Hope Shaken

“If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me;” (John 10:37) In Jesus’s day, the works were evident and easily measured. Today, the works of the Holy Spirit in the name of Jesus Christ are birthed in the heart and confessed with the mouth. The message is that the cross forgives sins and removes the need to sin. It does not put you on the road toward union with God. It accomplishes that union in one stroke. The only measurement is our ability to buy into the declarations of Christ before we have experienced the outward evidence. The man Jesus did not KNOW He would be raised, yet He was. Now, that is trust. Hope has ‘Christmas’ written all over it. Before me is a gift with wrapping, a bow, weighty with odd sounds when shaken, and a mystery to the senses.