Change involves endings and new beginnings
By Larry Platner
Day 4
'As Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside privately and told them what was going to happen to him. 18 “Listen,” he said, “we’re going up to Jerusalem, where the Son of Man will be betrayed to the leading priests and the teachers of religious law. They will sentence him to die. 19 Then they will hand him over to the Romans to be mocked, flogged with a whip, and crucified. But on the third day he will be raised from the dead.”' NLT
The disciples were not expecting the death of Jesus. His death meant a death to their hopes for the reestablishment of Israel as an independent nation ruled by a descendant of David. His death sent them reeling and fleeing into hiding. It was an unexpected and unwanted derailing of their hopes and plans. However, after death there was resurrection, a new beginning. This drastic change was necessary to bring a new way of life that was more glorious and fulfilling.
We prefer to remain in control and to operate in familiar patterns. It isn’t easy to trust the inner voice of the Spirit calling us to die to previous plans, ways of living, and cross over into a new and unknown territory. Yet it is often necessary, for us to know God more deeply and to grow in faith and love and enter into a new beginning.
Can you recall changes in your life that involved endings leading into new beginnings?
