Luke 5:1-11

Decisions we consider insignificant may actually be important in God’s eyes. Obedience in the small details prepares the believer for obedience in all things. Today’s passage shows that Peter experienced a gentle first lesson in following the Lord.

Peter’s initial interaction with Christ seemed insignificant. We can assume Jesus asked Peter for the use of his boat, which meant that the weary fisherman put aside his cleanup duties in order to steer the craft for an itinerant preacher. It was a small decision, but the reward was noteworthy. Peter had a front-row seat for the message Jesus proclaimed to the crowd on the beach.

The future disciple was convinced of Christ’s authority because of what he heard. Therefore, he obeyed Jesus’ second request to let down the nets for a catch, even though doing so contradicted everything he knew about fishing. The results were miraculous–a catch so great that a second boat had to come and take part of the haul.

Jesus was gently easing Peter into a place of absolute obedience. The fisherman’s brief but compelling history of submitting to the Lord’s will and experiencing His blessing convinced him that giving up everything to follow Christ was the wisest choice. The rewards for that decision are both innumerable and immeasurable.

Peter’s experience of increasingly demanding calls to obedience and sacrifice isn’t unique. That’s how the Father teaches His children to follow His will. So don’t assume a decision is insignificant–God is setting you on a course to fulfill His good purpose for your life. Choose to obey Him always.

“The cross,” someone said recently, “has become so ordinary that we hardly see it anymore.” The words at once sent through me a rush of lament, which then settled into a pool of reflection. How can this be true? How can an image once shameful enough to bow the proudest heads become ordinary? Could the gallows ever be innocuous? Would the death sentence of someone near us ever fail to get our attention?

Theodore Prescott is a sculptor who has spent a great deal of time thinking about the cross. In the 1980’s he began working on a series of crosses using different materials, forms, and processes hoping to reconstitute the cultural and scriptural imagery of the Roman cross. In a sense, Prescott attempts to portray the incongruous. The Roman cross was a loathsome manner of execution that inflicted an anguished death; the Cross of Christ held a man who went willingly—and without guilt. Though a reflection of beauty and sacrifice, the cross is also an image of physical torture, inseparable from flesh and blood. There was a body on these beams. Its image bears both startling realities—the presence of outstretched limbs and the mystery of being scandalously vacant. These contrasts alone are replete with a peculiar depth. Yet, our daily intake of the cross “precludes contemplation,” notes Prescott. The cross has become so ordinary that we hardly see it anymore.

Maybe he is right. But if the cross has become merely a symbol of Christianity, an emblem of one religion in a sea of others, it is still a symbol that stands secluded and unique. Even as an image among many, it remains conspicuously on its own. The symbol of the cross is an instrument of death. Far from ordinary, it suggests, at the very least, a love quite beyond us, scandalous, and impenetrable. Perhaps it is we who have become ordinary, our senses dulled to unconsciousness by the daily matters we give precedence. Even in his own time, the apostle Paul lamented such a blurring of the cross, calling us to a greater vision. “[A]s I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven” (Philippians 3:18-20).

For those who will not look carefully, the cross can be perceived as foolish or not perceived at all. It can be stripped of meaning or emptied of beauty, hope, and depth. But it cannot be emptied of Christ. “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his lifewill lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it” (Mark 8:34-35). The message of the cross may be nothing to some, but to those who will stand in its shame and offense, scandal and power, it is everything.

Moreover, where the cross is obscured, Christ is still near. Ironically, what started Theodore Prescott thinking about the absence of the cross’s meaning was a piece of his own art in which many people saw a cruciform image, though this was not his intention. For those who will see, the cross of Christ is expectantly present in every moment and every scene. In its beauty, we are changed. In view of an outstretched body and in the scandal of its emptiness, we are left yearning for the face of the risen Christ: “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead” (Philippians 3:10-11).

The Gospel of John reports that Pilate had a notice prepared and fastened to the beams of the common cross that bore the radical rabbi. It read in three languages: “JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS.” There is nothing ordinary about the manner in which he died, the cross on which he hung, or the symbol of death on which he inscribed a hope that would be carried throughout the nations. There was a cross in history with his name on it, and he went to it with nothing short of transforming the world in mind.

Jill Carattini is managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.

Morning    “I know that my Redeemer liveth.”    Job 19:25

The marrow of Job’s comfort lies in that little word “My”–“My Redeemer,” and in

the fact that the Redeemer lives. Oh! to get hold of a living Christ. We must

get a property in him before we can enjoy him. What is gold in the mine to me?

Men are beggars in Peru, and beg their bread in California. It is gold in my

purse which will satisfy my necessities, by purchasing the bread I need. So a

Redeemer who does not redeem me, an avenger who will never stand up for my

blood, of what avail were such? Rest not content until by faith you can say

“Yes, I cast myself upon my living Lord; and he is mine.” It may be you hold him

with a feeble hand; you half think it presumption to say, “He lives as my

Redeemer;” yet, remember if you have but faith as a grain of mustard seed, that

little faith entitles you to say it. But there is also another word here,

expressive of Job’s strong confidence, “I know.” To say, “I hope so, I trust so”

is comfortable; and there are thousands in the fold of Jesus who hardly ever get

much further. But to reach the essence of consolation you must say, “I know.”

Ifs, buts, and perhapses, are sure murderers of peace and comfort. Doubts are

dreary things in times of sorrow. Like wasps they sting the soul! If I have any

suspicion that Christ is not mine, then there is vinegar mingled with the gall

of death; but if I know that Jesus lives for me, then darkness is

not dark: even the night is light about me. Surely if Job, in those ages before

the coming and advent of Christ, could say, “I know,” we should not speak less

positively. God forbid that our positiveness should be presumption. Let us see

that our evidences are right, lest we build upon an ungrounded hope; and then

let us not be satisfied with the mere foundation, for it is from the upper rooms

that we get the widest prospect. A living Redeemer, truly mine, is joy

unspeakable.

 

Evening    “Who is even at the right hand of God.”

Romans 8:34

He who was once despised and rejected of men, now occupies the honourable

position of a beloved and honoured Son. The right hand of God is the place of

majesty and favour. Our Lord Jesus is his people’s representative. When he died

for them, they had rest; he rose again for them, they had liberty; when he sat

down at his Father’s right hand, they had favour, and honour, and dignity. The

raising and elevation of Christ is the elevation, the acceptance, and

enshrinement, the glorifying of all his people, for he is their head and

representative. This sitting at the right hand of God, then, is to be viewed as

the acceptance of the person of the Surety, the reception of the Representative,

and  therefore, the acceptance of our souls. O saint, see in this thy sure freedom

from condemnation. “Who is he that condemneth?” Who shall condemn the men who

are in Jesus at the right hand of God?

The right hand is the place of power. Christ at the right hand of God hath all

power in heaven and in earth. Who shall fight against the people who have such

power vested in their Captain? O my soul, what can destroy thee if Omnipotence

be thy helper? If the aegis of the Almighty cover thee, what sword can smite

thee? Rest thou secure. If Jesus is thine all-prevailing King, and hath trodden

thine enemies beneath his feet; if sin, death, and hell are all vanquished by

him, and thou art represented in him, by no possibility canst thou be destroyed.

“Jesu’s tremendous name

Puts all our foes to flight:

Jesus, the meek, the angry Lamb,

A Lion is in fight.

“By all hell’s host withstood;

We all hell’s host o’erthrow;

And conquering them, through Jesu’s blood

We still to conquer go.”

 

Fight the Lord’s battles.    1 Samuel 18:17

The Christian is involved in a continual war, with Jesus Christ as the Captain of their salvation. He has said, “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”2 Listen to the battle cries! Now let the people of God stand firm in their ranks, and let no man’s heart fail him. We may feel in these days that we are losing the battle and unless the Lord Jesus shall lift His sword we do not know what may become of the church of God in our time; but let us be courageous and bold.

Seldom has there been a time like this as biblical Christianity trembles on the brink of capitulation to pluralism and empty religious routine. We are in great need of a bold voice and a strong hand to preach and publish the Gospel for which martyrs bled and confessors died. The Savior is, by His Spirit, still on earth; let this encourage us. He is always ever in the middle of the fight, and therefore the outcome of the battle is not in doubt. And as the conflict rages, what a deep satisfaction it is to know that the Lord Jesus, in His office as our great Intercessor, is prevalently pleading for His people!

Turn your anxious gaze from the battle below, where, enshrouded in smoke, the faithful fight in garments rolled in blood. And lift your eyes above where the Savior lives and pleads, for while He intercedes, the cause of God is safe. Let us fight as if it all depended upon us, but let us look up and know that it all depends upon Him.

On the basis of our Savior’s atoning sacrifice and in the strength of the Holy Spirit’s power, we charge you who love Jesus to fight bravely in this holy war, for truth and righteousness, for the kingdom and the crown. Onward! The battle is not yours but God’s, and you will yet hear Him say, “Well done, brave warrior, well done!”

 

2Matthew 28:20

The family reading plan for April 20, 2012

Ecclesiastes 7 | 2 Timothy 3