For the Restoration of Life and Soul . . .

The end of Acts 4 is what the Church looks like when we really understand the gospel. They brought everything they had, no longer considering themselves to “own” any of their possessions. I sometimes give money, but not to this degree. My things are MY THINGS. I find it even more difficult to be generous with my time. Honestly, sometimes a gift of money is quick and relatively painless. It lets me feel good about myself without giving up time and possessions that are dearer to me. Yet of those early believers it was said, “None of them would say, ‘This is mine!’ about any of their possessions but held everything in common” (Acts 4:32).   Can you imagine the thrill of living in those early days of the church and sharing things this way? Taking care of each other, not grasping for their own things. They lived as though they truly believed the gospel and that God was preparing a place for them in heaven where real life began and thus there was no need to hold onto things here. To be s...

     It’s been my tendency to read John 14 and look down on Thomas and Philip. Thomas, of course, already has the bad rap as “doubting Thomas.” The scene that led to that nickname had not happened yet when John 14 is told, yet my mind fills in the details of it and I’ve already stacked the deck against him. So he says, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Good grief, Thomas, haven’t you been paying attention? Jesus is about to die and is giving final, important words and you’re asking a question like that? And then Philip says, “Lord, show us the Father; that will be enough for us.” Are you kidding? Jesus responds, “How can you say, ‘Show us the Father?’” and I’m like, “yeah, Philip, how can you?”      When I do this I hold myself above Thomas and Philip and the other disciples who weren’t getting it. Oh, but I have the benefit of knowing how the story unfolds. I get to look back on it all with all the details filled in. But t...

          John 9 tells the wonderful story of Jesus giving a man his sight. It wasn’t restored because the man had been blind from birth. He was given sight for the first time. That’s cause for celebration! Yet that is not what happened. And it becomes the backdrop to a larger conversation about seeing.   The disciples didn’t see. They were blinded by the teaching that someone’s sin was responsible for the man being born blind. The Pharisees didn’t see. They had a genuine desire to honor God and tried to show it by going beyond the Law. In their zeal to please God they were blind to the value of people. The only one who truly saw was the one whose physical sight had been restored. He knew something substantial had happened that was beyond his sight being restored. He knew someone significant was on the scene because “No one has ever heard of a healing of the eyes of someone born blind. If this man wasn’t from God, he couldn’t do this.” I think pa...