January 9, 2015
Luke 6:12-16
You are looking for a few
men to lead your mission, and at your disposal are the personnel files of
everyone on planet earth. With our super
computers and other resources this is not that far out of reach, but when Jesus
walked on planet earth there were no such resources. But Jesus being the Son of God knew about
something greater than super computers, He was about prayer.
Jesus knew that His Father
was Omnipotent; had all authority and power, was Omnipresent; always present
everywhere, and was Omniscient; all knowing.
So before making any decision and especially about His mission, He never
lost sight of His mission statement, it’s found in so many parts of the Bible,
such as Luke 19:10, “For the Son of Man came to seek and to save
the lost.” You may wonder,
when did God the Father come up with such a plan, maybe after Adam and Eve sinned,
and you would be so wrong? For God put
the plan to redeem mankind together before He ever created the world we call
earth. This mission is about Jesus, the
LORD of LORD’s and the King of kings who stepped out of being worshipped and
took on flesh, so that you and I could grasp a small part of God’s love for us.
In Paul’s letter to the church in
Ephesus we find this insight; “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places,
even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and blameless before him.”
(Ephesians 1:3-4 ESV)
We find Jesus going to the
mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to His Father. Where else would anyone go but to the source
of all power, all knowledge, who is and was and always will be present, when
picking the men who would implement your plan. I am often amazed how I’ve navigated life,
made major decisions without going to the Father who is so willing to listen
and guide me. Do you recall what Jesus
told us in John 16:7, “Nevertheless,
I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not
go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.” The Holy Spirit is our helper, but
unless we go to a quiet place and spend time with Him, we will not have the
resources Jesus had.
It
is the morning, after spending the night in prayer with the Father, and Jesus
is going to pick twelve men out of the entire Jewish nation to be His
disciples. Now you talk about your super
computers, the Father did not miss one subject, not one candidate, they were
all considered and most of them were market place men. Not one was from the religious group, from a
worldview this plan did not have a prayer, but from heaven ‘s view it was going
to change the world, and it has.
My
prayer is that if you see yourself as religious you examine yourself, for
Christ did not call religious men to follow Him, but men who would enter into a
relationship with Him. I also pray you
will drop the title of your denomination and tell the world around you that
you’re a follower of Christ.
From
the Back Porch,
Bob
Rice
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