Dear Faith Family,
"The Bible is an answer to the question:
What does God require of man?"
(Abraham Heschel)
Every genuine journey of faith is an asking of this ultimate question. Whether we ask from a place of desperation, dissatisfaction, disillusionment, or, like the rich young ruler, out of a desire for more, we all, in some way or another, ask, "Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" (Lk. 18:18).
Whatever circumstances, whether internal or external, compel the question of faith, our natural human tendency is to deduce a calculable return: X amount of time, X amount of effort, X amount of activities, services, and attendance to get the right offering. "Just tell me what to give," we seemingly say to God. "The more precise, the better, and I'll give it."
The problem is, in our calculations, we presume that God demands a return, a gift to honor Him. We have become, as Rabbi Heschel points out, "Oblivious to the fact of [our] receiving infinitely more than [we are] able to return," and so our presumption keeps us at the center of faith--what we can "do" and give. After all, as another Jewish writer said,
'Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?'
For from him and through him and to him are all things.
To him be the glory forever. (Romans 11:35-36)
In the next verse, the apostle Paul, like Jesus did with the rich young ruler, gives us the answer to the ultimate question: What does God require of man? NOT YOUR GIFTS, BUT YOUR LIFE.
...therefore present your bodies as a living sacrifice,
holy and acceptable to God... (Romans12:1)
Our All About Jesus story from Sunday gave us the same answer, revealing that what God desires more, is not the gifts to honor Him but a life given over to Him. A life, whatever and only the life we have, offered to Him with the expectation that the question is not about what we can give in return but what will be produced when life is where it is meant to be, in His Life.
Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit...By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit
and so prove to be my disciples. (John 15:5,8)
As we said on Sunday, the good thing for you and me is that what God demands of you is all you have to give...nothing more and nothing less. May we not withhold what Jesus did not withhold from us.
By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us...
(1 John 3:16)
Love you, faith family! God bless.