Thursday, May 12, 2005
GIFTS FROM OUR ASCENDED LORD
Last Sunday we celebrated Mother's Day. Many of us gave gifts to our mothers and our wives. This wasn't the first time we've given them gifts and it won't be the last. Our love and appreciation move us to show our love by the giving of gifts. I doubt we'll ever say, "I've thanked you enough." Truly, this love knows no bounds.
Jesus didn't ascend into heaven to give us a single gift either. Christ our LORD -- by His living and dying -- lavished upon us the priceless gifts of the forgiveness of sins and a place in the family of God. When He ascended into heaven, He promised to send the gift of the Holy Spirit to live in His people's hearts and to guide them in all truth. But that isn't the only gift he has provided us.
Jesus has many times throughout the history of the Christian Church called and sent pastors and teachers to teach and equip His people.
"When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men." And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a maturity, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head-Christ-from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love" (Ephesians 4:8-16).
Jesus love for us will never run out either. He has and will continue to call and send pastors and teachers to equip His people, using His Holy Word. The goal is that the whole gathering of believers be kept strong on this earth and prepared for the day when He returns again on the clouds of heaven to take us back with Him.
So while Jesus has taken His visible presence from us, He still blesses us by calling people to serve us and to help us serve Him by serving one another. May God grant that we are thankful for His gifts and each minister out of our blessings.
