AT HIS WORD

Wednesday 12 February

Who doesn’t like a good fishing story? We find an amazing account in Luke 5:1-7. Jesus borrowed Peter’s boat to preach to the crowds so that his voice carried across the water to His audience. When Jesus finished teaching the Word of God He gave Peter a simple instruction. “Now go out where it is deeper, and let down your nets to catch some fish.”Simon a.k.a. Peter’s response is what I want us to hone in on here. He said “Master, we have toiled all night and caught nothing; nevertheless at Your word I will let down the net.”

The ‘we’ here was most likely Peter, James and John. So because it was Peter’s boat, he was the one to make the call and he definitely made the right one. “When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break.”In fact they had to call another boat over to help them as both their nets were so full of fish that they began to sink. The key to this miracle? Responding to the words of Jesus.

Our next scripture is Jesus’ own Mother’s request at a wedding in Cana. (John 2:1-12) As the story goes, they were running out of wine when Mary prompted Jesus to do something about it. He protested that it was not yet His time and then in His inimitable style, He ordered the water pots to be filled up and to commence pouring them out, starting with serving it to the ‘master of the feast’.

The miracle of turning the water into wine happened and they thought the caterers were saving the best wine for last upon tasting it, which was not the cultural practice of the day. The reason for the miracle is in one phrase when Mary said about Jesus, “whatever He tells you to do, do it”.

Our last passage of scripture is about a Roman centurion that has an amazing conversation with Jesus about healing his servant. The full account is in Matthew 8:5-10. One of the most amazing this about this encounter was Jesus saying to the centurion about his servant “shall I come and heal him?” and then the centurions response when he famously uttered “Lord I am not worthy for you to come under my roof but just say the word and my servant will be healed”.

When we look at these three stories, there is a common thread that ties them all together. Obedience to the authority of the Word. Now it’s important to note that the Word is not a compilation of books put together. That’s a Bible, not the Word. In the beginning was the Bible and the Bible was with God and the Bible was God. Does that make any sense to you? Even cookbooks are sometimes called Bibles. No, the Word of God is not a book with paper and ink, the Word of God is a person and His name is Jesus!

Each person(s) showed obedience to the authority of Jesus, the Christ.

Now that He is manifest through His Spirit it is our yielding to the Spirit confirmed by the revelation of the scripture in the epistles that we have as a ‘more sure word of prophecy’. So what about you? Will you be like Peter and respond to Jesus words? Will you do whatever He says in the midst of of a seemingly impossible situation. Will you hold the authority of His word higher than the urgency of the moment? My prayer is that you will.

APPLICATION

Read through these three powerful stories and let them invoke a renewed confidence in you of the miracles that can occur when we do His words.