"Tetelestai" - It Is Finished!

 "Later, knowing that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, 'I am thirsty.' A jar of wine vinegar was there, and so they soaked a sponge in it, and put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant and lifted it to Jesus's lips. When He had received the drink Jesus said, 'It is finished.' With that He bowed His head and gave up His spirit." (John 19)

The Greek word translated as 'it is finished' in our English Bibles is 'tetelestai,' a word of various usages.

On many ancient invoices (from the time of Christ) we find that word verifying that the bill had been 'Paid in full - no balance due.' Today we often pay a bill and our receipt is stamped "Paid in full." Same idea: The debt has been fully satisficed.

Other ancient documents (military) we have found show the word is also used to announce that the army has had victory! 'The war is over --  We have won!' A cry of rejoicing!  'Victory is ours!'

Also it can mean a task or assignment has been completed;  we have records of servants reporting back to their masters that they had finished their assignment. 'Tetelestai' -- The job was complete!

Also, an artist, when finally completing their masterpiece, used the word to indicate their work was finished --  there was nothing more to be added. (Sort of like God pronouncing His creation 'Good'!)

Another use of the word relates to a prisoner who has finished his sentence. 'Tetelestai' on his certificate meant: 'no other penalty or punishment required.'

Tetelestai is the present tense, meaning the action was completed in the past, but the results continue into the present and into the future.

All of these meanings have significance for us! 

Just look at what Jesus was telling us  -- with His last breath!

                               *************

"It is finished," was His cry! Hallelujah! What a Savior!

He Knows Us By Name

 In the Old Testament we find many examples of God's grace and patience.

Reading Exodus 32 and 33 this morning. Moses is up on the mountain talking with God. The Hebrews, recently freed from slavery in Egypt, are waiting for him. They get impatient and decided to just stop waiting for him and talk Aaron into making a god for them, a golden calf, reminding them of the false religions they had in Egypt.

(Making your own god is never a good idea! I know from experience. You probably do, too!)

"You know how prone these people are to evil," Aaron reminds Moses.

God tells Moses He will reject the people for their sin.

But Moses intercedes and reminds God that they were chosen to be His special treasure, a people through whom all the world will be blessed. And that God had told Moses, 'I know you by name and you have found favor with Me.' "If You are pleased with me teach me Your ways so I may know You and continue to find favor with You. Remember this nation is Your people."

God listens to Moses and agrees to forgive and accompany them to the Promised Land. Moses had said, "I don't want to go with them unless You go with us."

Then, "The LORD replied, 'My presence will go with you and I will give you rest.'"

What a sacred moment. God tells him 'I will be with you. I know you. I am pleased with you. I know you by name. Just take a deep breath and relax. I will not leave you.'

We know from the New Testament that He knows us by name, too. He is our Good Shepherd. And we recognize His voice and follow Him and He will always be with us. Always.

Just relax. Take a deep breath. He's with us.

What Should We Be Doing Now? C S Lewis

 

How should we be living in these difficult days as we wait for Jesus to come back?

C S Lewis reminds us that some, or many, of the things we see in the world today are contrary to God's will. He says: "Christianity is a fighting religion. It thinks God made the world -- that space and time, heat and cold, colors and taste, animals and vegetables, are things He created. But it also thinks that a great many things have gone wrong with the world He made and He insists, and insists very loudly, that we put them right again! (From "Mere Christianity").

Then again, in the Narnian Chronicles, after the evil witch has entered Narnia, Aslan, the great Lion, gathers the Narnians around and says, "But do not be cast down. Evil will come of that evil, and I will see to it that the worst falls on Myself. In the meantime, let us make this a merry world. And as Adam's race has done the harm, Adam's race will help heal it."

Looks like that's how we live in these ungodly times -- we start putting things right again! Looks like quite a task for us! But the worst, by far, fell on Jesus!

We want to work now and then hear Him say to us, "Well done, good and faithful servant!"

Maranatha, Lord Jesus!

No Ordinary People

 Everyone is immortal. Everyone is going to live someplace forever...

   "There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal.

Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations -- these are mortal and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat.

But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, exploit --immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.

This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our play must be of that kind (and it is in fact the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously -- no flippancy, no superiority,  no presumption.

And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sin,  in spite of which we love the sinner." 

                                   -- C S Lewis, The Weight of Glory.

Everyone we see -- on the street, in the stadium or theater, in the grocery store, on Facebook -- everyone will live forever -- someplace.

The most loving and kind thing we can do is to ask them if they understand that.

Why don't we just ask?

Quoteworthy - Miracles - Albert Einstein

"There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle." - Albert Einstein


I was weeding. One sturdy little seedling, perhaps 6 inches tall, stood erect as a telephone pole, daring me to pull it up. I tugged and yanked. Out it came - with a pecan at its root! Left alone, that little soldier, in a few years, would have become a great pecan tree, sheltering birds and insects and providing food for squirrels.  A miracle in the making - just needing a few years to present itself as a for-real, authentic, bona-fide miracle!


Does a "miracle in the making"  still qualify as a miracle?  If a giant tree had grown up overnight, we would have taken pictures, called journalists - announcing the amazing news that a great pecan tree had sprouted and reached mature growth  in just a few hours! It would be like seeing a time-released photo show on the Nature channel. Growing and leafing out and producing pecans before our very eyes.


It would be a miracle!


Does that mean the only difference between miracles and just "normal" nature is time? Is that the only way to distinguish? Just time elapsing?


I don't know about you, but I think it is all a miracle! Everything around us,
every moment of our day......just one miracle after another.....

Here dies another day

During which I have had eyes, ears, hands,

And the great world around me;

And with tomorrow begins another,

Why am I allowed two?

   - G. K. Chesterton