Just some early morning thoughts from me to you…
Jesus said to him,
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
Matthew 22: 37-40 (NKJV)
A couple of months ago we finished the season of Advent—which means “to come.” Now we’re in the season we call Lent, a period of forty days, not including Sundays, from Ash Wednesday to Holy Saturday, starting another period of reflection and hope, like Advent.
Of course, as Advent marked the coming of the Savior, Lent leads to the fulfillment of His coming on Easter Sunday, as we follow Him to the Cross and then the Empty Tomb.
So here’s the question for you and me—what are we as His followers doing to honor that which Christ did—coming, dying, raised to life for us and to change the world? Are we doing anything to change the world ourselves? To become more like He intended for us to be? What are we doing that’s important? What are we doing that will honor the Empty Tomb we will celebrate again in a few weeks? I wonder if there is before us, an opportunity to change the world.
No matter where we are, or what we’re doing, we are in a season of reflection where we need to ask ourselves: Are we honoring what God did for us through His Son? Are we using our gifts, abilities, resources, money, time, and the platforms God has given us? Or, instead, are we simply honoring and doing what the world says is important?
As I look around—you can see it and what the world says is important, being lived out in so many lives and places. And there’s a part of me that feels that the world is winning.
So here are a few things for our perspective—
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Each weekend this past fall hundreds of millions of dollars were spent to watch and produce football games in colleges, and within the NFL, where for the most part winning is all that anyone cares about. Now the NCAA and NBA basketball is at hand, while baseball is also beginning;
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The Miami Marlins signed 25 year old slugger Giancarlo Stanton a couple years ago to a 13 year, $325 million contract—a rate of $154,321 a game;
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The Pittsburgh Steelers just signed wide receiver Antonio Brown to a five year, $71 million contract to play football;
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By the time this day is over it is estimated that 26,000 children will have died this day alone around the world because of starvation or a preventable disease;
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In 2017, an estimated forty-one million adults and children will have been enslaved into sexual trafficking systems around the world. And many more will have been abused and neglected;
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Over 1 in 5 children in this country will go to bed hungry tonight.
So, as we head toward Easter, and considering what Christ did for us, what do you suppose our perspective should be as to what we should be doing with our lives? As we head toward Easter Sunday, what are we doing to honor what Christ did for us—with the gifts, resources and the opportunities we have to make a difference?
As we think about that, and as we remember and reflect on what God did for us through the birth, death and resurrection of His Son, maybe we can also resolve to honor what He did for us, with what we will do for others.
Think about your answer to this question: are the things we are living for and doing in and with our lives, worth Christ dying for?
What would Christ’s answer be to that question, as He watches us live out each day of our life?
In His Name—Scott
Copyright 2017. Scott L. Whitaker. All rights reserved.
