As Archie Sees It
This morning I woke early and I read Luke Chapter 5. I have read it a number of time before but today it raised new, holy inspired thoughts in me and I felt compelled to share them with you tonight.
In Luke 5:1-11 Jesus tells Simon to “Go further out” he did and as a result he caught more fish than he could fit in his boat.
On reading this I thought “Am I fishing in the wrong place?” A big question but think of this, I did. “God can and does the impossible.” So who says He calls us to carry His message to others travelling the road we have traveled? Maybe He has a whole group of people we have nothing in common He wants us to introduce to Him.
Jesus then went on to say “You will be fishing for men and women.”
To me, this scripture talks about being prepared to go into places you may feel uncomfortable to meet with people you don’t understand. As human beings, most of us want to move in circles in areas in which we feel comfortable and we are scared to approach people we don understand.
In my Spiritual walk, I think I have been blessed in that I have had the opportunity to enter into many, many areas of life where I was uncomfortable and didn’t understand anything about. Yet God has used me in different ways in each of them. 6 of the best years of my life were working with the homeless in the City of Melbourne. I learned a lot, I met some of the best people I will ever meet in my life and I built relationships that will last a lifetime.
Luke 5:12-16 to me is all about ‘HEALING’ It says “If you want you can cleanse yourself.” I believe strongly that most of us don’t get well in the process of recovery cause deep down we don’t really want to. We are comfortable in our squaller because we understand it and it allows us to believe we are where we are because of circumstances outside of ourselves. But we are not! I believe that anyone who truly wants to recover will. Because they will be ‘willing to go to any lengths’ to get it.
Jesus also says in this passage “Don’t talk about this.” In the story of the paraplegic for me anyway it teaches us:
- Regardless of the circumstances in our life ‘GOD WILL MAKE A WAY’ If we are willing to put our faith and trust in Him and do what we can to start the ball rolling in doing what we can to bring ourselves before Him.
- The doubt of the religious scholars and Pharisees demonstrates
a) we don’t always understand what we claim to understand.
b) no matter how much we know it means nothing if we don’t put it into practice.
- “Get up and walk.” Doubt can only be changed into belief when we start to trust in Him and commit to doing what He commands us to do.
Everybody needs recovery from something. “We all fall short of God’s standards for living in faith.” To that end I for one want to commit to “Stepping out in faith and trusting Him.” Even when I feel uncomfortable or don’t undeerstand.
