain, curse those who brought it, and become angry, resentful, and bitter, demanding payment from the world and life itself for surely we deserve retribution for the wrongs committed against us. Or we can allow God to bring beauty out of our woundedness.
If we are to truly make a difference in this life, it seems to me that the starting place for that is the place of our woundedness. Why would such a thing be true?
Why You Must Go Back
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God’s ways are mysterious, beyond my understanding and often seem downright contradictory. While in my humanity, I prefer to think in straight lines which lend themselves to defining a goal as completed, a task marked off, I find that God’s ways are usually not pictured best by straight lines. They are paths which appear, at times, intertwined, difficult to map out, going forward, then backward, orbiting around a center, and often perplexing my human mind. The longer I walk with God, the more clearly I see that He is truly not confined to my limited understanding. He is working, often His deepest purposes in me, when I am clueless.
This week, I was meditating on two of the seemingly contradictory ways of God. In the next few days, I want to explore these two thoughts:
1. You must go back.
2. You can never go back.
Huh? Sounds confusing? I hope you are intrigued sufficiently to continue reading for both statements are true and I am not being ambivalent. There are times in life when you must absolutely go back. You must go back, as it were, in your mind, your emotions, your relationships, to moments of the past and experience the moments again. There are some very important reasons for us to go back. And in other ways, we must never go back and in fact, cannot do so, but that is for another day this week.
Jesus, the Healer of Broken Hearts
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If we believe that God is purposeful in His actions, then how significant is the fact that the first words of the first message Jesus preached were, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because … He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted…”? (Luke 4:18-19)
Jesus came to heal broken hearts and not only as a side benefit; it’s one of his life purposes! That’s good news because all of us who are in this world have experienced the pain of having our hearts broken in one way or another. If we look at the life of Jesus in the Gospels, we find that he moves throughout his days interacting with humanity and healing broken hearts. That healing takes many expressions. Today I want to look at how Jesus healed the heart of a woman as recorded in John 4 and what that healing means for us now.
Let’s take a look at the story.
Jesus was exhausted from his long trip. He had gone to the city well to get a drink of water. However, what followed was not a chance happening at all because we are told that Jesus “needed” to go through the region of Samaria; he was compelled to do so.
Jews did not have anything to do with Samaritans in those days. Samaritans were considered half-breeds and unclean by Jewish tradition. Yet Jesus, a Jew, chose to go through the middle of Samaria instead of making the usual trip around the area as most Jews did in order to avoid the Samaritans.
When Jesus Offers You More
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This morning I am contemplating the passage in Luke 17 which records the story of ten men who had leprosy being healed by Jesus. I am arrested by the response of the one … “and one of them, when he saw that he was healed, returned, and with a loud voice, glorified God, and fell down on his face at Jesus’ feet, giving Him thanks. And he was a Samaritan.”
And my heart is drawn to this idea… “When he saw that he was healed…”
Sometimes our healing comes just this obviously. We look and we see. We are healed. At other times, our healing is a process; it comes piece by piece, particularly when Jesus is healing our hearts.
Today I am asking myself, and I hope you will ask yourself, how do I respond to God’s healing in my life? Can I see what He is doing in me?
All ten lepers could physically see that they were healed. Yet this one, he saw more. He saw the person of Christ. He saw His redeemer. The others were doing just what Jesus told them. They were going to the priests in order to be declared ceremonially cleansed which would allow them to reconnect with their world and their God. Yet this one…
By His Grace
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I woke up this morning with a song in my heart and a dance in my feet. I love it when a day begins – and ends – that way. I slept great last night. I finished two grad classes yesterday and am sliding in to finish with just one more class which begins today. My husband fixed my computer, which I am quite sure had been possessed by some evil spirit. The sun is shining; the birds are singing with me on this springtime morning. My diet is working and the scales are going down, down, down. My husband and I are experiencing a new honeymoon of sorts after 32 years. My kids are doing well. I am expecting my first grandchild. I have friends who love me. My church is filled with amazing people. I have an appointment with my hair stylist who will effectively hide all my gray today and make my hair look like the sun kissed it. Someone is looking at my house for the second time in a week and I pray they make an offer so we can downsize.
Does life get any better than this? It is so easy to thank God during the good days, but what can we do when the days are not so good?
