Dear Jesus...

To the self proclaimed "Son of God,"

While we really are deeply appreciative of your offer to come and help us, we find that we have other more pressing needs at the moment. We would also like to communicate our deep dissatisfaction in your failure to provide for our needs. Sir, all we ask for is someone who will take care of us. We were mislead when you seemed to be able to feed five thousand of us, that you might be a worthy leader. We have since been convinced that your rule would be, to put it lightly, most offensive to some of our more reasonable sensibilities. We therefore respectfully decline your invitation to follow you. We are open to negotiations however if you would like to continue to discuss the possibility of working with us.

Best wishes,
Will Rearick
on behalf of
The People of the World


Earlier this summer I was reading the Bible in the book of John. I was reading that part where Jesus feeds 5000 people. They were all like trying to track him down and make him king, so he says (knowing it's not his time) that they only like him because he feeds them, but unless they eat his flesh and drink his blood then they can have no fellowship with him. The result? They get pissed off and leave. The lesson I learned is that we as people have a list of things we would like in a king. In ancient Judea being able to feed a lot of people was pretty high on the list. It's not that Jesus doesn't want to feed us. In fact the opposite is true. He desires us to be fed with the things that will satisfy our deepest hungers and thirsts. The question is then will we believe that he knows what those hungers and thirsts are, and that he knows the timeline on which he needs to work in order to meet them. The other day I was talking with God about some of the waiting he's been making me do in life. I still don't understand the reasons his timing cannot match mine in meeting my hungers and thirsts. I was deeply convicted yesterday in church as we sang the hymn "Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus." On the chorus over and over again I couldn't fight back the tears as the congregation sang

Jesus, Jesus how I trust him.
How I've proved him o'er and o'er
Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus
O for grace to trust him more.

I realized that time and again, especially most recently, that even the feeblest of my trust has been deeply rewarded, and yet my trust still seems so feeble. I desperately need grace to trust him more.

Trust in essence I suppose is like faith, which always works itself out in obedience. When we obey we move from trusting in our own efforts and reasoning to trusting in the one who's authority we are under. When Jesus invites us into his yoke, he invites us into his work, into obedience. But in the act of yolking ourselves to him, there is a trust that indeed his yolk is easy and the burden is light.

Today I choose to believe. I choose to trust that the yolk is easy and to place myself in a position where I have no choice but to let myself be guided by Christ. I choose to believe that God is the provider and has provided for all my needs in Christ Jesus even though I still feel my need. Today I choose to believe that though my flesh and my heart may fail, God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

"This grace gives me fear, and this grace draws me near
And all that it asks it provides"