Sunday, February 28, 2016
"CHANGE"?
Scripture: Luke 13:1-9
Over the years, I have always enjoyed a good “How many … does it take to change a light bulb” jokes. Here are a few:
How many aerospace engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
None – it’s not rocket science, you know!
How many football players does it take ….?
Two – one to try to screw it in, and the other to recover the fumble!
How many fishermen does it take …?
Four, one to change the light bulb and three to brag about how big the old one was and about the one that they would have changed, if "It hadn’t got away"
How many atheists does it take …?
None – they like the darkness!
How many evolutionists does it take …?
Only one, but it takes him 8 million years to do it!
How many psychiatrists does it take …?
Only one, but the light bulb has to want to change!
And of course, my all-time favorite – How many United Methodists does it take …?
CHANGE?
Change has never been a concept that is on the top of anyone’s list, except to insist that others are deeply in need of change! In Jesus’ time, Israel, too, was stuck in the traditions of a thousand years, and the changes that Jesus was calling for were not part of the life they had always known. Just as today, the people were content in the way they had always done it, and change was simply unnecessary.
Read Luke 13:1-5
For Israel, as well as other nations of that day, illness, disabilities, injuries and other physical and emotional issues were generally thought to be caused by a sinful life style. In the first instance that Luke relates, it had been rumored that Pilate had slaughtered a number of Galileans in the temple, allowing their blood to be mixed with the sacrifices they had brought. There is no historical or scriptural affirmation that this had actually happened, but Pilate was a brutal governor, and there is little doubt that he was predisposed to atrocities such as this.
The question that Jesus is posing, though, is not whether Pilate was capable of killing these men, but rather why would these men be chosen to die? Was it a purely political statement that the Roman governor was making? Or was it because these men were sinners, and God decided to hand them over to the Roman authorities for punishment? Either of these reasons could be a rational answer for the Jews, but was either of them true?
Jesus says that they aren’t, and he uses the situation to create a “teaching moment”. The original question, based in traditional thought, was centered on physical death, which, incidentally, everyone experiences! But Jesus turns it around to mean “spiritual death”, which, he is saying, NOT everyone will be subjected to.
And the key to avoiding the spiritual kind, he says, is repentance. But it’s interesting to note that repentance is also the turning away from sin! The point that he is making is this: the difference between living a worldly life and a life that is centered in him, has nothing to do with our physical death, regardless of the circumstances, but it has everything to do with our receiving eternal life! Jesus’ entire ministry is about our preparing for the coming Judgment that no one will be able to avoid, regardless of how good a life we live.
The question “If I live a sinful life, will I die?” is just as ludicrous as the one that asks “If I live a good life, will I be saved?” Neither is the question that we should be asking, because neither of them has anything directly to do with eternity. The question that humanity should be asking is “Am I living my life in Christ?”
And so, the second situation is raised – that of the deaths that supposedly occurred with the collapse of an unknown tower at the Pool of Siloam. This event also has no historical or Biblical confirmation, but it takes on a different context than the first event did. The first set of deaths were portrayed as an intentional and possibly politically motivated assassination, while the one associated with Siloam appears to have been an unintentional and unanticipated happening. But Jesus’ point is the same – the lives that these people had lived have no bearing whatsoever on the deaths that they experienced. The judgment has not yet come, but it is certainly on the way, and it will be based on the faith that the people had, not on the lives they had once lived.
And Jesus tells a parable to emphasize his point.
Read Luke 13:6-9
There are some passages in the Old Testament that compare our lives to trees. Psalm 1 says that the person who find worth in the Laws of God is like a tree planted beside a stream of water – that we are refreshed and nourished by following the Lord’s will. In Jeremiah 17:5-8, we read that the person who trusts in the Lord is, again, like a tree planted near water – we need the water to live. So let’s consider Jesus’ story in this light.
The gist of the parable is still about the coming Judgment. The world says that the judgment is about what we do now – that the tree should be condemned because it is unfruitful – and we are condemned because we are sinful.
The owner of the tree - God, or more specifically the Law of God - proclaims that the tree - humanity - is worthless, so let’s get rid of this nuisance. He had been waiting for three years for the tree to become productive for him, (which interestingly is the length of Jesus’ ministry), and it has produced nothing of worth. Cut it down! But the gardener, the one who cares for the vineyard – Jesus - asks for even more time – one year more.
He is asking that the Holy Spirit be given time to speak to human lives, to work with them, to beacon them, to “fertilize” their lives, to call them to a life in Christ. And if, at the end of “one year”, which represents the short amount of time that we have on this earth, as well as the short time that exists before the Judgment arrives, then death – then destruction – then condemnation - can occur.
This passage has nothing to do with death, and condemnation, and judgment in the here and now. It is about the call that Jesus is making for us to stop thinking in human ways and to begin thinking in his way. Strict and absolute adherence to the Law of God, and our expectation that this is sufficient to bring joy to our Lord, is so far off base that it completely misses the point of being a disciple of Jesus Christ. Jesus is telling us that we have to change our entire approach to showing our commitment to him, and to begin living a spiritual faith, one that is not based solely on our human understanding and abilities.
This parable is about change, regardless of whether we like change or not. Living a “good” life never has and never will bring pleasure to Almighty God – the only joy that we can bring to him is by trusting in Jesus and responding to his call on our lives. We can no longer trust in our own “good works” – it is time to begin trusting in the “good works” that Jesus has already made for each and every person on earth.
Change? If we are living a dead end life, and want to know true life, then change, complete change, is the only way. The old way leads to darkness, without any hope of light, but the new way of Jesus leads to an eternal light that never will need changing. Praise the Lord – coming to the new way of Jesus is what Lent is all about!
Sunday, February 21, 2016
“The Lord’s Handiwork – Covenant”
Scripture: Genesis 15:1-12; 17-18
Last week, we considered the ways that Satan works in human lives, and specifically, in the attempts he made against the life of Jesus. He never demands, never works great wonders, never solicits followers for his way – he simply attacks God’s ways through doubts, and innuendoes, and half-truths. And quite honestly, I’m surprised that it works! Are we really that gullible?
And since I have asked the question, I suppose that I should answer it for my own life – yes, I apparently am that gullible! I am no less a sinner than anyone else. There was a day when I was completely enthralled by earth’s call on my life, and even since I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior, I still find myself slipping back toward those un-Jesus ways from time to time. I guess it all comes back to Jesus’ words to his napping disciples in the Garden “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.” (Mark 14:37-38)
Now please don’t take this as an excuse that we can use to justify our sin! It isn’t! The point is that we need to focus our lives on the rest of that verse – that we are to be vigilant for Satan’s temptations, and to trust the spirit instead of our fleshly desires.
So is that all that is needed – to just keep watch and pray? Hardly! That would put the entire onus on our own abilities, and as we all know, that has never worked out very well!
Read Genesis 15:1-6
Let’s step back for a moment, and take a look at the events that preceded this marvelous time in Abram’s life.
In Genesis 12, God promises Abram that he will become the father of a great nation, that the Lord Himself will keep him safe, and that all the people of earth will heap honors on his name. And things went well for the man – for a while. He would live in the Lord’s blessings, but soon, he would fail God when he succumbed to the ways of the world. In the first half of this chapter, we read of the Lord’s many blessings for the man Abram, and in the second half, we read of Abram’s weakness in protecting his beautiful wife from the Pharaoh of Egypt.
There was little difference between the Abram of old, and the people of today. We readily accept the Lord’s blessings, but when push comes to shove, how often do we strive to resist Satan’s lies?
As we catch up to Abram in chapter 15, he has aged a few years. He has tried to live the best life that he could, he had tried to bring honor to his God, and now, when the Lord comes to him once again, proclaiming that He will be Abram’s great reward, Abram’s only thought is “Why haven’t you kept your promise of many descendants? I don’t have any legitimate heirs!”
His concerns seem to mimic the rich man in one of Jesus’ parables. He had accumulated so much wealth that he decided to tear down his barns and build bigger ones, but God tells him that they will do him no good, for he is going to die. (Matthew 6:13-21)
That’s Abram’s concern – he has wealth, but no one to pass it on to when he dies. But the Lord’s promise of great blessings wasn’t so much about preservation of his personal wealth, as it was in preservation of his faith.
But instead of chastising the man for his lack of trust, God shows him the heavens and challenges him to count the stars, for that is how many his family will become. Now, we probably could count a good deal of the stars that we see in the sky, but how many don’t we see? We can see only a small percentage of the ones that are visible from earth, and even less of those that exist in in our own galaxy. How many other stars, in how many other galaxies, are out there that we don’t know about, let alone can’t see?
And who is God claiming will be Abram’s “family”? Galatians 3:6-9 tells us that all who believe in Christ are his descendants, too! That’s a lot of stars! No wonder Abram couldn’t count them all.
But Abram would believe, and his faith was received in righteousness. In essence, we are being told that his faith was sufficient, and God was pleased. The relationship is firm. But this is a human being – how long will his faith stay strong?
Read Genesis 15:7-12
The first question we considered today is a matter of understanding “God’s giving nature”. But now the question is different – it is centered on Abram and “how he knows”. So maybe this is a question for each of us, too. How do we know that any of God’s promises can be taken for certain?
Scripture is full of promises, isn’t it! How do we know that they are all true?
“For God so loved the world …”(John 3:16-17); How do we know that God loves us – where is the proof?
“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith …” (Ephesians 2:8) How do we know that faith is enough? That simply believing in Jesus is enough?
“That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow …” (Philippians 2:6-11) Every knee? Every tongue? Not even one that won’t?
How do we know? Throughout the Gospels and into the Epistles, we are told over and over again that it all comes down to a matter of faith, not one of proof. In John 11:25-26, Jesus is with Lazarus’ sisters, and they acknowledge that even though resurrection is a possibility, they also know that if Jesus had been there, their brother wouldn’t have died in the first place. But Jesus tells them “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies, and who ever lives and believes in me will never die.”
Whether it is life in the here and now, or life in the hereafter, it all hinges on our faith in Christ. It has nothing to do with having an understanding of God and his ways! It’s about trusting in the Lord’s word – that it is good enough for us.
But trust doesn’t have a chance without the basis of a sound relationship to begin with. The New Testament is filled with examples of people who had a solid relationship with the Lord, and from that had complete trust in his call on them. The evidence that comes from that trust and calling is the proof. The proof comes later.
But in Abram’s case, the Lord actually will seal his promise with a covenantal sign – His proof. The man is asked to help prepare the rite with a blood sacrifice of 3 animals and 2 birds. By God’s grace, and Abram’s faith, the divine work is about to prove the validity of the Lord’s promise of a great nation.
In those days, when a covenant was established, whether it was between two people or between two nations, a similar ritual would be performed. A blood sacrifice would be made, and each party to the agreement would then walk through the blood, indicating that if, at any time, either of them were to break the covenant, they would pay for the failure with their own blood. There were no loopholes, there were no ifs, ands or buts – it was simply “I will do this, and you will do that.” And if either one didn’t ,.. well, you get the picture.
This is the setting that Abram finds himself in. He knows how a covenant is sealed, he knows how weak his faith has been at times, and he must have been more than a little concerned over this most recent move by God. Would he ever survive the covenant?
Read Genesis 15:17-18
The covenant was made, but it was sealed only by the Lord. Abram never had to take a single step in the blood of the covenant. His part of the bargain was to believe. Remember John 11? “Whoever believes in me will never die!” But God’s covenant with Abram didn’t end the affliction that sin has on our relationship with him. The covenant has been broken countless times – as many as the stars throughout the universe, and probably even more.
As we continue our journey through Lent, coming ever closer to the Cross of Calvary, each of us needs to remember who it was who had to be the Blood sacrifice for the relational break that each of us has created. It was humanity’s sin that caused the break, but it was only God who could repair it. But God can never die - only Man could do that, so it must be One who is fully Man to take the death, and who is fully God to restore the covenant of life.
Satan’s only desire is to break the covenant, and Jesus’ only desire is that all will have faith in his ability to repair the damage. John 14:1 – “Do not let your hearts be troubled - you believe in God; believe also in me.”
By faith in Jesus Christ and the power of his sacrifice, all of the mischief that Satan has ever worked in our lives, and ever will work, has been shattered. COMPLETELY! PERMANENTLY! All by Christ’s work in and through our faith. Praise the Lord!
Sunday, February 14, 2016
"Satan's Handiwork - Temptation"
Scripture: Luke 4:1-13
Today begins Lent – a time to begin refocusing our lives on the truths of faith. A couple of weeks ago, I attended our District Workshops, and one in particular caught my attention. Our District Lay Leader presented a session on “Trans-formational Leadership”. In the presentation, he offered a video from YouTube, entitled “Know Your Why”. The point of the video is that all too often, we focus our lives on “what” or “how” we live our lives – the things we do, and the way we do them. The truth of it, though, is that our first consideration must always be the “why”.
When we know our “why” for living, and let that drive our “what’s” and “how’s”, we begin to have purpose.
When we finally understand the “why” for all that we do, that is when we begin to live a live that honors Jesus.
He knew his “why”, and that guided him in every encounter that he had with the people during his 33 years among us.
Read Luke 4:1-2
Jesus had just been baptized by John (Luke 3:21-22), and his Messiahship had now been established. This should have been enough for all of Israel, but it didn’t even come close for most. Israel was focused more on the “what” and “who” and “how” of Messiah, and completely missed out on the “why”. Jesus had come to redeem Israel from the penalty of their sin, namely death, and this would determine the “how” and “what” of his ministry. But instead of beginning the salvation part immediately, he promptly journeyed out to the wilderness to fast and to submit to Satan’s temptations.
Israel expected Messiah to be mighty – he was to be a warrior king who would destroy the enemies who had oppressed them for so long. But he wasn’t that kind of king.
They expected that he would be of the royal family. He was, but not, primarily, of the one they had in mind.
They expected that he would be focused and intent on his one and only purpose – that of their rescue. This he was, but, again, not in the way that they hoped for.
Jesus was mighty in Spirit; he was focused in purpose; he was dedicated to Israel and their eternal welfare in a way that no one before him had ever been. So why would the Lord need to fast, and even more importantly, why would he even allow Satan to place all those temptations in his way? Jesus was establishing his identity with Israel, and actually, with all of humanity. He was about to undergo all that humanity is subjected to, and even more. After all, Jesus was human, too!
Satan, once the most beautiful of all God’s angels, is the one and only challenge to the reign of God throughout creation. (Luke 8:12-14) Satan’s deceit is our greatest downfall, and he succeeds all the time – there is none of us who can stand against his attacks consistently. But Jesus would never fail, and he offers us the very means to defeat the power of Satan in our lives – and that is by trust in the word of God.
Read Luke 4:3-4
“IF” you are the Son of God … the challenge is against the “why” that brought Jesus to earth. Satan wanted Jesus to begin caring for his own earthly needs, and if God’s creation doesn’t satisfy some particular momentary need, then why not just change it!! The temptation was to put his own needs first, and to relegate the Father’s plan to a distant second.
And Jesus counters Satan’s attempt to make him stumble with the thought that there are far more important things in this life than food. He quotes a portion of Deuteronomy 8:1-3, in which God proclaims to Israel that if they will but submit to his word and his way, that he will provide for more needs than they could ever imagine.
Jesus 1, Satan 0! So Satan moves on to his next challenge of Jesus’ “why”.
Read Luke 4:5-8
Satan offers Jesus the opportunity for power immediately, if he will only compromise his relationship with the Father. God’s plan is that one day, Jesus will, indeed, have authority over all of creation, but Satan offers to give it to him right now, IF only ….!
Jesus already had authority – he taught with authority (Matthew 7:28-29), he had authority over Satan’s demons (Mark 5:1-13), and he had the authority to forgive sin (Luke 5:17-26). If he had accepted Satan’s offer, he would not only have lost all of this, he would have lost his relationship with the Father, and his “why” would have been rendered meaningless.
And in addition, Satan is actually claiming an authority that he doesn’t possess – he can, if you will pardon the expression, “raise all kinds of hell” here on earth, but he has no authority to give any power to anyone. He can only raise doubts, he can only offer unholy alternatives,
- he can only make promises he can never keep, and, in general, his intent is to lead the people of God away from their promised glory!
Grant authority? Hardly!
And Jesus responds with Deuteronomy 6:4-13 – that the only One who is worthy of our allegiance and worship is the Almighty. There is only one authority, one power, one hope, one truth, one Light, and there is absolutely nothing like God’s gifts in all of the darkness that Satan wishes to envelop us in.
Jesus 2, Satan 0 - but even though he has lost another round, the “darkness” isn’t about to give up just yet.
Read Luke 4:9-12
Jesus has been effectively responding to Satan’s temptations with scripture, so the Tempter decides to use scripture against the Lord. He quotes verses 11 & 12 from Psalm 91, but he conveniently leaves out the verses that won’t fit his purpose! He omits the previous 2 (9-10) – “If you make the Most High your dwelling – even the Lord, who is my refuge – then no harm will befall you, no disaster will come near your tent.” Did you catch that? IF you remain in the Lord … that is the key phrase in this passage, and Satan seems to have missed it!
This is the tactic that the world employs – to take the word of God out of context, and they do this time and time again. Some years ago, a Christian brother of mine confessed that over the years, he had, figuratively, torn out many pages of his Bible because he didn’t believe them. But over time, he told me, he had replaced “most” of them, and was working on getting the rest restored. I believe that by now he has, indeed, put every single one back in its proper place. But I know, and suspect that you do, too, many others who haven’t even begun to put anything back!
Satan uses scripture, or at least a portion of it, to tempt Jesus, but Jesus uses another passage to counter the lie. Deuteronomy 6:16-19 calls us to never test the Lord, but to simply trust him, and keep the commandments and rulings that he hands us! When I was growing up, there were a number of times that my parents would tell me to either do something that I didn’t want to, or wouldn’t allow me to do something that I did. I know that my being a “rebellious child” may surprise most of you (!!!), and when I protested with “But WHY?”, I was almost always told “Because I said so!”. And as I look back on those formative years, I realize that my Mom and Dad never made any decision to harm me – as a matter of fact, their decisions were all intended to protect me, or grow me, or to make me a better person.
And that is how we are to see the Lord’s laws for our lives.
Jesus 3, Satan 0. He’s out!
Read Luke 4:13
Satan challenges the Lord Jesus in the same ways that he attacks us. First, he wants us to put ourselves first, to consider our own desires ahead of the way of the Lord. Second, he wants us to buy into his false promise of personal authority, that we might make all of our own decisions, to make our own way in this life, and even beyond. And third, he wants us to doubt that God has our best at heart when he offers up his word and his law, and that we can read scripture in any way that will justify our own self-centered beliefs.
So he gives up his attacks on Jesus for the time being. But he would be back at a time when he thinks that Jesus has become more vulnerable.
But Satan’s work against our lives will never end. He wants us to doubt the “whys” of Jesus, and once we succumb to that, the Lord’s “what’s” and “how’s” will easily fall away. During this Lenten season, set the temptations of Satan – his lies, his doubts, his deceits – put them all aside, and let the way of the Lord prevail. Why? Because that is when his best can become our best.
Praise the Lord!
Sunday, February 7, 2016
“Let the Glory of the Lord Shine!”
Scripture: Exodus 34:29-35
Moses had been called to go up the mountain to receive the Law of God for the people of Israel. We normally identify the law with the Ten Commandments, found in Exodus 20:1-17. But the entire word that was given to Moses covers 11 chapters - from 20 to 31! And, of course, we also remember Moses’ anger when he returned from the divine meeting, only to discover that the people had turned away from the Lord once more.
The golden calf had stolen the prominent place in Israel’s life, and their Jehovah God had been pushed aside. Moses, in his “burning anger” (Exodus 32:15-20), breaks the stone tablets into pieces, and then burns the calf and tramples it into dust. But the people are still in desperate need of the written law, so Moses makes the trek back up the mountain, where God writes the commandments again, and reminds him of the spoken commandments again. And Moses returns to the valley - again.
What might this God appointed leader have thought as he made his way back down toward the people? Was he concerned as to what he might find them doing this time? Was he ready to write them off – to call on the Lord to destroy these “stiff-necked” people once and for all? Or was he truly confident that the Lord had been guiding and re-shaping them while he was away?
As it happened, the fear of God was still with them, and he found them pretty much the way he had left them. The difference was in the way they would see Moses – he was in a completely new Light.
Read Exodus 34:29-32
What was this strange radiance that bathed Moses’ face? It was nothing less than the glory of God. We translate the Hebrew word for this radiance as “shekinah”, which means to rest, or settle, or to inhabit. Shekinah Glory is the glory of God that settled on Moses in such a visual way that day. It wasn’t a glow similar to the light that we know – it would have been dazzling, it was brilliant beyond words, it would have been a pure and unmistakable demonstration of God’s Presence.
Before this event had ever occurred, God had been glorified in the acts he made on behalf of Israel. He was glorified in a unique and obvious way in the parting of the Red Sea. He was glorified when he destroyed the Egyptian army with the release of the water. (Exodus 14:19-31) His glory had been at work high upon Mount Sinai that day, even though the people didn’t realize it or understand it at the time. But with this new vision of their leader, there was no way that they could ignore the visual change that had occurred.
The Light of God had filled him. The Divine glory had taken up a Presence in his very being. There could no longer be any question that God was living and working - in and through, within and beyond - this servant of the Most High God. Glory was no longer something to imagine – it was now a physical, visual, obviously present entity. Clouds can be an everyday occurrence. Swirling pillars of fire, while not especially common, can be seen in brush and forest fires. (Exodus 13:17-22) But this radiant face was something new – never before seen – never before explained or even proclaimed. God’s presence was now a certainty for Israel, and they were scared stiff!
Even Aaron and the elders were afraid to come near Moses while this “Shekinah” was on him. And why not? You simply didn’t approach God, for if you did, and God forbid that you should even touch the vessel he was residing in, death would be instantaneous. But Moses reassured them, and called them to come closer, and when the people saw that the elders weren’t destroyed, they, too, ventured closer to this incredible phenomenon. Moses had become the recognizable conduit of God’s presence.
And as Moses spoke the commandments that Adonai had given for the people, they would know for certain that this was the Lord’s truth for their lives.
Read Exodus 34: 33-35
While God’s visual presence can certainly be experienced as a blessing, it is more likely to be seen as a threat or judgment! And Israel was seeing it as the later. They knew that they were sinful, that they were unworthy to be in the Lord’s presence, and they were terrified. But as Moses spoke the Lord’s commands for the people’s lives, the glory stood before them, and it continued to do so until the word was complete. It was only then that the Radiance was covered and put out of sight.
The “veil” remained in place as long as Moses was among the people, but when he went into the Tent of Meeting, the covering was removed, and God would, once more, reveal his desires for his people. And as this servant of God relayed the holy words to Israel, the glory was allowed to be obvious again as a reminder as to Who was actually handing the commands down. And it wasn’t Moses!
His appearance had been transformed by the glory of Almighty God. It didn’t change his ministry and servanthood – it didn’t change his ability to converse with God or to carry out his will. His relationship with God was still just as important and vital as it always had been. It was only that the certainty of that relationship was now present for all who looked upon that glory.
Today is Transfiguration Sunday (Matthew 17:1-13; etal) – the day we celebrate the visual change that came over Jesus while he was up on that mountain. He, too, would shine with a transcendent glory, and it wasn’t just his face, but his entire presence that would become radiant. It would be a heavenly radiance, even though it was revealed to only three others, evidence that he truly was the Son of the Most High God.
Transfiguration is more than just a physical change. Another word might be “metamorphosis”. It wasn’t just an outward transformation – it was a complete change of his entire being. And as if that new presence wasn’t enough, he was joined by Moses and Elijah. Moses, the receiver of God’s Law, had also been bathed in glory. Elijah, the greatest of all the Hebrew prophets, had been taken directly into heaven, without the intervention of death (2 Kings 2:9-12). These two men had known the presence of God’s glory in their lives, and now they were being related and joined together with the Author and Source of Salvation. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus Himself proclaimed that he had not come to overturn either the law or the words of the prophets – that he had come to fulfill them both. (Matthew 5:17-20)
The visual proof and affirmation of God’s Presence had now settled on all three – the Law, the Prophecies, and the Salvation had become one. The Lord of Heaven and earth was now proclaiming for all to see and hear, that His will was now completely in force, and that it was to be enacted through obedience to his Son.
But the Law and the Prophets depart, leaving Jesus alone with his three closest friends. By this, we do not presume that the Law and the Prophecies are no longer needed. The only lesson for us here is that Jesus Christ the Savior is the only one of the three that is eternal life for us today. The others are confirmed through him, but he is our only hope for eternity.
Be transformed by the promise of glory by faith in Jesus Christ. The Father Himself has told us that Jesus is His Son – that he is loved and honored, and that we are to obey his every word. May those who have ears, hear, and may those who have faith SHINE!
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)