by R. Herbert | Apr 24, 2014 | Discipleship
Empty can be such a negative word: the empty glass, empty promises, an empty bank account, and perhaps worst of all is when we are driving late at night and far from a gas station and our fuel gauge shows that we are running dangerously low on fuel. We are “running on empty.”
But in God’s scheme of things even something empty can represent something very great. This time of year carries a wonderful reminder of that in the message of the empty tomb of Christ. As Christians we celebrate the empty tomb with awe at what occurred and thankfulness for what it means, but do we stop there, or does the story inspire us to something else? The gospels can provide us with a reminder of what needs to follow the fact of the empty tomb in the form of a detail of the resurrection story. Notice what Matthew says regarding the experience of the women who came to the empty tomb and who were confronted by a messenger of God:
“The angel said to the women, ‘Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples: He has risen from the dead…’ So the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples” (Matthew 28:5-8).
Here the women who were followers of Christ ran to tell the story of the empty tomb of Jesus and of his resurrection. It was the emptiness of the tomb that gave them a message that went first to those who were already disciples, and then outward to the whole world. And notice that they did not walk to deliver the message of the empty tomb, they ran. They were running based on the importance of the empty tomb – metaphorically they were running on empty.
Some two thousand years later the followers of Jesus can still run on empty. But do we? Is it enough to celebrate the empty tomb, then to go back to life as usual, or should we be running with the news? If we are truly inspired by the story of the empty tomb and what it means – not only for us personally, but for all humanity – with the help of God we, too, can be excited to joyfully run with that message in whatever opportunity we have been given to deliver it.
by R. Herbert | Apr 18, 2014 | The Life of Jesus
Most of us know what it feels like to finally accomplish something we have worked toward for a long time: a goal, a dream, a project to which we have dedicated time and energy. Even with small scale things it can be a triumphant feeling. The larger the accomplishment, the greater the triumph, thankfulness and deep happiness that come with accomplished goals.
This ties to the spring season of the year in which we celebrate the supreme sacrifice of the Son of God on behalf of humanity. That had surely been a project a long time in the planning, and it had been the thirty-five or more patient years of the physical life of Jesus (see our last blog post) in the actual making: growing, building, preparing, working toward the eventual goal of the sacrifice itself.
Meditating on the sacrificial death of Christ is a somber and heart-wrenching thing – as it doubtless should be – but I cannot help but believe that even as he perished in excruciating pain, there was for the Son of God a feeling of triumph and thankfulness at the very end. He had done it – successfully accomplished the very reason for his human life – something that would touch all other human lives throughout all time. We know that, leading up to that moment, because of the human sin he had taken upon himself, he was cut off from the very One who had brought him thus far, as is seen in his almost final words “Why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34 – and see Psalm 22:1). But he had to have known that he and the Father had succeeded.
It is in that way I believe the very last words of Jesus – three small words, in English translation, spoken directly before he died – were the most triumphant words spoken to that point in history: “It is finished!” (John 19:30). To that point in time no single event had accomplished so much good or incorporated such a victory. Those had to have been the three most triumphant words ever spoken – until just a few days later, when they were replaced by three yet more triumphant words: “He has risen” (Matthew 28:6).
by R. Herbert | Apr 17, 2014 | The Life of Jesus
This is one of those questions where many Christians believe they know the answer, but may not. Most people who know the Bible will answer that Christ died around the age of 33 or 33 and a half. But careful reading of the Gospel accounts shows this to be unlikely. The facts are very nicely summarized in an article by Andreas J. Köstenberger and Justin Taylor published in
Christianity Today this week – as this brief extract shows:
“The common assertion seems reasonable that if Jesus “began his ministry” when he “was about thirty years of age” (Luke 3:23) and engaged in a three-year ministry … then he was 33 years old at the time of his death. However, virtually no scholar believes Jesus was actually 33 when he died. Jesus was born before Herod the Great issued the decree to execute “all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under” (Matt. 2:16, ESV) and before Herod died in the spring of 4 B.C. If Jesus was born in the fall of 5 or 6 B.C., and if we remember that we don’t count the “0” between B.C. and A.D., then Jesus would have been 37 or 38 years old when he died in the spring of A.D. 33 (as we believe is most likely). Even if Jesus died in the year A.D. 30 (the only serious alternative date), he would have been 34 or 35, not 33 years old.”
As the
Christianity Today article points out, no major doctrine is affected by this common misconception, but it is something that is better to understand in speaking of Jesus’ life and in telling the story to others. You can read the
CT article
here.
by R. Herbert | Apr 13, 2014 | Gratitude
Are we really aware of the abundance that many enjoy in the developed world today – compared not only to less fortunate areas, but also compared to the past? A fascinating but little publicized study conducted at Cornell University a few years ago throws light on the growing abundance which many of us may take for granted.
In a careful study published as “The Largest Last Supper: Depictions of Food Portions and Plate Size Increased over the Millennium” in 2010, researchers Brian and Craig Wansink analyzed the amount of food depicted in 52 paintings of “The Last Supper” produced over the last millennium. Each painting was analyzed in order to ascertain the content of the meals depicted and changes which occurred over time in the kinds of food and the size of portions in the paintings. Cleverly, the sizes of the loaves of bread, the main food dishes, and the plates were all compared to the average size of the heads shown in the paintings in order to gain a benchmark reference. A computerized CAD-CAM program was used to allow selected parts of the paintings to be scanned, then rotated in order to get accurate size comparisons to calculate the food portion sizes with more precision.
As the researchers suspected, the number and size of the food portions in these paintings increased dramatically with time. From AD 1000 to the present, the amount of food depicted in the paintings increased 69.2%, and the size of the depicted plates increased 65.5%. This is certainly not a matter of chance, the researchers say. There is no question that the amount of food available to people in much of the Western world has grown dramatically over the hundreds of years covered by this study, and this is reflected in artistic representations. What was first shown as a simple meal has grown in artistic interpretations to more recent depictions of the Last Supper which suggest almost feast-like proportions compared to earlier paintings.
Today, many of us enjoy much greater abundance than our ancestors, as well as those less fortunate than us in other parts of today’s world. Representations of the Last Supper can remind us that we have much to be thankful for physically, as well as spiritually.
by R. Herbert | Apr 10, 2014 | Giving
Osawa – Image from SmileTrain Website
The cleft repair charity
Smile Train recently announced its greatest “smilestone” to date – the one millionth cleft repair surgery completed by its partner surgeons.
Founded in 1999, Smile Train has grown to be the world’s largest cleft charity and has made great inroads repairing cleft palates and cleft lips in countries where these untreated disfigurements cause lifetimes of psychological pain and physical suffering. Children with clefts often cannot speak or eat properly, and their physical plight is compounded by the fact that they are often not allowed to attend school and they are ostracized, even by members of their own families.
Smile Train pioneered the training of doctors to perform the relatively fast 45 minute surgery to provide free, safe treatment for poor patients with cleft lip and/or palate. Organized in such a way that overhead expenses are largely paid by Smile Train’s board members, the charity is able to claim that virtually all donated funds go to repairing clefts for individuals who would never normally receive such help.
The charity’s one millionth patient, six year old Osawa Owiti from a remote village in Tanzania, had already experienced years of psychological and physical hardship, and his mother was also subject to the stigma, being unjustly blamed for her child’s cleft. But Osawa is now recovered from his surgery and happily enjoying the new life he has been given.
Smile Train – and all cleft repair groups – are to be thanked for the work they are doing. Considering the extent of the cleft problem throughout the world, it is something for which we can be truly grateful that this particularly debilitating cause of suffering is being so aggressively fought. You can read more about Osawa Owiti and the work of the Smile Train
here. It is a worthwhile work for which we can pray, and one which deserves continued support.
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