Day No.3: To Know Him is to Love Him

To know Him is to Love Him, to love Him is to drink the cup with Him, the break bread with Him and sup with Him. To linger in His presence like the Twelve. How quick I am to to leave Him. How fast I run to "other gods". What are those other gods? For me, I am quick to rush into worry about my business, social media, the never ending list of "to do". Ah-ha!  "Todolist" that is the name of that idol. When Martha complained of all the things she needed to do and that Mary wasn't helping, Jesus gently explained that she was worried about many things and that only one thing was needed. Mary had chosen the good portion and it would not be taken from her. (Luke 10:40-42)

This idol mixed with my will easily becomes a god of sorts "their god is their own stomach.. their mind is on earthly things" (Phillipians 3:18-20) but our citizenship is in heaven and we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ. So you see, a "god" does not have to even be made out of iron or wood. It really can simply be our own appetites, our own egos, ultimately our own will. Jesus! please take my mind off of earthly things and know one thing only: Jesus Christ and Him crucified; like Mary, like Paul (1 Corinthians 2:2)

Yesterday morning was a beautiful time in the presence of the Lord, but quickly I got caught up in work. One of the things I would ask you Jesus is to please guard my heart and mind to still do the things required of me but to remain in You. 

Back to Matthew; it is interesting to see that Jospeh and Mary were visited by angels several times in their lives, that they prophesied and that they had dreams given to them by the Lord. What is also very interesting is that when the angel told Joseph to "not be afraid" it was not about seeing the angel, like most people were (understandably so), but not being afraid to take Mary as his wife. This leads me to believe that perhaps this wasn't the first time he had been visited by an angel and that his life was characterized by regular communion with the Lord.

On the temptation of Christ: when tempted, be wise and recant with holy scripture, not your own reasoning. The idea is, by God's very Spirit, to be a little Christ: to live like Christ, to think like Christ, to walk, talk, pray, minister, teach, heal, cast out demons, to die like Christ, to rise like Christ to judge and ultimately reign with Christ (supporting scriptures)