Young People’s Blog

“So they did eat, and were filled: and they took up of the broken meat that was left seven baskets” (Mark 8:8).

The Lord Jesus was the Creator of all things, yet we find in this verse that He was careful not to waste anything. He had just worked a miracle by multiplying seven loaves and a few small fishes into enough food to feed thousands of people, yet He and His disciples carefully picked up what was left over.

This is a good lesson for us. Some of us live in countries where there is plenty of food available to us, and sometimes it is tempting to waste it. We should not do that, for it is the Lord who has provided it for us. Of course, we realize that occasionally we cannot avoid wasting some food, such as when it may spoil in the refrigerator, or when someone serves us far more than we can eat. But at other times we may take more than we can eat, and then throw some of it out. It is good not to get into the habit of wasting food, even if we have plenty of it.

“For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul” (Mark 8:36).

It is a serious thing to think of eternity, for we spend only a short time in this world, and we will spend all eternity in one of two places. How many people there are who are using their time and energy to get things in this world, and yet are not paying any attention to their salvation?

Here in our verse today the Lord Jesus calls attention to this neglect. No matter how much money we may have, or how much fame, how much power in this world, we must leave it all behind someday. It will not mean much in eternity. There are many who have lived in this world, and whose names are now famous in history. Yet the question continues to haunt the memory of them — where is their soul?

To lose my wealth is much; to lose my health is more:
To lose my soul is such a loss, that no man can restore.

“If ye keep My commandments, ye shall abide in My love…These things have I spoken unto you, that My joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full” (John 15:10-11).

The Lord Jesus wants our joy to be full. He tells us how this can happen; we need to live in the enjoyment of His love. But how can we do this? It is very simple; we must obey His commandments. This does not mean commandments like the law in the Old Testament, where they had a set of rules, and were told to do this, and not to do that. Rather, the New Testament commandments are simply what pleases the Lord. He tells us what will please Him, and now we have a new life that wants to do those things. More than this, we are indwelt with the Holy Spirit that gives us the energy to do these things.

When we do what pleases the Lord, we live in the enjoyment of His love, and we have full joy in our hearts. A life that is lived to please the Lord is a happy life, even if He asks us to do some hard things!

“As the Father gave Me commandment, even so I do” (John 14:31).

The Lord Jesus came into this world to do the Father’s will. But where did that will take Him? All the way to Calvary’s cross. Sometimes we are willing to do what others ask us to do, but then perhaps they ask us to do something very difficult, and we say, “No, I cannot go that far. I cannot do that for you.” But the Lord Jesus was willing to do the Father’s will, whatever it cost Him.

It was a most difficult thing for Him to go to the cross, yet He went willingly, and although it was very hard for Him, yet in another sense it was a happy path. We too will be happy, and enjoy God’s love, if we keep His commandments. We will say a little more about this tomorrow.

“My peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:27).

We saw yesterday that the Lord Jesus gives us perfect peace about our sins being washed away through faith in Him. But in the same verse He talks about another kind of peace, which He calls “my peace.” What does He mean?

The Lord Jesus never committed any sin, so that He did not need forgiveness, as we do. Rather, in today’s verse, He is speaking about peace in all the difficulties and problems of our everyday life. When the Lord Jesus walked through this world, He faced all the same situations that we face in our lives. Yet He accepted them from His Father, and then went to His Father in prayer about them. Many times during His life down here, we read of the Lord Jesus being in prayer. As a result He lived in peace about all these things.

Now, He gives us His peace. We can accept whatever God sends into our lives, and then go to God our Father about them. When we have done this, the difficulty may not go away, but we can have peace about it — the same peace in which the Lord Jesus walked through this world. This is truly something wonderful He has left to us!

“Peace I leave with you” (John 14:27).

“Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1).

When the Lord Jesus went to Calvary’s cross, He completed the work so that all our sins could be washed away. According to our second verse today, we now have peace with God through the Lord Jesus, and we are justified by putting our faith in Him.

This is what the Lord Jesus meant when He said, “Peace I leave with you.” He was going away: He was going to ascend back to heaven after He rose from the dead. But He was going to leave them with peace as to their salvation, for He would finish the work on the cross. There is nothing more to be done, and you and I can have total peace about all our sins being forgiven.

“In My Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you” (John 14:2).

After the Lord Jesus rose from the dead, He went back to heaven as a man. Here in our verse He tells the disciples that He was going to prepare a place for them. What did He mean?

When I was young, I thought that the Lord had to make everything ready in heaven, just as we would get our home in proper order if we were expecting guests. But could anything possibly be out of place in heaven? Could anything need to be straightened out there? No, for everything is perfect in the place where God lives.

The Lord Jesus makes the place ready for us by being there as a man. He became a man when He came into this world, and He will remain a man for all eternity so that He can enjoy our company. When we get there, we will not feel strange or out of place, for He will be there as a risen man, with a glorified body. We too will have glorified bodies, suited to heaven.

“Felix, willing to show the Jews a pleasure, left Paul bound” (Acts 24:27).

“I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you” (Ephesians 4:1).

When the Apostle Paul was in Jerusalem, and later in Caesarea, he was a prisoner of the Romans. They knew very well that he was innocent of any crime, but Felix, the Roman governor, wanted to please the Jews, and left Paul in prison. As long as he could “keep the peace” with the Jews, he did not care much about Paul.

But later, when Paul was in Rome and wrote the epistle to the Ephesians, he calls himself “the prisoner of the Lord,” not the “prisoner of the Romans.” He recognized that nothing could happen to him unless the Lord allowed it, and that the Lord was over all his circumstances.

So it is with us too. We can look at others and the things they do to us, and we can look at how situations develop in our lives, but all of this is ordered of the Lord. We are to accept them from Him, and learn what He has for us in it all.

“Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian” (Acts 26:28).

Right at the beginning, when Paul (then he was called Saul) was first saved, the Lord told Ananias that Paul would “bear my name before the Gentiles, and before kings” (Acts 9:15), and in this chapter Paul speaks before a lot of Roman dignitaries, including king Agrippa. Agrippa probably said these words in our verse in mockery, but they are a solemn warning to all who hear the gospel and do not believe it.

Agrippa was an important man, and likely did not think he needed the gospel. Sad to say, there is no record in the Bible that he ever got saved. Agrippa was one of the Herod family, and his father had been struck down by the Lord and was “eaten of worms” because he pretended to be a god. (See if you can find this story in the book of Acts.) He was actually Agrippa I, so this man in our verse was his son — Agrippa II, and this was his second warning from God. To be “almost persuaded” is still to be lost!

“Be of good cheer, Paul” (Acts 23:11).

“And now I (Paul) exhort you to be of good cheer” (Acts 27:22).

It is a very encouraging word that the Lord gives Paul in our first verse today. Paul had gone up to Jerusalem against the wishes of his brethren, who had warned him that he would get into trouble there. But when he landed in prison, the Lord did not rebuke him, but rather encouraged him. Paul knew he had missed the mind of the Lord, and he learned from the experience.

Later, on the voyage to Rome, Paul is then able to be above all his circumstances, and in the middle of a bad storm he is able to encourage everyone on board the ship. He knows exactly what is going to happen, and is confident that all of them will make it to land. The Lord had told him how everything would turn out.

In our lives the Lord loves to encourage us, and then we can be an encouragement to others, for we know from the Word of God what is ahead for this world. Even in the middle of real difficulties, we know that our salvation is sure, and that we can never be lost.