Except for a lovely worship service and church school class this morning, followed by a great lunch at church, I have been working all day. This is not my usual kind of Sunday, but this particular semester, I've discovered that I often have to work on Sundays because of my class schedule and my deadline schedule with Spirit & Truth. Reminder to self: must find some sabbath time to take the place of what I'm not able to have on Sundays!
Because I've been working for several hours....work of the really needing to concentrate and think and write creatively type...I'm too tired to write the post I've been planning in the back of my head since this morning. That would be a post on John Newton, author of Amazing Grace. (I mention it here in hopes that it will spur me to actually come back sometime this week and write it...we shall see.)
For now, I just had to share this verse, which has also been running around in my mind and heart much of the day (it's been a crammed full to bursting mind and heart day)....
"Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted." (Hebrews 12:3)
This is a bit of Scripture that's been engrained in me for so long it nearly took my breath this morning in worship when I felt like I heard it "anew." I think I heard it back to front -- the words "weary" and "fainthearted" smacked me in between the eyes, because I must confess I've been feeling a lot of both lately. Then I backed up to the beginning of the verse, and the remedy for weariness and faintheartedness: "Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself..." jumped up for my attention. The enduring of hostility, going all the way to the cross, to restore us in love while we were yet sinners (yes, Romans 5 still singing through my head...thank you, Paul) -- what an amazing God we have.
But it was the "CONSIDER HIM" that really lodged in my heart today. It's an active verb. It's something we are to *do* so that will not grow weary or fainthearted....which suggests that the writer of Hebrews knows all to well how easy it is for us to become those things in this world.
Consider him...or as some other translations have it....
"just think of him"
"keep your mind on him"
"go over that story again"
"think constantly of him"
"think of what he went through"
Sounds like an important spiritual discipline, not just for Lent, but for any season!
Praying that I will find real and loving ways to consider him this week.
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