Fire codes require
public buildings to have a posted notice of the maximum occupancy and my church
has an occupancy of 265. When Jesus preached to the people in Capernaum the
fire marshal was nowhere to be seen and the room was so packed there wasn’t
even standing room outside the door. A maximum occupancy however didn’t deter
the friends of a paralytic who simply cut a hole in the roof and lowered the paralyzed
man down to Jesus. Sadly, many of us allow the size of a crowd, obedience to a man-made
regulation, or a lack of faith keep us from boldly approaching the Lord…not
only for ourselves, but also on behalf of others. “When Jesus saw their faith,
he said to the paralytic, “Son your sins are forgiven”” (Mark 2:5 NIV).
1 comment:
Gail;
-----Even though faith is the conviction of things not seen, it must come from somewhere; it must have a start of some kind. We don’t know anything about these men outside this very short story. But I am sure they did not say, “Hey, look at yonder crowd. I never saw anything like that before! I gots an idea! Throw ol’ Chuck on a stretcher and let’s go over there and find someone to heal him.” Crowds following Jesus everywhere He went evidenced the enormity of the chatter that was about. People running about with stories of how they were healed eventually ruled the public imagination. After a certain degree of evidence has been reached, denial must be brazen while belief becomes natural. Obviously these men had often heard of Jesus’ healings and had pondered the same possibility for their friend. By the time Jesus blew into town, they would be so convinced of their friend’s opportunity that nothing would overcome their ingenuity for getting him in front of Jesus.
-----Faith isn’t blind. The only blind faith is faith in a lie. For there is no evidence to support a lie, only twist and spin. But this world is such that all things together evidence what has happened. And what has happened is the truth. God interlaced world events with His message from beginning to end such that there is no excuse for anyone missing the fact Jesus is the Messiah.
-----Roughly five hundred and fifty years earlier, Daniel had been chatting with Gabriel. Gabriel told him that four-hundred-eighty-three years after a certain decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem an anointed one would be cut off. Yes, his words were a bit ambiguous in that no personal names were given, but the basic structure of events he foretold was undeniable. Jews were meticulous historians. They knew history was His story. So they knew when Artaxerxes made Nehemiah governor of Jerusalem and sent word through him to rebuild Jerusalem. Nearly four-hundred-eighty-three years later, here is this Jesus making a gargantuan splash all over the Jewish community, and beyond. The combination of scripture and current events should have made Jesus‘ identity unmistakable.
-----Because faith is the conviction of things unseen does not mean it is the conviction of things unknown. I have a friend who’s into Hindu up past her eyebrows. Her faith says Shiva and Buddha and Dolly Llama and whoever else anyone imagined to be anointed by God was anointed by God, “Because there’s room for everyone.” That’s the conviction of things unknown. God not only gave us His Word, He gave it interwoven into an historical context which together make understanding for faith to grow upon. So our faith rests upon Christ who is an historical figure attested to by undeniable traces of evidence. Although our eyes can not currently see Him, our minds can see Him clearly in these evidences such that our faith is not blind. And that it does not see, hear, touch, taste, or smell it’s object -Jesus- is not that it does not see, hear, touch, taste, or smell anything Jesus has done.
-----I love Frank Turik. He says, “When the next person asks you to show them a miracle, tell them to look down.” God miraculously created even the ground you are standing upon. And as mundane as it is, it is yet all the more light to serve the “eyes” of faith.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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