CTK Blog
Walk in Unity (Part 1)
Will there ever be a world where people with different skin colors, backgrounds, and personalities live in peace? God’s word promises that there will be.
Work from Rest
Fighting back the emotions she answers, “I don’t know how to relax… it’s harder than it looks.” Chili is on the verge of the discovery we’ve been making from John 5:1-18. Real rest is gained from a person: Jesus Christ.
Jesus is Real Rest
We’ve escaped on a vacation, came home, and needed a vacation from vacation. We’ve tried to optimize our life by reorganizing the kitchen pantry or updating our bullet journal but still go to bed just as anxious and sleepless. Why is this so? John 5 explains that real rest is not in a place or a plan, but in a person.
Real Rest
When our bodies and hearts are weary escape and optimize are our go to renewal strategies. Some of us think that an escape to the beach or the mountains will provide the R-and-R we need. “After a trip to our favorite get away we will be good as new,” we tell ourselves. A number of us hope that optimizing our to-do lists, calendars, and paycheck routines will finally give rest to our restless hearts. Unfortunately, like so many of us have discovered, we have escaped and optimized but our bodies and hearts are still so tired. Here, we need the words of Augustine of Hippo who said, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”
Hearing is Believing
We’ve all heard the phrase “seeing is believing,” but Jesus seems to differ with this maxim. In the healing of the official’s son in John 4, Jesus castigates the crowd for their desire to see him perform miracle. Instead, it is the father who hears the words of Jesu and responds in faith who ends up having his son healed so that he and his whole believe in Christ—not by seeing, but by hearing in faith.
Adversity as Gospel Opportunity
The encounter between Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well challenges our assumptions that God can only work through our strengeh and influence. Instead, this passage reminds us that the gospel often advances through adversity. God seems to delight to work through weakness to show the incredible power of his grace.
Eternal Life
Eternal life is a key theme throughout John’s gospel. The kind of life John is presenting is the kind that begins in the present and will continue forever. It is life from God (1:13; 3:3, 5). Life that never ends sounds cool and all, but only if there is a certain quality to it. Eternal life according to John is marked by the love of God (3:16; 13:34-35; 1 John 4:8-12). So then we should say that eternal life is to know and enjoy God’s life and love. This should be incredibly appealing to us.