Peterson’s Message interpretation of today’s gospel reading is entitled “Watch out for Doomsday deceivers.” Our own flesh tells us that we can take care of our bodies, because they are “the Temple of the Spirit of God” (1 Cor. 3:16). But we deceive ourselves when we try to hold on to our fleshly existence and the material world around us. “The time is coming when every stone in each physical building will end up destroyed.”
Jesus says that you and I don’t have to worry about WHEN our end or the end of the world is going to take place. All kinds of doomsday fear-mongers are on television and in the news. Maybe some of you have friends and family that seem to panic with every major disaster or routine wars or uprising. We all have questions and answers about what this or that means. Is it a sign of good or bad things to come?
We buried our sister Louise Baker last Friday morning and it was very evident that her messages to her loved ones throughout the years and the messages that they shared at her funeral spoke of good things to come in heaven. In that memorial service I reminded them that we all walk around with pockets full of disturbing questions and answers. But Jesus asks you and me to reach deep down into those pockets and give Him some change.
Do you hear the truth in that imagery? What will you give Jesus in this life full of questions and answers? Will you give Him only some more questions and answers about the next loved one that dies, about “Nations fighting nation and rulers fighting rulers,” about “huge earthquakes and famines,” about whether the sky is falling, about how evil-doers might “arrest you, hunt you down, and drag you to court and jail?”
Or will you give Jesus change in your life? You can choose to go from good to better instead of bad to worse. Choose to share steadfast loving kindness instead of dog-eat-dog self-preservation. Jesus will accept the change in your life instead of all your doubts, worries and guilt. Even if all the world’s bad things might happen, Jesus promises that our changed person of the Spirit will live on. Every detail of your new body and soul—even the hairs of your head!—are in His care.
If you are willing to follow Jesus and live in the Spirit instead of the Flesh, then nothing of the sanctified and purified “you” will be lost. If you are dying to self everyday, then Jesus will give you a new person, a new creature to live in your place and you will forgive and even forget the old dead self you left behind. And you will live on. Then you can staying with it in this new life in Him. You can stay with Him to the end of this impostor life and find the real heavenly life in the kingdom of heaven at hand – right now! You can claim the change in your life instead of all the questions and answers. You can share with each other new relationships and new beginnings of the eternally new day in heaven with the heavenly host and with Jesus. Don’t be sorry. Don’t feel guilty about leaving all this behind – all the regret and guilt and sin will be forgotten and every tear shall be wiped away and you’ll be saved for ever and ever, Amen.
Dear Heavenly Father, thank You for the eternal joy that You provide in Jesus. When we look in each other’s face we know that we don’t have to see through a glass darkly – even now. We can see face to face. We can refuse to sleep in our old dead selves and be changed in a moment in a twinkling of an eye. Please help us to grow in our new spiritual bodies of holiness and righteousness. Raise us right so we can help others to be “raised right” in reflection of our brother, Savior, and Lord Jesus Christ. We change in and because of the name of Him, Amen.
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