Sitting in church this morning, I realized that I have been given a truly wonderful gift like my father. He could take difficult passages from the Bible and make them understandable to all types of people. I was privileged to be one of those parishioners, and I will try to demonstrate this talent in paraphrasing of three books from the Bible: Jeremiah 31:31-34, John 8: 31-36, and John 8:12. I may not be as prolific as my father, but I will try to do the same as he did every single Sunday in the pulpit.
The Lord told the people of Israel that He would place the law in their hearts. He would be their God, and they would be His people. From the least to the greatest, He would forgive their sins, and they would sin no more. Later on, Jesus told the people that if they continue to follow His Word, they would be His disciples. They would know the truth and the truth would set them free. Anyone who commits sin is a slave to sin, and the slave would not be permanent in any of them. As the Son of God, He would always have a place in God’s house. So if He made you free, you were free.
We understand Christ’s purpose in the world by connecting His thoughts to our experiences today. He said that He was the light of the world. Whoever follows Him will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life. Knowing the truth that Christ is the truth, realizing that Christ is the light in the darkness, and that Christ will help increase our faith and make us strong in Him, we can be fully alive in this world and in the next. What comes next will be more wonderful and more beautiful than anything we have had here on earth.
Without the truth, the light, and the way, we cannot reach our true Christian purpose, to love one another as we would want to be loved. There is a cost for our discipleship, but we will inherit the Kingdom of God. Though our toils may be hard on earth and things might not go as we have planned, we will gain much more in heaven. We will gain our Father’s unconditional love, and we will realize that all things are possible with God.
Anna Hartt
