Happy Day 4! Yesterday’s reading was a little intense, was it not? If you weren’t able to do the bonus challenge, take a minute to work through it. The Bible is amazing. It was a chapter that reminded me to not believe the devil’s lies (because they are very real and present) and focus on God’s truth. His truth is greater than everything. So simple but yet something many of us struggle to believe at all times, which is why we need things like this to keep us focused and to keep us in the right lane. Now, on to today’s reading!
Day 4 Reading
Do you ever read books and wonder what the last chapter looks like, so you hop ahead and read the end? It’s only natural to want to know the outcome on things. Some people would rather know the ending right off the bat and some people would rather be surprised. Good endings are refreshing, and sometimes getting a peek at what’s to come isn’t such a bad thing. That’s where we’re going with today’s reading.
In the last chapter of Matthew, in the last few verses, we’ve reached the culmination of Jesus’ life by Matthew’s account. Jesus has risen and is about to descend back into heaven. His parting instructions to his disciples are this:
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age. Matthew 28: 19-20
But even here, knowing the “ending,” some of his disciples still doubted Jesus. The two lines right before this say, “And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.'” (Matthew 28: 17-18)
I mean, can you even? Can you imagine being a disciple on top of that mountain in Galilee looking at the resurrected Jesus and STILL doubting his truth? What in the actual world? If his own disciples, in the flesh, still doubted him, seeing him in the flesh, you better believe people in today’s world are still going to doubt Jesus.
So here is our job today. Our job is to BELIEVE all of His truth. Jesus told us in those last lines, I AM WITH YOU ALWAYS. From the first time we learned that Jesus would be brought into this world and be our Immanuel, the literal translation of GOD WITH US, he ends his time here on earth with a reminder that He will always be WITH US.
How has Jesus been showing up for you lately? What instances in your life has God left evidence that He was with you, leaving his handprints behind? Moments when you say, “Only God.” Hard, excruciating, happy, miraculous moments and everything in between, He is always WITH US.
DAY 4 CHALLENGE
Today, let’s go be God’s handprint. In some way, pay it forward today. One idea is to buy a gift card in the checkout line of whatever store you go to today. It doesn’t have to be much or it could be however much your heart desires, but the thought behind it is to give the person behind you a reminder that God is always with us. And maybe, just maybe, the person behind you today will have a handprint moment in which they say, “Only God.”
If we’re all to be disciples of all He has taught us, let our little actions be big reminders of our Immanuel.
