Drawn to Life

Jesus told the crowd of miracle seekers that everyone who comes to Him is drawn by God.  Those who respond to God’s magnetism go through a process: listen, learn, believe and live.  It starts with God; He initiates this process, He makes us spiritually hungry,  and we choose our response.

“I am the bread of life.” (John 6:48, NIV) Jesus’ teachings are rich with analogies, metaphors, parables and similes.  These four teaching tools take something unfamiliar to the listeners and make it understandable by comparing it to something the listeners are familiar with. Here Jesus used a metaphor and compared Himself to bread. Everyone one of His listeners was familiar with bread, so they understood at least half of the equation, and many of them became curious regarding just how Jesus was like bread, specifically the ‘bread of life.’

He still does that same thing with us; He takes lofty truths about abundant life off of the top shelf and sets them in our lap.  He graciously speaks to us individually in terms of our culture, our history, our language, our current awareness.

I read an article recently in an archeology magazine; the articles said long ago, before archeology’s modern era, some theologians and Christian leaders thought that the words of the New Testament were originally written in a special divine version of Greek, a heavenly Greek language God created just for the Bible’s New Testament. But as archeology advanced, as scraps of papyrus and engravings were unearthed, it was found that the words in the New Testament were common Greek, the same words used in average citizen’s grocery lists and personal reminders.

God is drawing us to Jesus, to Eternal Aliveness.  He draws us with words we can understand, using familiar terms to says, explain things about aliveness that I’m only beginning to grasp. To the scientist He  says, “It’s like electrons, neutron, and quarks.”  To the plumber He says, “Your life is leaking right here.”  To the vineyard owner He says, “I am the grapevine and you are the branches.”  God draws every person in terms she or he can understand.  Isn’t that amazing?

Life Spark: God will speak to about life in Jesus in understandable terms.  (John 6:43-59)

Life-challenge: Listen all day for the Spirit to whisper “It’s kind of like this.”  Stop tonight and think about whether you heard those words or not.