TRUST YOUR WOUNDS TO JESUS

Resentment is a prison. When you put someone in your jail cell of hatred, you’re stuck guarding the door. If you’re out to settle a score, you’re never going to rest. How can you? For one thing, your enemy may never pay up. And as much as you think you deserve an apology, your debtor may not agree. The racist may never repent; the chauvinist may never change. As justified as you are in your quest for vengeance, you may never get a penny’s worth of justice. And if you do, will it be enough?

You see, resentment is a prison. Jesus doesn’t question the reality of your wounds, he just doubts whether resentment is going to heal them. What are you going to do? Are you going to spend your life guarding the jail cell, or are you going to trust your wounds to Jesus?

Devotion by Max Lucado | The Almighty Jehovah | https://thealmightyJehovah.com

Hear Jesus

The Torah sends you to Moses. The Quran sends you to Muhammad. Buddhists invite you to meditate; spiritists, to levitate. “Step right up—try my witchcraft.” “Psst, over here. Interested in some new age channels?” Oh, the voices. And we pray, “Father, help me out! Please modulate one and relegate the others.”

If that’s your prayer, then Luke 9 is your chapter. The day God isolated the authoritative voice of history and declared, “Listen to him.” On the Mount of Transfiguration Jesus was praying with Peter and James and John. And his face became different, and his clothing became white and gleaming. “And a voice came out of a cloud, saying, ‘This is my beloved Son. Hear him!’ (Luke 9:35). Hear Jesus amidst all the other voices. Listen to him.

In the Middle of It All

God gets into things! Red seas, big fish, lions’ dens, and furnaces. Bankrupt businesses and jail cells. Look, and you’ll find what everyone from Moses to Martha discovered: God in the middle of our storms.

A young woman missed her station on the subway. By the time she realized her mistake, she didn’t know what to do. She prayed for some sign of God’s presence. This was no hour or place to be passing through a rough neighborhood alone. At that moment the doors opened and a disheveled man plopped down next to her. “God, are you near?” she prayed. And the man pulled out a harmonica and played “Be Thou My Vision”—her mother’s favorite hymn. The song was enough to convince her Christ was here, in the midst of it all.

And you? Look closer. He’s there. Right in the middle of it all.

TRUST YOUR WOUNDS TO JESUS