Second Week in Lent
Incredible News
Monday, February 19
Scripture: Mark 8:31-38
When we think of the gospels as “good news,” we rarely think what it must have been like for Jesus’ followers before they knew about his death and resurrection. How would they have coped with the devastating news of Christ’s death? How would they have understood his resurrection, unless Jesus himself had told them it would happen?
Jesus was bringing his followers good news when he spoke of being rejected, killed, and rising again on the third day. Yet Peter could not hear it. Peter, as so many of us might, wanted his savior to be victorious and rule the day conspicuously in a humanly triumphant way.
Jesus had a different version of victory in mind.
What Jesus offered his followers then, and still offers us today, is the victory of knowing the Risen Christ in our own hearts and minds. What good would a political victory do, if we couldn’t then know Christ as part of God’s still, small voice encouraging us to make more moral choices when the choices before us are not easy.
Would we rather gain a worldly successful life, but lose our life with Christ and with God? If we did that, we might be hanging out with other people who have no moral compunctions, and we might end up suffering rather than experiencing Christ’s resurrection at all. Jesus invites us to let go of life that is lived for ourselves, and to discover the joy of living life with Christ, and that life lasts forever.
Prayer: Everliving and Everloving God, we thank you for the gift of Jesus Christ and his desire to reassure us that God’s ways are better for us than we can even yet imagine. Help us to live in this reassurance that Christ is with us through the challenges of our lives, and that if we will just trust and walk in his ways, the resurrection will become real, even for us, and even in our lives.
– Carol Richardson