Bible study – goodchristianfiction

Jesus is my Superhero

Spring is a whirlwind of activity in my other life, the one where I go to health food industry conventions and visit manufacturing facilities. I get back from one trip just in time to head out for another one. As March fades into May, my house increasingly reflects the chaos of my mind and body. Dishes pile up in the sink, cat toys lay strewn where they’ve been batted by furry paws, my carpets bear the marks of heavy living without their regular vacuuming.

My travels take an equal toll on my body. My diet, always a challenge, flies out the window in the midst of the stress and upset routine of travel. My sugar intake skyrockets. I give in with increasing consistency to my comfort foods: chicken fried steak coated in creamy gravy, baked potatoes swimming in butter and sour cream, Tex-Mex enchiladas, and tortilla chips, and salsa. My usual, six-day workouts dwindle to catch-as-catch-can.

My mind struggles to function with my travel schedule and my poor habits. Stress, my forever friend, comes for a sleepover and sticks around like three-day-old fish. I find it hard to relax or to calm my mind, so that my thoughts run over and over, making it difficult for me to fall asleep or rest.

Most importantly, if I do not work at staying close to God, my spiritual house can become as untidy as my physical and mental houses. This year, my usual steadfast habit of Bible reading and study each morning has given way to last-minute catch-up items, oversleeping, and generally running out of time to do it. I have no valid excuse for this failure. God should always come first. But, I am supremely human, thankful for mercy, and wholly dependent on grace, and my inadequacy only underscores my abject need for God.

I remember one night this Spring lying in bed and realizing something powerful. No matter how bad things have gotten in my life, I’ve always made it through the bad times because God is there with me. Why, then, do I waste so much time being afraid about what might happen or is even likely to happen? As I embraced the idea that I can always call on Jesus and He will never be too busy to hear me, I felt such a sense of empowerment and peace.

But epiphanies that happen in the middle of the night can quickly fade in the harsh light of day, especially when you don’t make concerted efforts to build on your relationship with God and nurture your faith. Too often this Spring, my anxiety has won out over my faith. Instead of focusing on Jesus, I’ve focused on deadlines and bills, on health issues and work routines.

How grateful I am that God, the Creator of all things, is never too busy for me, even when I fall into the bad habits that make me “too busy” for Him. How do I know this? Jesus tells us: “Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows” (Luke 12:7). Paul assures Timothy, “This is good and pleases God our Savior, who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:3-4). No matter that we use His name in vain, that we mock Him in word and deed, that we ignore Him on a daily basis, God is always waiting patiently for us to believe.

“Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?” Jesus asks us (Matthew 6:27). When I truly embrace the truth that God is always with me, that when I call out to Him, He allows me to feel His presence, I understand the truth of that question. Jesus is like the ultimate superhero in my pocket. What do I have to fear?

As Summer fast approaches, I am glad to put paid to another busy Spring. I will spend this Summer getting back into my regular reading of the Word. I will make God an active participant in my daily life by seeking Him often, not just when I feel desperate or totally alone, but when I am happy as well as sad, when things are going well along with when they seem to be falling apart.

Sometimes a busy life is just busy. But making God the center of your life, that’s the kind of powerful stuff that leads to prosperous living no matter how busy or inactive you may be.

In Christ,
Ramona

Studying the Bible can be the most frustrating and the most rewarding thing you will ever do. Even if you don’t enjoy studying, per se, taking the time to read the word of God on a regular basis will reap benefits. Not only my own experience, but the Bible itself supports this thesis.

Timothy tells us that “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). In other words, the Bible comes from God and contains within it every thing we might need to do the good work that God would have us do.

Christ underscored the importance of the Word when He answered the devil’s temptation with the conclusion that “man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). Paul adds hope to the promises of what we can expect to gain from studying the Bible: “for whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope” (Romans 15:4).

But, the New Testament is not the only source of proof that the words of God are worth our undivided attention. Joshua promises prosperity and good success if we are careful to do “according to all that is written in it” by “meditat[ing] on it day and night” (Joshua 1:8). The Psalmist proclaims that God’s “word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (119:105), that He is “our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble (46:1). Isaiah explains that God’s full intention is to have His word used to accomplish His will, using the metaphor of the natural relationship between the seed and the sower: “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it” (55:10-11).

Sometimes, we want to avoid the parts of the Bible that are challenging to us, and lots of times those difficult parts are in the Old Testament (OT). But, as Philip Yancey reminds us, the OT is actually the Bible that Jesus read.

I was vividly reminded of the bonuses available in regular study of the Bible this week as I was making my way through the book of the prophet Jeremiah, who is warning Jerusalem about the coming tide of the Babylonian invasion. In chapter 6, Jeremiah writes, “This is what The Lord says: ‘Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls….” (16).

Remember how the OT is the Bible Jesus read? Are you struck like I was by the echoes of His words in this verse? Christ tells us the path is narrow to the Kingdom (Matthew 7:13-14), but promises that His burden is light (Matthew 11:30). And one of my favorite treasures from the word is when Christ promises, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid” (John 14:27).

So, the same promise that God was making for His people in the time of Jeremiah, He continued to offer to all of us, including Gentiles, through the words and actions of Christ.

I’ve left off the saddest part of the verse from Jeremiah, however, for at the end of verse 16, The Lord concludes, “But you said, ‘We will not walk in it‘” [emphasis added]. The Israelites who had refused to walk in the ways of God were facing destruction of their worldly kingdom. For those who refuse to follow the way of Christ . . . .

What we fill our minds with is what will come out of us. The more we know about the things that matter to us, the less likely we will be persuaded to do something that is actually contrary to what we profess to believe.

When I was in Sunday school as a child, we were told the “story” of the woman who saved up her whole life to afford a cruise. Because she had spent all her money on the cruise ticket, she spent the week of the cruise living off of saltines she had brought along, watching others indulge in the abundant food available as her stomach grumbled. Only at the end of the cruise did someone finally explain to her that her food had been included in the ticket!

Let’s not live a life nibbling saltines when our acceptance of Christ’s salvation has opened up to us an entire banquet of wisdom and love and peace–all just waiting to be discovered in His true, sometimes challenging, but always rewarding Word.