Good evening, friends. This is Pastor Don. Those days after Jesus’s resurrection were hard days in some ways. True, they were hopeful, but there were so many questions! In the middle of that chaos, two men were walking toward Emmaus when a stranger joined them. He was so tender with their despair that they unloaded their doubts and fears on him. His voice, his choice of scripture, and his compassion had a profound effect on them. In fact, they described it afterwards: “Didn’t our hearts burn within us as he talked with us on the road?”
Now there is an experience! Ever had a moment on your spiritual journey when you felt like your heart was on fire? Your first experience really seeing the natural world in a powerful way – like your first trip above the clouds? A startling insight? An emotional lift in a song on your phone? Those are memorable and priceless times!
The temptation that comes with those times is that desire to live in those moments! – to continually seek to return to that emotional high, mountain-top experience and try to duplicate it on a regular basis in your spiritual life! Oswald Chambers in his well-known devotional “My Utmost for His Highest” said that those peak moments are meant to lead us to some significant action – that is, some way to transform an emotion into a concrete way of living out your calling in the world. It is like the action completes the whole experience. A bonus is that the action is empowered by the feelings!
Let’s pray: Thank you God, for those times when you pay us an unexpected visit and fill us with joy. Teach us to work out that joy in wonderful Christ-like action. Amen
