“Keep smiling, because life is a beautiful thing and there’s so much to smile about.” – Marilyn Monroe
“I failed my way to success.” – Thomas Edison
Thank you, Marilyn, and Thomas, for that wonderful “wisdom”!
I’ll let you decide on how wonderful you think these quotes are, but these sorts of statements can now be found everywhere!
Inspirational quotes have become a bit of a thing. You can buy all kinds of stuff containing a thought provoking, hilarious, heart-warming, or super wise saying to make you feel better or motivate you to do something. They appear on nicely painted wooden plaques or slates, mugs, posters, t-shirts, bags, you name it, and you can most likely buy it.
And why not? They can be helpful for people and at least spreads a little bit of positivity. The only caution I would suggest is to be discerning; something might sound good but is truly a complete load of rubbish! It’s much healthier to live our lives according to God’s word rather than some pithy sentence.
With that in mind over the coming weeks, we are going to look at some things Jesus said directly to his disciples as recorded in the gospels. I encourage you to read them in a fuller context at your leisure, to gain a fuller understanding. Here we go…
“Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me.” John 14:1
We are all aware of what is happening around the world today equally as much as what is happening down our road or even on our doorstep. I’m sure for many of us there are a number of things that we could honestly say are ‘troubling us’, things that make our heart beat faster or heavier than we know it should. That feeling of being troubled can be hard to shake off or put down and it can grip us tightly.
Jesus says (in a tone that I think is full of compassion and gentleness) ‘Don’t let your hearts be troubled’. Easier said than done but Jesus gives us the solution as well. The key to freeing our hearts from trouble is to ‘trust in God, and trust also in me’. To trust Jesus in the middle of the trouble, to give God our heavy hearts.
BUT it’s tough. Our experience of trust is only ever in things (like a mountain climber trusting his rope) or in people (friends, family) BUT BOTH could let us down. If we have had trust broken in the past it can be difficult to place our trust in a thing or person again.
The story of the disciples gives us a good reference point of real people who faced all the struggles and challenges in this area that we do. They heard these words from Jesus’ mouth and although at times they failed, got it wrong, messed up, they learnt to keep going and trying and living life with their trust in Him, they knew this truth!
Ultimately, they were right to trust him, as Jesus was true to his word in all things.
They experienced the fruit of trusting Jesus in all things, particularly when it was hard.
May that be a huge encouragement to us, that we also can taste the fruit of trusting in Him in all things.
– Mark.
