WATCHWORD:
14 Dear brothers, what’s the use of saying that you have faith and are Christians if you aren’t proving it by helping others? Will that kind of faith save anyone? 15 If you have a friend who is in need of food and clothing, 16 and you say to him, “Well, good-bye and God bless you; stay warm and eat hearty,” and then don’t give him clothes or food, what good does that do?17 So you see, it isn’t enough just to have faith. You must also do good to prove that you have it. Faith that doesn’t show itself by good works is no faith at all—it is dead and useless. James 2:14-17
25 Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. 26 When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost,” they said, and cried out in fear. 27 But Jesus immediately said to them: “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.” 28 “Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.” 29 “Come,” he said. Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. Matthew 14:25-29
Meditation:
Doing Exceptional Things?
“Hello Dolly”. Opening night went beautifully and we received prideful reviews in the local newspaper. Civic Theater had done it, again!
I was one of the principal characters and I stood in the wings awaiting my cue on the second night. I was ready, my opening lines just waiting to bless the audience. My cue came just as I remembered my whole family was there on the front row. I rushed out on stage, opened my mouth and…nothing! Try as I might, I found no words, I had all the gestures down just right, but no words. Fortunately the one I was silently shouting at realized what was happening and fed me my lines, and the scene played on. But my dream career on the stage dissolved into dust that night.
I had lost my focus. Discipleship is built entirely on keeping our focus on the supernatural grace of God. Walking on water is easy to someone with impulsive boldness, but walking on dry land as a disciple of Jesus Christ, day in and day out, that’s something altogether different, and requires focus.
Oswald Chambers tells us “Peter walked on water to go to Jesus, but he followed him at a distance on dry land”, according to Mark 14:54. To be honest, we don’t need the grace of God to withstand our personal crises, our human nature and pride are sufficient to deal with those storms. But it does require the supernatural grace of God to live 24 hours of every day as a saint, going through the drudgery of living an ordinary, unnoticed, and ignored existence as a disciple of Jesus.
As we have grown up in the faith, somewhere along the line it became ingrained in us that we have to do exceptional things for God, but the truth is we do not. However, we do have to be exceptional in the ordinary things of life, and we have to be holy as we walk the ordinary streets among ordinary people. This is not learned in 5 minutes. We learn it by stumbles, times when we fell short, gathered ourselves, and took the next step, on the stage of our life, trusting that He would always be with us, with the Holy Spirit feeding us our lines.
I could turn a story into the fact that as I took those first two steps out on the stage with nothing in my brain, and continued to center stage where my friend began to lift me up and feed me lines. I could say that is not the way that happened, but I would be wrong. Oh, my fellow actor gave me my lines, but, I rather think that my Lord smiled at my pride-filled stupidity, forgave me, and bailed me out.
Have you ever been bailed out by the Lord? No? Really? Maybe you should pay closer attention. So be it.
Keep Your Focus on Him:
Heavenly Father, I praise Your name that I am a new creation in Christ and a member of His body. Help me Lord, to keep my eyes fixed on the Lord Jesus and focused on His victory. Help me to take every thought that enters my mind captive, so that it is not tainted by the ways of the world. Help me not to allow my attention to be diverted away from the things that are eternally important to the temporal things of the world, which are quickly fading away. Help me Lord, to focus on You as I wake in the morning, as I rest at night, and throughout every passing day. Lord, I desire to grow in grace and mature in the faith. Help me not to lose heart or to grow weary, but set my heart on things above, and be ready be respond according to Your will. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
