In this Gospel account, Jesus has just healed a man who
had been unable to walk for thirty-eight years.
For nearly four decades people walking through this busy intersection
had seen him lying there, powerless, fading into oblivion. Now he could pick up the mat that had been
his home, and walk like God created him.
Good story! But, what does it
have to do with human unity? Well, it
serves as the perfect illustration of the illusion of human unity.
We all want what the man got. He
was sick, disabled, and weak; Jesus made him strong and able. Yup…you keep doing that, Jesus – that’s what
we all want. And it seems so. And many preachers teach so. But it isn’t necessarily so!
The strength all humans crave…to be more fit, more
healthy, more wealthy and wise, comes at a price. Often that price is the strength of
others. If there is one at the top of
the heap, that means all the rest are below…and at least one at the
bottom. If you have a dollar more than I
do in the bank, you have more, I less.
Today there is a huge push towards unity and equality in
the human family, and that is not a bad idea, in fact it’s a grand, ethereal,
Godly ideal. But the humanistic view of
unity has a crack that will eventually reveal how much crumbling is in the
future for the house of cards upon which it stands. That crack is the void of faith that still
separates. At some point (to be
determined by the Father in Heaven) judgment will divide that crack, and all
human activity and plans will cease.
Scripture tells us that if there is no faith, you cannot
please the God who made you.[1] Those who fling-about catchy slogans, like Together we’re stronger, or pump their fist in the
air as a show of human strength and unity, yet leave God back in the closet of
antiquities to be ignored, are living in the crack of the foundation; even
worse, they’re hiding the crack, providing a false hope of some utopian myth, that, if we will all just agree, or be unified (on
all my ideas, of course, not yours, thank you), well, in that case, everything
will be just fine.
Decisions are a definite turning-point, where you go
left, instead of right…north, instead of south.
And when it comes to eternity, and the God who is truly Lord of all, the
Supreme author and sustainer of life and existance, that decision is vital to the
most important question you can get answered:
What’s to become of me? Jesus minced no words when he stated that in
four short sentences:
“Everyone who acknowledges me
publicly here on earth, I will also acknowledge before my Father in
heaven. But
everyone who denies me here on earth, I will also deny before my Father in
heaven. “Don’t imagine that I came to
bring peace to the earth! I came not to
bring peace, but a sword. Matthew
10:32-34
For You Today
You chew on that as
you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day!
There are about 2,000 devotional
posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions
library. To dig deeper on
today’s topic, explore some of these:
Leaving God Behind and Circle of Life
Images: Title
image Pixabay.com Images without citation are either personal
property of the author, or in public domain.
Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation©
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