Do you think about tasks in a way that will make them easier? When you have a task to do, do you look at multiple possibilities and chose the easiest of the possibilities? Are you always looking for the easy way out?
Into days reading from Mark 2:1-12 we see Jesus asking the question, which is easier? Is it easier to say to a man your sins are forgiven, or to get up and walk…
I thought about this for a while and it isn’t as easy a question as you first think. We could say that both of these statements are easy for us to make, because it really does not mean anything when we say them. But that is not true. Jesus gave the power to forgive and to retain sins to everyone of the disciples, and that power has been passed down to us. And actually Jesus said that if you have the faith the size of a mustard seed you will say to the mountain get up and throw yourself into the sea and it will be done, so if we can move a mountain with our words, then I have to believe that if we tell a crippled man to get up and take his mat and walk, that it would happen. So enough faith and the power of the keys, make both of these statements possible for us, let alone the Son of God…
So Jesus forgives the man’s sins because of the man’s friends. The man is silent in all of this, we do not even know if he asked to be taken to Jesus… but Jesus heals him, by forgiving his sin, and then when confronted tells him to take his mat and walk. He restores this man to community because of the community that brings him to Jesus. Community makes everything possible.
So which is easier? Everything is possible through Jesus who gives us all strength.
aSacredRebel 