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We Need to Live Our Lives Awake

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What Does It Mean to be Awake?

As we continue with Jesus on His journey to the cross, this week we find ourselves in the Garden of Gethsemane. They just finished sharing their last meal together. After singing a song, they went to the Mount of Olives. (Mark 14:22-26)

Jesus told them, “All of you will run away …” Peter insisted that even if everyone else runs away, he would not. Jesus said to him, “I assure you, this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny Me three times.” Peter insisted that he would never deny Him. (Mark 14:27-31)

We all know what happened later that night.

On the Mount of Olives was the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus told His disciples to sit and pray. Then, He took Peter, James, and John with Him further into the garden. Jesus was going through the distress of what He knew was coming.

Jesus asked these three to “remain and stay awake.”

Then He went on a little further and prayed. When He came back, He found them sleeping. He said to Peter,

“Couldn’t you stay awake for an hour?

“Stay awake and pray so that you won’t enter into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

This statement says a lot about us, doesn’t it? We want to do what’s right, but the world makes it hard.

Once again He went away and prayed, saying the same thing to them. When He came back, He found them sleeping again.

He then came a third time and said to them, “Are you still sleeping and resting? Enough! The time has come. Look, the Son of Man is being betrayed into the hands of sinners.” 

I think falling asleep in this Scripture is less about the physical act of the disciples sleeping and more about them, and us, going through life with our focus on the wrong things.

Prayer is one of those things that we too often overlook.

We need to be awake and in conversations with God.

Don’t go through life asleep. Wake up and live your life. The life that God wants you to live.

The Final Step of Peter’s Journey

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What Does it Mean to Let Jesus IN?

Over the past several weeks we’ve been going through the journey of Peter getting to know Jesus and the development of their relationship. This week we’ll discuss the final step of that process.

Have you noticed how all the previous messages have included words starting with the letters IN.

  • INtroduction
  • INvitation
  • INstruction
  • INterruption
  • Re-INstallation

This week we’ll look at INdwelling.

This journey began with Peter’s INtroduction to Jesus. All relationships begin here. Introduction is the act of introducing two people. We need to be introduced to Jesus as well as introduce others to Him.

The next step on the journey was Jesus INvitation to Peter to join Him in His journey. Invitation is what happens after being introduced. Peter needed an invitation from Jesus. One we’re introduced, Jesus invites us all to join Him.

As Peter is following Jesus, he gets INstruction from Him. This is when someone is showing and telling you how to do something. Instruction is the next level of learning. The Bible is full of God’s instructions for how we should live our lives.

Then what happens too often in everything we do is INterruption. This is where Peter let the things of the world interrupt his relationship with Jesus and he denied Him three times. Don’t let the world interrupt your relationship with Jesus. But if it does…

Jesus will forgive you and allow reINstallion.

This part of the journey is one of the hardest. After we mess up, why would anyone want anything to do with us, especially Jesus? This is probably the most important thing in this journey. This forgiveness we receive from Jesus is the reason He gave Himself up to be hung on a cross.

Don’t let this act of love go to waste.

This brings us to the final step of Peter’s discipleship journey – the INdwelling of Jesus. Indwelling is to inhabit or possess a person. This is what Jesus wants. He wants to inhabit and possess us fully. When this happens, we’ve come to a level in our relationship with Him that involves Him in everything we do.

The act of letting Jesus IN isn’t the same for everyone. But it’s up to us to take the journey.

How Much are You Willing to Sacrifice for the Ones You Love?

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God was Willing to Sacrifice His Only Son…That’s a Lot!

Most people are familiar with the Bible verse, John 3:16. It is the most popular verse out there. The reason for this is in its simplicity. This one verse summarizes the entire Gospel message in one simple statement.

This is the Gospel in a nutshell.  

  • Martin Luther called it “The Gospel in miniature”.
  • Biblical Commentator William Barclay wrote that it is “the very essence of the Gospel.”
  • Comedian Jeff Foxworthy stated, “This is the promise that bears hope for the hopeless.”
  • Gospel preacher, Robert Jackson, entitled it “The greatest sentence ever written.”　
  • Author Max Lucado described it as the “hope diamond of the Bible.”

John 3:16.

Jesus said to Nicodemus, the inquiring Rabbi, who came to Jesus by night:

For God

so loved the world

that He gave His only begotten Son,

that whoever believes in Him

should not perish

but have everlasting life.

John 3:16, “is a twenty-six word parade of hope: beginning with God, ending with Life, and urging us to do the same,” wrote Max Lucado. “Brief enough to write on a napkin or memorize in a moment, yet solid enough to weather two thousand years of storms and questions.

If you know nothing of the Bible, start here. If you know everything in the Bible, return here.”

An unknown author penned this tribute to John 3:16

“God“…………………………………………..….The greatest Lover

“so loved”………………………………………The greatest Degree

“the world”……………………………….….The greatest Company

“that He gave”………………………………………The greatest Act

“His only begotten Son”…………………………The greatest Gift

“that whosoever”………….………..……The greatest Invitation

“believeth”………….………………..…….The greatest Simplicity

“in Him”………………….…………………..…..The greatest Person

“should not perish”….……………….…….The greatest Promise

“but”………………………..………..………The greatest Difference

“have”….……………………………………..The greatest Certainty

“everlasting life”………………………..The greatest Possession

God’s willingness to give His Son to be killed on a cross by the very people that He came to save shows how much God loves us. This level of sacrifice is hard to emulate.

The Rev. George Bennard was “praying for a full understanding of the cross and its plan in Christianity.”, when he wrote the famous hymn, The Old Rugged Cross. He spent many hours in study, prayer and meditation, until he could say, “I saw the Christ of the cross as if I were seeing John 3:16 leave the printed page, take form and act out the meaning of redemption.”

As humans we overcomplicate the simple. We think everything has to be difficult. We think the message in John 3:16 is too amazing to understand and too simple to accept. It’s not!

It’s everything we need to know and nothing we don’t.

God has done all of the hard work… we just need to believe, accept and share!