Enter April once more with its mystic message and magic as our valley trumpets
the Resurrection with vibrant new life and colors. James S. Stewart, in his book River of Life illustrates for us the Easter miracle: “Are these not precisely the four facts to which Christ opens our eyes today? He opens our eyes to the world, so that we can see the glory of God in His creation: sun and sky, trees and flowers, rivers and mountains, they are all my Father’s making. He opens our eyes to our fellow men – so that we do not think of them any more as faces in the street
or cogs in a machine or factors in a race problem: everyone is now a child of
God, a brother for whom Christ died. He opens our eyes to ourselves – a
humbling p ocess, and yet the way to penitence and pardon and peace. And above
this all: He opens our eyes to Himself, so that He is no longer Someone we read
about in a book or hear of in church or argue about in a discussion group, but the living center of our lives, the one true
light to irradiate and interpret everything else. A new vision of creation, of
our brother man, of ourselves, of Christ – all that, when the Lord who is the Light of the world has touched us and
made us see.
”
"Be Kinder than
necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle."
Everything in Christ astonishes me. His spirit overawes me, and His will confounds me. He
is truly a being by Himself. His ideas and sentiments, the truth which He announces, His manner of convincing, are not explained
either by human organization or by the nature of things...... The nearer I approach, the more carefully I examine, everything
is above me - everything remains grand, of a grandeur which overpowers....One can absolutely find nowhere, but in Him alone,
the imitation or the example of His life .... I search in vain in history to find the similar to Jesus Christ. Neither history
nor humanity, nor the ages, nor nature, offer me anything with which I am able to compare it or explain it. Here everything
is extraordinary."
Napoleon Bonaparte Cited in "Evidence That
Demands a Verdict: Historical Evidences for the Christian Faith(San Bernadino, 1977
The things we try to avoid and fight against –
tribulation, suffering, and persecution – are the very things that produce abundant joy in us. “We are more than conquerors through Him” not in spite of them but
in the midst of them. A saint doesn’t know the joy of the Lord in
spite of tribulation, but because of it. Paul said, “ I am exceedingly
joyful in our tribulation” (2 Cor. 7:4.) The
undiminished radiance, which is the result of abundant joy is not built on anything passing, but on the love of God that nothing
can change. And the experiences of life, whether they are everyday events or
terrifying ones, are powerless to “separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:39).
Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest
