(Audio)
Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two
and gave them authority over unclean spirits.
Jesus sends us out and calls us to trust in him, rather than ourselves or the world.
He instructed them to take nothing for the journey but a walking stick
–no food, no sack, no money in their belts.
They were, however, to wear sandals but not a second tunic.
There will come times when it really feels like we are going to come up short if we don't take matters into our own hands. It will feel like we must turn aside from God's call to take care of our needs for ourselves. But if we are following God's call we don't have to obey such feelings. They are merely that: feelings. We know that God can be trusted. All his plans are good. We can't live the life we are meant to live until we begin to trust in the providence of God.
We need to learn to recognize the deeper spiritual reality that underlies our day-to-day experiences.
"I am terrified and trembling."
No, you have approached Mount Zion
and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem,
and countless angels in festal gathering,
and the assembly of the firstborn enrolled in heaven,
and God the judge of all,
and the spirits of the just made perfect,
and Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant,
and the sprinkled Blood that speaks more eloquently
than that of Abel.
We need Jesus to be the anchor of our hope. If we keep our eyes fixed on the one who is the author and perfecter of faith then nothing will be able to stop us from living the life God wants us to live. It is not simply a life of privation of the things we give up or don't provide for ourselves in following Jesus. That privation makes room for participation, even now, in the life of heaven, together with the angels, before the throne of God.
Mount Zion, "the recesses of the North,"
the city of the great King.
God is with her castles;
renowned is he as a stronghold.
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