Jesus Is Lord

In the ancient bygone past, the 1970's, Jackie and I were involved with the charismatic renewal in the Catholic Church.  We shared some leadership responsibilities for prayer meetings, went to big exciting conferences at places like Notre Dame and helped conduct Life in the Spirit seminars.

The first priority wasn't necessarily receiving the baptism in the Holy Spirit.  Much more important was the message that the Father's love was made real to us through the person of Jesus.  As important as it was to surrender our lives to Him as savior it was also necessary to ask Him to be the Lord of our lives as well.  The heart of the charismatic renewal could and was expressed in the phrase - JESUS IS LORD.

I love how Jesus as Lord is emphasized in Paul's greeting to the Corinthians in his first recorded letter to them;

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  

I thank my God always concerning you for the grace of God which was given you in Christ Jesus, that in everything you were enriched in Him, in all speech and in all knowledge, even as the testimony concerning Christ was confirmed in you,

so that you are not lacking in any gift, awaiting eagerly the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will also confirm you to the end, blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

God is faithful, through whom you were called into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

"God is faithful."   How powerful those words are when we are hurting and confused.  Why?  Because we know deep in our hearts and so we can still proclaim on our lips - Jesus is Lord.  We don't have to understand the why, the where for, the timing.  We don't have to have been perfect in all of our ways.  We don't have to muster up the strength and courage on our own to go forward.

He has taken my burden and loves me with a love that comes from the Father of love.  Because He is Lord I surrender all to Him.  Because He is Lord I trust that I am not on my own.  Because He is Lord I know He has a plan and a purpose for everything.

As my brother-in-law Jerry and sister-in-law Sherry travel to Japan today to pick up the body of their son Matt I pray that just as Matt knew and trusted Jesus as his Lord, so there would be many more through this that would be lead to confess - JESUS IS LORD!