Jesu Juva!
“Make the Book live to me, Oh Lord. Show me Thyself within Thy Word. Show me myself. And show me my Savior. And make the Book live to me.”
R. Hudson Pope, Ca. 1944
Galatians 2:20 “… I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” (ESV)
People can so easily become distracted by their very own emotions. Those emotions lead us down errant paths demanding that we find ourselves.
As I have aged, I have seen many believers caught in the search for significance, which often leads them away from God unless they find their worth in Him.
…for your loyalty is divided between God and the world. (James 4:8 NLT)
When we make feeling anything our goal, we become self-centered. Looking for anything other than Jesus to make us happy or fulfilled draws us closer to the world and away from our Savior. The problem is, even after we are born again our wants constantly nag at us for attention.
Jesus prayed for future believers on the night before He was crucified. Let’s look at His heart for you and me as He talked to His Abba, Father.
John 17:20-23 (NLT)
The last phrase of this passage should be our absolute contentment. “…You love them as much as You love Me…”
I hope you will read the whole prayer
What more could we want or need?
“…for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us,
and he is sitting in the place of honor at God’s right hand-
pleading for us“
Romans 8:34 (NLT)
Jesus was and is the very model of insignificance in the worlds view. But how wrong the world has been. He is the King of Glory.
He made the choice to give Himself up because He wanted to honor and submit to His Father and because He so loved the very world that considers Him insignificant and outdated.
Doesn’t that thought alone make you want to run away from tying your life’s joy to feeling significant by the world’s standard?
I love the old hymns. Yes, the lyrics can seem outdated, but they are in fact, timeless. One of my favorite composers of the 19th and 20th centuries was Fanny Crosby. Fanny was born in 1820. Fanny was blind as an infant. No one is certain if that was because of treatment to her eyes during an illness or if she was born blind.
Fanny stated, “It seemed intended by the blessed providence of God that I should be blind all my life, and I thank Him for the dispensation. If perfect earthly sight were offered me tomorrow I would not accept it. I might not have sung hymns to praise of God if I had been distracted by the beautiful and interesting things about me.” [2]
Fanny had found her significance in God and in the gifts that He chose for her. Those gifts were blindness and writing. Her significance was in Him alone. Her life was not easy. She chose to give her life away in ministry. I recommend that you read her full and inspiring story.
I remember years ago thinking how she may have come by one of the lines in her hymn, “Blessed Assurance, Jesus is Mine”. The line I’m referring to is, “visions of rapture now burst on my sight.” It dawned on me that the very first thing she would ever see in Heaven is Jesus’ face. That is why you can say, rightly, that her blindness was a gift. Can you just imagine that? Well, recently I read an article where she confirmed my thought.
“…when I get to heaven, the first face that shall ever gladden my sight will be that of my Savior” [3]
You see, mankind’s futile search for significance is so debilitating. The search just keeps telling us that we are insignificant.
Jesus is the One who is telling us what we mean to Him. Let’s be determined to find our worth in Him alone.
A great verse for us to either memorize or keep in a prominent place is this:
See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are! But the people who belong to this world don’t recognize that we are God’s children because they don’t know him. (1 John 3:1 NLT)
When Jesus is your first love, all that matters is what He thinks of you. When you subject your life to Him by repenting of your sin and living according to His plan, then you will have found your significance. It’s right where it’s been all along. Your significance is found in God and in His Son, Jesus.
Two additional passages for you to identify the place where your heart is: James 4:7-9 and Ephesians 1:3-6.
Remember, our enemy wants to keep us off our knees and focused on the world.
Perfect submission, all is at rest
I in my Savior am happy and blessed.
Watching and waiting, looking above,
Filled with His goodness, lost in His love.
This is my story, this is my song!
Praising my Savior, all the day long![4]
[1] ESV
[2] “Fanny Crosby;America’s Hymn Queen”,
Glimpses of Christian History 198
[3] The Sunday School World 1900 Retrieved August 20, 2013
[4] Blessed Assurance, Jesus is Mine
Ca. 1873
Getting the Seed out of the basket and into hungry hearts. Matthew 13 