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“At this point many of his disciples turned away and deserted him. Then Jesus turned to the Twelve and asked, “Are you also going to leave?”
Simon Peter replied, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words that give eternal life. We believe, and we know you are the Holy One of God.”
Jesus had just told his crowd of hundreds (if not thousands) what it meant to truly believe in Him. He said that it could not be a casual relationship, but that their devotion to Him must be as intimate as if He were literally living inside them. No, Jesus was not trying to gather a following and build a ministry based on a “miracle-of-the-day” philosophy. He told his crowd, that was diminishing by the minute, that He was the very essence of what it means to live, breathe, love and embrace life and that there would be many who would be unable understand that concept.
As always, Jesus knew his audience well as he knew his disciples. This is how he could ask them, as He asks us today, “Is this too much for you to grasp? Do you understand that when you don’t get what you asked for or when you don’t get what you think you deserved or when your most desperate prayer seems to go unanswered, that I am still God and that I am still with you and that My love never fails?” May we, like Peter, also be able to say that we have searched and never found the hope and peace that we have found in Jesus—even when our circumstances say we shouldn’t!
Dr. David McNabb
ATCM President/CEO
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