“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” Mark 12:29-31
The Jewish leaders struggled over 613 individual moral statutes or commands by which they were to live and conduct themselves. Sometimes they debated among themselves as to which of these moral statutes were vital and which of them were less vital. They didn’t want to make the mistake of placing some statues above more important one and vice-versa. Yet this struggle brought itself right before Jesus. One of the teachers ventured to ask Him this question, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” (Mark 12:28).
Jesus laid it all out for those who would hear Him; “The most important one,” Jesus answered, “is this: Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength,’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31)
Now, dear fellow Christ-follower, it is either time for us to put up or shut up. I don’t mean to be crass here or offend you, but I cannot stress how vital it is for us to love the Lord with every fiber of our being. Jesus placed this as the #1 priority in the lives of those asking and still today it ought to be #1 in our lives as well.
Let me illustrate:
Our homes are powered by electricity (well most of them are anyway). If we were to bring in a brand new television to watch we first must take it out of the box and connect it to a power source. Without the power source all of our favorite shows and possibilities are impossible. We need to plug that television into the power in order for anything to happen, without it nothing works and nothing ever will.
Without first loving God with our EVERYTHING nothing else will work. Without first loving God with ALL of our heart, soul, mind and strength we are powerless. It is either all or nothing. God doesn’t want a partial kind of love. He isn’t some on again off again God, either get on board with Him and love Him completely or don’t at all.
Secondly, don’t try and fake out God…He’s not buying the act. Others might see how good we look dressed up for Church and how we act in front of other Christians but if this isn’t consisted behind the scenes God knows. This is a tough pill to swallow. I’m not here to say that I have this all figured out either, because I too struggle at times with a divided heart. Not intentionally mind you, but at times I catch myself and find that I have to once again realign my relationship and priorities with God.
How is your heart today? Do you find that at times you have a divided heart when it comes to your relationship with the Lord? Perhaps it’s time for a heart realignment so that you can once again get plugged back into the true sources of power and life.
You have all probably seen this project already on Pintrest, and I’m in no way claiming that it’s mine…because it’s not, but I would like to incorporate a teachable lesson to accompany it. Please find the elements of this project accompanied by scripture passages below free for you to use if you so choose to do so. This teachable craft can be used for youth programs, women’s ministries, senior adult ministry or even at home with your family.
Elements & Scripture Discussion:
1. The Potting Saucer –
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth – Genesis 1:1
the saucer for this Easter craft represents (at least to me) the world in which we live. God created it and we live in a location and placed that was formed by His hands. We are blessed to live in such a world and should take care of this world as best we can. Genesis 2:5 – “The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.” God still wants us to take care of this world that He has entrusted us with.
2. The Potting Soil –
The potting soil represents you, me and all of creation.
“Then the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.” Genesis 2:7
God created this world for us and He desires to have fellowship with us. He longs for us to love Him in return and so in this Easter story we recognize that we too play a part in the crucifixion and the resurrection. Jesus came to die for us because we really and truly matter to Him. He created us and this Easter story is about our salvation through Christ Jesus.
3. The Gardening Rocks
“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…” -Romans 3:23
“Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned” -Romans 5:12
The gardening rocks represent sin in this world. It weighs us down and keeps us bound in our slavery to it. We cannot save ourselves from its weight, nor can we do enough good works to receive eternal life. We need help. We are all fallen, each one of us and because of this Jesus came to set us free and to remove the weight of sin from our lives.
4. The Three Crosses
With younger children you might want to tie these for the kids before hand.
“And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death–even death on a cross!” -Philippians 2:8
The Cross of Jesus is suffering and death. But it was suffering and death for a purpose. Jesus died so that the sins of every person on earth could be forgiven and also that we could be restored in our fellowship with God. Without the cross and Jesus’ suffering we are still hopelessly lost. We must look to the cross and Christ on the cross for our source of salvation.
The bindings of the cross pieces represent (to me) the lashings that Jesus received prior to his crucifixion. It should also represent for us the truth that we (sinful man) put Him there. We bound Him to that cross, but He willingly went in place of us.
A.W. Tozer: “The old cross is a symbol of death. God salvages the individual by liquidating him and then raising him again in newness of life. God offers life, but not an improved old life. The life He offers is life out of death. It always stands at the far side of the cross.“
5. The Tomb and the Large Rock
“…an empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives!” -Bill Gaither“They found the stone rolled away from the tomb” Luke 24:2
Both the tomb and the large stone (it could be white to represent life or another color) represent Christ’s resurrection. I’m sure it’s obvious to us all, but it also represents the fact that sin & death could not hold the Son of God! We can find peace, assurance and hope in this empty tomb!
“At the place where Jesus was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb, in which no one had ever been laid.” John 19:41
“Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. 2 So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!” “3 So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. 4 Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5 He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. 6 Then Simon Peter came along behind him and went straight into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, 7 as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus’ head. The cloth was still lying in its place, separate from the linen. 8 Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. 9 (They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.) 10 Then the disciples went back to where they were staying.” John 20:1-10
“Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live,” John 11:25
“For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.” 1 Thessalonians 4:14
6) The Grass seed or sprouts (Plant the grass seed before you place the rocks)
“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” -John 10:10
The grass seed will grow during the Easter season which will serve to remind us of the eternal life/ new life that Christ brings to us.
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” 2 Corinthians 5:17
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16
“And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.” John 14:3
Each of these verses talks about the new life that only Jesus Christ offers to us. New life is a free gift to us all if we accept it and believe in Christ and His love for us.
As we watch this “new life” grow during the season of Easter, may it continue to serve as a remind of God’s love for us and of our deep desire to grow in our faith. We shouldn’t stop learning about this relationship. We have also been given the help of the Holy Spirit to guide us and instruct us in this new life! “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” John 14:26 The Holy Spirit will show us areas of our lives that we need to still surrender to God and He will continue to work within us, helping us along the way.
This new life isn’t only about getting into heaven, it is also about living that eternal life right here on earth so that others might see Christ through us. When we embrace this new life, we become Christ’s representatives (Light) into the world (which is still lost in darkness). Be God’s light to others as you bloom and grow!
***Disclaimer: Again I didn’t invent this craft, I simply adapted it and provided a simple yet effective method for teaching this amazing story of love that God has for all of us! I am sure you can tweak this and make it your own in order to fit the demographic you wish to do this teaching craft with. This lesson play is free to use as you see fit! To God be the Glory!****
Perhaps, even “relentless” isn’t a good enough description of how God loves us. Yet, perhaps it adequately speaks to the nature of God who never quits on His creation. Do you remember the story of the prodigal son? In that parable of Jesus what does the Father do? Despite the son asking for his inheritance and wishing his father to be dead, the father lets him go. One of the hardest things to do as a parent is to let a child go and have them make their own choices even if those choices are harmful. Tough love has the capacity to hurt your heart while you relentlessly pursuit reconciliation and renewal of that lost loved one.
The father waited for his son to come to his senses. The story is more than just about this lost or prodigal son. This story is about the relentless kind of love that is embodied in the father. He waits, and even while his son is still a long way off, the father goes and runs to him. (Luke 15:20) It was unbecoming of an adult in the culture of Jesus to run anywhere, and this father runs to his undeserving and wayward son.
Isn’t that what God the Father has done for us through His Son Jesus Christ? He relentless love took Jesus to the cross for us. His relentless love brought about a way for us, the undeserving and wayward sinner, to experience right relationship with Him once again.
For the love of God – Our Response
What is our response to this relentless love? Can we recognize how undeserving we are and how amazing it is to have a God who pursues us like this? Secondly, if we accept this relentless love through Jesus Christ alone, the next step in the reciprocation of that love is our desire to become like Christ. By this I mean we ought to recognize that Jesus embodied for us in His living and dying what Holiness in human form looks like. Thus we are to place our feeble feet in the very footprints of Christ for the salvation of humanity! Our response to His love will take us to places we would never have wanted to go. (John 21:18) Perhaps it won’t take us to suffering and death like the Apostle Peter, but His love will propel us to do outrageous things for the cause of Christ!
Christ’s relentless love will prompt us to take up our crosses too and follow him! (Matthew 16:24) If we truly accept His salvation and grace in our lives, we will not be able to just keep it hidden inside of us, we will want to share that ceaseless love to those who are still lost in the darkness of lovelessness.
For the love of God…be bold in your relentless pursuit of others!
For the love of God…be genuine in your passion to serve Him humbly!
For the love of God…wrap your arms around the unlovable and show them love like they have never seen before!
For the love of God…be Holy as He (Jesus Christ) is Holy!
“The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases His mercies never come to an end, They are new every morning New every morning Great is Your faithfulness, O Lord Great is Your faithfulness”
-May all the Glory be to God and that of His Relentless love of You and Me!
“I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” Psalm 139:14
Recently a new television series on science and the universe began on the FOX television channel. It is called “The Cosmos” updated and adapted from the the original series by Carl Sagan.
It’s host is American astrophysicist, author and science communicator Neil deGrasse
Tyson http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_deGrasse_Tyson
Some fundamental Christians might be offended by this television series due to the absence of the Creator and in some cases how the church in the middle ages is portrayed. I honestly am not offended by either of these, in fact I find myself fascinated by the universe and how far science and our human exploration has come since the original series was aired in 1980.
You see for me science and our Creator go hand in hand. When I watch this series and other series’ about the universe I can’t help but marvel at the vastness of God’s creation.
Sometimes the Christian view is too small…
Tunnel Vision:
It is my belief that sometimes we of faith in God limit our understanding of a limitless Creator. We can become so fixated on the details of creation and how it was made and how long it took to make it. Granted I recognize too that science and those who solely rely on its tangible data can also have tunnel vision when theories of space and the ever expanding universe are completely quantified and accepted as concrete truths. By this I mean to say that when something becomes accepted as truth it is very hard to change that acceptance if more evidence comes along to shake that truth apart. For instance at one point people believed that the Sun revolved around the earth but we know now that the Earth actually revolves around the Sun.
What I am trying to say is that this Universe is amazing and wondrous and we who have faith in God shouldn’t be afraid to explore it and study it because I believe it points right back to Him! Recently I wrote that we cannot put God in a box and completely quantify his majestic nature, and when it comes to the Universe we can only begin to catch a glimpse of how deep and how wide God’s love is for us (Ephesians 3:18) along side His truly mind-boggling creation of the Universe around us.
“Don’t lose the forest for the trees…”
Recently I have been teaching a bible study in our church (Corps) on the book of Revelation. In this study I have stressed over and over again to our little class not to get so caught up in the interpretation and meaning of the symbolism of John’s vision and even various theories of the apocalypse for that matter. In other words don’t lose the forest for the tree, don’t get so bogged down in the details that you lose sight of the bigger (much bigger) picture! In the very same sense, the series of the Cosmos on FOX and other studies of our Universe should be looked at in this way as well. How amazing is our God and that of His vast creation around us. How small we are in His Universe, and though we may not comprehend it all, we should begin to see how much He loves us and how precious we are to Him.
“…your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” Psalm 139:14
“Come all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money,, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost….Seek the Lord while he may be found; call on him while he is near.” Isaiah 55:1,2,6
God, through his prophet Isaiah offers nourishment and life to those who seek Him. The Hebrew people would understand this concept and remember how God had provided manna from heaven to their ancestors while wandering in the wilderness after leaving Egypt. They would also recall how God led them into the promised land and brought them victory at Jericho.
God provides all that we require to live this life here on earth as His servant. All that we have to do is seek Him daily and have faith in His unlimited provision. But His provision doesn’t just stop with His children, He longs so desperately to extend His grace and blessings upon the rest of the world as well. After all, Jesus came for the whosoever (John 3:16) and if anyone would seek Him they will find the storehouses of God are never ending.
“But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” Matthew 6:33.
Are you thirsty today? Are you hungry for more in this life? Is there something lacking in your life and you can’t seem to find out what IT is? God still calls the righteous and the whosoever to come to Him. The very first two words of Isaiah 55:1 says; “Come ALL”. It doesn’t say “Come some of you”, or “Come you VIP’s”…it says “Come ALL”!
Allow God to replenish your storehouses today. Allow Him to renew you. If you’re seeking Him for the first time why don’t you pray this prayer with me:
PRAYER
How to Pray: Dear Lord Jesus, I know that I am a sinner, and I ask for Your forgiveness. I believe You died for my sins and rose from the dead. I turn from my sins and invite You to come into my heart and life. I want to trust and follow You as my Lord and Savior. In Your Name. Amen.
For additional information on what you just prayed check out this link:
When our first son was just an infant he slept in a crib which was right next to our bed. Each night we had a routine that we had to go through in order to get him to sleep. Perhaps it was because we were first time parents or perhaps he was just a needy baby. But each night, after he was dress in pajamas and had his blanket he would stick his hand out from between the crib railings and demand he hold either my hand or his Mom’s. Try as we might we could not break this cycle with him. He needed to have physical contact with us in order to fall asleep. He needed to have this assurance that we were there watching over him and that he was save and sound.
Sometimes I think back on those moments and wonder humorously why we didn’t buy a fake hand for him to hold on to or why we didn’t just break him of that dependence all together. But as I consider those precious moments that we had with our first born I realize how important those moments of contact were for him as he was growing as an infant. He needed to feel our touch, to know we were there and to be reassured that we were not going anywhere.
God still does this for you and for me as well! We constantly question if He’s there. We sometimes cry out to Him just to check if He is listening. We hold out our hand, sometimes in a demanding nature and hope that God’s touch will reach us. We hope that He’s really there and willing to remain near us.
The truth is God desires so desperately to hold our hand and to remain right beside us. He loves us so much that He longs for us to trust Him and to reach out to Him through every season of this life. Are you willing to reach out your hand to Him today? He is here, right now and He is not going anywhere. Trust Him. Lean on Him. Allow His love to fill your life with His joy, grace and peace.
There are so many inspiring stories about the athletes who train for and compete in the Olympics. Both the Summer and the Winter Olympics are grueling and highly competitive. Yet the back stories on the people who make it to this world stage are both inspiring and amazing.
For example in 1988 a Jamaican Bobsled team competed in the winter Olympics. The last time I checked Jamaica does not get snow…nor does it reach temperatures cold enough to have enough ice for Bob Sled training. Yet, a team showed up at the 1988 Winter Olympics to compete. They didn’t even own Bob sleds and had to borrow them from other competing teams in order to participate in the event. They competed for pride and for the pure sportsmanship of the games. Their inspiring story even ended up being made into a movie in 1993 and was again an inspiration to many who saw it.
When we think of the Olympics the imagery of winning gold medals come to mind, and the glory involved for the country who dominates a certain sport. But for any country who even competes in these events there is national pride and honor involved. Above and beyond the glory of winning an event, there is the joy of even being there to excel in excellence.
Another inspiring story comes to mind when I think of the Olympics, it is the story of Canadian Lawrence Lemieux. He was a Summer Olympian in Sailing. During the 1988 Summer Olympic games in Seoul South Korea as he was in the heat of his sailing event he saw a Singaporean boat capsize injuring the two sailors on board. He quickly altered course of his boat and immediately went to their rescue. In that moment Lawrence Lemieux didn’t have gold medals in his eyes, he had concern for others. Because of his bravery and concern those two lives were saved. Later, after finally completing the race (which he placed 22nd because of altering course to save lives) he was awarded second place in that heat. He didn’t go on to win the event (he ultimately placed 11th) but despite not winning gold, he won the hearts of many around the world for his heroic act of bravery. At the podium for the awards ceremony in the Sailing category, though Lemieux didn’t win gold he was awarded the Pierre de Coubertin medal by the president of the International Olympic Committee.
The idea behind our current Olympics embodies comradery, endurance, hard work, sportsmanship, team work and so many more adjectives.
I cringe when some individuals on this stage display poor sportsmanship and throw fits because they didn’t win an event. I think those athletes miss the point. Yes everyone is to compete to the best of their abilities but the Olympics is not only about winning. It is about striving for excellence and coming together peacefully as nations from around the world under one cause.
If only we didn’t have to wait every four years to come together.
If only we didn’t have to leave the arena or the Olympic village where regardless of ethnicity or difference by and large the athletes live for two weeks in harmony. If only…
To quote John Lennon, “You might say I’m a dreamer, but you know I’m not the only one.”
For just a second I wish our nations, all nations could put aside differences and wars and blood shed to see the bigger picture. For just a second I wish we as human beings would wake up and see what hatred and violence truly does and the long term effects of these divides. For just a second I wish we heard more stories of heroism and love displayed not just at the Olympics but in every corner of the world.
We have to tear down these walls that divide us if we’re going to survive each other. Jesus once said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven...” (Matt 5:43-45)
I know injustice exists in this world. I know that we don’t live in a Mary Poppins world where everything is easily solved with “just a spoon full of sugar”, but I believe despite of how others treat us, we (who are are Christ-followers) ought to rise above it and love despite its lack of reciprocation.
The Olympics give me hope and reminds me that one day the King of Heaven will make all things new and restore creation to its intended state…in the mean time I don’t have to wait for that to happen, I can live as a child of the Father in Heaven now. I can rise above the hate and display what love, Godly love looks like.
Pastor's Ponderings 