The King of Kings, the Son of God, Jesus came to earth to live amongst His people.
He spoke only Truth. He healed the sick. He cast out demons. He forgave people their sins. He welcomed children into his arms. He raised the dead.
And for the life he lived, he was granted great honor and glory amongst his people. 😊
Actually, it didn't turn out that way. 😞
The Religious Leaders hated him and conspired to kill him and the people, who for a time followed him, in the end turned into a bloodthirsty mob screaming for his death, which is exactly what they got.
The “King of Glory” was beaten, stripped naked, nailed to a cross and slowly died hanging between two criminals.
🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀
Now we live in a time when the whole world hates Jesus.
Jesus told us in the Bible,
“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first.”
And
“‘They hated me without reason’”.
The question I asked in the title I am not asking of you, I am asking it of myself.
Laura-Lee, will you follow Jesus
when He asks you to sell all you have and give to the poor?
when the only bed you have is a bed of straw?
when the only task he gives you is to wash the feet of those who betray you?
when you are hated by those you love because you have told them the Truth?
when you are so filled with fear you're sweating blood?
when your own people are calling for your death?
when the only crown this world will offer you is a crown of thorns?
(sigh) 😞 I don't know. My heart is so prone to selfishness and I tend to bail out when the going gets tough, but I WANT to be that kind of follower of Jesus.
“Lord, give me strength when I am weak. Help me to follow you even if no one else in the whole world does. Make me act bravely even when I am terrified. Give me the eyes of faith to see beyond the darkness of life around me and focus on the Life yet to come and, when you return, Jesus, let me still be found faithful to you.”
Amen.
Love Always,
Laura-Lee
“ Peter said to him, ‘We have left all we had to follow you!’
‘Truly I tell you,’ Jesus said to them, ‘no one who has left home or wife or brothers or sisters or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God will fail to receive many times as much in this age, and in the age to come eternal life.’ ”
(Luke 18:28-30)
“ And what more shall I say? I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson and Jephthah, about David and Samuel and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised;
who shut the mouths of lions, quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword; whose weakness was turned to strength; and who became powerful in battle and routed foreign armies.
Women received back their dead, raised to life again.
There were others who were tortured, refusing to be released so that they might gain an even better resurrection.
Some faced jeers and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment.
They were put to death by stoning; they were sawed in two; they were killed by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated—
the world was not worthy of them.
They wandered in deserts and mountains, living in caves and in holes in the ground.
These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised, since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.”
🌿❤️🌿❤️🌿❤️🌿❤️🌿
“And wilt thou leave me thus,
That hath loved thee so long
In wealth and woe among?
And is thy heart so strong
As for to leave me thus?
Say nay, say nay!”
(Poem by Thomas Wyatt)
