"abide in me and I in you" John 15:4
He loves you.
He loves you.
I'm not sure you got that.
He loves you.
It's unquestionable. It's so complete.
He has you deep...deep in His heart. The forces of a thousand hells could come to destroy you...you...and HE would risk everything to protect you...and he did.
Try something. Set aside some time to read the book of John from beginning to end without interruption. It's only 30 pages or so and it reads better than any novel ever written. It is 30-some pages of the last three years of Jesus life, and the intense drama and supernatural content is astounding. Set aside this time and read it with one thing in mind. Every word, every action, every miracle, every hardship, every difficulty, every painful blow, every sleepless night in prayer, every dinner with the disciples, every moment to moment temptation, and every wrestling match with satan himself was done for the love of only one person...just one person...YOU.
This man...God...who got up every morning and clothed himself and ate breakfast and cut wood and debated men and healed the sick and died horribly and now rules from the heavens loves you intensely. And here's the best part...His blood, his flesh, his DNA flows in and through YOU...if you want Him. The God who stretched out galaxies and spoke nebulas into existence loves YOU. His tabernacle that no one could ever approach now lives in you...if you want Him.
Try something. Set aside some time to read the book of John from beginning to end without interruption. It's only 30 pages or so and it reads better than any novel ever written. It is 30-some pages of the last three years of Jesus life, and the intense drama and supernatural content is astounding. Set aside this time and read it with one thing in mind. Every word, every action, every miracle, every hardship, every difficulty, every painful blow, every sleepless night in prayer, every dinner with the disciples, every moment to moment temptation, and every wrestling match with satan himself was done for the love of only one person...just one person...YOU.
This man...God...who got up every morning and clothed himself and ate breakfast and cut wood and debated men and healed the sick and died horribly and now rules from the heavens loves you intensely. And here's the best part...His blood, his flesh, his DNA flows in and through YOU...if you want Him. The God who stretched out galaxies and spoke nebulas into existence loves YOU. His tabernacle that no one could ever approach now lives in you...if you want Him.
"on that day you will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me, and I am in you"
Wow...it's like He was "tethered to the divine"...and so should we…"abide in me and I in you"...so complete...do we really need...anything...else? His DNA, His Spirit flows through us and connects us, unites us to a place unseen...a place unknown...a place where Ephesians says we've been given everything.
"who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ". Eph 1:3
For a couple of years my wife used to wake up in the middle of the night terrified she was most certainly going to die...right then. She was panic-stricken. In fact, we concluded they were "panic attacks". It was totally impossible to talk her out of these moments of panic. She just needed someone to clutch, to hold tightly until the fear subsided. She needed to be tethered to someone, some power, to some love until the panic passed.
If you read the chapters of John you find Jesus in constant conflict. You find Him continually offered well-meaning advice from his disciples or threatening accusations from angry mobs. Yet, He never moved, He never spoke, He never breathed...apart from the Father. He was tethered...to the divine.
I am nothing, a nobody in the eyes of the world...and I love it. My life is a secret and so are many thousands of other "nobodies" that walk the earth. Waitresses, clerks, managers, moms and dads, and just ordinary people who as John Wesley said, "their hearts have been strangely warmed within". They contain a fire. and in the midst of every painful trial and cold night they know that Jesus LOVES and LIVES in them supernaturally. They are tethered to a power so much greater than themselves that every act and every seemingly ordinary moment can be lived in GREATNESS serving Him.
Jesus spent some sleepless nights in prayer to stay close. Sounds like a good idea...every now and then. Some retreats to His word and some days of fasting might be just the thing to bring us back to the awareness that we abide in Him and He abides in us. I have tasted many, many bitter days and I have met fear and hardship on many levels. I have friends right this moment that are facing fears and possibilities of loss that I can hardly fathom. But I have yet to know a day of following Christ that I could not somehow reach deep within and deep within his word and find that I am tethered to a God that is a Father. This God is intensely in love with me.
For a couple of years my wife used to wake up in the middle of the night terrified she was most certainly going to die...right then. She was panic-stricken. In fact, we concluded they were "panic attacks". It was totally impossible to talk her out of these moments of panic. She just needed someone to clutch, to hold tightly until the fear subsided. She needed to be tethered to someone, some power, to some love until the panic passed.
If you read the chapters of John you find Jesus in constant conflict. You find Him continually offered well-meaning advice from his disciples or threatening accusations from angry mobs. Yet, He never moved, He never spoke, He never breathed...apart from the Father. He was tethered...to the divine.
I am nothing, a nobody in the eyes of the world...and I love it. My life is a secret and so are many thousands of other "nobodies" that walk the earth. Waitresses, clerks, managers, moms and dads, and just ordinary people who as John Wesley said, "their hearts have been strangely warmed within". They contain a fire. and in the midst of every painful trial and cold night they know that Jesus LOVES and LIVES in them supernaturally. They are tethered to a power so much greater than themselves that every act and every seemingly ordinary moment can be lived in GREATNESS serving Him.
Jesus spent some sleepless nights in prayer to stay close. Sounds like a good idea...every now and then. Some retreats to His word and some days of fasting might be just the thing to bring us back to the awareness that we abide in Him and He abides in us. I have tasted many, many bitter days and I have met fear and hardship on many levels. I have friends right this moment that are facing fears and possibilities of loss that I can hardly fathom. But I have yet to know a day of following Christ that I could not somehow reach deep within and deep within his word and find that I am tethered to a God that is a Father. This God is intensely in love with me.
As I walk through my day knowing that His mercy is not only new every morning but every second, I praise Him, I cry out to Him, I search for Him, I intercede with Him, I groan with Him, I die with Him, I live with Him, I love Him…and I thank Him...because I am tethered to Him…forever.
