Jesus Did Everything

What Did Jesus Do?

All things were made through him,
and without him was not any thing made that was made.
John 1.3

In the beginning (To borrow from Genesis and John 1.1) everything depended on Jesus. The Father spoke, but, if he had opened his mouth and there was silence, nothing would have happened, nothing whatever would have come into being. Without the Son, without the Word—let's put it plainly—without Jesus, you've got nothing.

I confess that I have devoted very little time to studying various scientific theories about the origins of the cosmos, and the reason is, none of them include the one absolutely essential ingredient to the creation of anything and everything—Jesus. It doesn't matter what the theory is, what so-called empirical data is offered (As if one could fashion an experiment, or observe actual creation ex nihilo), if Jesus isn't part of the equation, nothing happens; Christ is, if you will, the absolutely necessary catalyst to all things.

So, here at the beginning of a new year, all of us have the opportunity to decide right now if our year is going to be packed full of meaning and purpose, or if it is going to amount to, well, nothing. We can choose, right this very moment, to make Jesus the building block for each and every day of the coming year. Starting and filling each moment, each thought, each word, each action of each day with the Lord, there is no limit to what can happen in 2011. It is pretty simple, really. Either it's all about Jesus, or it's all about, well, nothing.

Think of it this way. Someone spends 365 days of 24/7 effort doing all manner of things without Christ for an entire year. Maybe they build a skyscraper twice as tall as the old Twin Towers of New York. Maybe they invent a plane that travels at the speed of light. Maybe they find a cure for cancer. Take all the accomplishments of that person, and put them in a balance against someone who does one thing in Jesus. The one thing done in and through Christ would tip the balance as sure as an anvil would outweigh a feather. Even the greatest of accomplishments, achieved apart from the Lord, add up to naught in the end. But the smallest of acts, done in and through Jesus Christ, achieves more than we can ever measure.

The question is, what is Jesus going to do this year in and through us? Are we going to set out to make this a Philippians 4.13 year (“I can do all things through him who strengthens me.”), or should we go ahead a write off 2011 right now? Just imagine what it would be like, a year from now, to look back on 2011 and survey 365 days of Jesus making things happen. I dare say, were everything written down that Jesus did in such a year, the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. (See John 21.25). That's what Jesus can do in 2011.

How about it? Are we willing to say, “In the beginning of my 2011 is the Word, and the Word will be with me from this beginning of the year to its ending, and all things in my life this year will be through him, and without him not any thing in my life will be done.” That is a New Year's resolution worth making!

Happy New Year, A.D. 2011—the Year of our Lord 2011!

S.D.G.

Jim
www.jimwilkenministries.org
Marion, NC
PS 37.4