FAITH CONNECTION – FARMERSVILLE UMC
Ministry Updates for Friday, July 17th, 2020
Facebook Live Worship—Sunday, July 19th, at 9:30 a.m.
Please join us as we again worship through Facebook Live. Use this link to watch the service. And please consider passing it along.
https://www.facebook.com/events/610361529605173
In-Person Worship will be postponed until further notice
Scripture for Reflection – Matthew 28:20
And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.
Reflection – All the Days
Jesus offers these words to his followers as some of his last. He was crucified, died, buried, and then he rose. He sent his followers into the world and promises to be with them always.
What Jesus actually says is, “I am with you all the days”. Translation is difficult and tedious work, and languages carry subtle nuances. And I am not in a position to argue with any translators, but I like the idea Jesus said something like, ‘I am with you all the days’. Basically, it means the same thing, but opens us to something a little different.
‘Always’ is a long time, and in my mind, loses touch with the daily through the implication of its broad scope. To me it would be like Jesus said, ‘I will be by every tree’, and it then got translated to, ‘I will be in the forest’.
My life changed when my faith moved outside of the boundaries of Sundays. My life changed when I really started to claim the daily joy and the daily responsibility of believing, sensing, knowing, God is with me. My life changed when I committed to cracking open my Bible daily. I sensed and began moving toward that higher plane that Jesus called ‘The kingdom of heaven’. So here is what this passage means to me:
Jesus is in the world, and in every nation.
Jesus is the head of THE church, and in every local church.
Jesus is with our families and with every individual in it.
Jesus is with us ‘always’, and Jesus is with us ‘all the days’.
That is the promise. It means something. When we embrace it, we may find how fully embraced we are.
God in heaven, we give you thanks that Jesus is with us always. He is with us in the pandemic, in the social unrest, in the evening sunset, in the hospital, in the struggle for survival, in the quest for life. We give you thanks that we can live with this promise, all the days. Amen.