Kingdom's Keys Fellowship
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Easter 11 Resurrection and the Cross of Hope
Easter 11 Resurrection and the Cross of Hope
If Jesus is the perfect example of hope in action His Resurrection is hope realized not only for Himself but also for all humanity. And if prayer is hope in practice we have to ask, ‘How did Jesus pray?’
Before we answer that question we need to return to the Cross. Jesus knew He was about to face the cruel injustice and agony of the Cross. That one event, the Cross, is the overarching most important event in all of recorded history. It is the moment, the conscious moment of every choice and decision that has been or will ever be made. It is the self-conscious series of moments when Jesus faced the constant barrage of inner and outer pressures to give in to the devil’s temptations; to retreat, to abandon His Father’s will, to escape the lonely terrifying end of conscious existence called death.
In those moments all His previous moments are at stake. The moments He taught, healed and gave hope that God was real, personal and caring,---those moments, hung in the balance. All previous history was on the line, from God’s choice of the Jews, Scripture, prophecy and all Creation, was it all true?
Bottom line, ---was God real, was there a right way to live, was truth just an illusion, is our experience of living all there is? The meaning, the significance and purpose of existence would depend on Jesus’ final choices and decisions.
Jesus’ moments were and are every person’s moments. Was He really who He said He was? Every personal conscious moment of decision and choice in every human being’s life from that time on rested on Jesus’ self-conscious choices. He took upon Himself the aloneness we all experience from birth to death. He was never really understood nor totally believed and He knew it. Who really understands or knows any of us completely? Only God does and Jesus bore that in His choices for us as well. This is what makes the Cross the balance beam for all existence.
The key for Jesus was not only what He knew in faith but also what He hoped for. His faith and hope were in His Father and His Word. But it was His hope in what He believed about His Father and what His Father promised in the Word that He carried to the Cross for all of us. His hope was realized in His Resurrection. Thus His hope realized becomes our hope not only at our death but whenever we make a conscious choice in the moment we are challenged to choose God’s way or our way. Every moment we live brings with it a conscious choice to live for God or for self without God. If we hope in Christ, if we believe the Spirit of hope is moving within us, then every conscious moment carries with it Jesus’ call to take up our cross and in so doing to be resurrected in it. Then we have lived the promise in the here and now that ‘Christ is in you, the hope of glory (Col.1:27).’
How did Jesus display hope in His final hours? Stay tuned.
If Jesus is the perfect example of hope in action His Resurrection is hope realized not only for Himself but also for all humanity. And if prayer is hope in practice we have to ask, ‘How did Jesus pray?’
Before we answer that question we need to return to the Cross. Jesus knew He was about to face the cruel injustice and agony of the Cross. That one event, the Cross, is the overarching most important event in all of recorded history. It is the moment, the conscious moment of every choice and decision that has been or will ever be made. It is the self-conscious series of moments when Jesus faced the constant barrage of inner and outer pressures to give in to the devil’s temptations; to retreat, to abandon His Father’s will, to escape the lonely terrifying end of conscious existence called death.
In those moments all His previous moments are at stake. The moments He taught, healed and gave hope that God was real, personal and caring,---those moments, hung in the balance. All previous history was on the line, from God’s choice of the Jews, Scripture, prophecy and all Creation, was it all true?
Bottom line, ---was God real, was there a right way to live, was truth just an illusion, is our experience of living all there is? The meaning, the significance and purpose of existence would depend on Jesus’ final choices and decisions.
Jesus’ moments were and are every person’s moments. Was He really who He said He was? Every personal conscious moment of decision and choice in every human being’s life from that time on rested on Jesus’ self-conscious choices. He took upon Himself the aloneness we all experience from birth to death. He was never really understood nor totally believed and He knew it. Who really understands or knows any of us completely? Only God does and Jesus bore that in His choices for us as well. This is what makes the Cross the balance beam for all existence.
The key for Jesus was not only what He knew in faith but also what He hoped for. His faith and hope were in His Father and His Word. But it was His hope in what He believed about His Father and what His Father promised in the Word that He carried to the Cross for all of us. His hope was realized in His Resurrection. Thus His hope realized becomes our hope not only at our death but whenever we make a conscious choice in the moment we are challenged to choose God’s way or our way. Every moment we live brings with it a conscious choice to live for God or for self without God. If we hope in Christ, if we believe the Spirit of hope is moving within us, then every conscious moment carries with it Jesus’ call to take up our cross and in so doing to be resurrected in it. Then we have lived the promise in the here and now that ‘Christ is in you, the hope of glory (Col.1:27).’
How did Jesus display hope in His final hours? Stay tuned.
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