thoughts by Max Lucado Archives - Page 5 of 42

Published April 7, 2023

The Suffering of His Broken Heart

Question: How does Jesus’ own suffering encourage you in times you suffer?

Go with me for a moment to witness what was perhaps the foggiest night in history. The scene is very simple; you’ll recognize it quickly. A grove of twisted olive trees. Ground cluttered with large rocks. A low stone fence. A dark, dark night.

Now, look into the picture. Look closely through the shadowy foliage. See that person? See that solitary figure? What’s he doing? Flat on the ground. Face stained with dirt and tears. Fists pounding the hard earth. Eyes wide with a stupor of fear. Hair matted with salty sweat. Is that blood on his forehead?

That’s Jesus. Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Maybe you’ve seen the classic portrait of Christ in the garden. Kneeling beside a big rock. Snow-white robe. Hands peacefully folded in prayer. A look of serenity on his face. Halo over his head. A spotlight from heaven illuminating his golden-brown hair.

Now, I’m no artist, but I can tell you one thing. The man who painted that picture didn’t use the gospel of Mark as a pattern. When Mark wrote about that painful night, he used phrases like these: “Horror and dismay came over him.” “My heart is ready to break with grief.” “He went a little forward and threw himself on the ground.”

Does this look like the picture of a saintly Jesus resting in the palm of God? Hardly. Mark used black paint to describe this scene. We see an agonizing, straining, and struggling Jesus. We see a “man of sorrows.” (Isaiah 53:3 NASB) We see a man struggling with fear, wrestling with commitments, and yearning for relief.

We see Jesus in the fog of a broken heart.

The writer of Hebrews would later pen,

“During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death.” (Hebrews 5:7 NIV)

My, what a portrait! Jesus is in pain. Jesus is on the stage of fear. Jesus is cloaked, not in sainthood, but in humanity.

The next time the fog finds you, you might do well to remember Jesus in the garden. The next time you think that no one understands, reread the fourteenth chapter of Mark. The next time your self-pity convinces you that no one cares, pay a visit to Gethsemane. And the next time you wonder if God really perceives the pain that prevails on this dusty planet, listen to him pleading among the twisted trees.

The next time you are called to suffer, pay attention. It may be the closest you’ll ever get to God. Watch closely. It could very well be that the hand that extends itself to lead you out of the fog is a pierced one.

Question: How does Jesus’ own suffering encourage you in times you suffer?

By Max Lucado
Used by permission

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

Original image from https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/c2/46/bb/c246bbbce203df476766b7031810f8a6.jpg

Let Your Gentleness Be Evident to All

How many disasters have been averted because one person refused to buckle under the strain? It’s this kind of composure Paul is summoning when he says, “Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything” (Philippians 4:5-6).

The Greek word translated here as “gentleness” describes a temperament that’s seasoned and mature. It envisions an attitude fitting to the occasion, levelheaded and tempered. This gentleness is “evident to all.” Family members take note. Your friends sense a difference. Coworkers benefit from it.

The gentle person is sober minded and clear thinking. The contagiously calm person is the one who reminds others, “God is in control.” Pursue this gentleness. The Lord is near—you are not alone. You may feel alone. You may think you’re alone. But there is never a moment in which you face life without help. God is near—be anxious for nothing!

By Max Lucado
Used by Permission
From: Anxious for Nothing: Finding Calm in a Chaotic World

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at: https://maxlucado.com/about-max/

A Heavenly Affirmation

Each of us has a fantasy that our family will be like the Walton’s, an expectation that our dearest friends will be our next of kin. Jesus didn’t have that expectation. Look how he defined his family:

“My true brother and sister and mother are those who do what God wants.” (Mark 3:35).

When Jesus brothers didn’t share his convictions, he didn’t try to force them. He recognized that his spiritual family could provide what his physical family didn’t. If Jesus himself couldn’t force his family to share his convictions, what makes you think you can force yours?

We can’t control the way our family responds to us. When it comes to the behavior of others toward us, our hands are tied. We have to move beyond the naive expectation that if we do good, people will treat us right. The fact is they may and they may not – we cannot control how people respond to us.

I can’t assure you that your family will ever give you the blessing you seek, but I know God will. Let God give you what your family doesn’t. If your earthly father doesn’t affirm you, then let your heavenly Father take his place.

God has proven himself as a faithful father. Now it falls to us to be trusting children. Let God give you what your family doesn’t. Let him fill the void others have left. Rely upon him for your affirmation and encouragement. Look at Paul’s words:

You are God’s child, and God will give you the blessing he promised, because you are his child.” Galatians 4:7, (emphasis added).

[And] don’t lose heart. God still changes families.

Max Lucado
From: He Still Moves Stones
Used by permission

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

An Unearthly Love

“Take in with all Christians the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.” Ephesians 3:18-19 (MSG).

Your goodness can’t win God’s love. Nor can your badness lose it. But you can resist it. We tend to do so honestly. Having been rejected so often, we fear God may reject us as well. Rejections have left us skittish and jumpy. Like my dog Salty. He sleeps next to me on the couch as I write. He’s a cranky cuss, but I like him. We’ve aged together over the last fifteen years, and he seems worse for the wear. He’s a wiry canine by nature; shave his salt-and-pepper mop, and he’d pass for a bulimic Chihuahua. He didn’t have much to start with; now the seasons have taken his energy, teeth, hearing, and all but eighteen inches’ worth of eyesight.

Toss him a dog treat, and he just stares at the floor through cloudy cataracts. (Or, in his case, dogaracts) He’s nervous and edgy, quick to growl and slow to trust. As I reach out to pet him, he yanks back. Still, I pet the old coot. I know he can’t see, and I can only wonder how dark his world has become.

We are a lot like Salty. I have a feeling that most people who defy and deny God do so more out of fear than conviction. For all our chest pumping and braggadocio, we are anxious folk – can’t see a step into the future, can’t hear the one who owns us. No wonder we try to gum the hand that feeds us.

But God reaches and touches. He speaks through the immensity of the Russian plain and the density of the Amazon rain forest. Through a physician’s touch in Africa, a bowl of rice in India. Through a Japanese bow or a South American abrao. He’s even been known to touch people through paragraphs like the ones you are reading. If he is touching you, let him.

Mark it down: God loves you with an unearthly love.

You can’t win it by being winsome. You can’t lose it by being a loser.

But you can be blind enough to resist it. Don’t. For heaven’s sake, don’t. For your sake, don’t.

By Max Lucado
From: 3:16, The Numbers of Hope
Used by permission

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

The Cure for Ingratitude

1st Thessalonians 5:18 tells us to “give thanks in everything!” In everything? In trouble, in the hospital, in a fix, in a mess, in distress? Interruptions? Jesus did. When five thousand people interrupted his planned retreat, he took them out to lunch. Matthew 14:19 says, “He took the five loaves and the two fish and, looking to heaven, he thanked God for the food.”

Jesus was robustly thankful.

He was thankful when Mary interrupted the party with perfume. When he hugged children and blessed babies and watched blind people look at their first sunsets, Jesus was thankful.

The cure for ingratitude? Look up. Look what God has done! Thank you, Jesus, for modeling gratitude. Thank you, King Jesus, for working all things together for your good. Thank you…. for letting love happen.

By Max Lucado
Used by permission
From: Before Amen

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

God’s Doing What’s Best for Us

God is at work in each of us whether we know it or not, whether we want it or not. Lamentations 3:33 says,

“He takes no pleasure in making life hard, in throwing roadblocks in the way.” He doesn’t delight in our sufferings, but He delights in our development“.

It’s what Paul pointed out in Philippians 1:6,

“God began doing a good work in you, and I am sure He will continue it until it is finished when Jesus Christ comes again.”

Don’t see your struggle as an interruption to life but as preparation for life. No one said the road would be easy or painless. But God will use this mess for something good. This trouble you are in isn’t punishment; it’s training, the normal experience of children. God is doing what’s best for us, training us to live God’s holy best!

By Max Lucado
From: You’ll Get Through This
Used by permission

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

What to Do with Worry

Romans 8:32 says: He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?

If God did this, won’t he freely give us everything else?”

Take your anxieties to the cross—literally. Next time you’re worried about your health or house or finances or flights, take a mental trip up the hill. Run your thumb over the tip of the spear. Balance a spike in the palm of your hand. Read the wooden sign written in your own language. And as you do, touch the velvet dirt, moist with the blood of God. Blood he bled for you. The spear he took for you. The nails he felt for you. The sign he left for you. He did it all for you. All of this. Knowing this, knowing all he did for you there, don’t you think he will look out for you here?

By Max Lucado
Used by Permission

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
https://maxlucado.com/about-max/

I’m Here

“You are all around me–in front and in back–and have put your hand on me.” Psalm 139:5 (NCV)

We wonder with so many miraculous testimonies around us, how we could escape God. But somehow we do. We live in an art gallery of divine creativity and yet are content to gaze only at the carpet.

The next time you hear a baby laugh or see an ocean wave, take note. Pause and listen as His Majesty whispers ever so gently,

“I’m here.”

By Max Lucado
From: Everyday Blessings

Used by permission
To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

Disarming Anxiety

Your goal is not to know every detail of the future. Your goal is to hold the hand of the One who does; and never, ever let go! Jesus tells us rather bluntly,

“Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on” (Matthew 6:25).

He then gives us two commands, look and consider.

“Look at the birds of the air” (Matthew 6:26).

When we do, they appear happy. They don’t appear sleep deprived or lonely. They whistle and soar! He then says,

“Consider the lilies” (Matthew 6:28).

And he adds,

“Even Solomon,” the richest king in history, “was not arrayed like one of these” (Matthew 6:29).

How do we disarm anxiety?

Stockpile our minds with God thoughts. If birds and flowers fall under the category of God’s care, won’t he care for us as well?

By Max Lucado
Used by Permission
Read more Anxious for Nothing

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

What You Were Made to Do

Many people stop short of their destiny. They settle for someone else’s story. Grandpa was a butcher, Dad was a butcher, so I guess I’ll be a butcher. Everyone I know is in farming, so I guess I’m supposed to farm. Consequently, they risk leading dull, joyless, and fruitless lives. They never sing the song God wrote for their voices. They never cross a finish line with heavenward-stretched arms and declare, I was made to do this! They fit in, settle in, and blend in. But they never find their call.

Don’t make the same mistake. Ephesians 2:10 says:

“It is God himself who has made us what we are and given us new lives from Christ Jesus; and long ages ago planned that we should spend these lives in helping others.”

Your existence is not accidental. Your skills are not incidental. God shaped each person in turn!

By Max Lucado
Used by permission
From: Glory Days

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

Look to the Source of Help

David said in Psalm 121,

“I lift up my eyes to the hills—where does my help come from?”

And David answers his own question,

“My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip, He who watches over you will not slumber. The Lord watches over you. The Lord will keep you from all harm, He will watch over your life.”

God—your rescuer, has the right vision. He also has the right direction. He made the boldest claim in the history of man when He declared, “I am the way.” People wondered if the claim was accurate. He answered their question by forging a path through the underbrush of sin and death—escaping alive. Maybe you need your hope restored. If so, lift up your eyes. Like David said, look unto the hills…look unto the One who made you and He will give you help.

By Max Lucado
Used by permission. From: Traveling Light

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

Your Kindness Quotient

How kind are you? What is your kindness quotient?

When was the last time you did something kind for someone in your family: e.g., got a blanket, cleaned off the table, prepared the coffee – without being asked?

Think about your school or workplace. Which person is the most overlooked or avoided? A shy student? A grumpy employee? Maybe he doesn’t speak the language. Maybe she doesn’t fit in. Are you kind to this person?

Kind hearts are quietly kind. They let the car cut into traffic and the young mom with three kids move up in the checkout line. They pick up the neighbor’s trash can that rolled into the street. And they are especially kind at church. They understand that perhaps the neediest person they’ll meet all week is the one standing in the foyer or sitting on the row behind them in worship. Paul writes: “When we have the opportunity to help anyone, we should do it. But we should give special attention to those who are in the family of believers” (Galatians 6:10).

And, here is a challenge – what about your enemies? With the boss who fired you or the wife who left you. Suppose you surprised them with kindness? Not easy? No, it’s not. But mercy is the deepest gesture of kindness. Paul equates the two. “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.” Ephesians 4:32 (NKJV).

Jesus said:

Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you. – If you love only the people who love you, what praise should you get? ¦ [L]ove your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without hoping to get anything back. Then you will have a great reward, and you will be children of the Most High God, because he is kind even to people who are ungrateful and full of sin. Show mercy, just as your Father shows mercy. (Luke 6:27-28, 32, 35-36)

Kindness at home. Kindness in public. Kindness at church and kindness with your enemies. Pretty well covers the gamut, don’t you think? Almost. Someone else needs your kindness. Who could that be? You.

Since he is so kind to us, can’t we be a little kinder to ourselves? Oh, but you don’t know me, Max. You don’t know my faults and my thoughts. You don’t know the gripes I grumble and the complaints I mumble. No, I don’t, but he does. He knows everything about you, yet he doesn’t hold back his kindness toward you. Has he, knowing all your secrets, retracted one promise or reclaimed one gift?

No, he is kind to you. Why don’t you be kind to yourself? He forgives your faults. Why don’t you do the same? He thinks tomorrow is worth living. Why don’t you agree? He believes in you enough to call you his ambassador, his follower, even his child. Why not take his cue and believe in yourself?

Be kind to yourself. God thinks you’re worth his kindness. And he’s a good judge of character.

By Max Lucado
Used by permission

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

Leave Your Guilt at Calvary

Do you carry a load of guilt?

So many do.

If our spiritual baggage were visible, do you know what you would see?

Suitcases of guilt, bulging with binges, blowups, and compromises. The kid with the baggy jeans and the nose ring? He’d give anything to retract the words he said to his mother. But he can’t, so he tows them along. The woman in the business suit that looks like she could run for Senator? She can’t run at all, not hauling that carpet bag wherever she goes. So what do we do?

In Psalm 23:3 David said it like this,

“He leads me in the paths of righteousness.”

The path of righteousness is a narrow, winding trail up a steep hill. At the top is a cross. At the base of the cross are bags, countless bags full of innumerable sins

By Max Lucado
From: Traveling Light
Used by permission

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

Give Thanks

Some things just weren’t made to coexist. Long-tailed cats and rocking chairs? Bulls in a china shop? Not a good idea. Blessings and bitterness? That mixture doesn’t go over well with God. Combine heavenly kindness with earthly ingratitude and expect a sour concoction. Perhaps you’ve sampled it. Gratitude doesn’t come naturally. Self-pity does. Bellyaches do. Grumbles and mumbles–no one has to remind us to offer them. Yet they don’t mix well with the kindness we’ve been given.

Gratitude gets us through the hard stuff.

To reflect on your blessings is to rehearse God’s accomplishments. To rehearse His accomplishments is to discover His heart. Gratitude always leaves us looking at God and away from dread. So practice gratitude! As Ephesians 5:20 puts it,

“Give thanks for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

By Max Lucado
From: You’ll Get Through This
Used by permission

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website
http://maxlucado.com/about/

Trust God to Lead

Worrying is one job you cannot farm out—but you can overcome it!

And there’s no better place to begin than Psalm 23:2. “He leads me beside the still waters,” David declares. He leads me! God isn’t behind me, yelling, Go! He’s ahead of me bidding, Come! He’s in front, clearing the path and cutting the brush. Standing next to the rocks He warns watch your step there.

Isn’t this what God gave the children of Israel? He promised to supply them with manna each day, but He told them to collect only one day’s supply at a time. Matthew 6:34 says to give your entire attention to what God is doing right now and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes. God is leading you– so leave tomorrow’s problems until tomorrow.

By Max Lucado
used by permission
Read more Traveling Light

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
http://maxlucado.com/about/

Category: <span>thoughts by Max Lucado</span>

Question: How does Jesus’ own suffering encourage you in times you suffer?

Further Reading

Further Reading

“My true brother and sister and mother are those who do what God wants.” (Mark 3:35).

[And] don’t lose heart. God still changes families.

Further Reading

“Take in with all Christians the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.” Ephesians 3:18-19 (MSG).

Mark it down: God loves you with an unearthly love.

Further Reading

Jesus was robustly thankful.

Further Reading

Further Reading

If God did this, won’t he freely give us everything else?”

Further Reading

“You are all around me–in front and in back–and have put your hand on me.” Psalm 139:5 (NCV)

Further Reading

How do we disarm anxiety?

Further Reading

Further Reading

“I lift up my eyes to the hills—where does my help come from?”

Further Reading

How kind are you? What is your kindness quotient?

Further Reading

Do you carry a load of guilt?

If our spiritual baggage were visible, do you know what you would see?

Further Reading

Gratitude gets us through the hard stuff.

Further Reading

Worrying is one job you cannot farm out—but you can overcome it!

Further Reading