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Showing posts from February, 2016

Jesus - Today!

21  Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if only you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22  But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask.” 23  Jesus told her, “Your brother will rise again.” 24  “Yes,” Martha said, “he will rise when everyone else rises, at the last day.” 25  Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life.   - John 11 In these words we see Martha talking to Jesus. Jesus is late as per Martha. She tells Jesus that if he had been a bit early, (4 days ago), her brother would not have died. In other words, Martha was talking about the past.    Lord, if only you had been here... She is saying that it is too late now.  Then Jesus says, "your brother will rise again".  Immediately Martha focuses on the future..she says,  “he will rise when everyone else rises, at the last day.” This seems like our problem too. We talk about how would it be if Jesus had come a little early when we faced the fiery trail. Or we talk about th

Prayer - Excerpts from Richard Foster

All who have walked with God have viewed prayer as the main business of their lives. The words of the gospel of Mark, “And in the morning, a great while before day, he rose and went out to a lonely place, and there he prayed,” stand as a commentary on the life-style of Jesus (Mark 1:35). David’s desire for God broke the self- indulgent chains of sleep: “Early will I seek Thee” (Ps. 63:1, KJV). When the apostles were tempted to invest their energies in other important and necessary tasks, they determined to give themselves continually to prayer and the ministry of the word (Acts 6:4). Martin Luther declares, “I have so much business I cannot get on without spending three hours daily in prayer.” He held it as a spiritual axiom that “He that has prayed well has studied well.” 2 John Wesley says, “God does nothing but in answer to prayer,” 3 and backed up his conviction by devoting two hours daily to that sacred exercise. The most notable feature of David Brainerd

Silent Listener? Really?

I have seen this common poster in the dinning room of so many Christian homes. The wording are something like this. "God is the head of this family. The unseen guest, the silent listener of every conversation." The problem is in the gospels, Jesus never is the silent listener in any dinner table conversation. In fact he is the one who is asking the questions. He is the one who is telling some stories. He is the one who is advising the host of how the seating arrangement should be. He is the one who is telling the host who should be invited to the dinner. Just for a sample read the 14th chapter of Luke and see for yourself if Jesus is the silent listener. He seems to be a dangerous guest. He notices even the thoughts of the people when they are eating at sometimes.  The Jesus of the gospel is a demanding and dangerous guest. He is not a silent listener but a active participant in every conversation of ours.  When you invite Jesus, remember he will change thi

The Weakness of Jesus!

The Pharisees got together to discuss about this man called Jesus. They wanted to get rid of Jesus because he was destroying their image about God and his rules.  One of the Pharisees asked: Does anyone know any weakness Jesus has? If we find the weakness of our enemy we can make use of this to defeat him.  Another Pharisee responded: I know two of his weaknesses. (Every eye focused on this fellow). He never rejects any dinner invitation. If anyone invites him, he accepts it. May be we could invite him for dinner.  And the other weakness he has is that, whenever he finds someone in need, he never passes by them without meeting their need.  So this would be our plan. We would invite him to a dinner and place a needy person (sick person) in our midst on a Sabbath day. I assure you that he will come to the dinner for sure and the first thing he would do is to meet the need of the person and would break the rules of Sabbath.  All the Pharisees agr eed.    And