Our calling in Christ Jesus, and our response and privilege is to worship him and to praise him even when there are many things we just do not understand and never will.
We reading of that beautiful anointing, in John Chapter 12 in the New Testament, when Mary anointed Jesus with that perfume costing thousands of pounds, and yet the cruel callous critical wicked Judas had to make his negative and sarcastic comment.
Did that not pierce Mary? Will there not be times, when your service to the living God through Jesus Christ, be criticised and maligned and perhaps you might even be persecuted? There are always people around ready to mock and laugh and ridicule.
Even on the Day of Pentecost when Jesus Christ baptised these one hundred and twenty disciples in the Holy Spirit, there were those who commented negatively upon what God had done through His risen and resurrected Son.
When the onlookers heard them praising God in languages they have never learned, called speaking in tongues by some, they accused the disciples of Jesus of being drunk with wine.
O, they had wine all right.
It was new wine.
It was the wine of the Holy Spirit and the oil of gladness.
The Word is so realistic, for are not these the very situations we face daily as we serve and minister in the Love of Jesus? You can be flowing in ministry, and in blessing, and suddenly opposition appears and you are suddenly attacked.
A fierce critical piercing wounding word is thrown at you and it hurts.
This Book, the Bible, is realistic.
Perhaps that is why so many people would like to explain it all away.
It is too real for comfort.
No, it is not too real for comfort.
It is too real for complacency, but to those who are committed to Jesus Christ it is a source of comfort because it depicts reveals and portrays life as it really is.
Many of the people who were around Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover were looking for Jesus, and not only Jesus, but they heard that Lazarus had been raised from the dead, and they wanted to see him too.
Check this out in John Chapter 12.
As soon as the religious leaders were aware of this, and heard of this, they decided that Jesus Christ must be killed and Lazarus too.
John is writing all this and all this is going on in Jerusalem a week or so before Jesus was crucified.
To be ministered to by Jesus, can put your life in danger, and that is the experience of thousands today around the world.
To be counted as among the friends of Jesus Christ can mean a threat upon your life.
Once somebody sets himself against Jesus, there is no limit as to how far an individual will go, and if you go against Jesus, you will probably find that you are against the friends and disciples of Jesus too.
Think of Paul before he met the risen Lord Jesus Christ.
Saul of Tarsus was out to wipe out this whole move of God.
He is the perfect example of this type of reaction.
But, God had other plans for him, for which we give thanks.
This man who attempted to wipe out the Church of Jesus Christ when it was but two years old became one of the greatest pioneering preachers this world has ever seen.
This man whose aim was to annihilate every disciple of Jesus was the man God changed and transformed and who was used to write a major part of the Word of God.
Give thanks for those whom God has used down through the years to minister to you and to strengthen and encourage you.
Give thanks this day, and if any of those people are still alive contact them and express your appreciation and gratitude! You may never know how such a word can inspire and lift people.
Sandy Shaw