THOUGHTS OF JOSEPH TKACH
With a new heart into the new year!
John Bell had the opportunity to do something most of us will hopefully never be able to do: He held his own heart in his hands. Two years ago he underwent a heart transplant, which was successful. Thanks to the Heart to Heart program at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, he was now able to hold the heart that had kept him alive for 70 years before it needed to be replaced. This amazing story reminds me of my own heart transplant. This was not a “physical” heart transplant – all who follow Christ have experienced the spiritual version of this process. The brutal reality of our sinful nature is that it causes spiritual death. The prophet Jeremiah stated it clearly: “The heart is a stubborn and despondent thing; Who can fathom it?" (Jeremiah 17,9).
When we are confronted with the reality of our spiritual “heart function,” it is hard to imagine having any hope. Our chance of survival is zero. But the wonderful thing happens for us: Jesus offers us the only possible chance for spiritual life: a heart transplant in the deepest core of our being. The Apostle Paul describes this generous gift as the regeneration of our humanity, the renewal of our...
Read more ➜Does God still love you?
Do you know that many Christians live every day and are not sure that God still loves them? They are worried that God might reject them, and worse, that he has already rejected them. Maybe you are the same scared. Why do you think Christians are so worried?
The answer is simply that they are honest with themselves. They know that they are sinners. They are painfully aware of their failures, their mistakes, their transgressions - their sins. They have been taught that God's love and even salvation depends on how well they obey God.
So they keep telling God how sorry they are and begging for forgiveness in the hope that God will forgive them and not turn their backs when they somehow create a deep, inner sense of concern.
It reminds me of Hamlet, a play by Shakespeare. In this story, Prince Hamlet learned that his uncle Claudius killed Hamlet's father and married his mother in order to usurp the throne. Therefore, Hamlet secretly plans to kill his uncle/stepfather in an act of revenge. The perfect opportunity arises, but the king is praying, so Hamlet postpones the plot. “If I kill him during his confession, he will go to heaven,” concludes Hamlet.
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