The focus this week is on Jesus’ willingness to give His life for us, His sheep. Unlike false shepherds who are only out for their own good and gain, Jesus is willing to lay down His life for us. There are two powerful ways this is true. The faithful shepherd lays down across the opening of the pasture sheep pen to protect the sheep at night and he is willing to give his life to protect the sheep from predators.

The Key Scriptures

• John 10:15, 17
• John 13:37-38
• John 15:13
• Mark 10:45
• 1 John 3:16-18; 4:7-12
  
• 1 Samuel 16:11; 17:34-37

Please share the link to any online pictures, YouTube movies, or video clips of sheep or shepherds or Scripture graphics you think illustrate the main focus of this week’s passages!

All along the way as we grow up, we learn to either trust or doubt those around us. It’s not easy once trust is broken. But, there are great lessons to learn from this process once we realize that God has not only given us permission, but also given us His Spirit, so we can approach Him as our Abba Father.

I relate in the post the experience of teaching my daughter to jump off the side of the pool. For me, this is a great metaphor for my challenge to trust God with a “leap of faith” at different points in my life. I see this as fitting for a number of others. Right now I am trying to minister to both young adults launching into life on their own and facing the challenges of trusting God with their future. They are facing the crucial faith challenge of owning their own faith and launching into life trusting Him. I am also trying to encourage and support several who are facing hard battles with illness and possible death. Others are facing financial challenges with the economic times. Each of these requires a longer leap of faith than they have had to make before. Trusting God for that leap, that launch into the unknown for them, is both a challenge and an opportunity to know God in fresh ways.

What is the hardest “leap of faith” you have had to make?

How can Jesus’ example of trusting Abba Father help us?

What are some other examples of a child trusting a parent that remind you of Jesus trusting his Father?

I’d love to hear from you in the response area below!

We often hear that God turned his back on his Son because Jesus was carrying the guilt of our sin. How do you reconcile that withJohn 16:32? Where do you find a Scripture supporting this concept?

How is it a blessing to us to know that Jesus felt abandoned, but in faith, trusted that God would not abandon him and would be faithful to his promises?

How do the events of the Cross create a new community of care? 

Why is it important for us to care for the least, the last, and the lonely?

What are some practical ways that Jesus’ community, our church families, can care for those who are older or in need of protection and friendship?

I’d love to get your input on this in the comments section below.

Does believing Jesus help you as you face the reality of death in your life or the life of someone you love?

Death is described in Scripture as a fear that dominated human beings for generation upon generation. Do you think we fear death today?

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this matter

What makes it hard for your to forgive others?

Why is it so easy to want to get even or hold onto bitterness?

What are steps you’ve taken to forgive others just as “God in Christ has forgiven you”?

Yesterday, I did ponder and give thanks for the awful humiliation Jesus endured on the Cross. However, I was also in “catching up mode” having been gone the early part of the week to Austin to move our Heartlight servers to a new location. (See the “It is Crazy Here!” post from several days ago — and yes, all of us have been dealing with the aftermath of the move ever since.)

I groused and moaned to myself through most of the day about how everything was taking three times longer than it should and how everything I did led to something messed up that required more effort. By bed time, I was exhausted and a bit frustrated that I had frittered away such a beautiful day, such a special day, on a ton of simple but time-intensive tasks that I had not expected to be waiting for me. As I heard myself whine to my wife Donna, I was offended at my own pettiness! I was revolting “to my own self”!

I confessed to Donna, “Here I am whining about a hard day full of complications on the day when I should be thinking about all that Jesus endured for me on the cross.”

She replied calmly, “And yet think about how much you got done and how much was done for you!”

Hmm …

Thankfully we look at Friday — or Thursday or Wednesday, depending on how you reckon the day Jesus was actually crucified — as “Good Friday” because we see it through the lens of the resurrection. We live on the resurrection side of the Cross. Because of the awful night and day of trial, crucifixion, and burial, I know the love of God for me. And because of the resurrection, I know that Jesus’ awful day was not wasted, but accomplished so much for me — for all of us — even when it seems nothing else goes right.

But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain (1 Corinthians 15:57-58 TNIV)