A Day in the Life of Jesus

Recently I have been reading through the Gospels, particularly to watch and see the suffering and trials that Jesus endured while on earth in a human body.  The Scripture tells us that He was tempted in all points like we are, but I know sometimes I feel like I am the only one going through _______________.  Sometimes I even wonder if the Lord knows how I feel or what I am struggling with.

In Matthew 14, we get a glimpse into the daily schedule in Jesus’ public ministry.  It makes me weary just thinking of it, and it helps me know that He understands when I feel like life is swirling out of control and I am weary to the bone.

This chapter begins with Jesus learning that His cousin, and His ministry partner, John the Baptist, has been executed in prison.  Jesus immediately departs for a “desert place”.  I can imagine He wanted to be alone.  To mourn.  To process what had just happened.  Sometimes I feel like I am drowning in everything going on around me, and I can’t quite get a grasp on it because more and more keeps flying my way.  I need to take a break and have some silence.

However, Jesus doesn’t get the silence or the quiet time to pray or talk to God.  The multitudes of people follow Him, and He spends the entire day healing them and teaching them.  When evening comes, His disciples implore Him to send the people away so they can buy food.  But Jesus takes His ministry a step further and feeds the people.  He expends yet more energy to perform a miracle, provide the meal, and clean up the leftovers. 

Jesus instructs His disciples to get in a boat and go while He sends the people away.  Have you ever seen a stadium after the crowd has disappeared?  What a mess is left behind!  Or entertained another family for dinner, and after they go you don’t have energy to wash the dishes?  But I don’t imagine Jesus left the hillside a mess.

Finally, Jesus will get His quiet prayer time.  I sometimes get to the end of my days with five little people and realize I didn’t have time to pray or study my Bible that day.  I’ve been trying to make place for it all day long, but it constantly gets crowded out by the needs of others around me.

Jesus gets to His quiet place, and then He sees that the disciples are struggling in the middle of a great storm.  So He goes to their aid.  My Bible says it was the fourth watch of the night, which I understand to be 3-6 a.m.  As a mom, sometimes I cannot wait for bedtime.  I finally close my eyes in exhaustion, and the baby cries in the night.  Even far into the night Jesus hasn’t had much time to Himself or to rest or to “recharge His batteries.” 

The Lord comes to His disciples walking on the water to still their storm, but they scream in terror and assume He is an evil spirit.  No faith to believe Him or to trust that He would come to their aid.  They panic.  Were they even praying for His help?  Were they looking for His rescuing hand?

Peter musters the faith to walk on the water to go to Jesus.  But in his distraction he begins to sink, and Jesus must perform yet another task – rescuing Peter from drowning, and then stilling the storm.

The weary men finally arrive at the other side of the sea.  But the sleepy town is waking up in the wee hours of the morning, and they hear that Jesus has come.  So they bring to Jesus all the diseased people to be healed.  And so begins a new day in the ministry of Jesus.

I am not putting myself on the same level as Jesus, but I am realizing in new ways that He has experienced the same things I am experiencing.  He has walked in my shoes.  And in dependence on the Holy Spirit, He was victorious and had a successful ministry.  In His strength, I can minister to the needs of my family and others around me today, though I be weary, and though I didn’t get much time to pray, and though the demands never seem to cease.  Even though the baby had me up half the night and I never got to prepare mentally for a new day.  Jesus is there.  Am I like the disciples, of little faith,  not really expecting Him to come to my aid at all?  Or do I have faith to walk this road with Him by my side, knowing He has already traveled the road before and knows its final end?

Help

Today I was reading an adoration passage in Psalm 60.  Verses 11-12 say,

Give us help from trouble: for vain is the help of man.
Through God we shall do valiantly: for He it is that shall  tread down our enemies.

I was struck with this thought…

Sometimes my enemies aren’t physical people.  Sometimes my enemy is doubt, or fear, or worry.  Sometimes my enemy is stress, or emotions out of control.  Sometimes my enemy seems like five little kiddos all demanding a piece of me at the same time (but that’s really just stress, right?)  So the question that struck me today is, where do I turn for help?  Too often I ask my husband to help, or I turn to my own creativity to solve a problem.  Start a movie for the kids.  Sit down and breathe.  Make a to-do list.  Sometimes I yell and lose control of the situation.  But vain is the help of man. 

What I really need when all of the situations hit me in the face is to turn to God for help.  When I am drowning in doubt, or guilt, or out-of-control emotions, I don’t just need another set of hands, or a fresh look at the situation – I need God.  I need to turn to Him FIRST.  I need to realize that any victory will only be through His strength.

When I shout, “HELP!” it needs to be to God first.  Sometimes He may use the help of man (or my husband, or my friend, or my kids) to help me.  But I need to turn to Him first.

The Lord is my Rock

Photo from Moab, UT

Sometimes life overwhelms me and I feel like I’m sinking.  Sometimes I’m sinking in laundry and dishes; other times it is in self-pity or guilt.  I can never pull myself out of that desperate place on my own.  I have to remember that the Lord is my rock.  He is a firm foundation, even when I feel like life is ever-shifting around me.  He never changes, even my kids’ schedules and my emotions are on a roller coaster.  He is my defense from those darts of guilt and shame and condemnation that the enemy flings my way. 

When I was in Moab, UT and I saw this rock, Psalm 18:2 came to my mind. Psalm 28:7  came to mind also.  It says, “The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in Him, and I am helped: therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; and with my song will I praise Him.”  When I go back to the fortress, my heart is helped.  When I put my trust back where it belongs, I find rejoicing and my song returns.

I shall not want

I thought I had learned this lesson.  Many times.  But it keeps coming back.  “I shall not want.”  The Lord is teaching me this in new dimensions.  When I teach this verse to my kids, I ask them a series of questions.

“Who takes care of the sheep?”  Little voices answer with, “The Shepherd.”

“Who is the Shepherd?”  “Jesus.”

“Who is a sheep?”  “Me!”

The Shepherd takes care of the sheep.  His tenderness is pictured well in Isaiah 40:11 -  “He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young.”  He is so tender and loving; patient and kind.  Lifting those who need help.  Walking slowly with the little ones.  Even when it takes me a long time to learn what is He trying to teach me, He is still patient and loving and continues to walk with me.  He continues to prove Himself trustworthy.  He continues to meet my needs, so that I shall not want.

It took me a long time to learn that He provides financially.  Through seasons of no work, or underpaying work.  Through college bills and times of unexpected expenses.  Through bad economy and the needs of four children.  God has always provided what we need, just when we need it.

I used to be pretty stingy.  I can’t print those things for church because I will run out of ink.  Or, I can’t afford the gas to travel there/help that person.  Or, I can’t sign up to bring food for the church fellowship because I don’t enough.  Why did it take me so long to learn that God would supply what I unselfishly gave to others?  And yet many times I still have to remind myself that everything I have isn’t really mine – it came from God.  He provided our van.  He gave us our computer and printer.  He fills our refrigerator.  He gave me clothes for my children.  If I share it with someone else, He will replenish it (and He always gives more in return than I gave away to begin with).

Recently I felt like I had a breakthrough.  When there was no work (and thus no paycheck), I didn’t immediately cry or stress out, panicking about financial obligations.  There was peace that God would supply in the right timing.  And He did.  He has already made up what was lacking.  The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.

Now He is teaching me that He is my Shepherd in other areas.  Not just financially, but emotionally, and spiritually too.  I have felt a little dry lately.  Probably because I have four kids and my “quiet” times with the Lord are not really very quiet, and they are nearly always very short.  But somehow…providentially…He provides just what I need.  Just a thought or a verse for the day.  A text that someone is praying for me.  An article online that speaks to what I am struggling with.  A compliment or funny moment from my kiddos.

I haven’t sat through an entire church service for a while.  There are two babies who never seem to want to nurse at “the right time.”  But the portions of the service that I do get have been filling me up.  A phrase from a song.  The Scripture reading.  Or just the third point of the sermon.  A teenager’s testimony.  The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.

When things are hard in Mommy Land and I feel like I just can’t handle it, He is gently reminding me that He is there with me.  His grace is sufficient.  I can handle it.  When I feel like crying, or yelling, or having a nervous breakdown, He reminds me that this is His Will for me.  He tells me He is holding my hand.  He shows me that my kids are “catching” things from my life – is what I am “throwing” worth catching?  I don’t have to lean on another person.  It’s not what my husband can say, or the hug from a friend that gets me through.  It’s my Shepherd.  Gently leading me.  Sometimes carrying me.  The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.

It’s one of those verses that we learn as a child.  One that many people probably know.  But it’s so profound – so hard to live out.  But so wonderful to experience.

The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.

Thoughts on Thorns

Here are some highlights from a sermon preached by Evangelist Jim VanGelderen at our church’s Family Revival Meetings this week.  This sermon really touched me, and many in our church.  It is from 2 Corinthians 12.

Many Christians want Christ’s strength {the end result} but they despise the ticket to getting that strength {the means}.  The ticket is weakness.

The Apostle Paul was given a thorn in the flesh.  Brother VanGelderen pointed out that this “thorn” may very well have been a person.  His argument comes from the Greek word for messenger in verse 7.  This particular word is never used of an inanimate object, but always of a being – whether human or angelic.

So Satan can use “thorny people” in our lives to provoke us, to cause problems, to tempt us to sin.  But God wants us to take that thorny situation and depend on Him for strength.

We cry out, “Lord change ___________”, but God responds
with “I want to change you.”

Thorns reveal our weakness.  They are our ticket to God’s strength.  But we avoid the thorns because we don’t like to be reminded that we are weak.

We tend to think of strength and weakness only in physical terms.  We think, “Lord I can do this maybe 25%, but I need you to give me the strength for the other 75%.”  However, the word for weakness is really just the word for strength, negated.  It means zero strength.  Not little strength, but absolutely no strength.  It is speaking of spiritual strength.  Jesus said, “for without me ye can do nothing.” (John 15:5). 

This really resonated with me because that is exactly how I think.  I think that I can sorta do it, but not well, or not completely.  Then when He helps me do it I get proud and think that I did it myself.  Then I stop depending on Him.

So I don’t just need help to do it.  I need God to do it for me.  Through me. 

Our weaknesses need to scream so that we realize it is God doing it.  When I allow the weakness to make me a channel for His strength, then my weakness can scream so much that others are blown away with the power. They may see my weakness, but they will see what God can do with weakness.  They will want to be used by God too.

Every weakness I have is a potential channel for His strength.  He keeps thorns in my life so that we never forget that we are weak.  I  can realize my weakness, and live expecting His Divine power to work in me and through me.  Human strength is powerless to stop the enemy, but inside of me is He Who is Strength.