Busy days sure keep me hopping, Father! This has been a very full week and it is not over. Thank You for strength, wisdom, guidance, and Your love to get me through it all. I am blessed to be called Your child!
Mark 8:11-13 (<<click to read the passage)
We first heard Jesus’ “sigh” when He was amongst the Gentiles in Sidon. He is once again given reason to sigh but this time it is in response to individuals who should have known better.
One of God’s attributes that is a bit challenging to grasp is the fact that He is the Almighty, All Powerful Creator of all there is. There is no doubt whatsoever! Yet…in all His might, as I have heard many times throughout my life, He is a gentleman. He loves us more than we can begin to comprehend but He has endued us with a free will. And he is a gentleman in that He will never make us follow Him. He calls us. He diligently pleads with us to forgo the eternal separation that will be ours if we do not abide in Him and accept Him for who He is – our Lord and Savior.
In this passage, Jesus sighs (and the Amplified Bible includes His groaning, as well) because the Pharisees “argue with him” demanding “that he show them a miraculous sign from heaven to prove his authority.”
In frustration Jesus exclaims, “Why does this generation demand a sign? I assure you and most solemnly say to you, no sign will be given to this generation!”
He loves them, yes, but until they yield their hearts to Him, their hearts will remain hard and resistant – and no miracle of any sort will change that.
The picture for today’s post is from an album cover put out by the group Glad way back in 1983. I still have LP and the picture has stuck with me all these years. Christ demands that we give Him No Less than All as the album title proclaims. Withholding our acquiescence to His authority keeps our hearts hardened. Our only hope of changing our hearts of stone is to give them over to Him.
Ezekiel 36:26 NLT says,
And I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony, stubborn heart and give you a tender, responsive heart [i.e. a heart of flesh].
Lord Jesus, we are prone to emulate the Pharisees. We plead, rid us of our hearts of stone and give us responsive hearts that we may abide in Your will in all we say and do. Amen.
Apr 25th, 2019, Thurs, 7:51 pm
