Your ball

Wednesday October 9^th, 2 Timothy 1:  8-10 So don't be embarrassed to speak up for our Master or for me, his prisoner. Take your share of suffering for the Message along with the rest of us. We can only keep on going, after all, by the power of God, who first saved us and then called us to this holy work. We had nothing to do with it. It was all his idea, a gift prepared for us in Jesus long before we knew anything about it. But we know it now. Since the appearance of our Savior, nothing could be plainer: death defeated, life vindicated in a steady blaze of light, all through the work of Jesus. News flash, death is defeated, now how will you live your life?  News flash, life is vindicated in a steady blaze of light, so now how will you live your life?  Most people of faith wrongly believe they have to earn their way into heaven in some fashion, either by being good, following the correct faith, or perhaps even believing in the saving power of Jesus.  In the Abrahamic faiths of Islam, Judaism and Christianity there exists the message that God created all that is and called it good. That “all” includes you, me, and thee.  God acts in history to bring about faith and God loves us and would no more condemn us, his children, than you would condemn any of your children, no matter how rotten a lives they have chosen to live.  Having said that, children always have a way of going places were a loving parent would rather they not go, this is the story of the Bible among other Holy Books.  It is a story of the children of God gone wrong and God finding them, and bringing the messaege that they are love and calling them home.  The scriptures of all three Abrahamic faiths are full of such stories.  But the question is, knowing that you are saved, knowing that you are going to be with God, knowing that God loves all people and calls us to live lives of justice and integrity with those God calls our brothers and sisters even if we refuse to acknowledge it, how do you now live?  The ball’s in your court!!