Look Again, For the Very First Time

I wish you had never heard the story of Jesus.  I wish you were hearing it for the first time.   I really wish that you hadn’t heard the story before,  simply because many of us have heard it so many times before that we have lost the wonder of the story.   We have grown so familiar with the details of the story, that we have lost our sense of awe.  It has grown to be common place, and we end up thinking, “Oh, yeah…I’ve heard this all before!”  And in so doing, we lose a chance at being amazed once again by the incredible story of Jesus.   I want you to be amazed again.  I want you to have that sense of awe and wonder.  I want you to stand with eyes wide and mouth open as you hear the story of Jesus and salvation.  So today, let’s play that old game of pretend.  Let’s pretend that you have never heard the story before.  Let’s put ourselves into parts of the story.   Let’s look again, for the very first time at the story of Jesus.  Are you ready to pretend?  Here we go…

Your name is Peter.  You’re a sanguine.  You enter a room mouth first.  You’re big, strong and foul-mouthed.  You can cuss any sailor under the table, because you are a sailor.  A fishing sailor.  Everyone knows who you are because at the tavern, you can tell the crustiest jokes.  At the docks, as you sort fish, you can make most other fishermen blush with your language.  Your wife is forever getting mad at you for being so crude, but she can’t help but love you since you are so big-hearted and caring. Honest too.  Perhaps it is these last characteristics that were the ones Jesus was looking at when He called you to follow Him, but unlikely, with all of your other character flaws.   Certainly everyone else is shocked.  A wharfman and a rabbi hanging out together?   Definitely not a rabbi from around here.  He wouldn’t want someone like you making his class of pupils look bad.  You stick out like a bad apple.  But, look again.   There He is motioning to you saying, Follow me.

Your name is Mary.  You’re a hooker.  A street-walker.  A prostitute.  Nobody at the church wants you hanging out in front of the entrance, and you assume that if the church people don’t want you, their God doesn’t want you either.  You watch from your corner as the people leave the evening service, giving you cold glares as they walk by or drive off.  Not a problem for you.  You’re not wanting what they have to give anyway.  You’re waiting for a certain someone to come out of the church.  Here he comes now.  One of the Pastoral staff.   He shakes hands with the last of the parishioners and watches as they disappear around the corner.  He locks the building and then looks your way.  You’ve seen that look hundreds of times before.  The look of a man hungry with lust.   He looks around to make sure that no one is watching and then gives you the signal.   You leave your corner and head for your previously arranged meeting place a few blocks away.  By the time you get there, he is already inside and waiting.  You are barely undressed when the door comes smashing in.  It’s the rest of the pastoral team.  Grabbing you, dragging you from the bed as you clutch at sheets and try to cover yourself, they half-lift, half-drag you out into the streets.

Your mind is swirling.  This is it. This time you lose. Set up by the pastors. You know the rules.  You mess around and get caught, you die. You’ve played the odds and this time you lose.  You’ve been in and out of a hundred beds, and so you figure it must be your time to go.

Inwardly  you cry for a God to save you.  But why would He?  His people know you’re scum.  His Word says that an unfaithful woman should be stoned.  No.  No use crying out to Him.  Take the punishment with as much dignity as you can muster.   Suddenly you are flung in front of the Teacher, your sheet being ripped away as you hit the dusty street.  Curling up you try to cover yourself from all of the laughter and leering eyes as the pastors say, “Teacher, Moses and the law say that we should stone this woman.  What do you say?”

You know what any holy man will be forced to say and you brace yourself for the rocks.  Abruptly, you realize that all has grown quiet and then you hear the question.  “Woman, where are your accusers?”  Looking up slowly from your curled up position, you realize no one else is around. It is just you and Jesus.  He is taking His outer cloak and covering you.  You respond, “I don’t see anyone, Lord.”   And then His response takes you totally by surprise, “Neither do I condemn you.  Go and leave your life of sin.”  You look again.  And you see for the very first time that He is smiling.

Your name is Jairus.  You’ve come a long way to find Jesus.  Your only daughter is dying.  The doctors have all given up and you’ve taken her home to die.  But somehow, you just can’t give up without trying everything.  One of your servants has seen Jesus heal and suggests that if you could just find Jesus and have him come, your daughter might not die.  You search frantically, from one town to the next.  The reports are all the same.  “You just missed Him.  He was here about 2 days ago and healed most of the people in the town.”  Hope grows stronger, while on the other side of the emotional roller coaster, you become frantic as you realize that you are a few days behind him.  You redouble your efforts, trying to reach Him and get Him home before it is too late.   Finally, you come racing in to a town and discover a large crowd of people gathered around.  This must be Jesus.    Pushing your way through the crowd, you come face to face with Him.   “Master, you must come now!”  The urgency is in your voice as you try to get Jesus to follow you back through the crowd.   He motions for you to lead and begins to follow.  You look back and realize that He has stopped and is asking who touched Him.  You turn back to urge Him to hurry when one of your servants rides up to the edge of the crowd on horseback and motions for you.

You can tell by the look on his face that it’s too late.   “Don’t trouble the Master any further,” he says,  “She’s dead.”   Grief wrenches your soul and you slump to the ground. The If only’s come. If only you had found Him quicker.  If only He had been closer to your home.  If only she had held on for a little while longer.  If only there were no crowds to slow Him down.”

A hand on your shoulder jars you  back to reality.  “Don’t worry, just believe.”   Jesus helps you to your feet and begins walking towards your town, He and his disciples helping you as you stumble along in a haze of grief.  You sleep little that night, and the next day is a blur as you head home.  As you come near your house, the mourner’s are there in full force.  It really hits home.  She’s dead.  Jesus simpy quiets them and says, “Don’t mourn.  She’s sleeping.”  Laughter meets His statement.   How can Jesus mock your pain with such a statement.   You enter to find  your wife weeping and lying across the bed holding the lifeless form of your daughter.   Jesus gently lifts her and you rush to hold her, to hold each other, as Jesus now looks at the little body on the bed.

Gently, yet with authority he says, “Little girl, I say to you arise!”  Her eyes flutter open as you heart beats wildly.  Your wife screams with joy and leaps toward the bed as your beloved daughter sits up.  Suddenly the three of you are laughing, crying, talking, hugging, kissing, and marveling at what just happened.  You look again…and He is gone.

Do any of these stories get your attention?  Do any of them make you say, “Wow, so that’s what God is like?”  Do they amaze you?  Do they warm your heart? Time and time again in scripture, we see Him healing the sick, opening blind eyes, giving legs to the lame, and raising the dead.  Stuff that would knock our socks off if we saw it today, but we have grown so used to the stories that we can barely muster a “ho-hum” as we stifle a yawn.  Look again, for the very first time.  Jesus is simply amazing.

Where’s the wonder?  Where’s the awe?  He chose a loud, foul-mouthed fisherman to be one of His main mouthpiece to share the good news of the Gospel.  He had no back up plan.  If Peter and the others failed, the story would not be shared.  Doesn’t that blow you away?  Look again and remember; if He can use Peter, He will use you.

He restored a broken-down woman, caught in the middle of her sin.  A sin worthy of stoning, and turned back her accusers with a line, “he that is without sin, let him cast the first stone.”  And then wrote their sins in the dirt to remind them that there is not one righteous.  Doesn’t that bring you hope?  If He can forgive Mary, he can forgive you.

And this one absolutely blows my mind.  He took a lifeless form and gave it life.  How many funerals have you seen that one happen at?  One minute you have a corpse, the next minute a dancing little girl. One minute you have parents mourning the loss of their only child, and the next minute they are weeping for joy and laughing all at the same time.  Which really pumps me.  If He can raise Jairus’s daughter, He can raise my dad!  And He can raise your loved ones that have fallen asleep in Jesus.  

But those are only three stories.  Jesus always does the amazing thing.  He puts aside Divinity to take on the form of a baby.  He works for 30 years as a carpenter.  God. A carpenter.  He feeds 20,000 with a few loaves and fish.  He walks on water.  He calms storms with a word.  He meets demon-possessed people and leaves them demon-free, sending the demons into pigs.  He called the most unlikely people to do the most unbelievable.  He loves. He forgives.  He laughs with people.  That’s amazing.  A God that not only loves us, but one that likes us and is willing to sit down to supper with the worst of us.  And enjoy our company.  Look again.  When was the last time you saw this Jesus?  When was the last time you were amazed?