SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 8/24/2016 9:51 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-2 “His Claim”
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 11:20-27
Message of the verses: I want to focus in on verses 25-27 as we
finish this section this morning: “25
Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in
Me will live even if he dies, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in Me will
never die. Do you believe this?" 27 She said to Him, "Yes, Lord; I
have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into
the world.’”
The two statements
that we see in this section “he who believes in Me will live even if he dies,”
and “everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die,” seem to be opposite
statements, but the teach separate though related truths. MacArthur writes “The one who believes in
Jesus will live even if he dies physically because He will raise him on the
last day (5:21, 25-29; 6:39-40, 44, 54).
And since everyone who lives and believes in Him has eternal life (3:36;
5:24; 6:47, 54), they will never die spiritually…since eternal life cannot be
extinguished by physical death. As a
result, all who trust in Christ can exult ‘O death, where is your victory? O
death, where is your sting?’ (1 Cor. 15:55).”
Jesus then
asks Martha “Do you believe this?” What
really was He asking her to believe? He
was not asking her if she believed that He was about to raise her brother from
the dead. John MacArthur quotes R. C. H.
Lenski who says: “To believe “this” is
to believe what He says of Himself and thus to believe ‘in Him.’ It is one thing to hear it, to reason and to
argue about it; and quite another thing to believe, embrace, trust it. To believe is to receive, hold, enjoy the
reality and power of it, with all that lies in it of joy, comfort, peace, and
hope. The measure of our believing,
while it is not the measure of our possessing, since the smallest faith has
Jesus, the resurrection and the life, completely, is yet the measure of our
enjoyment of it all.” I have to say that
this sheds some new light on what I have believed about the question that Jesus
asked Martha here. We know that Jesus
had a great love for Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, and so Jesus was pointing her
to the only source of spiritual life and well-being which of course was
Himself. We have to put ourselves in her
sandals to help us to understand how much Jesus loves her, and believe that He
loves us in that same way, for after all He was about to go to the cross and
die for Martha, along with all of the world.
Martha
confirms he belief in Jesus by saying “Yes, Lord; I have believed that You are
the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world.” This is one of the many great acts of faith
seen in the gospels as we have seen Andrew in 1:41; John the Baptist in 1:34,
Nathanael in 1:49 and also the disciples in Matthew 14:33. The last part of her statement confers
statements from the Old Testament that the Messiah would come into the world.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I have to confess that the political turmoil
in our country is very distressing to me, and I think for good cause, however
the hope of the resurrection is much more important to me than what is going to
happen to this country even though I care very much for the freedoms that we have,
especially to spread the Word of God to the lost and to practice our faith as
we see fit.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Remember the truth of the
resurrection, to give peace to my life today.
Memory verse for the week:
(Romans 6:8) “8 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we
shall also live with Him,”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Surely I come quickly.”
Today’s Bible question:
“Who said ‘Seek me a woman that hath a familiar spirit, that I may go to
her, and enquire of her’?”
Answer in our next SD.
8/24/2016 10:26 AM
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