The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him. But woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man! It would be better for him if he had not been born.” Then Judas, the one who would betray him, said, “Surely you don’t mean me, Rabbi?” Jesus answered, “You have said so.

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭26‬:‭24‬-‭25‬ ‭NIV‬‬

There is a Judas in all of us. 

We each live our lives with some secret rebellion believing we are better at hiding than Jesus is at finding. 

Judas’ reply when confronted clearly demonstrates he doubted Jesus as God incarnate who is by his very nature all-knowing and all-seeing, otherwise he would have come clean immediately. 

There’s a Judas in all of us. 

Being wholly devoted means even when we sin, we don’t hide like Adam or deny it like Judas in self-defense or deflection of blame. 

When I was arrested on drug charges years ago, my first emotion was relief not defense. Despite having continued using and selling, I had longed for all of it to end. Not necessarily the way it did, but I knew I’d been found out. 

There’s a Judas in all of us. 

Accepting God’s forgiveness means first acknowledging both our guilt and God’s omniscience in the equation. 

Our reflexive response when confronted must include humility and sorrow before we can experience grace and mercy. 

Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.
‭‭Matthew‬ ‭24‬:‭42‬-‭44‬ ‭NIV‬‬

If you’re not already living on the edge of your seat, waiting expectantly, given the events of today’s world, your bet is poorly placed against the odds.

Signs of end times have appeared for generations to generations on high alert.

The most transformative event in all of human history is on the horizon and reactions are either great fear, greater faith, or dismissive altogether.

I’m pretty sure Jesus isn’t one to scare people into submission and to be dismissive of it altogether is an eternally ignorant position.

However—and this is an important takeaway—Jesus desires that ALL come to him (1Tim:2 4)

To essentially write-off these folks is for the faithful to abandon their great commission.

Being ready for his return and the end of the age is for all.

I heard it once explained to me something like this: If the gift you received means eternal life and you don’t earnestly share that invitation with others, your cruelty may be a greater sin than their unbelief.

Get ready EVERYONE.
He’s coming soon.

Vertical and horizontal. 

A vertical relationship with God and a horizontal relationship with others sets the stage for all other instruction.

Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭22‬:‭36‬-‭40‬ ‭NIV‬‬

The axis of power is manifest when you’re right with God and servant to your fellow man. 

The greatest among you will be your servant. For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭23‬:‭11‬-‭12‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Just for fun, I asked ChatGPT to write my eulogy using only information available about me on the internet. 

The nearly instant summary was a paragraph extolling my virtues of being “a deeply religious man” with a “sincere care and concern for the welfare of others, particularly the elderly.”

Not entirely disappointed, I wondered if this is all the world will remember of me when I’m gone. 

It seemed to check both the X and Y axes, but thought the summary was otherwise unremarkable.

We are our own worst critics. 

Our personal standards of what it means to be a Christian can get lost in our history of rule keeping and rule breaking, and for most of us, that’s not on the internet. 

Nonetheless, while you’re pursuing performance on these two commandments, don’t forsake the simplicity of John 3:16, the one that supersedes both. 

Sin Offering Sparrows Special: $2.99 each or 2 for $5

Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. “It is written,” he said to them, “ ‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it a den of robbers.

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭21‬:‭12‬-‭13‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Like visiting the attraction’s gift shop on the way in, not the way out, temple sales were booming but cheapening the worship experience. 

Anything to make a buck broke the very heart of solemn temple worship and left the church indistinguishable from a midtown city marketplace on a Friday afternoon. 

Church is a place to escape distractions of this world.

Church is a space to come as you are to commune with God. 

Church provides a pace of rest to pray and hope with others who also expect God to show up and be glorified. 

Let’s keep it that way. 

Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭19‬:‭21‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Imagine earning all your life, accruing savings, investments, and valuables only to suddenly give it all away someday. 

That’s what you’re doing right now. 

You’ll kick the bucket one unexpected day and 

    💨poof! 💨 

it all goes to others or back in the box as you fly off in faith to your heavenly destination made perfect but empty handed and you just don’t care. 

Heaven itself is the treasure. 

Seek ye first the kingdom of God and all good things will be added unto you. —Matthew 6:33

The passages are less about giving and more about what you receive when you “Come, follow me.”

To truly believe in Christ is to always yearn for a life unencumbered by the things of this world and for the grand prize of a fully and completely devoted life. 

It takes great faith to give up reliance and dependence on the “stuff” of our years. 

When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭19‬:‭22‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Always yearning for the right stuff will turn poverty into wealth sooner or later. 

In his name the nations will put their hope.

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭12‬:‭21‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Not their stock markets, 

not supply chains,

not affordability of housing or food, not their defense budgets. 

In times of volatility with near infinite security variables in the balance, the nations whose plurality keeps Christ at the center of their flourishing will prosper. 

Not in worldly assets,

not in peace through strength, not even in treaties of peace crafted between embittered rivaling nations.

My hope is built on nothing less

Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.

I dare not trust the sweetest frame

But wholly lean on Jesus’ name.

On Christ the solid rock I stand

All other ground is sinking sand

All other ground is sinking sand.

All glory to the One who has enabled nations of freed men and women to sing, speak, and have their being fixed not on things of this world but on the one to come. 

At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick some heads of grain and eat them. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, “Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath.

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭12‬:‭1‬-‭2‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Ok Karen. 

The shift from living by the strict letter of the law to living by grace must have been difficult. Still is for some. 

Busybodies are on watch 24/7 aiming to catch you in violation of what they claim you profess as your faith. 

Entangling you in their arguments may be their goal, but without a relationship with Jesus themselves, they’ve no authority to report you to. 

Going on from that place, he went into their synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to bring charges against Jesus, they asked him, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?” He said to them, “If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out?

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭12‬:‭9‬-‭11‬ ‭NIV‬‬

There were over 600 laws that governed every minutiae of Jewish behavior and still do, and everyone was a Karen looking for reportable offenses. 

When Jesus came, he freed the people of Israel from the law and established a kingdom ruled by grace and mercy according to each individual’s faith. 

A personal relationship with Christ is the key that unlocks the door to legit freedom and focus on the purest purposes of God for his creation. 

Avoid the entanglements and pray for the Karens who are missing out on life ruled by a God of grace, mercy, and loving one another as Christ loves. 

Speak to your own Manager on behalf of Karens everywhere. 
God knows they need it.

There are uncounted pockets of missing persons in wait for the chance of being found.

A generation of lonely and mostly forgotten, abandoned by family, underserved and unacknowledged by society, making do with less than any human being should.

Few with the mobility to seek help and all living their golden years like a scrap of aluminum foil.
While they dream of somewhere else, they’ve no place better to be.

They eat what they can on twenty bucks a month, pay their rent on time often at the sacrifice of air conditioning, and wear the same broken glasses they bought back in the 1980s when times were different.

And with few friends if any to talk with about their struggle, they are unable to muster a lasting living audience.

They’ve neither owned nor operated a computer, plow their walkers along highways in the heat of the day hoping to return home safely, and if so, with a bag from a food bank to satisfy their hunger affording them more than one meal a day.

And each day they fall further into the pit.

They are medically fragile, unemployable, and marks for thieves, schemes and scam artists. They’ve few if any assets, raises in income, and no awareness that this kind of life is not normal.

Yet despite it all, they are the kindest most generous generation of friends anyone could ever have.

They want no pity, seek no justice and pray relentlessly for the best for others.

They are society’s almost buried treasures still longing to be found and cherished for their patriotic, colorful, enduring life stories and the touch of someone’s hand who may listen and understand so that they themselves will never end up this way some day.

So do not be afraid of them, for there is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known.

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭10‬:‭26‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Omniscience. An attribute of a God who is all-knowing.

Lately, God has revealed to me times and events of my life I never before knew existed or had forgotten, probably because they were too painful.

I wasn’t actively seeking these revelations, but somehow they seeped out into my consciousness and to rebalance my mind and heart, I’ve had to man up and deal with them. 

Sanctification is an ongoing path for believers who choose to be open to the stuff of our past and a God who is all-knowing and omniscient.

He never gives us more than we can handle at the time (1Cor 10:13) but trust that for those he loves he will reveal what is hidden as we are becoming found. 

If I was a younger man, I would use more commas than exclamation points, make pregnant pauses mean something more in conversation and ponder longer the silent moments I was dealt.

If I was a younger man, I would take up causes that mattered most, view my future the least and risk much more for what I believed.

If I was a younger man, my contemplations would be richer, reflections clearer, and conversations more indelible.

As a younger man I would spend more time writing poetry, longer notes on greeting cards, and make more calls to those I love for no particular reason at all.

My friends would be closer, my enemies further, and my heart much softer as a younger man. I would listen to older men more, memorize better quotations, create more memories, and remember more of what was most important.

Everything I’d do would be taken down a notch or two, time would be much more precious, and life would boil down to a single purpose. And I would do it today instead of tomorrow, look at the big picture,
and take more snapshots on the way.

The clock would pale in significance and my “I” would be much less important than my “you.”

As a younger man, my gains would be more intangible, my virtues more apparent, and my focus more intense. I’d play more, give more,
and say more thank you’s to complete strangers for their unacknowledged acts of valor.

I would pet more puppies, take longer walks, and pause a few more times to see smaller things around me in bigger ways. And I wouldn’t be afraid to cry.

I would be an older soul in a younger body, chasing more inventions, reading more genres,
and blazing more trails for younger men to follow.

I would scour the dictionary for just the right word, enter more contests, and share more of my winnings with strangers.

I would edit less, listen more, and use smaller words to say the same things to more people so they could understand the wisdom of men much older than them.

And maybe then, the younger men would see the value of using commas more, exclamation points less, and the perfect power of a pause.