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He Breathed His Last

Fri, 02 Apr 2021 07:55:07 GMT

THE KING OF THE JEWS

Hello, Faith Family,

Today is a somber day of remembrance and many mixed emotions as we reflect on the crucifixion of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Sadness as we remember...
Unjust trials in the night
The crown of thorns
Flogging Him
Mocking Him
Spitting on Him
Dividing His garments as He hung on the cross
Blaspheming Him
His torn, beaten, bloody and unrecognizable body

44 Now it was about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. 45 Then the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was torn in two. 46 And when Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, He said, "Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit." Having said this, He breathed His last. Luke 23:44-46 nkjv

Joy as we know...
He did this for you and me!
The veil is torn!
Our sins are forgiven!
He loves us extravagantly!

Won't you take time today to reflect on what Jesus did for us so many years ago... That He did this so that we could have a right relationship with God... That He bore the excruciating pain and humiliation for us?

Jesus is enough.

Rest in Him.

IT IS FINISHED!

He loves us more than we can fathom and this day proves it. My prayer today is that you reflect on Jesus' sacrifice, look to Him and never turn back.

Faithfully yours,
Kristie Livingston

Not My Will

Sat, 27 Mar 2021 08:02:09 GMT

Good Morning, Faith Family!

I remain in Luke continuing our march to the crucifixion. This week we're in the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus was praying before He was betrayed.

Jesus understands that the time has come and He retreats to a familiar place with his disciples - a place that' 'He is accustomed to'. As is also typical, the disciples followed Him. What Jesus proceeds to do in these verses is show us the love He has for His disciples, His obedience to the Father, and His humanity.

39 Coming out, He went to the Mount of Olives, as He was accustomed and His disciples also followed Him. 40 When He came to the place, He said to them, "Pray that you may not enter into temptation." 41 And He was withdrawn from them about a stone's throw, and He knelt down and prayed, 42 saying, "Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours be done." 42 Then an angel appeared to Him from heaven strengthening Him. 44 And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. Then His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. Luke 22:39-44

These moments in the garden are so intimate and we are given the opportunity to see them -- to see how Jesus is feeling, His moments with His Father, and the loving care He has for His disciples.

Jesus knows both what is immediately in store for His disciples and that He will be leaving them soon. He knows they will need strength to withstand the impending temptations, so He instructs them to pray to ask for the strength to resist them. He knows they are not strong enough on their own to resist temptations and that praying will give them more strength to resist.

We can take this to heart also, as Jesus instructs His disciples, He is also instructing us. It should then make sense to us that if we stay in communication with our Lord, that He will give us that same strength to resist the temptations in this world, strength to endure all that life will throw at us. And yet, it is painfully obvious that we fall short - both in praying and in resisting temptation, just as the disciples fell short.

In this passage, Luke tells us that Jesus withdraws from the disciples, but only by a 'stone's throw', which indicates He was close enough to them that they could still hear Him. Jesus didn't want to completely separate Himself from His disciples, but He also needed precious time with His Father.

These verses clearly show us that Jesus was in agony knowing what was ahead of Him. He knew He would soon endure the horrific death on the cross, and what was even worse, He would be completely separated from God. This quite literally means the weight of the world was on Jesus. After all, this was the reason Jesus came to earth and this was the will of His Father.

Jesus' prayer is a beautiful and intimate scene. He shows us His humanity when asking the Father to take this cup -- He didn't want to take on this suffering and divine anger. In that moment He asked His Father to remove it, but only if it was His will. Even in these words, Jesus remains obedient, telling God that if it was His will, it would be done. In this intimate prayer time with God, Jesus shows us that it is ok to express our feelings to God. We too, can tell God how we are feeling and still remain obedient to His will.

In God's grace, He sent an angel to strengthen Jesus. This is a beautiful picture of God's love. What I find interesting is that once the angel strengthened Him, His agony increased. We see this in the verse 44 - where He began to pray 'more earnestly' or 'fervently' depending on the version you read. And then Luke likens Jesus' sweat to great drops of blood. Jesus is in so much agony that He is sweating blood, which is a foreshadowing of the blood shed on the cross.

Friends, we have been given the ultimate gift. A gift that we cannot even begin to repay, nor are we expected to repay it. Jesus paid the price. Jesus is the only one who could have paid the price. The debt was too great for anyone else. Jesus loves us so much He gave His life for us.

This is how much God loves us, how He extravagantly loves us. God gave us His own Son to die, to carry all of our sins - past, present and future - to the cross so that we could be brought back to a right relationship with God. So that we can have a new way of living! We can go directly to our Father because Jesus paid it all! Jesus, so generously, gave us a new way to live. He is alive! He is the living way!

Live for Jesus because He loves us extravagantly. Live for Jesus because He gave us His everything. Live for Jesus because He is alive and gave us a new way to live.

Faithfully yours,
Kristie Livingston

Satan Wants You But Jesus Prays for You

Fri, 19 Mar 2021 08:13:12 GMT

Good Morning, Faith Family!

Easter is on my mind and this week and I found myself in the book of Luke right before Jesus was taken into custody. In these verses, Jesus is both addressing all the disciples and Peter singularly. Jesus knows that all will suffer because of Him and He also knows that Peter will be challenged sooner than he realizes. In Peter's beloved fashion, he responds with arrogance and pride, which is a sure sign that he is about to fall.

31 And the Lord said, "Simon, Simon! Indeed Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat. 32 But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren." 33 But he said to Him, "Lord, I am ready to go with You, both to prison and to death." 34 Then He said, "I tell you, Peter, the rooster shall not crow this day before you will deny three times that you know me." Luke 22:31-34 nkjv

There are a few things I find intriguing about these verses.

Verse 31
1. Jesus addresses Simon (Peter) by using his name two times. This is telling us that what Jesus is about to say is both personal and significant. 2. Both instances of the word 'you' in this verse are the plural versions, so Jesus is addressing all the disciples, not just Peter. 3. Satan asks Jesus to have the disciples -- meaning Satan does not have any power without Jesus' approval. 4. Satan wants to sift the disciples like wheat. Sifting wheat makes all the chaff fall away. He wants the disciples to fall away entirely.

Verse 32
1. Jesus says that He has prayed for Peter - in this verse, 'you' is singular. So, now Jesus is addressing Peter directly. Jesus knows that Peter is about to deny him and is especially at risk. 2. Even though Peter will deny Him three times, Jesus also assures Peter that he will return to Him. And when Peter returns, Jesus instructs him to turn to others and strengthen them in their faith. This is important later as we learn Peter's outcome.

Verse 33
1. Here Peter shows his arrogance and spouts out that he is ready to go to prison and even die for Jesus.

Verse 34
1. In this verse, Jesus tells Peter that he is going to deny Him three times. And after the third denial, the rooster will crow. Peter must have thought Jesus was crazy and that there was no way he would deny Jesus even one time.

In Luke 22:54-62 Peter proceeds to deny Jesus three times and when the rooster crows, Jesus looks at Peter. Peter immediately remembers what Jesus said, weeps bitterly and leaves. Peter's betrayal brings him to his knees in repentance. Later Jesus tenderly forgives Peter and it is a beautiful scene of how much Jesus loves Peter and vice-versa.

We can all apply these verses to our lives. We can be assured that Satan wants to sift each of us like wheat. He wants to see everyone blow away like chaff. He does his best to lead us astray...

But Jesus!

Jesus prays for us. He knows this life is difficult and that our faith will falter. But He also knows that when we go through these trials, our faith will be strengthened on the other side. And when we get to the other side, we are to strengthen others as they falter.

Isn't this beautiful? Jesus prays for us in our failures and sin. He strengthens us through our trials and sin.

Jesus died for each of us and He loves us so extravagantly that He did not come down from the cross. Our sin nailed Him to the cross and in all of His perfectness and pain, He remained there and carried out the will of God.

If you are faltering in your faith right now, know that Jesus is praying for you. He is strengthening you. Won't you look to Jesus, soak in all of His love and turn back to him?

Faithfully yours,
Kristie Livingston

Have Faith and Believe

Sat, 13 Mar 2021 08:25:11 GMT

Hello, Faith Family!

The verses I've chosen for today are well-known and because of that, they often get read without too much thought. I know I do this all the time. Today, I stopped on these verses because of the words "Have Faith" and "Believe". I think these words are often taken for granted. Every day, in addition to having faith in God, there are many things we put our faith in. Faith that the sun will rise, the grass, flowers, plants, and trees will grow when Spring comes back, we'll go to work, the chair we sit on won't break... so many things we put our faith in without even thinking.

But Jesus commands us in these verses to "Have faith in God." This means that we are to put our reliance upon Jesus Christ for salvation; that we have a confiding belief in the truth. And God is that truth. Sure, probably all of us would say, "Yes, of course I have faith in God and rely on Jesus Christ for my salvation." These words are easy to say, but can be hard to do on a day-to-day basis. In reality, these four words are a huge command.

Not only does Jesus command us to have faith in God, He also commands us to "believe" that whatever we ask in God's name has already been granted to us. This doesn't mean that God will provide whatever we ask of Him. God is not a genie in a bottle. But, if we have faith, we are to pray asking for God's will to be done and we are to believe that what we have asked has already been done.

And Jesus answered saying to them, "Have faith in God. Truly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, 'Be taken up and cast into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says is going to happen, it shall be granted him. Therefore I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them, and they shall be granted you." Mark 11:22-24, nasb

Have you checked your faith and belief lately? Is your faith dialed in and fine tuned or is it checked out and on the back burner? One easy way to do a reality check -- ask yourself these questions.

Have I been relying on myself to get through my day or have I truly been relying on God? In my prayers, am I believing God has already answered them and then patiently wait for the answer to come? Are my prayers spoken expectantly? Am I already believing God has provided and handled the situation?

In the prosperous times it is easy to forget about God. It's easy to forget that God is still with us in our daily lives. For me, it is easy to think I am on my own; doing this life by myself and I fall back to relying on self. It's easy to forget that God is still in control and that He always has been and always will be in control.

God desperately wants to be part of our every day lives - no matter if we're in prosperous times or a trial. We just need to stop and listen. Won't you have faith, believe that He is in control and providing for our needs and let Him in today?

Faithfully yours,
Kristie Livingston