Good morning to all from Kingston Jamaica! Waine and I are in Kingston, enjoying our friends and each other. All is well in the Kong household and God continues to bless us beyond measure. Continue to pray for ET and his family and pray for all the families of the world. Family is no small thing. It is the glue that binds our lives one with another and the glue that God made to bind society. Remember that He made them male and female to be a family!
I am continuing my journey in Matthew 27, verses 1-10, "Early in the morning, all the chief priests and the elders of the people came to the decision to put Jesus to death. They bound Him, led Him away and handed Him over to Pilate, the governor. When Judas, who had betrayed Him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. I have sinned, he said, for I have betrayed innocent blood. What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility." So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself. The chief priests picked up the coins and said, "It is against the law to put this into the treasury, since it is blood money." So they decided to use the money to buy the potter's field as a burial place for foreigners. That is why it has been called the Field of Blood to this day. Then what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: They took the thirty silver coins, the price set on Him by the people of Israel, and they used them to buy the potter's field, as the Lord commanded me. May the Lord add a blessing to the reading of His Word. Amen!
Isn't that something. Judas realized too late that Christ was the Son of God who had come to take away the sins of the world. Judas, however, still did not recognize that he, Judas, was just a minor actor in this most important Play, the Salvation of Mankind. Judas thought he could influence the process by returning the silver that was the price paid for the betrayal of Christ. What Judas didn't realize, was that what was set in motion was not influenced by Judas or the high priests; Jeremiah wrote about it hundreds of years before the birth of Jesus the Christ. Judas realized too late that the only thing he could claim was the result of his sin and disbelief!
Sin is just like that. Sin would have you believe that the sin you are contemplating or involved in, is this great mystery. Something that neither you or the powers of the universe can control. At the end of the day, when you have sinned, sin will look you right in the face and say "hey, I didn't tell you to sin, you sinned because you wanted to and you are responsible." And sin is correct, you and I are responsible for the sins we commit. It starts with what we put in our minds and hearts and proceeds from there. Judas' sin of conceit and dis-belief led to his own demise. What happened to Christ was the willing act of God so that you and I might live. Judas was a minor actor in his own play of destruction as we all are when we allow sin to rule our hearts and mind. The Good News is that we can repent of our sins at any time so that the God of the Universe can rule our hearts and minds and the fruits of the Spirit can dominate and our lives will be for the glory of God and not self. Don't measure your success on what can be gone in a day. Don't sell your soul for 30 pieces of silver--it is worth so much more to Christ who, unlike the chief priests, took responsibility for our sins so that we could again be in the presence of the Almighty. Thank you Jesus for your sacrifice! Amen and amen!
Stephanie
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