Revelation 2:1-7 Remember Your First Love

Revelation 2:1-7 NIV
Bishop Frederic Baraga, missionary to the Ojibwa, during the 1800's, often reminded the people to "remember their first love." In his vision, St. John was instructed to warn the church at Ephesus about their falling away from their first love, who is Jesus the Christ.

Whenever we put anything or anyone before our God, we are committing idolatry. God must always come first and everything else will fall into it's proper place. How often we neglect to put God first in our lives! It is so very disheartening to see those who profess to be Christians putting so many other things of this world before worship and service to God.

The message to the people of Ephesus is an excellent example of both law and gospel. Jesus, in John's vision, commends the church for their hard work and perseverance; for the fact that they cannot tolerate wicked people; and have confronted those who claim to be apostles and are not. Even as they are being commended for their faithfulness in these areas; they and we are being warned against idolatry. Remember your first love. Remember him and keep him first in your life.

"Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God." (vs 7)

God's Peace - Pr. J

2 Corinthians 12 Ecstasy And Thorns

2 Corinthians 12 NIV
Paul experienced an "ecstasy" fourteen years prior to writing this letter. He claims that he was caught up to paradise where he heard things he was not permitted to tell. Well, he doesn't actually claim it was he who had this experience. He speaks in the third person possibly to deflect any admiration toward him that might occur because of this incident. Paul's mission (and ours); after all, is to proclaim Jesus the Christ not to boast about himself. It may well be that he did not speak of this incident previously because he was not permitted to tell what he heard in heaven. So what good would it have accomplished if he spoke of the incident, but could not tell anyone what he heard there? It would have only sounded like boasting about himself and his experience.

Paul does his best to defend his ministry without boasting about himself. Yes, he was gifted with the opportunity of hearing these unspeakable things in the third heaven. Yet, he was given a thorn in the flesh (we know not what that was) to remind him of his own weakness and not to boast about himself. So rather than boast about this moment of ecstasy, Paul boasts about his weaknesses so that Christ's power might rest on him.

God would not take Paul's "thorn" from him. Weaknesses are not a bad thing. It is when we can recognize our weaknesses and our limitations that we know that we must trust God to get us through.
When we realize that we are weak and can do nothing; then we are strong and not by our own strength but by the power of Christ that rests on us.

God's Peace - Pr. J

Luke 23:32-43 Criminal Saved By Faith

Luke 23:32-43 NIV
"Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise." (vs 43)  
Whenever I hear or read this promise of paradise to the criminal, I smile. It is such good news! The criminal hanging on a cross next to Jesus asks Jesus to remember him when he comes into His Kingdom. The criminal knows that Jesus is about to die. He knows and acknowledges that he is a sinful man and deserves the punishment he will receive in this world; that is death in this world. Yet, his request of Jesus to remember him when he comes into his kingdom testifies to his faith in the Kingdom of God where Jesus will reign. And... Jesus comforts him by assuring him that he will enter into paradise.

Thanks be to God! All who believe, who trust in him, will enter into paradise; into His Kingdom. It doesn't matter what you have done or what you have left undone. By faith, your sins are forgiven. The promised paradise is received and entered into by faith that we are forgiven our sins and welcomed in the home of our Father, through the sacrifice of Jesus for us, by the power of the Holy Spirit.

By faith in Jesus the Christ you have been saved!

God's Peace - Pr. J

Psalm 126 - Paradise Restored

Have you ever found something treasured that had been lost?  Have you ever felt like you were in the deepest, darkest valley and suddenly everything changed and you were on a mountaintop dancing in the sunlight and giddy as you breathed the mountain fresh air?

When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion, that's how they felt. They were filled with joy. They sang and danced for the LORD had done a marvelous thing. They proclaimed it to the world and the world acknowledged this great thing that God had done for His children.

God has done a marvelous thing.  He sent His Son, that all who believe in Him, would not perish, but live eternally in His Kingdom, in His presence! Let us sing and dance for joy.  Let us proclaim the good news that He has restored us to Paradise through His only begotten Son! Thanks be to God!

God's Peace - Pr. J