Spring of Hope

Jesus was left behind and was found three days later as narrated by the Gospel writer Luke. Mary and Joseph went to Jerusalem to celebrate the feast of passover with Jesus when He was tweleve years old. When passover was over they began their trip towards home. After they had travelled a whole day’s journey that they had realized that Jesus was missing. Some may criticize the parents for not watching their kids diligently. If we look at another angle and understand a little better on what happened we can get a more non-judgmental opinion. In those days, they travelled in large groups. Men would travel ahead of women and children to prepare the tents for the stay at night. By evening time the women and children would catch up. I guess Mary thought Jesus was with the men's group and Joseph thought Jesus was with Mary. So it wasn’t until evening they found that they had lost Jesus. Regardless, they lost Jesus. “After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among...

Many people are anxious to carry pictures of their children, grandchildren or other dear ones and show them to others. They are the proud people who approach and ask you "Have I shown you the most recent pictures of my so and so?" You may want to say, “Yes, thank you, I have seen them three times already.” People have taken pictures from the beginning of history, not as photographs but as stories narrated in words. They might go around and say, "Our baby came last night, a boy, about 7 pounds, brown eyes, little bit of hair, got his father's nose or whatever." Such narratives seem to be more graphic since they leave more room for imagination. There are some such pictures of the baby Jesus of Nazareth in the Bible. The earliest picture of Jesus is recorded by Luke when a group of shepherds went to see the baby in the manger. The shepherds took some pictures with their eyes, stored in their memory and went and proclaimed with their mouth. "When the...

Jesus declared at the opening of His public ministry: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Mark 1:15). While the angels announced the birth of Christ with their tidings of peace (Luke 2:14), God was declaring that His promises were being fulfilled. The apostle Paul interprets this fullness of time as the time when God’s people could at last claim their promised inheritance. Prior to this time they were like minor children but now in Christ as mature children they had received the full rights to their promised inheritance (Gal. 4:1–7). After the first man and woman sinned, God made clothing out of skins, and He clothed them (Genesis 3). Through the sacrifice of an animal, God provided a way of redemption in the garden. It was pointing to the Son of God who would be sacrificed as the sinless man for the sin of all the world. When Adam and Eve first heard the promise, they looked for its speedy fulfillment. They joyfully welcomed their first-born son, hop...

Some people say that they go to bed at night thinking about a problem or issue they could not resolve during the day and wake up with a solution. Some may call it a super natural revelation, others may call it a dream. Many modern scientists believe that dreams can be revelatory. Several studies have reported that dreams appear to be a side effect of the process of memory consolidation that takes place during sleep ( Oxford Journal, January 2006 ). This process seems to edit the thoughts and impressions we already have and consolidates them into a more coherent narrative or story. As it inputs the data in the visual cortex, auditory cortex, and in the motor cortex, it also activates these parts of the brain in a way that an internal movie pattern is generated. Neuroscience has established that such events need not be seen as diminishing their potential revelatory function. Joseph, the man betrothed to Mary had a problem that worried him and he went to bed thinking about it and th...