GRACE WORDS

Max Lucado - UpWords Week of April 20 by Max Lucado Jesus’ final act on earth was intended to win your trust. This is the final act of Jesus’ life. In the concluding measure of his earthly composition, we hear the sounds of a thirsty man. And through his thirst—through a sponge and a jar of cheap wine—he leaves a final appeal. “You can trust me.” Jesus. Lips cracked and mouth of cotton. Throat so dry he couldn’t swallow, and voice so hoarse he could scarcely speak. He is thirsty. To find the last time moisture touched these lips you need to rewind a dozen hours to the meal in the upper room. Since tasting that cup of wine, Jesus has been beaten, spat upon, bruised, and cut. He has been a cross-carrier and sin-bearer, and no liquid has salved his throat. He is thirsty. Why doesn’t he do something about it? Couldn’t he? Did he not cause jugs of water to be jugs of wine? Did he not make a wall out of the Jordan River and two walls out of the Red Sea? Didn’t he, ...

Max Lucado - UpWords by Max Lucado The belief of French philosopher Voltaire:  The Bible and Christianity would pass within a hundred years.  He died in 1778. The movement continues. The pronouncement of Friedrich Nietzsche in 1882:  “God is dead.”  The dawn of science, he believed, would be the doom of faith. Science has dawned; the movement continues. The way a Communist dictionary defined the Bible:  “It is a collection of fantastic legends without any scientific support.”  Communism is diminishing; the movement continues. The discovery made by every person who has tried to bury the faith:  The same as the one made by those who tried to bury its Founder: He won’t stay in the tomb. The facts.  The movement has never been stronger. Over one billion Catholics and nearly as many Protestants. The question.  How do we explain it? Jesus was a backwater peasant. He never wrote a book, never held an office. He never journeye...