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Tag: John

  • Death’s Melancholy: Resurrection’s Rapture

    Death’s Melancholy: Resurrection’s Rapture

    “Then beginning with the scriptures of Moses and from all the prophets he uncovered the things concerning himself.” – the good news of Luke 24:27

    Scripture taught along a road from Jerusalem

    One of the the most remarkable verses in scripture comes to us from witnesses on a road to Emmaus from Jerusalem. Though less notable than much scripture, two followers of the crucified Christ learn scripture from him. We quickly learn the personal witness of Cleopas and one other follower who encounter the risen Lord in person! Jesus, as we might expect, picks up in teaching scripture just as the Lord had done for three years.

    Describing the Scene

    Matthew Henry [1662-1714], scriptural commentator from Wales U.K., describes the scene with much compassion for those who had just endured the traumatic events in Jerusalem.

    Our Lord Jesus went gloriously down to death, in spite of the malice of his enemies, who did all they could to make his death ignominious; but he rose again more gloriously, of which we have an account in this chapter; and the proofs and evidences of Christ’s resurrection are more fully related by this evangelist than they were by Matthew and Mark.

    One of these two disciples was Cleopas or Alpheus, said by the ancients to be the brother of Joseph, Christ’s supposed father; who the other was is not certain..

    They went to a village called Emmaus, which is reckoned to be about two hours’ walk from Jerusalem; it is here said to be about sixty furlongs, seven measured miles..

    Henry describes these two former followers of Jesus of Nazareth:

    They were sad; it appeared to a stranger that they were so. They had lost their dear Master, and were, in their own apprehensions, quite disappointed in their expectations from him. They had given up the cause, and knew not what course to take to retrieve it.

    Isn’t this how death of one we love and admire generally comes upon us?  Listen more to Henry’s account:

    Note, Christ’s disciples are often sad and sorrowful even when they have reason to rejoice, but through the weakness of their faith they cannot take the comfort that is offered to them. Being sad, they had communications one with another concerning Christ…

    Weep with them who weep

    Henry continues: Giving vent to the grief may perhaps give ease to the grieved; and by talking it over we may talk ourselves or our friends may talk us into a better frame.

    “Joint mourners should be mutual comforters; comforts sometimes come best from such.”
    Matthew Henry on the mourning of the Disciples after Jesus’ death.

    Though Christ had now entered into his state of exaltation, yet he continued tender of his disciples, and concerned for their comfort. He speaks as one troubled to see their melancholy.. Note, Our Lord Jesus takes notice of the sorrow and sadness of his disciples, and is afflicted in their afflictions.

    Christ has hereby taught us, [1.] To be conversable. Christ here fell into discourse with two grave serious persons, though he was a stranger to them and they knew him not, and they readily embraced him. It does not become Christians to be morose and shy, but to take pleasure in good society.

    [2.] We are hereby taught to be compassionate. When we see our friends in sorrow and sadness, we should, like Christ here, take cognizance of their grief, and give them the best counsel and comfort we can: Weep with them that weep.

    Luke 24:13-35 excerpts

    [You may want to take time here to read Luke 24 or additional verses.]

    15 While they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. 16 But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. 17 And he said to them, “What is this conversation that you are holding with each other as you walk?” And they stood still, looking sad.

    Conversation along a road to Emmaus

    NOTE: The conversational style of their witness presumes who speaks, yet who says anything other than Jesus does not really matter.

    Cleopas: “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?”

    The unrecognized man now walking with them:  “What things?”

    Cleopas (most likely): “Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him.  But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.

    The other disciple: Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things happened. Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning, and when they did not find his body, they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive.

    Cleopas (perhaps): Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but him they did not see.

    The unrecognized, risen, Son of Man: “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?”

    Reaction to the Risen Christ!

    Can you image their reaction and sudden recognition of their witness of the Risen Christ?

    From this point forward, their journey would be transformed. Sorrow lifts toward rapturous joy! Jesus once more walks with those He loves. The Lord begins teaching more scriptures from the books of Moses. He unwraps so many verses from the scriptures written about Him by the Prophets.

    Jesus’ words from Isaiah and other Prophets we have just read must have pierced the hearts of these two disciples. For He spoke of His life as predicted by scripture and explained why the Lord’s crucifixion for our sins had to take place.

    What a glorious walk to Emmaus after having left Jerusalem dejected and directionless.

    Conclusion to conversation at journey’s end

    28 So they drew near to the village to which they were going. He acted as if he were going farther..

    Cleopas:  “Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent.”

    ,, So he went in to stay with them. 30 When he was at table with them, he took the bread,,

    Jesus (familiar words of blessing, to this effect):

    ‘This is my body which is given for you…

    He broke it and gave it to both disciples…

    31 And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him.

    And he vanished from their sight!

    The other disciple (in mutual amazement) to Cleopas:  “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?”

    33 And they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem.

    Yes, even though it was toward evening, these two disciples who had just encountered Jesus immediately returned. They had just completed a seven mile walk, yet would return under the cover of darkness for about a three hour journey and ascent back into the Roman-guarded city of Jerusalem.

    35 Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.

    Melancholy or Joy?

    What describes your mortal life? Does the inevitability of death (and yes, judgment) cause you grief?

    Christians speak of a rapture, really an overflowing indescribable joy in one sense.

    The Gospel of the sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus is filled with joy.
    “for those who believe.
    Yet you must believe in Jesus and receive the Holy Spirit.”

    Scripture also prophesies a rapture of these last days as certainly as death destroys the flesh. Judgment of all, in Christ or against Christ (the only two choices). Resurrection lifts up the soul and the Lord creates a new and indestructible sinless body! Only by the purification of the Blood of Christ Jesus… only through Christ.

    The Bible speaks of a new Jerusalem, a new heaven and a new earth! An eternal place in the Presence of the LORD where:

    “..there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. – The Revelation of Jesus Christ to John: 21:4 KJV

    Who do you choose?

    Do you stand alone, justifying your sins by your own good works? After having done so little for the Lord, as we all may rightfully be convicted, are you facing death’s melancholy?

    Or in Christ Jesus, the incarnate son of man, born to a virgin, died for our sins as Perfect Sacrifice on a cross – in Christ the LORD, One with the Father and One with the Holy Spirit, will you embrace the resurrection’s rapture? It is the Good News, the great joy, the glad tidings of Easter for those who bow down to the LORD.

    “He IS the Lord of love. Jesus IS. Worship the Lord our God, who loves you so much as to endure the Cross.” tweet=”Amen. Happy Easter. Joy and eternal life is ours in Christ Jesus.

  • Beyond Nations and Coastlands

    Beyond Nations and Coastlands

    The Servant of the Lord

    Is Jesus Savior of the nations, good news to the coastlands and Messiah of the elect?

    Prophets and kings of Israel have looked forward to the incarnate Son of Man. Yet the Messiah of Israel did not suffer, die and rise to glory only for Jacob. The Lord is lord of all the earth, the heavens and mankind. He IS the hope of the nations, Redeemer of Israel and God incarnate now and forever!

    Isaiah 49

    Listen to me, O coastlands,
        and give attention, you peoples from afar.
    The Lord called me from the womb,
        from the body of my mother he named my name.
    2 He made my mouth like a sharp sword;
        in the shadow of his hand he hid me;
    he made me a polished arrow;
        in his quiver he hid me away.
    3 And he said to me, “You are my servant,
        Israel, in whom I will be glorified.”

    Listen, you unbelievers of every nation

    The Messiah of God predicted by Isaiah will have to deal with a number of challenges, not least among these understanding mortality.

    [ctt title=”How does an eternal, immortal, timeless One experience life as man?” tweet=”https://ctt.ec/3d2V2+ Read John 1″ coverup=”3d2V2″]

    No man may stand before Almighty God face to Face, yet the LORD has dwelt in the womb of a virgin and endured the suffering of death on a Cross for our sake.

    If the Lord rejected all except Noah long ago, will the Lord not reject even the wicked of Israel along with those beyond the coastlands at the day of reckoning? [Matthew 24:37-38]

    John 4:22

    [ctt title=”4:22 ὑμεῖς προσκυνεῖτε ὃ οὐκ οἴδατε ἡμεῖς προσκυνοῦμεν ὃ οἴδαμεν ὅτι ἡ σωτηρία ἐκ τῶν Ἰουδαίων ἐστίν” tweet=”.. we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. – John 4:22″ coverup=”mHlMU”]

    Even the chosen needed witness that the LORD chose Abraham and Jacob, Moses and David for their faith. For the LORD destroyed and damned those who turned from righteousness. “Before Abraham was, I AM;” says the Lord, the God of Israel!

    Not only Messiah of Israel, but Savior of the Nations

    Isaiah 49:6

    he says:
    “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant
    to raise up the tribes of Jacob
    and to bring back the preserved of Israel;
    I will make you as a light for the nations,
    that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”

    So difficult for a man of flesh and bone to think in terms of timeless soul and Savior before time. Moses witnessed judgment on the land and redemption of a people for the Lord’s own purpose. Yet even in one hundred twenty years Moses could not claim the covenant of Abraham. Moses led a chosen nation through the sea. He and leaders of an elect people bowed before the Lord on a mountain where we would receive the Law of God. Yet Moses who had parted the sea and brought water from the parched wilderness could not cross the Jordan into Israel.

    Judges and Kings could not rule over a stiff-necked people who believed that Abraham’s promise is fulfilled in their land land and success for their generation. From Elijah to Isaiah the elect continued in the sins of their fathers, while worshiping their ancestry over the LORD! Isaiah and Prophets of the LORD would eventually come to an end of their time, yet anticipating the lasting Redeemer the LORD did promise.

    7 Thus says the Lord,
    the Redeemer of Israel and his Holy One,
    to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nation,
    the servant of rulers:
    “Kings shall see and arise;
    princes, and they shall prostrate themselves;
    because of the Lord, who is faithful,
    the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you.”

    Who IS the Holy One of Israel?

    The Redeemer of Israel IS and was and will be Lord over those who love Him.

    Isaiah tells the chosen: 50 Thus says the Lord:

    “Where is your mother’s certificate of divorce,
        with which I sent her away?
    Or which of my creditors is it
        to whom I have sold you?
    Behold, for your iniquities you were sold,
        and for your transgressions your mother was sent away.
    2 Why, when I came, was there no man;
        why, when I called, was there no one to answer?
    Is my hand shortened, that it cannot redeem?

    Isaiah foretells of a great Teacher of Israel

    Isaiah, the prophet of God tells of the Redeemer of man’s slavery to sin, a Savior sent beyond nations and coastlands; the Lord who is risen after the love of His own Sacrifice. Isaiah speaks next of the wise and loving teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. Can you hear His voice?

    4 The Lord God has given me
        the tongue of those who are taught,
    that I may know how to sustain with a word
        him who is weary.

    [ctt title=”If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear.”” tweet=”Jesus speaks truth, love and the words of eternal life.” coverup=”f5KGc”]

    Recalling the crowds who followed and foreshadowing of a trial long past the days of Isaiah:

    Morning by morning he awakens;
    he awakens my ear
    to hear as those who are taught.
    5 The Lord God has opened my ear,
    and I was not rebellious;
    I turned not backward.

    6 I gave my back to those who strike,
    and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard;
    I hid not my face
    from disgrace and spitting.

    The suffering servant will rise to outlive His accusers

    9 Behold, the Lord God helps me;
    who will declare me guilty?
    Behold, all of them will wear out like a garment;
    the moth will eat them up.
    10 Who among you fears the Lord
    and obeys the voice of his servant?
    Let him who walks in darkness
    and has no light
    trust in the name of the Lord
    and rely on his God.

    Has Caesar prevailed? Pilate? Does one High Priest yet live?

    Do the kings who did what was evil in the sight of the Lord live? Have the false prophets of hatred risen to take the lands they plunders?

    Only Christ, Holy One, Son of the Living Father and One with the Holy Spirit rises from the Cross of sacrifice to preach once more to Israel and the Nations – His redemption for those who believe in every nation beyond time and circumstance: Jesus IS Lord!

    The Promised Messiah, Jesus

    Acts 26:22b-23

    I stand here testifying both to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said would come to pass: that the Christ must suffer and that, by being the first to rise from the dead, he would proclaim light both to our people and to the Gentiles.

    John 1:

    In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

    [ctt title=”“Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! ” tweet=”Messiah, Christ Jesus, the pure blood sacrifice on the Cross of perfect redemption.” coverup=”GSa8o”]

    Hebrews 9:27-28

    And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.

    “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” – Revelation 1:8

    Surely the Lord created the heavens and the earth and man in the beginning. The Shepherd gathers every faithful follower from every nation and generation. In these last days the Lord will count the elect and the adopted, fulfilling all prophesy. He will form the old creation into a new heaven and a new earth where the LORD will dwell among us. The faithful will rise to His glorious love and embrace a overflowing joy we have not known because of sin.

    Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit

    As it was in the beginning, it will be once more and forever.

    Amen.

     

     

     

  • That Unwelcome Quiet Time

    That Unwelcome Quiet Time

    STRESS!! It consumes, divides and doubles. You would think that a little quiet time would be welcome, but that’s not always the case. In fact, for many of us quiet time may invite the most intimidating minutes of our day.

    A quiet awakening

    I should have welcomed opportunity for more sleep, for my night had been nearly sleepless. Yet after awakening to near silence before dawn I turned off the alarm and remained awake.

    What was on my mind? Everything. And I must confess that my first thought was not,

    This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.

    Psalm 118:24

    We arose as usual, beginning the necessary routines of each day. The dog stretched and hurried toward the door. Routine, but required, we set out on today’s event full journey. Charlie followed his nose along previously blazed paths oblivious to my attempt of a hurried pace along a cold continuous sidewalk.

    Running from work

    A jogger ran by, buds in her ears and pulse-monitoring watch on her wrist. She tracks more than time and steps. On warmer days I sensed her daily pace, caught in her mini-marathon between school drop-off and her gym or coffee shop. A man drove by in his loud pizza-logoed car, bobbing his head to a beat of some music inside.

    Charlie walked further, but I was no different from these running to and from work. I could have been busy in some song or sense of life’s sprint, but this day all was quiet except multiplying messages of a mind caught up in my ‘what to do next’ and ‘why did I do that.”

    Once I had driven miles between accounts with my mind also cruising well above the speed limit of a time-constrained goal list. I once listened to anything louder than my passing thoughts; nostalgic classics or current upbeat songs by young musicians full of life. Yet work always approached with the day’s music fleeting to where carefree sounds, singing and smiles fade into hope of a different journey.

    As I thought ahead to work I considered a place filled with well-meaning souls, busy building barns most will never see. Eight or so hours without running to places where we have time to count the costs before the laying of foundations of futility.

    An unexpected glimpse at quiet sleep

    Unexplored paths led by tugs of long leash from long-wandered straight paths of purpose, we returned to a road taken by only a few headed to their cul-de-sac of journey’s end.

    A sight behind an open blind of dawn-lit window imprints image of both past and future. The man lay sleeping peacefully in a hospital bed, between his room’s window and rising metal tree with clear bags of liquid extending long lines dripping life into failing flesh and relief into the delay of decay.

    Man is like to vanity: his days are as a shadow that passeth away.

    Psalm 144:4 KJV

    A mere breath, vapour, a fleeting shadow are the lives of mankind. Souls caught in the image of God trapped in failing flesh. What question of man precedes such astute observation though the looking-glass of life?

    יְֽהוָה מָה־אָדָם וַתֵּדָעֵהוּ בֶּן־אֱנֹושׁ וַֽתְּחַשְּׁבֵֽהוּ׃

    O LORD, what is man that you regard him, or the son of man that you think of him?

    PS 144:3

    A second to last death bed

    Psalm 41:

    Blessed is the one who considers the poor!

    In the day of trouble the Lord delivers him;
    2 the Lord protects him and keeps him alive;
    he is called blessed in the land;
    you do not give him up to the will of his enemies.

    3 The Lord sustains him on his sickbed;
    in his illness you restore him to full health.

    Charlie had inadvertently led me to a path where in the near silence of our morning walk I had to remember our path toward a final rest. So many have passed this way before us, yet today in an unwelcome misstep I glanced briefly into my own future as well as a sudden step back into a memory of a deathbed before.

    By the sweat of your face
    You shall eat bread,
    Till you return to the ground,
    Because from it you were taken;
    For you are dust,
    And to dust you shall return.”

    Genesis 3:19 NASB

    It had been brought into my own living room. She had been sick for months and they couldn’t figure it out. Doctors were busy and work went on while family and life rushed about. A trip to the ER told more of the disruption of life to come.

    After giving up on work and her parents moving in, trips from doctor to hospital and home again… to a bed not our own…

    Once I sat by her inadvertently on her oxygen tube. It was that kind of sudden realization that the breath of life we take so granted becomes perilously cumbersome to draw in for just one more moment. She would live fully just two score and ten, one more month and one more night to say ‘Good-bye, I love you.’

    Psalm 90: 9-12 KJV

    For all our days are passed away in thy wrath:

    we spend our years as a tale that is told.

    The days of our years are threescore years and ten;

    and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years,

    yet is their strength labour and sorrow;

    for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.

    Who knoweth the power of thine anger?

    even according to thy fear, so is thy wrath.

    So teach us to number our days,

    that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.

    Charlie and I turned off into home, just a short way along our temporary path of these days. I remained lost in contemplative prayer and unexpectedly fond memory, for I knew just how temporary was this life for her and for me.

    “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live…

    “..and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”

    John 11:25-26