Is it real?
When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, for he taught with real authority-quite unlike their teachers of religious law.
Matthew 7:28-29 (NLT)
I was pleasantly surprised when a picture of a group of pelicans came up on my computer screen. They have always given me a sense of calm and peace; a feeling of God’s presence. As I gazed upon the picture I soon said to myself, ‘That is not real, it is a fake.’ My peace soon vanished. There are so many generated fakes in the world now that you are never sure if something is real or not. I even saw an app. selling the ability to generate fake reels. So, what is real?
Yet this has been a problem since the Garden of Eden. We read in Genesis 3:1, ‘The serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild animals the LORD God had made. One day he asked the woman, “Did God really say you must not eat the fruit from any of the trees in the garden?’
We have the father of all lies, Satan (John 8:44), messing with the minds of God’s children from the start. We are warned in Matthew 7:15, “Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves.” It is unsettling but at the same time a warning to sharpen our tools of discernment with God’s help.
‘When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, for he taught with real authority—quite unlike their teachers of religious law.’ (Matthew 7:28-29). Now we have something real we can trust. Jesus taught with real authority, for he was really the Son of God (Matthew 14:33). Jesus did not have to fake his authority, put it on with fancy dress or rituals, he was who he claimed to be; he was the real thing.
What does this mean for us today? Well, everything. We can place our trust in Jesus because he really is the Son of God, he loves us, saves us, cares for us, provides for us, and desires our presence. Our lives depend on his reality. Though I prefer a real picture over an AI image, it is still not the real thing. To find the real thing I need to go to the river and look for the pelicans I love. Nothing can take their place.
Nothing can take the place of Jesus. I seek to live my life as Jesus wants me to; to love as he loves, to serve as he served, but as I do so I am only an image; Jesus is still the real thing. I am not seeking to take his place, yet I want to share the gifts Jesus gave to me, with those around me, and this is what we are called to do. We often say, ‘I want to be like you Jesus.’ At times it is hard to live in the reality of who we are meant to be. With the help of Jesus, we will finally reach that reality. The reality of being the real me, the real you, loving the real Jesus. Now that is something to really work for. That is the better meaning of the saying: ‘Let’s be real.’
Prayer
We are so glad to know you God, to have you in our lives and to experience what it means to be really loved. Teach us God to be more like you every day and draw us into the people we are meant to be. You really are all we need. We praise you God. In Jesus’s name I pray. Amen.
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Study by: Anne Gillam About the author: |
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