Year: 2021

Taking a Pause

Leave a comment

As we continue in our new teaching series, A Fresh Start, we are examining yet another of the basic spiritual disciplines that all followers of Jesus need to be incorporating into their lives. This time it’s prayer. Like engaging with the Scriptures, prayer is basic. It is a foundation stone. It is one of those things we must get in place before we can do just about anything else. Let’s spend a few minutes thinking about why and how.

Taking a Pause

Have you ever been busy? Heh. How about, when was the last time you weren’t busy? Maybe the 13th of last Neveruary? We live in a busy world, don’t we? There’s always something to do. Even when there’s nothing to do, there’s still something to do. That’s the story of our household. Even when we don’t have any work to do, there’s still laundry to wash and laundry to fold and laundry to put away and bathrooms to clean and clothes to pick up and clutter to disperse and floors to vacuum and Nerf bullets…so…many…Nerf bullets to collect and Legos to build and the list goes on. Then there’s the list of things we actually want to do. It never stops. I don’t know about you, but some days I feel like the only real time I get to stop and breathe while I’m awake is when I’m in the shower. I’ll just about drain our hot water heater some days because that’s protected space. I can’t do anything for anybody else and I’m digitally disconnected which, for me, is even more important.

Read the rest…

Morning Musing: Mark 5:32-34

Leave a comment

“But he was looking around to see who had done this. The woman, with fear and trembling, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell down before him, and told him the whole truth. ‘Daughter,’ he said to her, “‘your faith has saved you. Go in peace and be healed from your affliction.’”‬ ‭(CSB‬‬ – Read the chapter)

Have you ever been in the spotlight when you didn’t want to be there? Some people seek the spotlight relentlessly. They thrive off of people recognizing them. They really don’t care whether the attention is for good reasons or bad ones, they just want to be noticed. More—and I’d argue many more—are content to not be noticed. Sure, getting their 15 minutes of fame sounds thrilling, but only if it lasts 15 minutes. Other than that, they’re just fine being mostly invisible. This becomes especially true when they have some reason to hide. Well, this woman Jesus healed wanted to hide. Jesus called her to the spotlight. Let’s talk about why this was the best thing He could have done for her.

Read the rest…

Digging in Deeper: Mark 5:30

Leave a comment

“Immediately Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and said, ‘Who touched my clothes?’”‬ ‭(CSB‬‬ – Read the chapter)

Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. In fact, that’s often the case. And when it happens, we have to simply sit back and marvel at it. Trying to understand will just make our heads hurt. When it comes to the Scriptures, sometimes the things we find are too strange not to be true. This is especially the case when it comes to Jesus and the Gospels. Sometimes the stories the authors tell are so unexpected or seem so different from what we might expect that they have to be true. This is one of them.

Read the rest…

Digging in Deeper: Mark 5:25-27

Leave a comment

“Now a woman suffering from bleeding for twelve years had endured much under many doctors. She had spent everything she had and was not helped at all. On the contrary, she became worse. Having heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his clothing.”‬ ‭(CSB‬‬ – Read the chapter)

Have you ever been desperate? I mean, truly desperate. The kind of desperate where you’re willing to do anything—even things you wouldn’t have considered before hitting that point—in order to get what you are convinced you need? That’s a scary place to be. It’s a place where hopelessness and despair can easily take hold of our lives and not let go. For this particular woman, it led her to reach out and do something most people would have considered crazy. Let’s dig in to her story together.

Read the rest…

Morning Musing: Mark 5:22-23

2 Comments

“One of the synagogue leaders, named Jairus, came, and when he saw Jesus, he fell at his feet and begged him earnestly, ‘My little daughter is dying. Come and lay your hands on her so that she can get well and live.’”‬ ‭(CSB‬‬ – Read the chapter)

When was it that you finally cried out for help? For me, most recently, it was when we purchased a new TV stand for our living room. Looking at it on the Sam’s showroom floor it didn’t look all that big. It was swallowed up by the room. I figured I could manhandle it into the house. Once it was loaded in the back of my van straight from the forklift and in a box that filled every square inch of the cargo space, though, it became clear that was not going to happen. I cried for help. That was a pretty insignificant cry for help in the grand scheme of things. Sometimes in life we run up against walls entirely more intimidating than that. Who we reach out to in those moments matters.

Read the rest…