There was once a king in a very large country. He had great control over his empire and kept a close eye on all his citizens.

He took particular notice of one of his citizens, a farmer. The farmer stole money from his neighbors, cheated his relatives out of money and once beat a man nearly to death simply because he didn’t like the man.

Eventually, the farmer was turned into the king’s officials. He was charged with stealing, racketeering, and assault. The farmer was put in prison and stayed there until the date of his trial.

As the trial began, the prosecutor said to the jury, “Is there any reason why this man shouldn’t be a slave for the rest of his life and be destitute in a foreign land? After all, the man is clearly guilty as his neighbors and relatives testify.”

As the trial was about to end, the judge said to the farmer, “Do you have anything to say before you are cast off to your life of slavery and banishment?”

The farmer stood mute, knowing that the amount of money he needed to be acquitted of his crimes was more than even the most wealthy citizens of his country had.

Just as the the judge was about to give the farmer his sentence, a man stood up from among the crowd and removed his hood, revealing his identity.

The crowd gasped, for they knew who this man was. The man said to the judge, “I have been sent by my father- the king. I am here to pay the ransom of this farmer.”

The judge took the payment from the king’s son and said to the farmer, “Thanks to this man, you are not going to be sentenced to a life of banishment. You are free. Now go.”

The farmer’s eyes swelled and tears began to slide down his face. He said to the king’s son,”Why would you do this for me? All I’ve ever done is break your laws.”

“Because I care. My father and I want to give you a new life because you are as valuable to us as anyone in our country. You are no longer guilty in our eyes and will one day live in our palace.”

The farmer fell at the feet of the king’s son. “Truly I do not deserve this. How can I ever show my gratitude to you?”

“Turn from your evil ways and do as I ask you for the rest of your life. Follow me as we serve my father.”

The king’s son left the courtroom and the farmer followed him from that day on.

I’ll never forget that day. It was last September, and I was sitting in the hospital waiting room. My Grandfather had a heart attack earlier that day. My dad was sitting next to me on one of the couches. On the two ends of the other couch were my uncle and mom. And between them was my grandma, shocked and devastated by what had happened that day. Never before had I seen so much emotion emitted from one person at a given time. Her words from that day still ring in my ear, “I can’t go on without him.”

My Grandma and Grandpa were married for sixty-three years. Their love for each other was of a magnitude that I have yet to see eclipsed by two human beings. They waited on one another each and every day. My Grandpa took care of my Grandma’s physical needs by always taking her to her doctors appointments and giving her the many pills that she needed every day. He always encouraged her, even though he was shouldering tremendous emotional burdens himself. My Grandfather was there for her until his last day; the final word that he spoke was her name: Helen.

And here she was in a surreal moment. The love of her life, her soul mate, the person that kept her going, was taken. The hospital waiting room that she was in represented the end of one era, her life with him, and the beginning of the next: her life without him. But this new life was not something that she believed that she was capable of living. To go on without my Grandpa, in her mind, was too much to bear.

But that was last September. And she is still with me now, almost a year later. Every morning I see her pushing her walker in the hallway. Her back, hunched from the painful effects of osteoporosis, reminds me of the tremendous emotional weight that she is carrying. She, however, is doing something that she didn’t think was possible: she’s living without my Grandpa by her side. She still has the strength to ask me how I am doing and jokes with me when I’m feeling down. How can this be? How can someone who didn’t even believe that she could live another day without someone be an inspiration to others? It’s because she’s being sustained. Almost every day someone prays for her. Her friends and loved ones care for her. And ultimately, she is being upheld by the power of God.

My Grandma Helen is not the only one being sustained by God, though. I, too, have seen this in my life. When I’ve felt like I don’t have what it takes to make it through something, He is there. Always there. And He is there for each and every one of us. He keeps us going, even when life looks confusing and scary.

I believe that the most obvious way that He does this is through others. He has given us many people in our lives who are there for us. They shower us with love, hear our cries, and laugh with us even when something isn’t funny. Our friends and relatives are given to us by God as gifts to make it through this life.

We can’t take these gifts for granted. We must invest to make the lives of those around us as good as we want our lives to be. In doing this, we will be a reflection of Christ and lead each other ever closer to the One who has kept us going all along.

Father, open my eyes
Awaken me from this slumber

Make me alive
And show me Your wonders

Let me not look inside
Where I feed my pride

Help me to look beyond these eyelid covers
To those You put in my life: others

Show me their needs
So that I may be free

From the disease of self
This cage I call me

My heart was pounding like a drum inside of my chest. My hands were sweaty; my mouth, dry. The person standing only about five feet from me had this quality that made it difficult for me to breathe and even harder to speak. This person was one of those rare people that evoke a sense of wonder just by their very presence.

Many of us would feel this way if we were to meet someone famous like our favorite musician or athlete. It’s this unusual feeling of admiration mixed with fear. It can be very surreal to meet or even come into contact with such a person.

As I was thinking about this, I was wondering what it would be like to meet the Lord. Here. Now. What if one day He showed up at our work as a customer or walked into church during the middle of service and we knew it was Him. How would we respond? Would we tremble in His sight? Would our hearts pound, our hands sweat, and our mouths become dry? Would we completely forget everything in that moment- ourselves, the other people in the room with us, and everything else in our lives? Would we see only His face, hear only His voice, and be aware of His presence alone? Would we even have the ability to say “hello”? Or would we be so overwhelmed by Him that we would be left speechless?

Many of us go to God on a daily basis through prayer. But how often do we really stop to comprehend Who it is that we are speaking to? When we are before the throne of grace, do we remember that it is literally the Creator of the universe, the King of kings and Lord of lords, that is hearing our words?

As Christians, we seek to, as we should, come into contact with God through many means such as Bible reading, prayer, and worship music. But sometimes we just need to reverently bow before Him and know that He is Lord.

The voice. What a tool it is. We sometimes take this instrument for granted. I know I have. That is, I took it for granted until I injured mine at an acting audition last July. It was a very odd thing to have this tool, the social manifestation of my thoughts, hindered. I even rested it for three weeks straight out of fear. I thought that once I stopped resting it, I would use it for some great purpose. I thought about the people that I would share the gospel with. One of them was my grandfather. I rehearsed just what I would say in my mind. When I came out of my silence, I would tell him just how much I loved him and that he should trust Christ alone for his eternal salvation. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the chance. The day before I stopped resting my voice, my Grandpa had a massive heart attack and remained unconscious until his death the next week. I don’t know whether or not my Grandpa was saved. And I never got to tell him of the Savior. But I was silenced far before I injured my voice. Only it wasn’t my physical voice that was silenced - it was my spiritual one. I just didn’t use it to share the gospel with people like my Grandpa.

We are the voices of truth. As followers of Christ, we are the means by which God communicates his eternal message. Yes, it’s the Spirit who prepares the heart and transforms the mind. But He uses us to bring forth the words of the gospel itself. We are the only way for the lost to hear the message. How will we use these voices of ours? Will we use them to tell our family members, friends, and co-workers of their peril without Christ and their assurance with Him? Or will we silence ourselves and let the very souls that we share this life with die in their sins? This is reality. The way that we use or don’t use these voices has eternal implications. What a gift the voice is. We use it for many purposes such as laughing, talking, and singing. But we have been given much more than physical voices. We have been given spiritual voices- the voices of truth.

Much has been made about Christian growth. How do we grow? What makes this process happen? Why do we see some people we know growing and not others? Often we can look to outside influences to find this growth. We can try to find pastors who can “feed” us. Or we may stumble from church to church to find one that makes us “feel” closer to God. We want God to do something big for us so that we can reach a higher level of spirituality. Often times, though, these things don’t happen. We can get discouraged because we think the pastor just isn’t good enough, the churches aren’t helpful enough, or that God just isn’t moving in our lives. But what if Christian growth isn’t something to be found? Or something that happens to us? What if this growth is something that we do? And what if it is right inside of us? The point is that growth starts with our effort. And it’s through the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit who lives in us that this is achieved. We have to strive to grow. But how can we do this? There are some very practical steps that we can take to get closer to God and thus grow.

To start with, we must pray. Earnestly. Daily. Jesus repeatedly said, “Ask anything in my name and it will be given to you.” We should ask God to reveal Himself to us in new ways and to conform us to the image of His Son. This may mean that we will be taken out of our comfort zone and even into the realm of suffering.

Secondly, we must read the Word. In it are the truths of salvation, the mysteries of God’s nature, and the clues of living the Holy life. We must research it to find out what it means to follow after Christ. The Spirit uses the word to convict us of sin and bring us into right communion with God.

Lastly, we must serve others. It’s by helping other people that we serve God. He has put many people in our path that need our help. The more that we sacrifice of ourselves for others, the more we become like Christ and less like our selfish selves. We don’t have to think that hard about ways to do it. It could be cutting a relative’s lawn, discipling a friend, or driving a neighbor to work.

In conclusion, Christian growth isn’t some mysterious thing out there that needs to happen to us. It starts with us being on our knees. It continues to establish itself by Biblical knowledge. And it culminates in our actions to help those in need. We cannot expect God to move closer to us unless we are willing to work to be closer to Him. The Spirit will give us the strength to strive and will be with us in the growth process. He lives within us. It starts here and now. All we have to do is try.

There are times in life when negative things that go beyond our control happen to us. These could be health problems, the death of a loved one, or hurtful things that others have said or done to us. These things usually come and go. But sometimes our tribulations live much longer than we want and cause us to suffer. We might be left wondering, “Lord, why would You let me go through this? What is the purpose of these painful things in my life that don’t seem to go away?”

None of us really understands the nature and role of suffering in our lives. But we can learn some very useful things through our times of trial. I believe that suffering can teach us three things.

First of all, suffering shows us that there are people in the world who are hurting. I have been struggling with some things recently and have felt pain because of them. But this has reminded me that there are many people out there with hurts who need to be encouraged and helped. Sometimes we have to feel pain for a long time to understand the struggles of others.

Another thing that we can learn from suffering is that we have been saved from some terrible hurts. This life can yield some really hard times-times when we are simply overwhelmed by our problems. But our issues here on earth don’t even begin to compare with the future sufferings of those who don’t know the Lord. Because we have been redeemed, we have been rescued from the eternal fires of hell which never let up. We don’t like to think of these things, but this is one of the reasons that Christ came to die. We have been saved from the Holy wrath of God that would hurt far more than any amount of physical, emotional, or mental pain. This realization can be understood without our suffering, but is made more real in our sufferings. When we hurt significantly, we naturally want to curse God. But the more that we as Christians hurt, the more we should praise Him for what He has delivered us from.

Finally, our suffering gives us insight into the earthly sufferings of the Lord Jesus Christ. We can never truly comprehend the sufferings of Christ. But when we experience real hurt, our Savior’s sacrifices come to have new meaning. To start with, He stepped down from His perfect throne to condescend upon the fallen world. He didn’t owe us this. Redemption came at a price. That price was His life and death. He suffered in both of those areas. He was tempted severely by the devil when He was nearly dead from fasting for forty days. He had to listen to people who didn’t believe that He was the Messiah say awful things about Him. His body was battered and torn by the Romans in the days leading up to his crucifixion. He had to endure the righteous wrath of God which was poured out on Him in volcanic fury at the Cross of Calvary. He was all alone on there- no friends, loved ones, and even His own Father turned from Him. He had to endure all of our sin; every lie, theft, prideful and lustful thought was absorbed by Him. He took all of the eternal pain due to us and placed it upon Himself. He suffered more than any human being has or even ever could.

We sometimes get beat down by our suffering. But suffering teaches us that there are people who need our help, that we have been spared from eternal suffering, and that Christ’s sufferings dwarf ours. We may never understand why we are suffering with something right now. But He knows. There were people during Christ’s day who didn’t understand why He, an innocent Man, had to suffer. But He knew. He knew that the only way for Him to redeem us was to suffer. He loved us enough to suffer for us. And He loves us enough to let us suffer now to bring more glory and honor to His name.

These hands and feet are not worthy to serve You.
These eyes are not worthy to read Your Word.
These ears are not worthy to hear Your truth.
This mouth is not worthy to sing Your praises.
This body is not worthy to be a temple for You.
This name is not worthy to be written in Your book of life.

This mind is not worthy to know You.
This heart is not worthy to love You.
And most of all, this soul is not worthy to be redeemed by You.

Holy God, why would You bless us sinners so?
You didn’t owe us these gifts; gifts that we don’t even comprehend.
You only owed us punishment.

Your mercy astounds me.
Your grace humbles me.

You are the ultimate Gift-Giver.
You transcend my understanding of what perfection is.

We are merely Your vessels that You have chosen to reveal Yourself to.
Because You have done this, we will one day see that You alone are worthy.

Our belief in God is ultimately based on faith. But there are many things in the world and beyond that make the existence of God seem very plausible. This area of Christianity, apologetics, is of great interest in strengthening our faith and silencing skeptics. But what is the greatest evidence for their being a Creator? What is the one thing in Creation that stands head and shoulders above everything else in pointing to God?

What was the only thing that God made in His image? It was man. The human being. We are the closest representation of God in creation and are the greatest evidence of His existence.

Man is primarily divided into four elements: mind, emotion, body, and spirit. Each of these elements is a system with unique properties. Let’s take a look at each system.

The mind. It is the agent by which we function and make decisions. Through it we learn how to do mathematical problems, shoot a basketball, or dance. When we want to walk from one room to the next, we do it automatically. It effortlessly sends signals to the body, or commands, of what we want to do. It gets neurological feedback from our body when we are in pain, have numbness, etc. We use it to formulate thoughts about things that we perceive through our senses. Using one of it’s features, the imagination, we have come up with creations like skyscrapers and automobiles. By the mind we possess the ability to create, something that nothing else in creation can claim.

Emotions. Emotions are a vital part of life. They motivate us to do things. But they also have a way of touching us that is almost otherworldly. For example, a two year old child may tell his father for the first time, “I love you.” The father may not even be able to communicate what he feels in that moment. It’s just magical. And we can sometimes just see the love that our relatives have for us just by the look in their eyes. This cannot be explained. It can only be experienced.

The body. There is so much that goes into it. There are bones, tendons, ligaments, organs, and microscopic cells which make it possible for us to physically live. Our bodies allow us to make athletic movements that no well-oiled machine ever could. These bodies sometimes puzzle the most intelligent of doctors and can keep us guessing. The eye allows us to see beautiful things like sunsets and exotic animals. The ear makes it possible to hear birds chirping and the latest song by Chris Tomlin.

And then there is the spirit. We are all spiritual. Again, this is something that nothing else on earth can claim. This realm makes us have needs that go beyond this life. Our spirits yearn for a level of love and communion that nothing in the world can offer. That is why we turn to religions and spiritual experiences. It’s a longing. We want to ultimately know what brought us here to earth, what our purpose is, and where we are going when we die. We also engage in the spiritual realm on a daily basis. It’s through our spirits that we make moral choices- choices of the heart. We can be selfish, unselfish, prideful, compassionate or dishonest.

Each of the four elements of the human (mind, emotion, body, and spirit) are astounding in their own right. But what’s even more startling than the fact that each of these elements exist on their own is the fact that they work in perfect harmony to comprise one thing: the human being. This can be seen in people who sing praises to God. They use all four elements at the same time. They mentally construct the words to sing. They emotionally engage by singing of their love for God. Their physical voices power the activity. And their spirits strive to be in contact with God through the song.

There are many things in creation which point to our Maker. But no phenomenon speaks more to God’s existence than the human being. We don’t have to look that hard to find evidence of God in the world. We just have to look at one another. We are the images of God.

As I walk through the mall or roam the hallways of my college, dozens, maybe even hundreds of faces pass me by. These faces communicate different messages to me. I see one of a middle aged man. It’s worn from the struggles of life and is starved for joy. Another face passes me by, this one of a troubled youth. It’s eyes scream of hopelessness and doubt.

I have never seen these faces before, but they are somehow dear to me. For I know that these are not just faces. They are lives. They are hearts. And they are souls. Behind these faces are people with addictions, depression, worries, and confusion. They are people with problems and needs just like me. My heart wonders what they are going through, what they are like. Although they are “strangers,” they are my neighbors that Jesus spoke of when he commanded us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. They need love. And they need hope.

Then I begin to wonder what this face of mine is saying to them. Am I displaying the love and hope of Christ? Are my eyes a glimpse of something beyond this everyday, common life? Does my mouth clench in the stress of my problems? Or does it act as a subtle encouraging word in the form of a smile? Because the ones in the malls or college hallways who see this face are so much more than faces. They are the very people that the Lord came to save.