Category: Teaching Topics

When the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!”  John 20:19

The disciples are undone. They had grown to love Jesus with the kind of love that changes the whole shape of a life. He had spoken to them of a kingdom, and they believed Him. But only days earlier, they had watched Him be arrested, condemned, and crucified. Now everything inside them is shaking. The future they thought they were stepping into seems to have collapsed. So they gather behind locked doors—to grieve together, and to hide.

And if sorrow were not enough, fear is there too. If this is what they did to Him, what will they do to us?

Yet into that shut-up, trembling room, Jesus comes. He enters the very place they have sealed off. Not as an intruder breaking in, but as the risen Redeemer coming to His own.

He knows how to enter rooms we have closed tight, the places where the light has gone dim, and hope has lost its edges. No locked place is beyond His reach. The risen Christ comes into spaces barred by unbelief, trauma, sorrow, and shame. He is not unsettled by our fear, nor silenced by our silence. He comes carrying the finished peace of His cross. It is a peace purchased by His blood and made unshakably true by His resurrection.

Lord Jesus, speak Your peace where our hearts have forgotten how to rest. Amen

As he approached the town gate, a dead person was being carried out—the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a large crowd from the town was with her. When the Lord saw her, his heart went out to her and he said, “Don’t cry.” Then he went up and touched the stretcher they were carrying him on, and the bearers stood still. He said, “Young man, I say to you, get up!” 15 The dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him back to his mother. Luke 7:12-16

A dead son, an only son, was touched by Jesus. He rose to life and then ‘Jesus gave him back to his mother.’   In 2 Kings 4, Elisha laid on the dead son of a godly woman, her only son, and this boy also rose to life. The story concludes with the same line. ‘And he gave the boy back to his mother.’

There are circumstances only God can change. There are people only God can transform. There are loved ones we need to relinquish into God’s hands to do what only He can do. When He’s done, they return to us as different people.  For this mother from Nain, it wasn’t hard for her to let Jesus enter the picture. Things were desperate and death was the end of the road. But in the land of the living, we play the Savior —- trying to fix, inspire, motivate, chide —- and we don’t realize that it’s necessary to step back in order to let God step close. Loving from afar is difficult when we’ve been the caretaker. Entrusting them to Jesus’ care doesn’t seem like the most loving thing to do. His way of bringing about a yielded life is usually much more severe than ours. We like to cushion people to make their journey as easy as possible but Jesus is not so much about comfort as He is holiness. And isn’t that what we want for them? Is any divine measure too unkind if it culminates in surrender? Is any wound too bad if it is a saving wound?

For whom do I want change so badly that I stand in the way of God? Ultimately, it’s an issue of trust. Do I trust God with someone with whom I’ve been intimately involved? Wrapping my arms around a person and bringing them to the Savior in prayer is not failure on my part. It is the beginning of their redemptive story if they will just bow at the feet of Jesus.

Help us know how to apply this. People need You first, then we can love each other. Father us and help us relinquish control. Amen

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. And I am the worst sinner of all. I Tim. 2:15

Parenting is hard work and though it’s so very rewarding, it can be painful at times. Ask God. He created, fathered, and sacrificed, only to see the majority of His creation use His name in vain, shake their fist at Him, and chalk up His character as mean, stingy, and vengeful. I’ve heard more than one person say, “What has He ever done for me?”

If you’ve been a parent, it would be like crawling on your hands and knees from San Francisco to Maine to prove your love to your child.  But you arrive, only to have your child say, “You’ve never done anything for me!” With knees still bloody from the journey, you wouldn’t believe your ears nor begin to fathom such blindness to sacrificial love.

Yeshua means ‘savior’.  Jesus came to save. Dying for our sins was His response to the wounds He sustained in the Garden of Eden. The pain was severe. God does grieve. God does weep. The plan of redemption came as a response to our alienation from Him. He asked His Son to leave glory, put on mortal flesh, suffer rejection and persecution at the hands of those He created, and then die the worst death possible to buy us back with His blood.  And yet, the gift seems like a trifle to so many. I contend that, for me, the cross is not just central to Easter, it’s central to every day. At the epicenter of something so gruesome was a love so exquisite that I’ll never be able to fully internalize the power of it.

In closing, here’s another picture. After completing your San Francisco/Maine journey, you see your child waiting for you over the finish line. He is cheering, arms open to receive you, and his face is stained with tears. Today, I offer grateful tears  to Jesus, Yeshua. I cheer Him as being my Savior and Deliverer.

For the many years I treated You casually and the cross recklessly, forgive me. Amen

He himself bore our sins in his own body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live to righteousness.  I Pet.2:24

When someone has hurt me, seeing them reminds me of what they did.  Even after I forgive them, I can still remember when I see them across the room.

When God forgives me, he separates my sin from me.  I no longer wear it when He looks at me.  One of the words for ‘forgive’ is to ‘send away’.  This is what Peter meant when he said, “He himself bore our sins in his own body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live to righteousness.”  I Pet.2:24  God took that ‘thing’ for which I repented, took it off of me and put it on Jesus.  Jesus died for it as if He was the One who committed it.  And in turn, Jehovah Tsidkenu clothed me with His own righteousness.

So why wallow in past failures?  Why let my one huge mistake weigh down my spirit?  Jesus took it from me, paid the penalty, and justified me.  When He looks at me, He sees His own perfection.  

I echo David’s words to himself in Psalm 42. “Why are you so downcast, oh my soul?”  Satan is the author of a self-punishing lifestyle.  He takes every failure, magnifies it by a thousand, records it like a movie and plays it over and over again in my head.  He rejoices when I am hard on myself.  He encourages payback and self-hatred.  Unlike Jesus, he offers a heavy robe of guilt and it can appear to fit just right.  Right color.  Right size.  Right length.

When I can’t hold my head up, I remember that I am not my sin!  Christ wore my sin, once and for all, on a cross.  Then He declared, “It is finished.”  Sin, forever removed.  So, who am I?  A forgiven, justified, righteous, child of Jehovah Tsidkenu.

Do I really understand justification yet, Lord?  Write this on my heart.  Amen

As soon as Simon Peter heard him say, “It is the Lord,” he wrapped his outer garment around him…and jumped into the water.  John 21:7

Peter was known as the impetuous one ~ more than all the other disciples.  He had a big heart, expressed himself with passion, and acted impulsively.  But this also got him into trouble.  His public bravado regarding an unwavering allegiance to Jesus came back to bite him.  It was just hours later that he would betray Jesus three times in the course of an hour.

After the resurrection, the disciples were in a boat.  John spotted Jesus on the shore and told Peter.  Peter threw himself into the sea to get there first.  This is typical of Peter’s personality yet I’m amazed at his boldness so soon after the humiliation of sin.

How did Peter know that his relationship with Jesus was intact?  How could he be so sure that Jesus would be pleased to see him?  Peter had never read the New Testament passages on grace.  They hadn’t been written yet.  He had no theological degree.  He just knew Jesus.  That was all.  That was enough.

Being forgiven with full restoration is a rare thing in this world.  We don’t expect it.  If we sin against someone severely enough, we never dare hope to gain their full trust.  We hang back, afraid to approach the one we wronged with any sense of confidence.  We read their facial expressions and body language to discern where we stand.  If we sense ambivalence, we wait from a distance.

When Jesus forgives, he puts our sins behind his back.  He never brings them out again to accuse us and remind us of what we’ve done.  We can approach him as Peter did.  Whether we throw ourselves into the sea or run across the threshold into his embrace, we can be assured of warm and happy reunion.

I always know where I stand with you, Lord.  Thank you for such extravagant forgiveness.

After He had sent them away, He went up on the mountain by Himself to pray. When evening came, He was there alone. Matt. 14:23

One of the gravest mistakes I can make today is to judge things by how I perceive them. How things are now mean nothing as to how things will be.

I’m not speaking of actions and consequences. God did say that if we reap sin, or righteousness, we will reap the same. But I’m talking about the obedient walk of a disciple and the many times he can believe that things are declining, even failing. If he is following Jesus, ‘failure’ is not how heaven defines his journey.

I have been surprised by the number of times scripture says that Jesus withdrew from the crowd to go and pray. He did this when he was fatigued but also withdrew after a profound time of discouragement. Did Jesus, at any time, believe that His mission was failing? No, He never succumbed to the lies that He was failing. Perception could not be built on any or segment of time single day. Though the crowds rejected him, a few did not and the ‘few’ were the point of His mission.

I can see things deteriorate around me. Church, family, ministry, friendships, even a marriage. I can say that it is in obvious decline but I can not safely say that ‘it is finished.’ What was ‘finished’ was the work of salvation and redemption. As long as I live today, there is still time for faith. There is still time for prayer. There is still time for firm belief in eternal truths.

‘The few’ are still the point of His mission.  If there is despair, I speak into it with enduring words of hope. If there is warfare, I speak into the battle with reminders of ultimate victory. God’s mathematics defies perception. A few hundred of his people defeated hundreds of thousands of enemies. The proportions were always ludicrous and God’s enemies risked everything on false perceptions. They didn’t know God.

The kingdom and God’s promises are where we plant our feet.

This is the day where I affirm, yet again, “Lord, I believe.” What You started, You will complete. Amen