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For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin. Hebrews 4:15
Have you ever taken the time to sit and listen to any of the promotional television shows? Each show has a product or ‘system’ to sell that will make your life easier physically, relationally financially or career-wise. The problem with most of these shows is that they can’t possibly take into account your particular life circumstance, your past, your family situation, your feelings or your hurts.
Wouldn’t it be nice if there were a show on TV that gave you ten easy steps to having whatever you wanted or needed in life? The unfortunate reality is, it’s not going to happen. No one can possibly give you an easy answer to all the things that are troubling you. There is no quick-fix to the disappointments, the pain of abuse, the fear of the future or the shadows of your past, those ghosts in the closet that you have kept hidden for years.
Worse yet, no one fully understands how you feel. You may be lucky enough to have one or two friends that can understand somewhat the feelings you are going through. They may be able to cry with you, listen to you and support you, but nobody can climb inside your body to know exactly how you feel. No one, that is, except Jesus.
Jesus alone knows and understands exactly how you feel and understands your weakness. In fact, the Bible says he personally has experienced every temptation, every rejection, every struggle you have. The difference is that Jesus never gave in to those temptations, never let the rejection keep him captive, never allowed the attacks of other people to affect how he viewed himself.
Even though he knows how to overcome all those obstacles, he’s not going to hold that over you. You’ll never hear Jesus say, “Suck it up! I resisted. I overcame. You just need to be strong. You just need to reach deep within yourself and resolve to be better”. Jesus won’t criticize us because even though he was victorious over the struggles of life, he knows we are weak. He knows we fail.
Jesus is our great high-priest. A high-priest was the person that would go before God with our sins and seek God’s forgiveness on our behalf. When Jesus goes to the Father with our sin, he says something like, “I know he’s failed again. I know she’s having a hard time with forgiveness and that addiction, but I know how he/she feels. I was there. I know the struggle and the power life can have over them.”
There aren’t ten easy steps to perfection. But there is one easy step to forgiveness in Jesus Christ. There is one person in this world who understands every time you’ve failed. Every time you’ve given in to an addiction, a struggle, anger, hate or any of the other things that attack. Jesus understands. He longs to hold you in his arms of grace. He’s only a prayer away.
PRAYER: Dear Jesus, I don’t fully understand how you can understand me when I don’t understand myself most days. There are so many days when I wake up in the morning determined to conquer the obstacles in my path, only to fail miserably. Thank you for knowing how I feel. Thank you for accepting me anyway. Forgive me for my failings and empower me to get up and keep going. In your name I pray, Amen.
After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him. John 13:5
So, imagine, just for a moment, that you are one of Jesus’ disciples. It’s been a long day walking along the hot and dusty road through the wilderness. You are hot and tired. Even the thoughts of the people Jesus healed in the last town aren’t lifting your spirits. All you can think of is laying down to eat and giving your hot sore feet a rest.
As you enter the room where the meal is to be served you breathe a sigh of relief. The room is ready. The clay walls have kept the room cool. A welcome relief from the blazing sun outside. You scan the room briefly. Table is ready. Bread is out. Fresh wine is already poured. Foot washing bowl is in the corner complete with towel and ….wait. Where is the foot-washing servant?
You shake your head. Judas and his penny-pinching. How hard would it have been to get a servant to wash your feet? The coolness of the room is replaced by the heat of anger rising inside you. It doesn’t take that much to plan.
You look around once more. Nope. No servant. Most of the others probably think your face is red from being outside. It isn’t. It’s red with anger as you make your way to your spot. Hopefully you’ll get a place near Jesus so that if an opportune time comes you can tell him what you think of the lack of a servant.
John reclines beside you. Great! Everyone knows that he has the smelliest feet of the group and now there’s no one to wash them. Can this day get any worse? Your thoughts are interrupted by the sloshing sound of water. A momentary sense of relief comes as you turn towards the sound. The momentary relief is replaced by shock as you look down and see Jesus at your feet. Towel wrapped around his waist, his hands gently washing the hot dust from your feet. It feels so incredibly good on one hand, and seems so incredibly wrong on the other. He’s the Rabbi! He has no place stooping so low as to wash our feet.
What was that he was saying? No servant is greater than his master? Of course not. A servant is a servant. Then it hits you. We are all servants. John with his stinking feet is no better or worse than you are. Judas with his penny-pinching, shady ways is on the same level as you too. And Peter, with his arrogant, speak-now-think-later ways? No worse than the attitude you are embracing in your heart.
It’s the same Jesus today as in the upper room. He is still willing to kneel down to your level. He’s still willing to touch you in the areas that are most in need of his touch, no matter how dirty, no matter how rotten those areas are.
His love is like soothing cool water on hot, painful feet. His touch softens the hardest calluses of your soul. Jesus thinks nothing of stooping to the lowest level to lift you up. Let him wash your feet today. Feel the soothing, healing relief of his love and forgiveness. Then reach out to those who need to feel that touch as well.
PRAYER: Dear Jesus, thank you for the lesson of the feet washing. I confess that there are too many times I’ve thought myself to important or too busy to reach out to others who need to feel your touch. Refresh me with the soothing touch of your love and forgiveness. Empower me to share your love and forgiveness with those around me. In your name I pray, Amen.
Jesus replied, “Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. John 14:23
Imagine what it would be like if your favorite actor, athlete, author or some other public figure gave you a call and said something like, “Hey there, I’ve been thinking of you lately and was wondering if I could stop by your house for a chat?”
What would you do? Thank him profusely and tell him under no circumstances do you want to see him? Would you suggest that you meet him elsewhere, say a restaurant or coffee shop or your favorite burger joint? What if he insisted that he come to your house and that he would be there in an hour?
No doubt you’d look around and decide what could and could not be cleaned. You’d think about repainting or re-carpeting…but you don’t have time. You may even consider borrowing a neighbor’s house and telling your guest that he had the address wrong.
Once your emotions were somewhat under control you’d think of the people to invite, the food to serve…you still have time to run to the store for a few things. Over the span of the next 59 ½ minutes you would do everything in your power to have your home looking it’s best for your guest.
Take this story to a whole new level. Now imagine that your guest really isn’t coming just for a visit. He wants to move in. He wants the room down the hall and on the left and he wants to be able to wake up every morning to have a cup of coffee with you and chat about the day ahead! Oh, and instead of this guest being some admired public figure, envision this guest as being God instead of some famous public figure! Sound outlandish? It isn’t.
Jesus told his followers that he and his Father not only wanted a relationship with them. He wanted to live with them. Let that sink in a bit. The great God of heaven, the creator of the universe, the almighty, all powerful, all knowing God WANTS to live with YOU.
Now, you may think, how would I ever be able to prepare my humble shack for God? That’s the other beautiful part of this story. You don’t have to clean up to get ready for him. God wants to come into your home and do everything that needs to be done for him to dwell with you. How’s that for an Extreme Makeover!
You may be thinking, “I’m not worth all that”, and you are right. You aren’t. But God’s desire for you is based on his love for you, not on your worthiness to receive it. All he asks of us it to love him and show him our love by obeying his word.
PRAYER: Father God, I’m in awe to think about how much you must love me if you want to live with me. There are days when I don’t even want to be around me, but you always want to be around me. I pray that you would come into my home. Forgive me for the mess I have here. Empower me by your Spirit to show you my love through obedience to your word. Amen.
Is anything too hard for the Lord? I will return about this time next year, and Sarah will have a son.” Genesis 18:14 (NLT)
You can’t do it. You know you can’t. It’s impossible. You’ve tried before and failed and you’ll fail again. Why bother to try? You really need to be more realistic about your abilities. You’ve prayed about it. You’ve done everything right and it hasn’t happened. Why not just give it up now. Move on. That’s one dream that was never meant to be.
We’ve heard it all before. Those voices that remind us that we’ve failed. Those not-so-gentle reminders that we’ve fallen short of our potential or expectations. We’ve wasted yet another opportunity for success. We haven’t measured up, we don’t measure up, and since it seems to be a pattern, we probably don’t have much of a chance to measure up in the foreseeable future.
Words of gloom and doom can come from the expected sources; the people who seem to have as their goal in life to be our enemies regardless of how we try to live in peace with them. These remarks can come from those who are so-called friends but are really wolves in sheep’s clothing. It’s especially painful when they preface their remarks with “I’m telling you this in Christian love”. (Yeah, right. I can feel the love oozing from your pores.) Even parents are guilty of the destructive tongue, those who are supposed to nurture us and care for us.
Some people should be given the benefit of the doubt I suppose. Their intentions may be noble; it’s just their method that has the diplomacy of a fox gone wild in the chicken coop. Well intentioned attacks are still attacks!
But the most painful voice we hear, the most destructive one that has the most impact on us is the voice that comes from within. We are often our worst critic. We are the ones that can do the most damage to our own possibilities. I can imagine Sarah’s frustration when God said she’d have a baby. She’d heard God promise this before but the promise had long been drowned out by the women at the well who constantly asked “So, you pregnant yet?” It wasn’t always a verbal question, but there was no denying it was there.
The words ricocheted from one side of her skull to the other. “Is nothing to hard for the Lord? No, of course not. But where’s my baby?” Then one day it happened. There were stirrings inside her that she’d never felt before but longed for since she was a young woman. A few months later the midwife handed her a little pink bundle of God’s fulfilled promise!
Never give up. Never listen to the voices of the nay Sayers and the speakers of gloom and doom. Your Heavenly Father, the God of the universe, Creator of the seen and the unseen, loves you. God’s promises may come in ways we don’t expect, but they will come. His promises may take longer than we’d like, but they always come in his perfect time.
Never stop believing in God’s ability to give you the victory you desire. Never give up on you. Losing faith in yourself will keep you from the blessings God so earnestly wants to give you.
PRAYER: Father God, all my life I’ve been running from the voices that tell me ‘I can’t’. Some of those words have come from people I loved and trusted the most. Their words have left a gaping wound in my soul. Some of those words have come from me. I ask that you would fill the wound in my soul with your love and forgiveness. Empower me to believe that your word is true and your promises will be fulfilled in your time. Grant me the patience to wait. In Jesus name I pray, Amen.
Mike Fisk & Built with Grace 