Κύριος Notes

Adoration

What a wonderful Maker

What a wonderful Savior

How majestic Your whispers

And how humble Your love

With a strength like no other

And the heart of a Father

How majestic Your whispers

What a wonderful God.

Scripture Reflection:Luke 18

31Jesus took the Twelve aside and told them, "We are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written by the prophets about the Son of Man will be fulfilled. 32He will be handed over to the Gentiles. They will mock him, insult him, spit on him, flog him and kill him. 33On the third day he will rise again."

For these men who were follow you Lord this was the last thing that they wanted to hear. It was exactly the wrong direction, the wrong reason and outcome.

Are there things that you would tell me Lord that I am not willing to hear? Where are the places that what you are saying to me is just not where I can go right now? Lord Jesus teach me to listen closer even when the message is hard to hear.

34The disciples did not understand any of this. Its meaning was hidden from them, and they did not know what he was talking about.

The prophets fortold of your birth and of your ministry...they told of the suffering servant that died, as we look back on it now it seems too clear and so evident. Yet not on street level, for these people who loved you so much that they put their lives on hold to...or maybe better yet...they changed the course of their lives to follow you, they could not see it.

Was this hidden from them because it would hurt too much? Was this hidden from them because they just refused to see it, or to listen to what you were saying.

Lord, Thank you for your mercy that does not reveal all of the things that might be coming down the road. This morning Lord Jesus thank you for the things that are hidden. You are the wonderful maker. You make the course of my life, you for the channels that determine and you formed the challenges,help me to see your hand in them and to praise you.

Κύριος Notes

Adoration

Savior, please take my hand .

I work so hard, I live so fast.

This life begins, then it ends.

And then I do the best that I can,

but I don't know how long I'll last.

I try to be so tough,

but I'm just not strong enough.

I can't do this alone,

God I need you to hold on to me.

I try to be good enough,

but I'm nothing without your love.

Savior, please keep saving me.

Scripture Reflection:Luke 18

28Peter said to him, "We have left all we had to follow you!"
29"I tell you the truth," Jesus said to them, "no one who has left home or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God 30will fail to receive many times as much in this age and, in the age to come, eternal life."

As I read this Lord Jesus I am moving the remaining household items from the Glens Falls house. I realize that I am closing a chapter on my life, that by your call I am now living in Saratoga for good. As I reflect I realize that I have lived in places that you have called me to for so many years. We originally move to Glens it was at your call, it was a place that for many years you gave me a place, a home, a sense of rootedness and a place where my children could remember as home.

I know that Your disciples at this point had to make much the same choice. They left all that they had known or had been able to establish to follow you. It was a scary and difficult transition.

They hoped to see you establish you kingdom on earth...they would have loved to see the Roman's pushed into the Mediterranean Sea...the sea that the Roman's owned...that they call their own. I am sure that they were thinking about those hopes even as they heard you to speak to this rich young ruler and invite him to discipleship and what that would mean for his life.

I know that you have a plan that you are working out here in this place even as I close for good a chapter of my life I have left hanging for a time. You have called you will sustain, you will bring hope at the needed times, you will provide all that is needed to accomplish your will in your people.

So my prayer this morning is simple and yet is scary to pray knowing that you will have to work out its impacts with grace and determination in my wandering and wondering heart.

Savior, please help me stand.

I fall so hard, I fade so fast.

Will you begin right where I end?

And be the God of all I am because you're all I have.

Hallelujah! Everything you are to me is everything

I'll ever need. and I am learning to believe

cause you're the one who's saving me.

Κύριος Notes

Adoration

It's all about You, Jesus

And all this is for You

For Your glory and your fame

It's not about me

As if You should do things my way

You alone are God

And I surrender to your ways

Scripture Reflection:Luke 18
18A certain ruler asked him, "Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?"
19"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone. 20You know the commandments: 'Do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.'"
21"All these I have kept since I was a boy," he said.

Lord Jesus this was a person who had been raised right. He had been instructed and had an understanding of the law. He was someone who was interested in the message that you were preaching. It could be that internally he had a sense of the impending change that was about to occur with your coming. He was a rich man who made the journey to see you.

I can so easily get intimidated by power and by people who have it and know how to use it. Thank you Lord Jesus for the example of telling truth to power. Even when Your message was last thing that power wanted to hear.

22When Jesus heard this, he said to him, "You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."

This young man could have been the thirteenth disciple? Here is an invitation that was not extended to many. It was a select few who were offered this chance. The entrance fee was to leave behind what constraining and limiting his ability to follow.

23When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was a man of great wealth. 24Jesus looked at him and said, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!

I wonder if this man ever changed his mind? I wonder if in the years ahead somewhere along the road did he ever make the changes that he needed to make?

25Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."
26Those who heard this asked, "Who then can be saved?"
27Jesus replied, "What is impossible with men is possible with God."

Lord Jesus this rich man who rejected you that day...only eternity will tell if he changed his mind...if he had another chance at redemption. Sometimes impossible things happen rich men change, sometimes rebels repent, sometimes the truth seeps into where it did not have entrance before.
Salvation costs the same for everyone...acceptance of a free gift unearned and undeserved. Dependence on You Lord Jesus for our value and not on the things we have or earn or even learn. Salvation depends on radical dependence.

Lord Jesus in this day lead me in your ways. Help me to say yes to you as soon as you ask ...lead me in the way of your way everlasting.

Κύριος Notes

Adoration

Jesus, lover of my soul

All consuming fire is in Your gaze

Jesus, I want you to know

I will follow you all my days

For no one else in history is like you

And history itself belongs to you

Alpha and Omega, You have loved me

And I will share eternity with You

Scriputure Reflection:Luke 18

15People were also bringing babies to Jesus to have him touch them. When the disciples saw this, they rebuked them. 16But Jesus called the children to him and said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. 17I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it."

Lord Jesus at a time when children were not important you elevated their importance. In fact I need to come to you as a child...childlike.

Open, vulnerable, teachable and able to identify wonder all are qualities that children have. That is at least a part of what you were getting at...but at the same time not childish...inmature, changeable, limited attention span...are some of the issues that come to mind.

So recieving the kingdom...like a little child...I need to be open to your leading...and teachable. Lord you know me so well there are times when I am open and teachable and vulnerable and then there are those places and times where I close in and circle the wagon train and hunker down for the attack.

Lord in this coming day help me to sense those times when I need to recieve from you hand in an open vulnerable and childlike way what you are giving. Help me to resist the circle the wagons mentality except when it is your will and way. Help me to follow you all my days...with childlike faith and seasoned endurance.

Κύριος Notes

Adoration

Open the eyes of my heart, Lord

Open the eyes of my heart

I want to see You

I want to see You

Open the eyes of my heart, Lord

Open the eyes of my heart

I want to see You

I want to see You

Scripture Reflection:Luke 18


9To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: 10"Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. 12I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.'

By external standards it seems as if this gentleman has it all together. He prays, he fasts, he tithes his income.


Yet in the middle of these good things he is comparing himself to the people that surround him. When it comes to spiritual disciplines it one of the most counterproductive activities that can be engaged in to compare. For all his efforts, he ends up a self rightouess, judgemental , foolish man.

I am called to follow. What does it matter how you work with others? It has nothing to do with me. Sometimes it doesn't seem fair, but you didn't say it would be fair. In fact I am eternally gratiful that you were not just with me, Lord Jesus. If you were just it would be incredibley fair but I would be without hope, and without grace.

13"But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, 'God, have mercy on me, a sinner.'

I have only the prayer for mercy that I can say...in the middle of this life that is so complex and twisted on its head...all that I can say is "God have mercy on me a sinner!"

14"I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."

So the rule is humblity bring exaltation...I come to you Lord in need of forgiveness again and again and I know that only through you mercy can I hope to find the grace that I need.

Lord Jesus in my moments and my days teach me the ways of humility and grace. The strange thing Lord is I can't see from my perspective always which of these people I am. Open the eyse of my heart Lord to see my enduring need of you everyday and every moment.

Κύριος Notes

Adoration

Open our eyes, Lord
We want to see Jesus,
To reach out and touch Him,
And say that we love Him.
Open our ears, Lord
And help us to listen.
Open our eyes, Lord
We want to see Jesus.

Scriputure Reflection:Luke 18

1Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.

Even to the disciples you used parables...on occassions. Prayer needs to be something that there is commitment connected to...something that is not just a whim, but that is backed up with action.

2He said: "In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men.

Lord Jesus even in your day people ended up in power that just were not the kind of people who ever should get power. It is not new but it is unfortunate. It can be something that is frustrating. We are left with no recourse but prayer.

3And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, 'Grant me justice against my adversary.'

Powerless people have limited options. They can either give up or continue to quietly but persistently continue to ask that there need be addressed. Gandhi comes to mind...Martin Luther King comes to mind...

The one thing that she could do she did. She kept coming back to this judge. As much as she might not have wanted to...she kept coming back to present her case.

4"For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care about men, 5yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually wear me out with her coming!' "

The reason that this judge acts is out of sheer desire to have this quiet but persistent, polite but unchanging person out of his court room.

6And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. 7And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?"

So there needs to be persistent ongoing prayer that brings the request before the Father again and again...with persistence and patience. But there is clarity about what the request that is being brought to the Father...the request is for justice for God's chosen ones. So even before your death you are saying there will be a need for prayer about this issue...and disciples will I find you faithfully engaged in this process when I return?

Lord Jesus in this day help me to be faithful to your call to prayer and action. Make this day a day that is founded on you and on your grace. Lead me in this day.

Κύριος Notes

Adoration

I Wish We'd All Been Ready

Life was filled with guns and war,
And everyone got trampled on the floor,
I wish we'd all been ready
Children died, the days grew cold,
A piece of bread could buy a bag of gold,
I wish we'd all been ready,
There's no time to change your mind,
The Son has come and you've been left behind.

Scripture Reflection: Luke 17

30"It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is revealed. 31On that day no one who is on the roof of his house, with his goods inside, should go down to get them. Likewise, no one in the field should go back for anything. 32Remember Lot's wife!

When it is time to go...it is time to go. The problem with Lot's wife was that she loved her hometown so much that when it was time to leave she just wanted one more good look at the old place. When specifically told not to.

Your return will be for those who are ready, for those who have accepted your free gift of salvation. Nothing other that being with you really matters anyway Lord Jesus. I doubt we will need any of the usually things that we worry about in crisis situations. Identity papers will not be need, your know our hearts. Emergency supplies will not be needed...

The preparations are done on the from the inside out.

33Whoever tries to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it. 34I tell you, on that night two people will be in one bed; one will be taken and the other left. 35Two women will be grinding grain together; one will be taken and the other left."

It is all about your life alive within me Lord Jesus. As I let go of attempting to keep my life...I find that you are preserving it in a way that I never would have thought of. Preparation for you return does not revolve around stores of food and bottle water. Ir revolves around letting you have all there is of me...my days and nights, my dreams and ambitions, all given over to your control.

Lord Jesus be in this day that begins even as I write this. It will be a busy day filled with things that need doing. May I let go of my way for this day and embrace your way for this day.