Spiritual Ponderings

"The sower went out to sow his seed; and as he sowed, some fell beside the road, and it was trampled under foot and the birds of the air ate it up. Other seed fell on rocky soil, and as soon as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture. Other seed fell among the thorns; and the thorns grew up with it and choked it out. Other seed fell into the good soil, and grew up, and produced a crop a hundred times as great." As He said these things, He would call out, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear." (Luke 8:5-8) When we look at the seeds as representing saints who are commissioned to bear fruit, how does that affect the response of those saints who are cast onto far less productive soil? What if bearing fruit does not look like what we typically think of, like harvesting many souls for God? What if a saint is seemingly abandoned in a place of dishonor, their reputation is blackened and they end up emotionally and even physically destroyed? Is their ...

I just read some things this morning that have opened my understanding just a little more about the true nature of the work of Jesus and the ministry of mediation He came to accomplish. For a long time I have known that this idea of mediation is not intended to appease an angry God from punishing sinners. But I need to know much more clearly just what it is designed to do. The reason that Jesus took on human form was so that sinners, both human and angelic, could have access within their sphere of existence to treat God the way they really wanted to treat Him. Humans ever since sin have felt in their rebellious spirit that God is unfair but there is nothing they can do about it. Because He seems so distant and out of touch, His dealings with us tend to be viewed as arbitrary and sometimes even harsh. Sin at its core is really the lies about God that we have be thoroughly infected with and that have been passed down from generation to generation through our lineage from Adam. I am n...