Galatians 4:6 (NLT)

Because we are His Children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, prompting us to call out, “Abba, Father.”

We all need a Father.  We all need someone stronger and wiser than we are.  I was thinking today about that need in our world of sinfulness, selfishness and pain.  

Humans can certainly be hurt and they can hurt others, so we truly need a powerful, loving, kind Father.  

Then I got to thinking about God creating these humans.  

Because 

In the beginning there was God and He created everything good, even people.

The Bible tells us in Genesis 2:26-27 that God said,

"Let us make mankind in Our image, according to our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the livestock and over all the earth . . ." So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him , male and female He created them.  

 In His image - in God's image.  Unless we find out what God is like, that makes no sense at all.  What in me could possibly be like God, what in me could possibly  reflect His image?

Humans did not make the world.  

They are not all-powerful.  

We cannot calm the storm, heal the sick, or raise the dead. 

 So obviously, if I believe I'm created in His image, that's not what "in His image" means.

So let's think about Him.  Yes, God is powerful, but He is also gentle.  He put the desire for strength in us and also the feelings of gentleness.  The tenderness of a parent for a hurting child, and even tenderness and care when we see an animal in pain.

God is Holy.  He put in us the desire and ability to be holy.  Surely, we can't measure up to His holiness, but I believe most of us want to, try to, and can at least be "good."

God is love.  He put in us the ability to love, the ability to sacrifice our own wishes for others, to desire a closeness with Him and with other people.  

God is generous.  He has given everything possible to His children.  He gave life and suffered death for us.  And it doesn't take a lot to see generosity in people as well, as they give time and gifts to others.

This is such a short picture of God's image.  But I believe with all my heart that even people who do not claim Jesus as their Savior are still created in His image.

He did create us in a way that we might see His image in Jesus, and in people.  

So why even consider the idea of "made in His image?" 

Because I see such evil and pain in this world that I'm tempted to believe 
that's all there is.   And it's not.  
If we strive to see His Image in others, we will see just that.  

  And I need to open my eyes and see His image bearers,

and love them as He does.  

God Himself Knows What and When and Where

Musings today.  

Don't do anything, just wait!  Those were the words I thought I heard yesterday morning, but my brain said - no, don't just wait, take a step!

Wait on God to show me "for sure" what I should do here in our new hometown, or how I should proceed or when to begin.  That's what I thought I heard, but I really don't think that that was what I was told.

For one thing, If I read Matthew 17 correctly, it seems that, if I will but take even one step - a tiny bit of faith, toward serving Him, God will honor that.  Jesus told His followers that if they have faith the size of a mustard seed, they could move a mountain.

Matthew 17:20  He said to them, “. . .  . For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.”

Jesus expects us to serve Him and serve others in His name.  He tells us trust Him and to Go.

So let's look at an instance in the Scriptures that God said "GO."  Let's see if He actually said, wait.  

He sometimes does, and He sometimes explains why, and sometimes - He just says Go!  But does He say wait?  I think He did to Saul.

Saul of Tarsus was persecuting the early Christians.  He was hunting them down and sending them to prison.  He thought he was honoring God, but he did not understand that Jesus was the fulfillment of God's promise of a savior.

Acts 9

Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest  and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem.  

As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.  He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, 

“Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”

“Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked.  

“I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied.  “Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”

The men traveling with Saul stood there speechless; they heard the sound but did not see anyone.  Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing. So they led him by the hand into Damascus.  For three days he was blind, and did not eat or drink anything.

Jesus said Go, He did not tell Saul why, or what he was to to.  Basically He said Go, and wait - you will be told what to do.  I love the fact that Jesus made it clear to Saul who it was that was speaking to him.

The second "Go."

In Damascus there was a disciple named Ananias. The Lord called to him in a vision, 

“Ananias!” 

“Yes, Lord,” he answered.  

The Lord told him, “Go to the house of Judas on Straight Street and ask for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for he is praying.  In a vision he has seen a man named Ananias come and place his hands on him to restore his sight.” 

“Lord,” Ananias answered, “I have heard many reports about this man and all the harm he has done to your holy people in Jerusalem. And he has come here with authority from the chief priests to arrest all who call on your name.” 

But the Lord said to Ananias, “Go! This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel.  I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.” 

Jesus said Go; and because Ananias was concerned about the safety of Christians, he asked Jesus about his concerns.  Jesus explained what Ananias was to do and why.

Then Ananias WENT to the house and entered it. Placing his hands on Saul, he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord—Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here—has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit.”  

So, both Saul and Ananias went because Jesus said "Go."

So what was the difference?  Possibly, the situation, the people impacted, the heart of the man.  The Lord knew the people and the situation.  He knew and He provided answers as they were needed.  We cannot expect to know how God will use us, but we can know that He will, as long as we are seeking to do His will.

My lesson from the Miracle at the Pool

 

Many yesterday’s ago, they gathered at the Pool of Bethesda, on the porch, the covered area near the temple in Jerusalem where many of the sick and infirm of the area gathered, hoping to be healed - wanting to be healed. Maybe even afraid to be healed. 

A few days ago, my husband and I were in the emergency room waiting to hear what the pain and fear of this current virus would mean in my own body.  I thought then that this was our own porch.  

So many people waiting!  So many hurts!  So many stories!  And we could do nothing for them.  (That was how we felt) but it was not true. 

WE COULD SEE THEM!

That sounds strange, I guess, but when I read the scripture about the temple porch I see these words, “One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years.  When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, ‘Do you want to be healed?’” (John 5:5)

JESUS SAW A MAN

Jesus saw a man, it wasn’t only that Jesus saw sickness – He saw the person, the man, and Jesus knew all about him.  Isn’t it amazing that the God of the universe knew and looked at this man? 

We can do something for all of the hurting, and it’s a hard thing to do - to really do.  

We can SEE them as people, as loved and wanted children of our good, just, and our all-knowing God.

The Pool of Bethesda that we read about in the scripture was “in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate”. John 5:2 tells us that the pool was “surrounded by five covered colonnades". During Jesus’ time, the Pool of Bethesda lay outside the city walls. It was at this pool that Jesus performed this miracle.

The name of the pool, “Bethesda,” is Aramaic. It means “House of Mercy.” John tells us that “a great number of disabled people used to lie there —the blind, the lame, the paralyzed”.  The covered colonnades would have provided shade for those who gathered there, but there was another reason for the popularity of the Pool of Bethesda. It was believed that an angel came and stirred the water, and the first person to get in the pool would be healed.  There is speculation as to whether that reference is in our Bible as an explanation of why the people were there, or whether it was something that really happened.  Either way it was hope in a person’s own ability to solve every problem in life, to get into the water first.  That was impossible hope in something other than God, and it is not the ultimate hope.

However, on the day that Jesus visited the Pool of Bethesda, there was a man. (John 5:5) Jesus SAW him and asked the man if he wanted to be healed. The man replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me” (verse 7). The man said that he hadn’t been healed because he was not able to get to the water ahead of the others.

Jesus swept aside the excuse with one command: “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk”. The man was instantly cured, and “he picked up his mat and walked.” (verse 9) The man needed Jesus to be there right then – maybe sometime in the past or the future as well, but – right then.  That’s interesting, isn’t it?  Thirty-eight years and Jesus knew the man was ready to do what Jesus told him to do. 

If we could really see people, and if we could know their hurts, we would help them by taking them in our prayers to the living water, to Jesus.  Oh, I know, we can’t solve each of their problems, sickness, pain, and trials, in fact we most likely cannot solve any of them.  My question is sometimes, will He?  Will God solve them?  All I do know is that He is here, He sees them, He cares, and He will do what is needed and right.

Amazingly, not everyone was happy about the man’s miraculous healing. It wasn’t in the realm of the way they looked at the rule book, at the way things “should” be.   I believe we do the same thing when we expect God to always act in a way that we humans understand.

The day Jesus healed the man at the poolside happened to be a Sabbath. As the man left Bethesda, the religious leaders saw him carrying his mat, and they stopped him: “It is the Sabbath,” they said. “The law forbids you to carry your mat.” (John 5:10) The reaction of those leaders shows that, no matter how much proof God provides, there will be some people who refuse to see the truth. The religious leaders couldn’t see the miracle. All they could see was that someone had violated a rule that they believed would protect them from sinning.

There is an idea that Jesus may have done more than heal just this one man on that day, though the account does say that Jesus slipped away after healing this man.  You would think that, if He had healed more, we might hear more about that, but why, if it was just that one, why just the one man?  Why one healing when so many were hurting? 

I was thinking about a parent who knows that there is one child in his or her family that truly needs extra attention (maybe help, or correction, or forgiveness) in some area.  We are NOT perfect parents, but God is.  And God, that parent, will do what is necessary for that one – He won’t paint with a ‘broad brush.”  He cares about each ONE.

God doesn’t have a limited amount of care, and He does have an unlimited amount of knowledge about our needs, personalities, courage, possibilities and frailties, and an unlimited amount of love for His children.  Unlimited love and unlimited power do not always equate in our minds.  And “love” in our minds isn’t always demonstrated in the way it is in His.  God does nothing haphazardly. I believe that the Bible shows “God has purpose.”   

From my own selfish standpoint, I truly want to be special to God in that way.  Special, in that He knows me as His own.  He knows me,  not a “class” or a “type” or a “part of a group”?  Maybe that is selfish, but maybe it’s just being a child of a good, good Father, even when I don’t understand it. 

It isn’t that God doesn’t put each of His children in that role of “special child.”  I believe It just means that He knows each ONE of us – alone - and each ONE is a “special child” to Him.

As to the why?  Why not fix them all, heal them all?  I’m not sure there is an answer that we would understand from this point of eternity.  But I do know that there is an answer. 

Is God more interested in His will for our eternal life than the present pain and suffering?  How do we say “more” interested when we don’t even know Him?  The Bible tells us that He made us, He has always known us, and He loves us.   He is interested in every aspect of our lives, and He would do anything to bring us through the valley.  Psalm 23 tells us, “Though I walk THROUGH the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil..." Even when we do not understand, we must know that God is walking through this life with us.  God is for us, not against us.  Each individual one of us.

Just a thought - When the Bible refers to the “Church” the word is translated from the “Ecclesia, Greek Ekklēsia, (“gathering of those summoned) or the “called out ones.” There was not a summon for a particular type of people, there was a summons for ones!  The reason that’s important to me is that we cannot expect to understand the needs and hearts and minds and responsibilities of each individual person as God does. 

So, I need to look at each one.  I need to see each individual, as made in the IMAGE of God.  As made by God and loved by Him. 

I pray that as I look at the people, the hurting people on my porch,  I will truly SEE them.