What Does Jesus' Death Have To Do With Me? (3)
Wednesday March 23, 2016
When we pray we often expect God to immediately change everything for our good. We want others to be sorry for the harm they have caused us, and for them to make things right. We want to be finished with whatever needs to be done to make our relationships and circumstances what we desire them to be. However, life doesn’t work that way. What does Jesus death show me about getting through difficult times?
Let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith. Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame. Now he is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne. (Hebrews 12:1b-2 NLT)).
Jesus had to go through the suffering and death of the cross before God’s plan of redemption was fully recognized by His friends. Even though Jesus had told His disciples that three days after His death on the cross He would be resurrected from the dead, they appear not to have understood. They had their own ideas of how Jesus was going to fix the suffering in their world, but God had a better plan.
Like the disciples, we often give up on God too soon because we believe He is not doing things our way or in our time frame. The truth is that God is never wrong in the way He does things and He is always right on time. Our interpretation of how God operates often is in error because it is based on our own limited understanding rather than God’s wisdom which is much fuller than ours. We want a quick and easy solution to our problems while God may be building character that only develops through perseverance. As we submit to His ways and watch things work out for our good over and over again, our patience and trust in God will grow.
The choice before us today is to trust God and endure, looking forward to what lies ahead, or, stumble and fall, supposing we know a quick and better way. Why not choose to, “run with endurance the race God has set before us”? (Hebrews 12:1 NKJV)
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