Best recipe- lasting taste!

 

Man is ever consuming and insatiable. We desire all that our eyes are fixated at. There is a longingness for contentment and fulfilment but never reaching the point of satisfaction. This is more profound in our sense of food where our belly is always hungry, our taste buds are looking for exquisite food all the time. We ensure that we get our daily calories. We toil in our kitchens for hours to prepare a delicious meal only to finish eating it in minutes. This has become our untiring activity till our death.

Regarding food Jesus states, ‘Do not labor for the food which perishes’. He addresses this to a crowd where He performs a miracle with five loaves and two fishes. He multiplies this to feed five thousand men alone. With their families the number grows to twelve to fifteen thousand. He makes an important observation to them, “Jesus answered them and said, “Most assuredly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw the signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him.”.

Is Jesus asking the people to stay hungry and seek God? Of course not. He is encouraging them to seek something more valuable, i.e. to satisfy the hungry soul - ‘but for the food which endures to everlasting life’. Unfortunately, as humans we try to suppress the hunger of the soul by feeding our bellies. We try to shut the cries of our soul by overindulging in food. The Bible further records that for many who do not set their mind on the matters of God and for them “their god is their belly”. The untiring lifetime activity of working for food ultimately does not sustain man for life. Man is still, always hungry and restless. 

Do not confuse the need of your soul with physical satisfaction. You need Jesus who satisfies human hunger. The gospel of John records what Jesus claimed, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst". Man is continuing to search God in the work of his hands, and in his creation and believes he has found God. The biggest mistake we make is finding a god for ourselves and personalizing it. Jesus came to the world to seek and save the lost. Those who are lost in the pursuit of happiness, satisfaction and God. You just believe and accept Jesus to find meaning in life and hope for an everlasting life in eternity. 

 

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The 10% control!

We humans are control freaks and its more obvious when we have sound financial condition, guaranteed resource flow, commendable social status and good connections with powerful people. Even with less resources we are motivated that one day we will make it big. Positive captions like ‘believe in yourself’, ‘you can do it’, ‘you are more than enough’ assures us that we are in perfect control of our lives. Sometimes our hard work, and favorable situations also ascertain a positive result. Life keeps fluctuating between success and challenge, therefore our control over it is 10% or little more.  

As humans we fail to take in the fact that we are dependent on God for our next breath. Bible likens man to a vapor. Kind Solomon who encountered immeasurable success and amassed riches beyond measure states, “I have seen something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all. Moreover, no one knows when their hour will come: As fish are caught in a cruel net, or birds are taken in a snare, so people are trapped by evil times that fall unexpectedly upon them.”. This exposes our fragility as humans with absolutely no control and that means we need the grace and the favor of God each moment.

King David in his writing recorded in Psalms in Bible says, “the horse is prepared for the battle, but the victory is from the Lord”. We can do all the preparation but ultimately, we need the favor of God for helping us in each endeavor. We are not at the mercy of the 10% chance. We have a living God, an incarnated God who lived among men. He proved the fact that there is no challenge in this world that could destroy humans if they are rooted in the living God, Jesus Christ. The ultimate problem of human lives is death, and Jesus overcame this very thing through His death and resurrection, thereby defeating the power of death too, over us.

You don’t have to struggle with your 90% even if you are powerless. Speak to Jesus Christ who is willing to indwell in your heart. Whatever is your hopeless situation, there is hope in Christ Jesus. Acknowledge Him, receive Him and follow Him all your life. You have a hope to live here in this life and in eternity. Jesus claimed this, "because I live ye shall live also.". Do you want to know this resurrected living God who is in perfect control of your life?

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THE FOUR

Becoming Nude to find God!

In recent times people become nude for various reasons and some of them are for religious causes. They believe that physical stripping away of clothes can lead to stripping away of sins, leading us to finding God. That’s an interesting perspective, but have we ever questioned the essence of the act, is that what God wants? I recently read an article that informs the top three naked festivals celebrated in Japan. One of them is the hadaka-matsuri, or “naked festivals,” are among the most eccentric of Japan’s happenings, featuring mainly male participants who cover themselves with nothing, but a loincloth known as a fundoshi. Hadaka-matsuri are intended to cleanse the impurities that a person has accumulated over the previous year and express hopes for peace in the coming year. Well, such acts are not exclusive to Japan. We hear about Naga Sadhus in India who are seen without clothes, their bodies covered in ash in severe cold. The writer in the news article states that the secret behind their ability to withstand extreme cold lies in the power of their spiritual practices, known as Sadhana. 

Interestingly, Bible also records an incident about a man who was demon possessed and without clothes. Jesus meets this man from Gerasenes who lived in tombs and bound in chains. He couldn’t be tamed as he often would break the shackles. But the moment he meets Jesus the Bible records the demons within him cried with a loud voice saying, “what do you have to do with me, Jesus son of the most High God, don’t torment me!”. The demons recognized the true God. Jesus immediately commands the unclean spirits to come out of the man. The whole crowd witnessed something very significant which is quoted in the Gospel of Mark 5:16, “They came to Jesus and saw the man who had been demon-possessed, sitting there, dressed and in his right mind; and they were afraid.” He was nude, lost his sense of dignity and hurt himself. But after meeting God, he was with a right mind fully clothed.  

What this story teaches us is what really matters is the baring or stripping our hearts to God where all evil thoughts originate. We as humans do the opposite, we keep our sinful hearts in wraps and are willing to even lose our dignity to appease God with our physical acts. If nudity was important then all gods would be nude. Do you ever see that? Then why would a God who secretly formed you in your mother’s womb safeguarding your dignity would want to see you nude in public to appease Him? We fail to ask ourselves these obvious questions because our heart is not in right alignment with God. We feel we can appease God by being physically nude to cover our sinful heart. Our limited understanding of God’s sovereignty and awesome presence makes us come up with devious ways to dishonor Him.

A mere dipping in water whether hot or cold, being nude is not going to save our souls. We desperately need a God who is willing to accept the filthiness of our heart and has the purity to wash away our sins. We can find this in Jesus Christ who sacrificed Himself on the cross to do this for us. He lived a human life to know our frailties, died an excruciating death on the cross and rose again to be with us. You need this Savior if you are convinced that you are living a lie through your religious obligations. Come close to Him by stripping your heart to Jesus. He is willing to accept you as you are and radically transform who when you give your life to Him.

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Japan Naked Festival

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THE FOUR

Satisfaction - The Real Deal!

 

Satisfaction is temporary and shifts based on circumstances. Once it has achieved the preferred markers, it keeps moving further or to something different. We pin our satisfaction levels on material things or emotions and in some religious pursuits. It dawns on us at a very late stage in life that none of the mentioned factors can satisfy a human being permanently. Thomas Boston in his writings on ‘Human Nature in its Fourfold State’ cites, “the natural person’s affections are horribly misplaced, making them a spiritual monstrosity. Instead of focusing on heavenly matters, their hearts are fixated on earthly things. They turn their backs to heaven and face hell. God calls out to them, urging them to turn around. They love what they should hate and hate what they should love.”. 

Satisfaction is the matter of heart. If your heart is peaceful and quiet, then there is inner satisfaction. Our meditations, mind calming and positive reinforcements are not going to help. The Rolling Stones, a well-known rock band in their prime several decades back, sang a song “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction…”. They tried girls, money, fame–yet their song confesses dissatisfaction with what the world had and has to offer.

Jesus, God in the flesh, said “Blessed (happy) are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”  What does this mean?  It means that true and lasting happiness and satisfaction comes only through a right relationship with God.  Hungering and thirsting for righteousness. No matter how much money you make, it will leave you wanting for more. No matter how perfect you try to be, you will be discontent. No matter how much porn you consume, it doesn’t fill the void. Only Jesus guarantees satisfaction. Jesus made a powerful statement and claimed “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will not go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”.  In this relationship with Christ, your soul is satisfied and eventually your longings are satiated too.  Dallas Willard puts it beautifully, “Our soul is like an inner stream of water, which gives strength, direction, and harmony to every element of our life. When that stream is as it should be (rooted in the vastness of God and his kingdom), we are constantly refreshed and exuberant in all we do.”

Andy Woodall states the opposite of this satisfaction is where many find themselves, like how Jeremiah in the Bible described God’s people, “For my people have committed two evils:  They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, to hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that hold no water.”. We forsake God. We creatively, deceptively, and possessively craft our own fantasy path to pleasure and satisfaction only to find out how empty, broken, and riddled with pain and disappointment, that imaginary path is.  The pleasure of the moment is then swallowed in the pain of reality.  You have a choice, a choice to choose the living Savior who can bring perfect satisfaction. Try to know Him more and find how He can bring peace joy and satisfaction. You can grab an online Bible and read in your preferred language. I suggest you start reading from the gospel of John. 

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