As we approach Easter, I am reminded over and over that Jesus didn’t deserve the cross. Jesus did nothing to warrant the punishment, the torture, the death.
Staying on that road seems so hard when we’re in the middle of the storm. It can seem so difficult to close off the world and the easy short cuts they provide, instead taking the long, usually hard high road. Life is often not fair.
What I’m realizing is that if we listened what God spoke to us in a whisper or in an earthquake. If we listened and obeyed, followed his instructions for our lives there would be a lot less pain – no, not no pain, but less pain.
We’re OK with emulating a Jesus that gets plaques and awards and recognition. But what about the Jesus that looks like the guy who lives under the bridge? Not many of us are willing to go there.
Have you ever been the hand that someone needed to hold? Have you ever been the shoulder that someone needed to cry on? Have you ever been the hug that was desperately needed?
In this {the coming of Christ} you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor [...]
