Man Crucified – God Glorified

What LOOKS like a natural end will not BE the end if you are faithful to GOD’S end.

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Man Crucified – God Glorified

Acts 2:23-24 – Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:  Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be holden of it.

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My intention to is certainly NOT to bring up hurtful memories, but rather to provoke the reader to spiritual, emotional, and even physical healing.  So, think for a moment.  What dream, passion, vision, or even ministry has been stripped from you?  I could ask it this way; what joy has Father placed IN your life that has been stripped FROM your life by its being crucified in some way.  It may have been stripped from you by the world and some demonic attack.  Or it could have been stripped from you by some religious-minded person or action due to jealousy or bitterness on someone’s part.  And just as horrible, it may have been taken from you by deceit of the enemy in some way causing you to think you were inadequate, too old, too young, not prepared, or possessed inadequate resources (time, talent, treasure).  I think that it has happened to every believer at some level at some time.  My intention in today’s Second Miler is to prevent that for you in the future, and possibly, to help you see that what has happened in the past is still not irretrievable. 

On at least three occasions, Jesus overcame the vision-stopper, death, to restore to someone a vision they were sure had been taken from them (Jairus’ daughter, widow of Nain’s son, Lazarus).  Paul the apostle was stoned to death in Lystra, his body drug from the city and tossed on a garbage heap, and his friends and followers simply stood by the corpse, all hope stripped from them.  But Paul’s assignment had not been completed; he had not finished the vision the Lord had given him.  I am convinced that it was Paul’s own faith that moved God to put him back into his body after his spirit and soul had gone to heaven, and from that, heal his body and return him to the vision for ministry that was his.  Consider our Text for Today.  Almost all who stood that day on Golgotha believed the ministry of Jesus to be ended.  But it was not.  Satan, using people whose hearts and minds were darkness-ruled, had determined to kill Jesus and end His work.  But God had a plan, and He had instituted that plan through the man, Jesus.  And from that brief season of the darkest of darks, hope, love, life, and faith were resurrected in perfection through Jesus Christ.  What the world thought they had ended, God intended to raise up in glory.  He is still the same God today.  What, of all that God has placed in you, does it seem that man has destroyed – stolen, abused, crucified, and buried?  If God gave it to you, IN HIM it still lives.  Call it forth and let it be raised up to a new glory to honor Him.

Manna for Today – Acts 2:13-41; Proverbs 29:18; Habakkuk 2:2-3

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