Walking like David

Today’s devotional from Jason begins with scripture:

Luke 18:35-43
As Jesus approached Jericho, a blind beggar was sitting beside the road. When he heard the noise of a crowd going past, he asked what was happening. They told him that Jesus the Nazarene was going by. So he began shouting, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!"

"Be quiet!" the people in front yelled at him.

But he only shouted louder, "Son of David, have mercy on me!"

When Jesus heard him, he stopped and ordered that the man be brought to him. As the man came near, Jesus asked him, "What do you want me to do for you?"

"Lord," he said, "I want to see!"

And Jesus said, "All right, receive your sight! Your faith has healed you." Instantly the man could see, and he followed Jesus, praising God. And all who saw it praised God, too.

This passage of scripture was one of David’s favorite passages to read. David was one of the youth I worked with in Johnson, AR. During one of our Bible study times we were going through this passage and he came and told me how much he loved this story. He said, "I like how no matter how much people kept the blind man from Jesus and tried to shut him up from yelling for help, he just kept on. He only shouted louder for help." David told me that was how he felt most of the time. Like he was constantly yelling for help and no one ever tried to help him. He said that he was the blind man realizing that Jesus was walking by and there was his answer to his blindness.

I will never forget that after this class, David walked up to the front of the auditorium and said that he was tired of feeling spiritually blind. He was tired of feeling like someone walking around with no direction and no hope. He knew the man to yell for and he was going to start shouting louder and louder for Jesus’ help. He rededicated his life to Christ that morning. That was almost 10 years ago now. I was reminded of this because I received an email from David a few weeks ago asking me if I would help him in his youth ministry. He and a few of my old teens, who are now twenty-something with kids of their own, have taken it upon themselves to work with the youth ministry there at Johnson, and are doing a wonderful job. David is developing their ministry goals and strategies, and he wants me to help him. We talked about that “Come to Jesus” moment 10 years ago, and I let him know how much he changed my life just by watching the transforming power of Jesus in his life.

The blind beggar and his amazing faith is one example of a God follower, but David and his outrageous passion for Jesus are another example of how Christ wants to change our lives. I told David that I wanted to be like him when I grow up. I told him that I was so proud of him and am so thankful that God placed him in my life. I have so many other stories of people like David who have been placed in my life that have helped this blind beggar to see, by pointing me to Jesus. What do you want? Jesus asks us. I want to see! Keep calling out! He’s waiting!

Jason

Making joy complete

Greg ends the week with these thoughts:

This week we have identified the joy in knowing God's power and knowing that he is mighty to save, the joy in God's forgiveness of our sins and remaking of our hearts, and the joy of God the fixer, who restores us and makes us whole. These all represent joy that is derived from what God does; God is powerful, God transforms, God restores. Today let's ask, "Is there any joy that comes from what we do?"

But to give me the power to displease you, or to set a sin before your face, which you infinitely hate, to profane Eternity, or to defile your works, is more stupendous than all these. What else could you intend by it but that I might infinitely please you? And having the power of pleasing or displeasing, might please you and myself infinitely, in being pleasing! Thus you have prepared a new fountain and torrent of joys greater than all that went before, seated us in the throne of God, made us your companions, endued us with a power more dreadful to ourselves, that we might live in sublime and incomprehensible blessedness forevermore. For the satisfaction of our goodness is the most sovereign delight of which we are capable. And that by our own actions we should be well pleasing to you, is the greatest happiness nature can contain. O you who are infinitely delightful to human beings, make me, and all humans, infinitely delightful to you. Replenish our actions with amiableness and beauty, that they may be answerable to yours, and like yours in sweetness and value. That as you in all your works are pleasing to us, we in all our works may be so to you; our own actions as they are pleasing to you being an offspring of pleasures sweeter than all.
- adapted from Thomas Traherne

Perhaps the greatest joy available to humanity is the joy of pleasing God. This joy is how God's transformation of our hearts and restoration of our souls work themselves out. This joy is the perpetual, enduring, ever-renewable joy of lives lived in God's will. This is what we are made for! What greater joy can there be than the fulfillment of doing and being what we are made for?

"As the Father has loved me,
so I have loved you.
Now remain in my love.
If you obey my commands,
you will remain in my love,
just as I have obeyed my Father's commands
and remain in his love.
I have told you this so that my joy may be in you
and that your joy may be complete.
- John 15:9-12

Obeying God's commands, and remaining in his love, makes our joy complete! The fact that we can please God is cause for joy, because it gives us hope of a deeper bond with him and it represents his plan for us. Joy can surprise; it can come at us from many different directions. One of the most unfiltered joys of all is the joy is living out God's call. Let's pray for joy.

O God,
God of joy
we pray that you give us your joy

Help us to rejoice in your might,
and your power to overcome our sins and circumstances

Show us joy as you wash away our sin
and form within us something new,
your kind of person

Let joy rush through us as you make us whole again
let us dance when you restore to what you made us to be

Above all, help us to multiply these joys in our lives
Grant us grace to live out these joys,
and so to attain the joy of pleasing you
may the sacrifice of our lives be a pleasing aroma to you
and let us dance and sing,
living in your light.

Amen