The Plumbline

Jesus sensed that his disciples were having a hard time with this and said, “Does this rattle you completely? What would happen if you saw the Son of Man ascending to where he came from? The Spirit can make life. Sheer muscle and willpower don’t make anything happen. Every word I’ve spoken to you is a Spirit-word, and so it is life-making. But some of you are resisting, refusing to have any part in this.” (Jesus knew from the start that some weren’t going to risk themselves with him. He knew also who would betray him.) He went on to say, “This is why I told you earlier that no one is capable of coming to me on his own. You get to me only as a gift from the Father.” (John 6:61-65) Jesus knows when we are having a hard time taking what he says as truth, so we should not be surprised when he challenges us to come to a place of complete belief. Some of his teachings were kind of hard for those early disciples to swallow, so they resisted placing their trust in him. Whenever we resist his ...

Albert Pike reminds us, "We have all the light we need - we just need to put it into practice." There are times we already know what to do, when to do it, or how to do it, but we just stand still, not doing anything. Why is that? It could be we just don't 'feel' it at the moment - causing just a bit of a delay or lag in our 'obedience' response. We have 'light', but light is meant to reveal and reflect. We must remember all steps toward God are good, but when light is given, it is meant to illuminate the steps we are to take - God provides 'plenty of light to live in' both now and in the future. Jesus once again addressed them: “I am the world’s Light. No one who follows me stumbles around in the darkness. I provide plenty of light to live in.” The Pharisees objected, “All we have is your word on this. We need more than this to go on.” Jesus replied, “You’re right that you only have my word. But you can depend on it being true . I know whe...