“O unbelieving generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy to Me.” Mark 9:19.

That they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me. John 17:21.

And continuing our 351 Old Testament prophecies, promises of God, fulfilled in Jesus Christ, we come to number 95: “Into Your hands I commit My spirit.” Psalm 31:5: Into Your hand I commit my spirit; You have ransomed me, O LORD, God of truth. And, Luke 23:46: And Jesus, crying out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.” Having said this, He breathed His last.

The first Scripture verse cited above resonated with me on so many levels. Jesus, Peter, James and John have just come down from the mountain where the disciples saw Jesus transfigured before them, Mark 9:1-29. They see a crowd around the disciples who had stayed below, and there is arguing. A man brought his son who has been possessed by a demon causing him great physical harm. He had heard about Jesus and his hope was that Jesus would heal the boy. Imagine the years watching and protecting as best he could his son whom the demon sends into convulsions and then throws into fires or into water. And he arrives where he has heard Jesus would be and Jesus is not there but the disciples are. They could not drive out the demon. When He sees Jesus finally and tells Him what has been happening, and as Jesus watches the boy thrown into convulsion, falling and foaming at the mouth, the father begs Jesus, if He can, to help them. Time after time nothing helped. And now the disciples could not help. So the father in desperation says, “But if You can do anything – take pity on us and help us!” And Jesus said to him, “‘If You can?’ All things are possible to him who believes.” And the father wanting desperately to believe but has seen even the disciples can’t heal his son cries out, “I do believe! Help my unbelief!” What a roller-coaster for the father that we all experience in our walk toward faith in Creator God – Father, Son, Spirit, because the things of this physical world that are so huge that we see and live through are what we see, and so we think that is all there is. But there is more.

In My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers this morning, I loved this: “We tend to think that if Jesus Christ compels us to do something and we are obedient to Him, He will lead us to great success. We should never have the thought that our dreams of success are God’s purpose for us. In fact, His purpose may be exactly the opposite. We have the idea that God is leading us toward a particular end or a desired goal, but He is not. The question of whether we arrive at a particular goal is of little importance, and reaching it becomes merely an episode along the way. What we see as only the process of reaching a particular end, God sees as the goal itself. What is my vision of God’s purpose for me? Whatever it may be, His purpose is for me to depend on Him and on His power now…God’s purpose is to enable me to see that He can walk on the storms of my life right now. If we have a further goal in mind, we are not paying enough attention to the present time. However, if we realize that moment-by-moment obedience is the goal, then each moment as it comes is precious.”

As I thought about all of this this morning in prayer, I realized that all of the obstacles we see in this fallen world that loom so large for us, like the child harmed by the demon, or the huge walls of water crashing on the boat the disciples were in terrifying them, or their seeing all they could not do on their own to have that demon leave that child, is temporary. Everyone living then has long since died. But Jesus, Creator God, who created this physical world we live in, is eternal. This physical life, however brief or long it is for each of us, is the very ground upon which we learn the most important lessons of all. No matter how huge the obstacles we face in this life, they are not permanent. But the faith we are building as we trust in God is. Never forget that Jesus, Creator God, came as one of us, to this very physical life of challenges and hardships we also live. He knows every trial we are living through. He knows so much more. He knows the beginning to the end to the beginning of the new creation with Him with us for all eternity. He knows how hard grief is. He knows He will wipe away every tear and bring healing. And we can know He is with us now. He promised He would never leave us or forsake us as we walk this very ground given for our most important lesson of all. Trusting God. Into Your hand I commit my spirit – You have ransomed me, O LORD, God of truth.

***I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My own wisdom and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day. Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865).***