Insightful Musings on the Scriptures

by

Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67

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April 3, 2010
    Good morning, dear people.
    Becki and I joined some friends and attended a Good Friday service last night...a walk through the components and significance of Passover presented by a representative of Jews For Jesus.  It was terrific.
    Time for a jog.  Wish you could come.  Have a good day.  Blessings.
        Dad/Ray
 

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3 April 2010
Passage: Mark 2:1-22
Focus: “Why does this fellow talk like that?  He’s blaspheming!  Who can forgive sins but God alone?”  Mark 2:7.

           It is of supreme importance that we gain and understanding of WHO Jesus is.  I cannot believe that He is just a great example of piety and moral excellence.  He is not just a man who was mightily empowered by God to preach and perform miracles.  He is not just the founder of a renowned religious system.  The over-all scriptural revelation leaves only one conclusion for me: HE IS GOD.  If you have any doubts whatsoever, I encourage you to study the whole and gather the facts with an attitude of heart that seeks God and His truth.   Don’t trust the conclusions of others or even your own independent judgments.
            Needless to say, the teachers of the law who were in the presence of Jesus on this particular occasion were wrong in their judgment of Jesus’ true identity, but they were right when they reasoned, “Who can forgive sins but God alone?”  Being only half right made them grossly wrong.
            I am quick to confess to a limited understanding of the incarnation—this great display of God becoming man.  But that’s okay.  Why should I stumble over my finiteness in my struggle to comprehend infiniteness?  I simply do not have the capacity to comprehend anyway.  All I can do is accept the adequate evidence that Jesus is God.  And I must accept the scriptural fact that GOD ALONE can forgive MY sins.  Read again the prophetic lines of Isaiah 9:6.