“JESUS
CHRIST - A MAN APPROVED OF GOD (Acts 2:22)”
Miracle #22-
John
6:16-19,20-21
Positive
thinking, weather control, translation,
the meaning of time
I
mean, they’ve all just had a tiring night feeding
the 5,000 … they should be home in bed … but Christ has urged them to
row
across the Sea of Galilee.
“I’ll
see you on the other side” he said. What’s
going on? What is Christ trying to achieve?
Among
many other lessons the following stand
out:
1.
Positive thinking
The
disciples rowing across the Sea of Galilee
represent our salvation journey … will it be by the ‘impossibilities’
of positive
thinking and hard physical yakka to get to the other side … or will we
simply
look unto Christ to get the job done (John 6:21)?
2.
Weather control
In
controlling the weather, Christ shows himself to
be God (Matthew 14:33; Genesis 1:1).
3.
Translation
Those who
like Sci-Fi movies, are familiar with the
term “Beam me up Scotty.”
A translation
is to be bodily transported
through space to another destination.
In the Old
Testament, translations were common
place with men appearing out of heaven (Joshua 5:13); Enoch (Genesis
5:24);
Elijah (2 Kings 2:11) to name a few. Indeed, we have Philip (Acts 8:39)
in the
New Testament.
And so
here we have the disciples being translated
to their destination … “Then they willingly received him into the
ship: and immediately
the ship was at the land whither they went.” (John 6:21).
4.
The meaning of time
Christ
created time and therefore he is its master
… he is before time, and will be, after it finishes. Christ is the was,
the is, and the is to come (Revelation 1:4).
The
fact is that the disciples had rowed half the
journey across the Sea with much physical effort, but Christ completes
the last
half in an instant as follows …
“… immediately
the ship was at the land
whither they went.” (John 6:21).
A
couple of points
Only
when we receive Christ into our ‘ship’, can we
be immediately put onto the other shore … and into heaven; and
secondly,
only Christ can restore the years the locusts have eaten (Joel 2:25) in
making
up for lost time.
The
lesson is this … on earth a thousand years is
one thousand years … and it drags on and on and on … but in heaven, it
will
seem like a day (2Peter 3:8). These disciples, in the presence of the
Lord and
with their eyes on him, time became irrelevant … and this is how it
will be in
heaven.
Funny
isn’t it Dear Reader, when you’re bored and
time drags, you are not thinking about the Lord. That’s why we fill up
our time
with the physical of the five senses …. entertainment, distractions,
travel and
so on.
It
just proves, although we are new creatures,
we are not as yet new creations (2 Corinthians 5:17).
Indeed Paul
says that with his mind he loves the law of God but his body serves the
law of
sin (Romans 7:25).
God’s
purposes
Knowing
in advance what is good for us, but
unbeknown to them, Christ constrains the disciples to go to sea
(Matthew 14:22),
that he might show himself as the Almighty God, through his control of
the weather,
translation and time … and truly, the I AM THAT I AM
(Genesis 18:14; Matthew 14:33; Exodus 3:14).
Lastly
…
He
says to the disciples “It is I” (Mark
6:50). Why didn’t Christ say “It is me.”
Christ
said “Before Abraham was, I am” (John
8:58) not “Before Abraham was, it was me”
Christ
is never the ‘secondary’ object
pronoun of “me”, but always the ‘primary’ subject pronoun of
“I”.
Indeed
Dear Reader, let us all be of good cheer
that the “I”, and not the “me” is present (Matthew 14:27).
Harley
Hitchcock
This
website’s front page is:
www.
“JESUS
CHRIST - A MAN APPROVED OF GOD (Acts 2:22)”
Miracle #23-
The
Syrophoenician
woman has a daughter with a devil
Matthew
15:22-25,26-28; Mark 7:25-28,29-30
Among
many others, this miracle raises four
points as follows: