Luke 13:1-17
Friday, 26 August 2022
‘…….leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine!’
‘Should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan has bound for eighteen years, be free…….?’ – Luke 13: 8-9; 16
We live in a very insensitive and merciless world that lacks compassion for the weak, where there is no room for failures or for helpless people. If you do not produce the result expected of you, you are most likely to be replaced by someone considered ‘BETTER THAN YOU.’
We read about such a situation in today’s scripture reading— a tree ready to be cut down due to its fruitlessness and a crippled woman to be denied healing because it’s a Sabbath. When you look at your own life, who do you resemble— the tree or the woman? Here is good news for you!- the Master is at hand!
Very often we are rejected by the world just as the woman and the tree. People are impatient with us due to our weaknesses and inadequacies (as Verses 7 & 14 respectively portray). People may say: ‘Cut it down why should it use up the soil?’’ ‘..Come and be healed on other days not a Sabbath!’ Overlooked, underrated and shunned!! The one comment we hear is ‘Forget him / her.’ Nothing good will come from there! It was the same with the tree and the woman. For 3 years the master did not find any fruit on it and the woman had been crippled for 18 years, a big burden to the family.
Is this how your life looks like today? ‘When the world is giving up on you there is a gentle voice telling you: “I will stand up for you!” -All we need to do is yield to Christ. As 1 Peter 2:4 [The MSG] says “Welcome to the living stone, the source of life. The workmen took one look and threw it out; God set it in place of honour.”
Why does He do this?
The LORD recognizes our potentials.
He says about the tree: ‘leave it alone for one more year’; (V.8)
About the woman: ‘‘a daughter of Abraham’ (V.16).
Our Heavenly Father looks at us way differently from the way the world looks at us. He sees us as ‘what we could become if He could work in our lives. He sees us as precious and valuable because we are his craftsmanship created in Christ Jesus (Eph.2:10). The Lord sees our faultlessness, when the world sees our flaws. He paid a very costly price to rescue us from the pit of sin. The Lord reminds the weak from 2 Cor.12: 9: ‘for my strength is made perfect in weakness.’ He will bring out the best in us!
This strength is available for us, provided we entrust our lives into:
The restoring hands for the Master’s touch
This is the key to freedom and fruitfulness. When the Maker gives us special attention, there is absolute certainty that things are going to become new. Jesus, the gardener dug around the tree and fertilized it [V.8]. Jesus, the healer spotted this crippled woman among all the other women and put his hands on her [V.13]. The woman needed only a touch; the tree needed a whole year’s work on it. We would see results in our lives according to the extent we yield to him. When the world is looking at our brokenness they fail to see how God is turning it around into a blessing because we are in His hands.
Today the Master stretches out his nail-pierced hands toward us wanting to touch and restore us. What is keeping you from receiving this touch? Is it stubbornness or are you stiff-necked?
Thought for the Day: “God will never reject you. Whether you accept him is your decision.” ~Charles Stanly
Comments