Your healing will come.

But Jesus shares his authority

Mark 6:7, 12-13 Jesus called his twelve disciples together and began sending them out two by two, giving them authority to cast out evil spirits [and to heal all diseases, Luke 9:1]. … So the disciples went out, telling everyone they met to repent of their sins and turn to God. And they cast out many demons and healed many sick people, anointing them with olive oil.

I’m skipping ahead in Mark today, because of something that happened last night. We had an evening without other commitments, and Dave suggested we watch the second episode of the new Season 3 of The Chosen (we haven’t managed to accompany the episodes as they’ve been released). The episode is called “Two by Two.” It dramatizes this passage in Mark, Luke 9, and Matthew 13.

After Jesus gives his instructions to the disciples and is walking away, the “other James” follows Jesus and asks for a conversation. In Mark 15:40, this James is referred to by a word that means least, less, little, small. English versions translate this variously as James the young, the younger, the youngest, the less, the lesser, the little. In The Chosen, he is called Little James, and James the brother of John is called Big James. Additionally, Little James is cast in The Chosen as a man with a lame leg.

As I listened to the conversation between Jesus and Little James, I had goosebumps. I watched with my mouth open. Because the conversation could have been lifted straight from the pages of Karis’s journals. Clearly the script was written by someone who has been there, who has asked God the question, “Why haven’t you healed me? How can I heal others like—like this?” Jesus’s response is exactly what Karis records God saying to her, multiple times from her adolescence on.

To understand more deeply the impact of this for me, it may be helpful to know that all her life, since being born with a severe intestinal anomaly, Karis, Dave and I, and our family have been challenged by Christians who believe God only doesn’t heal because of sin and/or lack of faith. Therefore, Dave and I, and later Karis as she grew up, were exhorted again and again to confess the sin for which she/we were being punished, to confess our lack of faith, and to live our lives out of the belief she had been healed (i.e., stop seeking medical help for her, especially when her life was at risk, as “proof” of our faith). Make her get out of bed. Make her see this illness is not real; what is real is the health God promises every believer.

All of this is one of the main reasons Karis cites in her journals for wanting her story written down. She wanted believers to understand the deeper grace God offers when he chooses not to heal someone physically. “If God heals me—gives me a brand-new intestine—that story will make a big splash,” she wrote. “For a little while, many people will be excited. But quickly it will become old news. Instead, for as many days or years God gives me, I want to show people a different kind of grace—the grace that allows me to praise God even through my pain. The doors that open for me exactly because I am disabled. The compassion God has given me for all who suffer, with any kind of pain, whether physical, emotional, social, or mental. The joy greater than my circumstances that wells up from the Spirit inside me. That’s what I want people to see when they look at my life: not a ‘big splash,’ but the daily faithfulness of God, available to everyone, everywhere, in any condition of life.”

Karis’s journals, from age 9 until the week before her last coma, age 30

So, imagine how intrigued I was to hear Jesus’s words to Little James on the screen last night. You’ll find the conversation at 53:12-59:44 on Episode 2 of The Chosen Season 3, called “Two by Two.” I’ve transcribed it, but will wait until the next post to quote part of the conversation for you. I hope meanwhile you’ll take the time to watch it.

In fact, God did perform miracles in Karis’s life. Huge miracles that restored her again and again when the doctors told us (again) that this time there was no hope, from infancy on. But never “the big miracle,” the big splash. Her story is both bigger and deeper than that, to the glory of God.

At the end of the conversation, Jesus starts to walk away. Then he turns back and says to Little James, “Your healing will come. It’s just a matter of time.”

That is true for every one of us.

Your sacred center

But Jesus takes his orders from the Father

Mark 1:35-38 Before daybreak, Jesus got up and went out to an isolated place to pray. Later Simon and the others went out to find him. When they found him, they said, “Everyone is looking for you.” But Jesus replied, “We must go on to other towns as well. … That is why I came.”

John 5:19 Jesus explained, “I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself. He does only what he sees the Father doing.”

Are you a people-pleaser? I certainly have been. I love knowing people are happy with me and with ways I try to serve them.

But do I shape my own sense of wellbeing around other people’s happiness with me? Ah, there’s the rub, right? Because in fact I am not responsible for whether other people feel happy.

Jesus made it clear to his disciples right away that he took his orders from the Father, not from them or from the people surrounding them. I’m sure this bothered some of the disciples.

And to understand the Father’s directions, Jesus had to spend time with him. Again and again in the Gospels we see him doing so.

I love the concept of having an audience of One, making my Father’s pleasure the center of my life. If I am spending time with him, submitting my priorities and desires to him, and following his direction as well as I can, I can better keep my balance I terms of all the other voices in my life and my natural desire to serve and care for the people I love.

Here’s another lovely passage from Henri Nouwen, The Inner Voice of Love. The meditation is titled, “Set Boundaries to Your Love”:

You give whatever people ask of you, and when they ask for more, you give more, until you find yourself exhausted, used, and manipulated. Only when you are able to set your own boundaries will you be able to acknowledge, respect, and even be grateful for the boundaries of others … The great task is to claim yourself for yourself … True mutuality in love requires people who possess themselves and who can give to each other while holding on to their own identities. … You must learn to set boundaries to your love.

Later, Nouwen says, “the identity that makes you free is anchored beyond all human praise and blame. … Only God can fully dwell in that deepest place in you and give you a sense of safety. Don’t let others run away with your sacred center.” Amen.

Here’s a song to make you smile, a flashback to 1955. In light of this post, think of the lyrics directed to the Father.

Real authority

But Jesus came to serve

Mark 1:22 The people were amazed at Jesus’s teaching, for he taught with real authority, quite unlike the teachers of religious law.

Mark 10:42-45 Jesus called his disciples together and said, “You know that the rulers in this world lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant … for even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

Philippians 2:5-7, 14 You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. … Live clean, innocent lives as children of God.

One of my favorite books when I was a child was The Scarlet Pimpernel, published in 1905 by Baroness Orczy. I loved the fact that Sir Percy led a double life, apparently a wealthy fop, but secretly risking his life to save others. The ridicule Percy experienced actually protected him–no one suspected he could be the one carrying out amazing heroic deeds. Orczy wrote this long before Marvel popularized the idea of a superhero who seemed a mild-mannered, ineffectual, or unremarkable person. In fact–just after writing that–I read on Wikipedia that Stan Lee, the Marvel co-creator, read The Scarlet Pimpernel as a boy and has called Sir Percy the first character who could be called a superhero.

I’m not sure I can agree with Stan Lee, and you probably anticipate what I’m going to say. The Gospels show us members of Jesus’s family and his neighbors not thinking there was anything special about Jesus. He was looked down on for his humble place in society, for coming from a nothing place (“Can anything good come from Nazareth?”), for not having wealth or credentials or position. He was killed like a common criminal.

Yet Jesus’s words and acts as a teacher, a healer, a servant, and a redeemer have impacted the world, transforming lives, for two thousand years.

In the current film series “The Chosen,” early episodes show us Jesus playing with children. In the episode about Jesus healing the paralytic let down through the roof, kids watch the spectacle from another roof nearby. OCD Matthew awkwardly climbs up beside them and starts to tell the children who Jesus is. “We know him,” they nod, startling Matthew. We can imagine Matthew’s churning thoughts: Who is this man?

By Allen Hogan. I couldn’t find one of the kids on the wall with Matthew.

Real authority comes not from words alone, but from deeds and attitudes that match the words, done not to garner attention but out of love. It’s called integrity. Some of integrity’s fruits are safety and trustworthiness. I love this passage from Henri Nouwen’s little book, The Inner Voice of Love (pages 49 and 50):

A part of you was left behind very early in your life … it is full of fears. Meanwhile, you grew up with many survival skills. But you want your self to be one. So you have to bring home the part of you that was left behind. That is not easy, because you have become quite a formidable person, and your fearful part does not know if it can safely dwell with you. … Jesus dwells in your fearful, never fully received self. Where you are most human, most yourself, weakest, there Jesus lives. Bringing your fearful self home is bringing Jesus home. As long as your vulnerable self does not feel welcomed by you, it keeps so distant that it cannot show you its true beauty and wisdom. Thus, you survive without truly living. … When you become more childlike, your small, fearful self will no longer feel the need to dwell elsewhere. It will begin to look to you as home. Be patient … Gradually you will become one, and you will find that Jesus is living in your heart and offering you all you need.

Nothing enchants me more than discovering quiet integrity. It’s as thrilling now in real life as it was for me through fiction as a child. And no one embodies this more than Jesus, loving us in the past, the present, and the future.

This is an old song with a still-relevant message.

Being human is good

But Jesus, fully God, is fully human as well

Mark 1:1 This is the Good News about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God … John [the Baptist] baptized Jesus in the Jordan River. As Jesus came up out of the water, he saw the heavens splitting apart and the Holy Spirit descending on him like dove. And a voice from heaven said, “You are my beloved Son, and you bring me great joy.”

Hebrews 4:15 This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do.

2 Peter 1:2-3 May God give you more and more grace and peace as you grow in your knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord. By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life.

During these seven weeks of Epiphany, I want to look at the question, “Who is this man?” from the perspective of the Gospel of Mark. Mark isn’t part of our lectionary readings this year, but I’ve written a lot in the past from Matthew, Luke, and John and have neglected Mark.

Since I’m on vacation, I invite you to listen to Kevin Antlitz’s New Year’s sermon, “What Christmas teaches us about being human.” Our problem is not that we’re human; it’s that we’re not human enough, as Jesus was. Kevin cites St. Gregory: “What Jesus does not assume [we could use the word “incarnate” here], he does not heal.”

Happy listening!!

This is the irrational season

When love blooms bright and wild.

Had Mary been filled with reason

There’d have been no room for the child.

—Madeleine L’Engle

Twelve drummers drumming

But God sent his Son for everyone

Psalm 145:21 I will praise the Lord, and may everyone on earth bless his holy name forever and ever.

Psalm 24:9-10 Open up, ancient gates! Open up, ancient doors, and let the King of glory enter. Who is the King of glory? The Lord of Heaven’s Armies—he is the King of glory.

Psalm 102:15 The nations will fear the name of the Lord. All the kings of the earth will revere your glory.

John 3:16-17 For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him.

Drumroll please! Because January 6 is a very special day.

In some parts of the world, it’s the day of the Three Kings, Día de los Reyes, the day children receive gifts in commemoration of the magi who followed a star from far-off lands to recognize and honor the baby Jesus with their worship and their gifts.

It’s the day called Epiphany, the day of revelation to the world that this child born in a stable to humble parents is the King of kings for all nations, not only for Israel.

In Eastern traditions, it’s called Theophany, to remember the revelation at Jesus’s baptism, when God’s voice from Heaven declared Jesus to be his beloved Son, and the Holy Spirit attested to this in the form of a dove.

In every case, believers ask on this day for greater and clearer revelation of who Jesus was, is, and will be. “Open my eyes, Lord. I want to see Jesus.”

So, I like the drummers drumming on the twelfth day, reminding us the King is coming! We must prepare our hearts to receive and honor him!

Whatever the origin of “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” published in England at least as early as 1780 and popularized in its now-standard version by Frederic Austin in 1909, the number twelve reminds me as well of the twelve apostles, whose task it was to reveal Jesus to the world as the resurrected Christ, the Anointed One (Acts 1:22).

We are invited to share in this joyful task, to beat our drums for the King of kings as we await his full revelation to the world, saying with the Apostle John, Maranatha. Come, Lord Jesus.

Ten lords a-leaping?

But God hears our cries for help

Psalm 145:19-20 The Lord grants the desires of those who fear him; he hears their cries for help and rescues them. The Lord protects all those who love him.

Matthew 28:20 [Jesus said] “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Luke 6:46-48 “Why do you keep calling me ‘Lord, Lord!’ when you don’t do what I say? I will show you what it’s like when someone comes to me, listens to my teaching, and then follows it. It is like a person building a house who digs deep and lays the foundation on solid rock. When the floodwaters rise and break against that house, it stands firm.”

1 Peter 1:6 There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you have to endure many trials for a little while.

The image that comes to mind is comical. I picture a game of leapfrog, with the ten lords in all their finery becoming ever more disheveled and wet as they fall in the grass sodden and muddy from all the rain we’ve been having.

And that reminds me of my then three-year-old grandson slipping and falling in mud. When I heard his cries and went to rescue him, I slipped too, and we were both lying there covered in mud and with no apparent way to clean ourselves up enough to get in the car and go home from the park.

On this tenth day of Christmas, the last thing I feel I need is ten lords a-leaping. I need only one Lord who hears my cries for help and rescues me. For my heart is shattered with a loss I can’t describe to you. Maybe that’s OK, because your heartache is different from mine, and I want you to hear this word of comfort from Psalm 145 through the lens of your own grief or need.

Wait a minute! you may be thinking. I don’t see the Lord granting my desires or rescuing and protecting me. I feel like God has forgotten me, or maybe, with the world in such a mess, he doesn’t care about my concerns. I’m like that crying three-year-old lying cold in the mud.

I hear you. Sometimes nothing makes sense, even words of comfort like these words from Psalm 145. Sometimes the Lord rescues us in ways we don’t understand until much later.

I’ve gone through a lot of trouble and anguish in my life, and what I want to tell you, even in my own grieving today, is that the Lord does hear, and he does care. Sometimes I wish he didn’t so much respect our free will and would swoop in and prevent us feeling the effects of our own and others’ poor choices and wounded hearts and wrong thinking and acting. I wish I could go back to being like three-month-old Juliana whose every need my daughter attends to.

But God wants me to grow up, painful and messy as that process can be. And while this “vale of tears” can be very dark at times, light and hope come to us through the promise of final defeat of wrong and evil. This isn’t “pie in the sky by and by.” Our solid rock, the anchor for our souls, our unwavering confidence is that Jesus is with us now, today, walking through it all right beside us, caring for us in big ways and small.

Please open my eyes; let me see you with me, Lord.

Today.

Two turtledoves …

But God is close

Psalm 145:17-18 The Lord is righteous in everything he does; he is filled with kindness. The Lord is close to all who call on him, yes, to all who call on him in truth.

Hebrews 2:16-18 We know the Son did not come to help angels; he came to help the descendants of Abraham. Therefore, it was necessary for him to be made in every respect like us, his brothers and sisters, so that he could be our merciful and faithful High Priest before God. Then he could offer a sacrifice that would take away the sins of the people. Since he himself has gone through suffering and testing, he is able to help us when we are being tested.

It seems like every time I ask Youtube to play Christmas carols, sooner or later I’m treated to yet one more rendition of “The Twelve Days of Christmas.” And on NPR I learned that someone (sorry, I didn’t catch who) prices the cost of the “goods and services” in this song each year as a measure of inflation: giving your true love the gifts of all twelve days would cost you 10.5% more this year than last year. Especially turtledoves! Sorry, that’s about all I remember, but feel free to research it!

What is it that so fascinates us about this dated song that we keep on playing it and listening to it?

Hearing about this on NPR did prompt me to think about turtledoves, because they show up periodically in Scripture. They are cited in Song of Solomon as a sign of spring (no wonder they are expensive at the moment, huh). In Psalm 74:19, God’s beloved people are compared to turtledoves. In Leviticus a series of texts describes using them for sacrifices, for those too poor to purchase a lamb. In Luke we learn that Mary and Joseph fell into that category, because they took two turtledoves to the Temple to substitute legally for their firstborn Jesus’s dedication to the Lord when he was circumcised at eight days of age.

The Temple priests didn’t know Jesus was the Lamb, the One who would be sacrificed for each one of us. The One described by the old man Simeon in the Temple as “the consolation of Israel.”

Two turtledoves, the offering of the poor. For the Magi had not yet arrived to bring him their costly gifts.

On this second day of Christmas, I am filled with awe thinking about the mystery of God become a tiny, helpless baby.

My favorite carol again this Christmas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifCWN5pJGIE

How long, Lord?

How long, Lord?

But God opens his hand

Psalm 145:15 The eyes of all look to you in hope; you give them their food as they need it. When you open your hand, you satisfy the hunger and thirst of every living thing.

Psalm 130:5 I am counting on the Lord; yes, I am counting on him. I have put my hope in his word.

What a delight to care for my two-month-old granddaughter Juliana yesterday, satisfying her hunger with the milk my daughter had left for her.

I felt overwhelmed with gratitude for little JuJu’s health. I couldn’t help flashing back to Karis at that age, in the hospital and unable to swallow without bilious vomiting even one teaspoon slow drip over an hour.

And I started thinking about all the ways God fed Karis despite her dysfunctional intestines. Had she been born even a few years earlier, TPN (elemental nutrition administered directly into the veins) would not have been available for her. She was the first baby to survive infancy with her condition, thanks to TPN and to God’s dramatic intervention when the doctors asked us to remove life support and let her go, and instead her intestine inexplicably started functioning for the first time.

After that, for a while, she was able to nurse. When her intestines shut down again, she had a combination of TPN and pregestimil, administered half-strength slow drip through a kangaroo pump. (At other times in her life she actually drank that horrible stuff.) There were long periods when the only foods she tolerated were yogurt and boiled chicken breast. She had her own special “yogurt spoon.”

There were periods when she could eat a variety of foods, but that could morph in a matter of minutes into painful, life-threatening bowel obstructions and dehydration. We tried all kinds of combinations and concoctions. When she lost too much weight, the docs would put her back on TPN, which led to its own complications and scary line infections.

One day in Brazil when Karis was in high school, struggling to live a version of “normal life,” I carried my Bible into her bedroom open to Psalm 145 and told her God had spoken to me very directly through one verse; could she guess which it was?

She glanced at the page to see which psalm I was showing her and said, “Verse 15, right, Mom? Don’t I keep telling you to stop worrying about me? But Mom, what about all the children who starve, not because they can’t eat, like me, but because they simply don’t have food to eat? How does this verse apply to them?”

Her eyes filled with tears. “Mom, I wish I could use the money our insurance is spending to keep me alive to feed the children who don’t have food. Why can’t I, Mom? The world is totally out of whack, with so many resources invested in me and so few in them. It’s not right. What can I do? How can God bear it? How can we make the world a more equitable place?”

By now Karis was sobbing, and I with her. I still don’t know the answers to her questions. We have so much. Others have so little.

Remembering all this today, I think of God’s promise that the time will come when there is no more hunger and thirst. For the Lamb on the throne will be their Shepherd. He will lead them to springs of life-giving water. And God will wipe every tear from their eyes (Revelation 7:16-17). How long, Lord? How long?

As this season focuses our attention on the Source of our hope, God himself become a helpless, hungry infant, savor this beautiful reflection by Luci Shaw, “Mary’s Song” (thanks, Shari!):

Blue homespun and the bend of my breast

keep warm this small hot naked star

fallen to my arms. (Rest . . .

you who have had so far

to come.) Now nearness satisfies

the body of God sweetly. Quiet he lies

whose vigor hurled

a universe. He sleeps

whose eyelids have not closed before.

His breath (so slight it seems

no breath at all) once ruffled the dark deeps

to sprout a world.

Charmed by doves’ voices, the whisper of straw,

he dreams,

hearing no music from other spheres.

Breath, mouth, ears, eyes

he is curtailed

who overflowed all skies,

all years.

Older than eternity, now he

is new. Now native to earth as I am, nailed

to my poor planet, caught that I might be free,

blind in my womb to know my darkness ended,

brought to this birth

for me to be new-born,

and for him to see me mended

I must see him torn.

Waiting for Baby Jesus … beautiful creche fashioned from cardboard boxes, tape, and paint by our friend Lineth.

Peace

But God keeps his promises December 19, 2022

Psalm 145:13-14 The Lord always keeps his promises; he is gracious in all he does. The Lord helps the fallen and lifts those bent beneath their loads.

Psalm 119:140 Your promises have been thoroughly tested; that is why I love them so much.

Matthew 11:28 Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.”

Last night Dave and I watched a movie reminiscent of “The Notebook,” called “Still Mine.” 89-year-old Craig (James Cromwell) tells his memory-challenged wife, Irene (Geneviève Bujold), “I have never broken a promise to you.” Amid the insecurities she experiences, Craig wants Irene (her name means “peace”) to know she can trust him to care for her.

Psalm 145 also links confidence in God’s promises to relief from the burdens we carry. We can trust him to help us bear the weights of our lives. As we trust him, our burdens ease. Isn’t it true that when we worry about whether we can trust someone, our concerns in relation to them are heavier?

It occurs to me that Jesus’s invitation can include sharing with him our doubts and concerns, even about God’s trustworthiness. We can tell him how it feels to want something very badly and not see God doing anything about it. We can tell him we don’t always understand why he doesn’t apparently act on our behalf. We can weep in his lap about the disappointments and betrayals we feel so keenly.

Doing so in itself is an act of trust. I love Psalm 116:10-11, I believed in you, SO I said, “I am deeply troubled, Lord.” In my anxiety I cried out to you.

We’ve reached the fourth week of Advent, the last week before we celebrate one part of what we’ve been waiting for: the Incarnation, the birth of our Savior. In one system of naming the Advent candles (there are many!), the fourth candle represents Peace. Peace is the direct result of trust, so easily seen in the comfort of a child relaxed in his or her mother’s lap.

Or in the case of Irene, resting in Craig’s embrace, his tears reveal his heart touched by her trust in him.

My granddaughter Talita with her daddy

Don’t be afraid

But God’s kingdom is glorious

Psalm 145:10-13 All of your works will thank you, Lord, and your faithful followers will praise you. They will speak of the glory of your kingdom; they will give examples of your power. They will tell about the majesty and glory of your reign.

Luke 12:30-32 Your Father already knows your needs. Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and he will give you everything you need. So don’t be afraid, little flock. For it gives your Father great happiness to give you the Kingdom.

1 Thessalonians 2:12 God called you to share in his Kingdom and glory.

In August of 2004 I had already lived quite a long time. For fifty years I had seen God provide for me. I had seen God touch my daughter Karis and restore her many times when doctors told us there was no hope for survival from the current crisis.

Yet the evening of August 23, after watching a video of a person who died on the operating table, I was terrified. For most of the night I could not sleep, agonizing over what Karis had agreed to do: undergo a highly risky transplant. The “good, bad, and ugly” of intestinal transplant had been drilled into us, complete with examples of patients who had died. The chances of her surviving were small. Why then had we signed up for this? Should I try to persuade Karis to change her mind?

Toward morning, I fell asleep, briefly. But shortly before 7:00 a.m. I woke up, startled, as if someone had shaken me awake. I heard a voice say, “Get up, get dressed, and go to church.” I tried to ignore it, snuggling back into my pillow, but the voice spoke again: “Get up, get dressed, and go to church.” What … ??!!

Karis was still sound asleep. I got up, got dressed, and went to church. I walked into the early morning service to hear the pastor concluding the sermon by saying the words from Luke’s Gospel quoted above. Don’t be afraid.

God had told me to get out of bed and go to church just to hear those words?

Later that morning, while visiting a friend, an immigrant from the Arab world, Karis received a transplant call and said yes.

Don’t be afraid.

Hour by hour through the fourteen-hour surgery, Don’t be afraid.

Seeing her in the transplant ICU afterward, tubes and wires sprouting from her body like the quills of a porcupine, multiple machines humming, Don’t be afraid.

Skipping ahead days, weeks, months, to Karis finally emerging from coma, irreversible rejection, one lethal infection after another, total debilitation … “Mama, why were you afraid? It’s not time for me to die yet. God still has plans for me here.”

January 2005: off the vent!!!

Why was I afraid? Because I’m human and I loved my daughter. Because I’m weak, not strong. Because being back in the ICU for 75 days straight wa an eternity.

Your Father already knows your needs …

Reliving those days, weeks, and months to write the Karis book, God showed me where he had been through that eternity of time: with me in the ICU. Calling people to give me support and care. Providing basics: Food. Occasional nights or days of sleep. His word, Psalm 118:5, with the mystery of feeling the walls of the ICU recede—larger inside than outside—when I became claustrophobic. The mystery and wonder of Karis still living, one more hour, one more day.

Your Father already knows your needs. Don’t be afraid. It gives him great joy to give you the Kingdom.

The mystery of the Kingdom: The King is your Father, who loves you …

Can you receive these words today?

Close your eyes and listen.