Help is calling

     Recently I read a news story about a man who went hiking in the mountains and got lost.  People searching for him tried to call him on his cell phone as there was a chance he might have service in the area, but to no avail no one answered.  After several more days, the man was later found and recovered alive.  He told his rescuers that he had received their calls, but because he did not recognize the phone number he didn't answer the calls (we are so conditioned to ignore solicitors).   It seems so silly in retrospect that this man spent several more nights in the woods and could have potentially died all because he didn't recognize the phone number of the caller but we are really no different when it comes to God.

    God is desperately trying to reach us in our times of fear, darkness and loneliness.  He wants to rescue us from our despair over our past sins and current problems.   Too often, however, we don't "pick up" on his call all because we don't recognize Him working in our lives (or may be we do but we are too stubborn to let God be the rescuer).  He wants to restore us and save us.  

Jesus cried over Jerusalem as he approached the city saying, 

"Jerusalem! Jerusalem!  Killer of the prophets and those sent to you!  How often I wanted to gather you like a hen gathers her chicks under her wings but you would not!"

   He cries over you too in much the same way! 

    Unlike, the rescuers in the story, God doesn't hang up on us and stop trying.  Instead, as Jesus said, 

"He leaves the 99 in the pasture and pursues the one lost sheep and searches for it until he has found it.  When he finds it he puts it on his shoulders and tells his friends, "Come and celebrate with me for I have found my lost sheep!" 

TO INFINITY AND BEYOND!!

    Those are the infamous words repeated by Buzz Lightyear in the movie series "Toy Story".   The phrase is a bit of an oxymoron in that there is technically nothing beyond "infinity".   Infinity can never be defined or limited such that you can ever go beyond it.  Make up any large number with any number of zeros after it and all you have to do is add 1 more zero and you have a number 10 times larger than the one before it.

Let me illustrate:

      You say this is large number: 

                   1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000

       But add a zero on the end and it becomes: 

                 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000

        As soon as you think you have the largest number possible, I can make a larger one.  

     Infinity is a problem mathematicians have had to grapple with over the centuries.  As they study various mathematical functions and theorems the question always arises: 

                    "What happens when X goes to infinity?"   

     The solution to the problem may work for reasonably small values of X but may not work for problems were X is very large. Because of this many of their theorems have "clauses" written into them that limit the use of their purpose to "when X is small" or "X is between 0 and 1". 

      Infinity is difficult for humans to grasp.  We are finite humans.  We live in finite worlds, with finite bodies, with finite life-spans and have finite physical and mental capabilities. So how do you grasp something that has no beginning and also no ending?  Because we can't, we tend to limit the universe in some way to suit our finite limitations. 

     We also do this with God's love and grace. We think God's answer to sin (his grace) only works for small bounded problems like those math theorems.  We think to ourselves, "Well that may work for someone who hasn't committed any major sins or has lived a fairly descent life, but not for someone like me!"  

     But Paul writes:

so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

     In Romans 5:20 he also writes:

The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more,

     Only through God's Holy Spirit can we even attempt to know the infinite love of God in Christ. Like the large number you thought was a big number , only to have a bigger number made by adding a zero at the end so also is God's grace towards you.

     Then why should I stop sinning if God's grace expands to infinity?

     The problem is not with God but with us.  Because we may say God's love is infinite our finite selves reject this notion as it applies to us.  Oh it may apply to "others" but we often view ourselves as having a unique place in God's Kingdom that is outside of God's grace.  Because we will ultimately limit the grace God can supply, we will run out of it by constantly sinning or committing a sin which we view as too great for God to forgive.  (this is why we ask God to "lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil") 

     This was the case of Judas.  We will never know the reason why Judas betrayed Jesus.  It might have been out of anger or frustration with Jesus not being the "Mighty Messiah" to kick the Romans out.  Who knows!  Often we get too caught up in the "Why did he do it?" and not the "Why did he kill himself?".  Judas spent 3 years with Jesus. He heard all his sermons. He saw all of his miracles.  He even participated in those miracles when he was sent out 2 by 2 to the local towns.  He saw Jesus forgive the sins of countless people, but Judas believed he had done something so egregious that God could not forgive him.  Peter denied Jesus to a little girl within ear shot of Jesus.  His sin was just as bad as Judas.  The difference is in their perception of God's love to them.  I believe 100% that Judas would have been forgiven by Jesus just as Peter was forgiven.  After all, didn't Jesus forgive the men standing below the cross who had lied to put him there?  If he could do that to them, he would surely have done it for Judas as well.

      Maybe you have done something you thought you would never ever do.  Maybe you think you are outside of God's grace in Jesus Christ.   Let me tell you that you are not.  Whenever you feel this way just remember this:

GOD'S LOVE IS "TO INFINITY AND BEYOND!"

God runs beside us

Recently while exercising at the gym I was watching ESPN and their coverage of the Paralympic Games.  I was watching the Track-and-Field portion of the program and was fascinated by the Women's Visually Impaired (blind) 100 meter dash. The event put the runners in odd numbered lanes and a seeing-aid in the even number lanes.   In this case, each woman was paired with a man running beside them all the way to the finish line.  Their aid helped with keeping in their lane by giving them instructions, but also to encourage them and let them know what place they were in.  

I couldn't help but see the connection to our "race" as Christians.  Christ is not waiting at the finish line to see if we make it or not.  No!   Like the runner-aid, Christ runs right beside us.  He urges us on to keep going and finish our race.  He also helps guide us with his words to help keep us going in a straight path and staying in our lane that is marked out for us.