Category: The Hour has arrived

From where he sat in the classroom, Tim had a view of all his fellow students. All of them were scholars of a local high school in a small town. Most of them had been together since primary school. This class was not the most popular one in school, in fact, that was an understatement. They were labelled “losers” by the rest of the school because not one of them achieved any trophy or prize on the sport field. The honours that were achieved, were in connection with academic or cultural activities and boy, did that sink the honour ship for them.

Tim was one of the quiet ones in class who preferring studying insects in the garden rather than fooling around with others or watching television.

He remembers one day when another boy, Josh, found him in the garden exclaiming with disgust, “Oh, you are such a loser!”

Sally sat next to Tim in class. She was very unpopular because she was a child of the richest people in town. Almost all the other children in school were children of butchers, bakers and toilet-brush makers, employees of the rich business empire owned by Sally’s parents. She could wear all the expensive perfume of the world, the smell of money still came through. She was called Loser with a capital L.

Today Tim is science professor and he was sitting in a restaurant, waiting for his wife, Sally, his former fellow student from high school, when he saw Josh approaching him. “Is this really you, Tim? Wow, you look good. How are you?”

Tim was about to answer when Sally arrived. “Look, Sally, you remember Josh?”

Good to see you, Josh! How are you?” As she gave him a hug.

“You two look so good!” Josh said. “What happened to you? Why do you look so happy? Why are you so different from the time you were lo…. you were in school!”

Tim laughed. “Yes, you could say we were losers because everyone called us losers. We discovered that we were indeed losers, but so were you Josh.”

“Why do you say that?” Josh enquired.

“We met Jesus. I suppose you could say that if humans were winners, it would not have been necessary for Jesus to die for us, and yet, Jesus never looks at us, or anybody else for that matter, as losers.”

Tim continued, “However, if Sally and I did not realise that we are losing it in life, we would definitely have lost our lives. We have accepted Jesus and He calls us winners now. It is the most wonderful experience to be on His winning side!”

Josh replied, “I am also a Christian today and in all honesty, when we called you losers, we did that because we were jealous. When I gave my life to Christ I felt so bad about the way I treated you. We were jealous because Jesus protected you guys. There was a kind of presence in your class that were absent in all the others and I am positive it is because Jesus was covering you. I suppose He saw the unfair treatment and His love for you covered you from all sides, even before you gave your life to Him.”

If you, while reading this, would be feeling like a loser today, remember that Jesus is standing very close to you, protecting you and covering you in His love. Remember there are no losers in the world. Just accept that and lay down fear, anxiety, feelings of inadequacy and find rest in the love of Jesus. (1 John 3:16)

I met Mike at a funeral of all places. We were in the hall after the burial, enjoying tea and refreshments when I saw him sitting quietly with his teacup in his hand, his head bent forward slightly.

I took a seat next to him. “Hi, my name is Ken. Are you a member of the family?”

“No”, he replied. “Joe and I were best friends for more than thirty years. Ah, you know, I feel sad today, not because Joe is gone and that we will not see him again, but because we have missed so much in life. He is in heaven but we have missed a great deal of true life.”

“Why do you say that?” I asked. Mike told me their story. They met at school many years ago and instantly became close friends. They shared so much together, but Mike said that the time he remembers best, was after they met Jesus.

With a smile on his face Mike continued and told me how they went all out serving Jesus, from school to university and even after they had started their own separate careers.

“It was a feast. You know, when I think about those years I can almost smell it. We smelled the fragrance of success and prosperity but above all, the fragrance of Jesus at our side.”

Mike went silent for a while before he continued. “Then we got so busy with our careers, we gradually forgot to live. I guess you could say we had backslidden spiritually to a place where Jesus was just a framed picture on a wall, a sweet memory. And the fragrance was gone from our lives without us noticing anything.”

“However, unfortunately, or should I say fortunately, Joe fell ill, seriously, incurably ill. This illness took Joe back on his footprints to the place where he had left Jesus. I don’t know how far he had to go back but he got there, and when he did, he grabbed the hand of Jesus and, do you know what? I am sure he is still holding on to that hand in heaven as we speak.”

“Today I smell life again. The preacher delivered a message in church that I know was sent from Jesus and Joe. He read something about people like us who went missing for Jesus in the buzz of life – ‘I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely, for my anger has turned away from him (Hosea 14:4).’”

With a tear trickling down his cheek, he continued, “What hit me the most was one of the verses that read, ‘His branches shall spread, his beauty shall be like an olive tree and his fragrance like the Lebanon.’

And this is exactly what is happening now. I smell the fragrance of life again, the life of Jesus!”

Mike put down his empty cup, greeted me as if we were old friends and left smiling. It suddenly felt very quiet and lonely but I picked up a wonderful fragrance in the air.

Jesus is Alive! All I have to do, is to backtrack to the place where I let go of His hand and grab on to it like Joe did, knowing that He has never left me.

We see people develop into beautiful Christians on seed others have sown into their lives. Yet, looking at people we ourselves are in contact with, we often fail to see any development on seed we have sown and it causes doubt in our minds considering our seed and our ability to sow. And then the question whether we are at the right place doing the right thing, bears down heavily on us.

And yet, not one of us is at a place in his life by chance, even considering our mistakes and bad decisions in life. Someone once said, “To wish you were someone else is to waste the person you are.” I’d like add on to that by saying, “To wish you could be doing something else, would mean admitting that every castle you built, was built on sand.” God uses us regardless. We are in touch with people around us with the purpose of sowing seed into their lives. Although we might become discouraged for not noticing any yield on our seed, we must remember that it is a matter between that person and God.

In the Bible we find a married couple, Joanna and Chuza, who found themselves at specific places in their lives that were not by chance. Joanna looked after Jesus and His disciples from her substance and Chuza was a steward of Herod (Luke 8:3). A steward has privileges that other servants do not have. He manages his master’s household and can speak freely with his master. Joanna was in close contact with Jesus and knew everything that He had done and Chuza must have told Herod everything his wife shared with him. Herod, the Roman ruler, was a Jew and he was in Jerusalem to take part in the Passover feast. Let’s see what might have happened in their lives:

Joanna raced to the house where Chuza worked. When she arrived, she asked the servants to call her husband quickly because she had terrible news to share with him. When he saw her, he immediately noticed the concern and shock on his wife’s face. “What is wrong, Joanna?”

“You have no idea what has happened! They have arrested Jesus and the Jews want to kill him. He was with Pilate and I understand that he has plans to send Him to your master Herod. Would you please speak to him and ask him to free Jesus?” Joanna begged her husband.

“You don’t have to worry, Joanna. I’ve been telling Herod everything that you told me about Jesus, and believe me, he is very anxious to meet Him. I am sure he will release Him. Go back and tell the disciples they don’t need to worry. I have shared every miracle you told me about with him. Honestly, Herod knows about Jesus, and he desires to meet Him.”

Herod indeed welcomed the decision of Pilate to send Jesus to him. He had been longing to meet Him for a long time because he heard many things about Him (Luke 23:8). Alas, we know what Herod did to Jesus and we therefore know the seed that Chuza had sown, did not grow in Herod’s heart.

If you would be looking for your harvest or are busy grappling with the question of whether you should be sowing anyway, there is one very important matter we should keep in mind. If we do not sow, no harvest will follow… ever.

God does not sow seed except through us, and if we neglect sowing, no seed is sown, ever. However, when we sow, the success of the harvest does not depend on us but on God. In 1 Cor 3:7 we read that “…neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God Who gives the increase.”

Chuza looked at the greatness of his master and thought the ground on which he was sowing, was good. Yet, he could have given him all the fertiliser in the world and watered him daily, but the seed would not have yielded a harvest because God knew Herod’s heart was infertile ground and no increase was possible.

Praise God for the fact that He chose your heart for His seed to grow in. No matter where you are or what you are doing, scatter the seed of Jesus without worrying where it would fall. I have seen seed grow among thorns or thrive between rocks because it is God who makes it grow.

Peter was a man of solid rock. When he confessed that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, Jesus called him the foundation of the church. Peter was a man of action and it was evident that Peter played a prominent part.

Peter walked on water. He did not hesitate to ask Jesus questions about any issue and he even had the audacity to rebuke Jesus wrongfully when He told them what would happen to Him (Mathew 16:22,23).

He was bold enough to speak to Jesus when He was with Moses and Elijah on the mountain.

When Jesus was captured, he took his sword and cut off the ear of one guard.

Peter was indeed a man of action, a solid rock, a go-getter.

Peter and his brother were called to follow Jesus after Jesus told them to cast their nets into the water and they hauled in probably the biggest catch of their careers (Luke 5). After that they were called to follow Him and they immediately obeyed and followed.

It is interesting to note that after the crucifixion their calling to follow Jesus seemed to have ended and they went back to fishing. After the resurrection of Jesus, He met them again while they were fishing and again He told them to cast out their nets and again they hauled in another big catch (John 21).

Once again they were called to follow Jesus signifying the continuance of their calling. However, before that Jesus asked Peter three times whether he loved Him. Only after he had answered three times that he did, Jesus told him again to follow Him.

To follow Jesus today is our biggest and only task. The question comes to mind, why did Jesus ask Peter three times in a row whether he loved Him? There could only be one explanation….. Because three times in a row Peter denied Jesus.

How could Peter? How on earth could he stoop so low to deny Jesus three times after everything he experienced at His side?

We definitely are not like Peter, or are we? “Oh, but I have never denied Jesus!” Really?

I don’t believe I am the only one guilty of denying Jesus many times more than Peter did. I remember times when I asked Him to assist me in a test, and when my fellow students told me how clever I was, I accepted the honours and at the same time denied Jesus the honours for my success.

I asked Jesus for rain and after He had answered my prayers I harvested a bumper crop. Then I thought how good a farmer I had become. Again I denied Jesus the honour He deserved.

I can go on and on, relating incidents like the above.

All the successes in my life are contributed to the input and guidance of Jesus, and still I call them “my” success stories. Yet, Jesus still desires me to follow Him. His love for me stays the same.

If Jesus would ask you whether you love Him, how many times would He have to do that to cancel out the times you denied Him? Rest assured, He does not count the denials but He listens when you confess your love for Him every time and that is His joy in your life. Give Him a special hug today, the one He deserves for being our loving God and Saviour and yes, give Him all the credit for all your successes. He deserves that.

Thinking back over my life I remember the times when my daughter was very small, moments when she was terrified of something or got hurt and came to dad for the rescue. I remember after picking her up into my arms how she clung to me, holding on for dear life.

I could smell her soft hair and felt het soft arms around my neck while her tears soaked through my shirt. Even after she calmed down from whatever problem she had, she often kept on holding to me with her head resting on my shoulder.

She is grown up today with children of her own but I remember those moments very clearly and I keep those precious memories dusted and polished.

In Mat 11:28 Jesus says, “Come to Me, all you who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”

We know that when we experience some problem we also run to our Father, or do we? Sometimes we are so independent, strong, wise and grown up that we try to solve all our problems on our own. At times we think that grownups are not supposed to be in need of something.

In Mathew 18 Jesus tells us to become like little children because He knows that if we do, we would be running to Him every time. To hold our arms around His neck while resting our heads on His shoulder. To rest in His presence. Then we would not only run to Him in times of need but also in times of joy.

We are entitled to run to God for safety and comfort every time but we should keep one very important fact in mind – just as I keep my precious memories close to my heart because I love my children very much, so does God.

I can imagine that the most precious moments Jesus experienced in our lives were moments when we ran to Him, jumped up into His arms and held on to Him because we trust Him and because we love Him.

Why would Jesus feel different about those memories than we do? He loves us much more than we would ever be able to.

Maybe you don’t need Him for crisis management right now or for any matter anyhow, but just to make Him a wonderful memory on this day, go to Him right now, sit on His lap and just hold on to Him and love Him. He will smile on you and tenderly hold you close to Him. I guarantee you that He would keep this memory safe, dusted and polished at all time.

As a ranger, Gustav spent most of his life in the forest with his wife and children and they loved every second of it. Eventually each child got married and moved out of the house to settle in different places and consequently, they asked their parents to get a cell phone because it was the only way of communication most of the time.

Gustav was not very keen at first but his wife persuaded him to get one, especially since they had become grandparents.

Gustav entered the shop and approached the young man behind the counter, “Good day, son. I need to buy a cellular phone. I have never had one before. Could you assist me, please?”

The salesman’s face lit up, “Sir, this is the best decision you have ever made. Let me show you what we have.” At that point he was very confident and decided to start with the best. “The advanced technology of today is absolutely amazing, sir. I don’t know what the people did without this device 50 years ago.”

Gustav looked at him and asked, “What can this thing do that makes it so special? I only need to speak to my children.”

“Well sir, this one has a 12 megapixel camera and a video player, MP3 player, a camcorder and voice recorder. It has blue tooth, 3G, GPS and you can log onto any internet site, send and receive e-mails including photos that you have taken. All you have to do, is sign the contract, charge your phone and use it.”

Gustav looked at the phone in front of him. “You call this plastic thing after some berries and claim it is advanced technology, but you cannot eat it. Then you rave about the features it has only to communicate with someone else. I have been a Christian for the most part of my life and I think this is very primitive.”

I don’t think it is advanced at all. Since I became a Christian, I can speak to Jesus every day of my life, any time of the day or night and I don’t need electricity to be recharged. I don’t have to carry anything around with me because Jesus gave me the Holy Spirit. I have His “Chip” indwelling me since I became His child. He speaks to me whenever He wants to and when He does not speak to me, He is still present and remains connected.

I am able to communicate with Jesus any time without having to push any buttons because our connection is voice activated. I don’t even need to call His number first, I can just speak, whisper or think and the response is instantaneous.”

“However, don’t let me discourage you. I will take the phone because I need to speak to my children too, but is not advanced. It is extremely primitive and outdated.”

No modern technology will ever be able to outperform the modern creation of God. If we do not get ourselves updated by the always new and advanced knowledge of Jesus and our Father in heaven, we will remain in our small, primitive, plastic world.

Our eyes act as information grabbers and memory makers all through our lives. It depends on where and what we would focus our eyes on to gather the information we prefer to build our memory and enhance our experience in life.

As a young boy I was sitting in church one day, waiting for the sermon to start when I gathered something through my eyes. A tramp walked into church through one of the side entrances and took a seat close to the front on the right hand side.

He sat for about a minute or two when a woman who sat behind him leaned over and whispered something in his ear. The man then stood up and walked out of church. We later learned that she asked him to take a seat in the back of the church. He felt so ashamed that he chose to leave.

I imagined a scene experienced through the eyes of the tramp. He probably saw a church and, having had positive memories about it from the past, he longed to experience that love and peace once again. He saw his own worn clothes with months of dust and dirt clinging to them, but he gathered enough courage to enter and quickly sat down on the first empty space he found. His heart grew warm inside as he listened to the music. Then he heard someone whispering in his ear, “Sir, would you please get up and go sit at the back.”

I suppose the woman who appointed herself as tramp whisperer felt she did everyone a favour by asking this man to take a seat of lesser class.

As he left, his eyes filled with tears and he could only see blurred images of people walking towards the entrance, staring at him with frosty frozen expressions of disgust, pity and shame. The tramp did not blame the tramp whisperer or the church, but reminded himself why he had become the man he was. Sheer pain throbbed where his heart was supposed to be.

God noticed through His eyes the wasted past of someone who lost the way many years before, but He also saw the longing for love, the desire to come back and sit at the feet of Jesus again and to hear someone say to him, “Hi, I love you”, or just “ How are you?”

We are the instruments Jesus uses to touch broken hearts and to lead them to the hands of the Creator, the Healer and Mender of broken hearts.

If it had been a feast organised by Jesus, He would have stopped the tramp, invited him back into the hall and asked the tramp whisperer to take a seat at the back to make room for him (Luke 14:8,9).

Luke 11:33-36 says the lamp of the body is the eye.

This lamp shines in two directions. What we allow to enter through our eyes, determines our way of thinking which in turn determines where we want our eyes to rest upon.

My wife and I returned home from vacation recently when we took the scenic but narrow Meiringskloof road meandering through the mountains. At one spot our car left the road slightly and when I over-adjusted, it started to spin out of control.

When we finally stopped, the car faced in the opposite direction.

Right next to the road was the sheer mountain face and opposite on the other side, trees and a river. Yet, this 360 degree manoeuvre took place while the car stayed on the surface of the narrow road. An accident was avoided not because of our car or my driving skills, but because Jesus was present.

When we started to spin, Harriet cried out to God to assist us and I joined in and He abruptly stopped the car without us getting injured or the car damaged.

This accentuated the fact once again that Jesus is present in Person during our everyday lives. It is easy to believe in Someone who lived in the past whom we will meet in future, but it is not easy to know He is present now if there is no visual proof of that presence – until we experience it like we did above. Then we realise we have to hold on to His realistically present hand every second of the day.

In John 5:31-47 Jesus addressed the Jews who sought to kill Him because they did not believe the Man in front of them was the Messiah.

Then Jesus told them that they searched the Scriptures proclaiming the coming of Christ. They listened to Moses and accepted his message. They listened to John the Baptist and many believed and were baptised. And He continued: “But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life.” (40)

After years of anticipating His appearance, they did not believe in Jesus when He arrived!

When the Scriptures were fulfilled, they had the privilege to look at Him, touch Him and follow Him, and yet, they did not believe in Him.

We do the same most of the time. We pray “Our Father which are in heaven.” We surrender to the Holy Spirit to be in His presence. We study the Scriptures and organise Colleges and Seminars to train people to understand different languages and study the cultures and history of the people in the Bible to find out more about redemption and Jesus. We join denominations and get baptised, sing in church choirs, give money to the church and serve the people around us, but we miss the most important part – spending time with Jesus.

If your life seems to spin out of control like our car did, do not wait for the spinning to stop – ask Him to step in because He is present.

You can neither see, nor physically touch Him. Nevertheless, at this very moment, give Him a hug and love Him, He’s been waiting every day for you to do just that. And tomorrow morning as you wake up, live as if to breathe His presence into your existence because He would stay with you throughout the day in Person.

In the huge black and dark hall satan and all his followers were gathered. Sulphur fumes filled the air with hissing and coughing sounds all around.

One of the leader demons gathered enough courage to address satan, “Boss, we are so proud of you after you persuaded Eve to eat from the forbidden tree. Wow, now due to their disobedience, these human beings are doomed just like we are. I suppose you achieved quite something because they would now be unable to go to heaven, heh, heh.”

Satan’s voice thundered through the hall. “Yes, oh yes, but I am feeling so frustrated,” and he illustrated his feelings by slapping one of his demons right across the hall. “I don’t understand God. He is just and therefore the humans should have been history, but He made a covenant with Abraham and He promised to send a Saviour to rescue the people….. Why?”

Suddenly they heard a horrible screaching sound as a demon stormed into the hall. “Bouuuuss, boss, you got to hear this! They say the Saviour has been born. I’ve tried to find out where but the angels of God prevented us.”

Satan’s face fell. “Why would God do this? He should have treated them like He treated us. Why is He still trying to make them righteous? We would need to work a lot harder now.”

Why Jesus had to die for our sins, is answered by looking at what had happened to the devil.

Initially the devil and his demons were angels in heaven and were loved by God. However, because God is holy, fair and just, He dealt with their rebellion by removing the devil and all his followers from heaven.

Adam and Eve were created outside of heaven on earth, but because God loved them so much, He desired to take them and their children into heaven where He is, even after they had sinned. To enter heaven they needed to be righteous, and to accomplish that, payment would be required for their sins.

As human beings and sinners, like Adam and his family, we do not have any means to settle the debt for our wrongdoings. The animal sacrifices of the Old Testament were like paying with a credit card, you remain in debt.

God had the following solution: He allowed His Son, Jesus, to become a human being and Jesus, while He willingly took our sins upon Himself, paid the price on behalf of us. Only Jesus could do that. God allowed this to happen because He is both a just and a loving God.

By receiving this dearly paid for gift as my very own, my life with the Father and Son in heaven is guaranteed. Awesome in its totality, but especially awesome and precious if I, even for one second should consider the outcome of my refusal of this Gift: eternity spent separated from God, with Satan and his hordes in hell.

“The bread is almost ready,” Mary thought as she looked at it on the hot stone in the brick oven. She suddenly realized it was almost time for lunch.

She put the vegetables on the table, took a sharp knife and as she started to peel, she noticed her three year old playing on the kitchen floor.

At that moment she cut her thumb. She quickly put down the knife and grabbed a cloth to stop the bleeding.

“O no,” she thought, “I am already late as it is.”

“Mommy, let me see.” She looked down at her Son standing next to her.

“No, it’s fine, my child,” she said. He kept on asking her tenderly, “Mother, please, let me see”. She opened her hand to show Him. He took her hand into his hands and smiled back at her. “It’s fine now, Mom.”

She sensed a warm sensation running through her hand and when she looked at it, she could not believe her eyes. The cut had healed perfectly with no trace of any scar. In unbelief she looked at the bloodstained cloth on the table and gradually she began to comprehend who this Child really is.

“Mom, you have to keep quiet about this because My time has not yet come. This is our little secret.” He kissed her hand and resumed playing on the floor.

What is described above is not taken from a history book or Bible text. However, I believe many miracles like this took place in the household of Mary and Joseph. In John 2:1-12 Jesus, His mother and disciples attended a wedding when the wine ran out and Mary mentioned it to Jesus.

She did not ask Him how this could be solved, but just told Him because she knew what He would do. He answered, “My hour has not yet come.”

Mary persisted and told the servants, “Whatever He says to you, do it,” and we know that Jesus turned water into wine, the best wine ever.

It is obvious that Mary already knew exactly what Jesus would do, because she experienced the presence of Jesus in her life first hand.

Having spent more than 33 years in His presence daily, she knew Him personally. Do you know Him that well too, or is He only known to you as another interesting character from the number one bestselling Book in the world?

The hour has arrived for each of us to get to know Him personally, as Mary did, and follow Him, walking with Him daily, moment by moment.