This thing called 'the journey'...

On our Journey through the New Testament, we've been challenged to keep a journal, using the acrostic of s-o-a-p, as a daily writing assignment. One 'S'cripture verse that popped out in the chapter that we read that day. Then what we 'O'bserved about the chapter. 'A'pplication is next...and then a 'P'rayer thought about the word. I've been journaling for a very long time, it seems, so I've embraced this with great enthusiasm...but there are those that are very intimidated by writing down things. I try to encourage everyone to just write it down, the 'journal police' are not going to come and check it!

Because I get to teach our ladies' Sunday school class, I also get to pick the lesson topic. With their permission, of course, we all decided to do this journey together! It is so much fun for me to be in this group every Sunday morning. These are truly women that are seeking God's face each day...and His will for their lives...these women are very faithful in their reading and studying, they even bring their journals to class each week to enhance discussion!

Amazingly, this past week, I didn't get to go all the way through the lesson that I had prepared; the discussion was just too rich. Sometimes, you just have to ride that wave, because that is the way of our Lord! And so that the lesson doesn't go completely to waste, I wanted to share those thoughts here, I find them fascinating.

Mark 12:44 grabbed my attention because the last phrase there says that the poor widow had given more than everyone else because of this fact: 'she put in everything--all she had to live on.' Stay with me here. This spoke volumes to me about her faith. (As we talked about chapters 8-12 of Mark last night in our small group, we decided that a re-curring theme seems to be 'faith')

Just back in chapter 10, Jesus had had the conversation with the rich young ruler...remember him? He'd asked what he needed to do to inherit eternal life...Jesus told him to keep the commandments, the young man said he'd kept those since his youth, then Jesus told him to go, sell all he had and follow Him! He went away sad...Jesus eventually said to His disciples "How hard it is for the rich to enter the Kingdom of God!"--notice exclamation point, not a question mark...Jesus KNOWS how hard it is...

And, because of where we are sitting on the planet, we are 'richer' than most the world's population. We need to wrap our heads around how rich we are! If we stop our study there, we can feel pretty frustrated, figuring out what we should sell, how much we should sell...if we should keep anything...I feel very strongly that we are to hold all our possessions, especially those we count as dear and valuable...with open hands...(remember: Blessed be the Name of the Lord, He gives & takes away..blessed be HIS NAME!!!)

But, I was very encouraged when I read the passage from Mark 12:29-34...remember? The most important commandments are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and to love your neighbor as yourself. After Jesus relates this to the synagogue teacher, the teacher answers him back with this:
You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love you neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.

Then, Jesus tells him that he's answered wisely, and says to him: "You are not far from the kingdom of God."

Get this part right, and you won't be far from the kingdom of God!!!--That's exciting to me!

This teacher answered Jesus verbally, and Jesus saw that he was wise--the man, himself, used the word understanding instead of the 'your mind' that Jesus had said...if you take a look at Proverbs 1:1 & 2, it tells you that these Proverbs are good for attaining wisdom, discipline and for understanding words of insight!

I believe that we can learn from the widow's example of giving all we have...she understood the kingdom of God...because of her love for God, she was able to trust Him with her existence, how else would she have even considered giving all she had without any hope of getting more on her own strength? Just trusting that God would provide, because He's always been faithful in the past--she'd tested him to build her trust in Him before...

Start today...start today to build your trust...to be close to the kingdom of God...

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and love your neighbor as yourself, then give HIM all you've got...to show HIM how much you trust HIM...tell HIM about it, not everyone else...HIM only!