Author: Bellissiwarriors

There are things about your life that are true, even though you wish they were not. Things that cause you sorrow and pain. Things you never asked for and definitely never wanted. And they happened anyway.

What does it mean when you’ve given your life to God and you still end up hurting? You’ve been a faithful follower and you still get cancer. You still lose your job, your house, your family. What do you do when God’s plans make you weep?

You are not alone in your tears.  Look to Christ. See Jesus weeping before the grave of His friend, Lazarus (John 11:35), over all the pain, sorrow, and loss that death has unleashed since it entered the world. See Jesus weeping as He enters Jerusalem on a donkey (Luke 19:41), knowing judgment and destruction were coming. See Jesus in anguish in the Garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22:44) in anticipation of what was to come – His betrayal, arrest, abandonment, persecution, and execution.

This is Jesus. He followed the will of the Father perfectly and it led him to the cross.

How do we keep following God when He leads us to places that break our hearts?

We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from start to finish. He was willing to die a shameful death on the cross because of the joy he knew would be his afterward.    Hebrews 12:2

Joy?  Are we supposed to believe that Jesus looked forward to, even welcomed, the cross? No! We clearly see Jesus’ agony in the face of the suffering He knew He was about to endure. But He surrendered His will to God, saying “Yet I want your will, not mine” (Luke 22:42). Then He was able to get up and face what came next. To endure through to the joy.

Were His circumstances changed? Not one bit. If anything, they got worse. So what was different? His thoughts. He looked past the pain to the joy of knowing that He was fulfilling God’s plan to rescue what was lost, to redeem what had been stolen. In the Garden of Gethsemane Jesus stood the test that Adam and Eve failed in the Garden of Eden. What Eve brought into the world by her distrust and disobedience, Christ defeated by His trust and obedience.

For I have come down from heaven to do the will of God who sent me, not to do what I want.         John 6:38

My nourishment comes from doing the will of God, who sent me, and from finishing his work.               John 4:34

Jesus shouts from a cross that God’s plans are good, even when they make us weep. Not because every moment feels good, but because God is good. Certainly the cross wasn’t the source of Jesus’ joy. And whatever painful circumstances you face aren’t intended to be the source of your joy either. They are an invitation to stand the test, to declare that God is fundamentally, at His very essence, good and therefore His plans for us are better than any we could make for ourselves.

So we don’t look at the troubles we can see right now; rather, we look forward to what we have not yet seen. For the troubles we see will soon be over, but the joys to come will last forever.      2 Corinthians 4:18

At this point, many of his disciples turned away and deserted him. Then Jesus turned to the Twelve and asked, “Are you going to leave, too?” Simon Peter replied, “Lord, to whom would we go? You alone have the words that give eternal life. We believe them, and we know you are the Holy One of God.” Then Jesus said, “I chose the twelve of you, but one is a devil.” He was speaking of Judas, son of Simon Iscariot, one of the Twelve, who would betray him.            John 6:66-71

We marvel that Jesus invited Judas to be His disciple when He knew Judas would betray Him. But that’s true for all the disciples. He washed all of their feet. He broke bread with all of them. And they all let Jesus down. They all fled. Jesus invited all of them to follow Him knowing what they would do on the night He was betrayed.

When Jesus asked if the Twelve were going to desert Him, Peter answered: Where else can we go? There’s no one else who gives thirst-quenching water. There’s no one else who gives soul-satisfying bread. There’s no one else that speaks words that wake up the soul and bring it to life.

And yet. And yet Judas gave Jesus away with a kiss for 30 pieces of silver. And yet Peter declared, “I am ready to die for you” (John 13:37) and then only a few hours later insisted, “I swear by God, I don’t know this man you’re talking about” (Mark 14:71). They both had lived alongside, learned from, and ministered with Jesus. And yet neither one really understood what it all meant.

There’s always the risk that we’ll walk away from the Christian life. The road will get too hard. The seas too stormy. The cup too bitter. The lessons too hard to understand. But for the person who has truly met Christ, walking away really isn’t an option.  If we want to live, where else can we go?

The disciples were people who lived with Jesus, walked with Him, talked with Him.  They sat at the table with Him. They abandoned Him. They were people like us – imperfect and in need of a Savior. Because Jesus invited Peter, James, John, and the rest even though He knew they would let Him down, we can take heart. He does this for us as well. He invites us, knowing who we are and what we will do, the ways we will disappoint Him and run away from Him.

Jesus also sees beyond our moment of betrayal, beyond our night in the Garden. He knows what we can be. What He can do with a heart that surrenders to him.

We know what happened to Judas. He regretted his betrayal. Regret sent him back to the Council, a power that couldn’t save him. They rejected him and he went and hanged himself (Matthew 27:3-5).

We also know what happened to Peter. Jesus met him on the beach and invited him back to the table. There He asked Peter, “Do you love me?” Peter was quick to say yes. But Jesus knew more was needed.  He kept asking until godly sorrow brought repentance.  And repentance brought Peter to the Savior.

Peter was grieved that Jesus asked the question a third time. He said, “Lord, you know everything. You know I love you.”       John 21:17

This was Peter’s final surrender. He had been eager, enthusiastic, but without understanding. Now he yields to Christ. His humbled answer says I think I love you. But I thought I loved you and I know what I did. You know me better than I know myself. You know my heart. In response Jesus told Peter, Follow me. Don’t turn back. Don’t walk away. It’s not an option. To do so means death. There is no other way.

Peter caught Jesus’ vision.  He saw beyond his failure in the High Priest’s courtyard to who he could be living by the power of the living God (Matthew 16:18). And that made all the difference.

Not long after Peter’s dismal failure, he was arrested by the religious leaders for speaking about Jesus. Now he wasn’t standing with some servants around a bonfire in the dark. He was before the entire religious Council in the full light of day. He could have saved himself by denying Christ, but there was no way he could do it.  He’d been there before and he knew how it had turned out.

Now he understood. There was no way he could save himself. And he understood if he denied Christ, there was no way he could be saved. There was nowhere else to go.

“There is salvation in no one else!”  — Peter (Acts 4:12)