Day 154

2 Samuel 3:22-5:5, Acts 1:1-22, Psalms 69:13-28

David finally becomes king over all of Israel, but there seems to have been a heck of a lot of killing along the way. None of it by David, and none of it in his name, he is pretty annoyed at it all and grieves and brings justice on all the perpetrators, although granted, that does involve killing them! If we can put aside our views on the death penalty, and this side of David’s actions, and look at the killing of Saul’s family, we see a king who is going to be just, a man of principle, a man that his people look up to.

Moving on, yesterday was quite a significant moment, as we finished the Gospels. So we move into Acts, before then going on the Epistles (letters). Here the author talks of a former book, because this is the author of the Gospel of Luke and so it seeks to jump off a little bit from where Luke left off.

Being honest though, the reading from Luke offers us the greatest promise ever made, the promise of Baptism in the Holy Spirit. The disciples have just seen Jesus die, come back to life and now he is disappearing again, this has been huge emotional trek for them, across the darkest valleys and the highest peaks, but there is something even greater to come, that will take them to new and greater heights.

And there is that small little thing again – prayer. Once Jesus has gone, and the future direction is a little bit up in the air, the disciples lock themselves and did one thing, prayed. You can imagine that they are very uncertain about it all, Jesus has not left them a huge instruction manual, just the promise of something to come, but when, how and what will it be like when it happens? So they go and give it all to God.

A couple of times recently we have looked to the Methodist Covenant prayer and the way that we offer ourselves to God. Baptism in the power of the Holy Spirit involves a way of life that we cannot fathom, it offers utter joy but some challenges along the way. Just like the disciples we do not know exactly what all of it will entail, so there is only one thing left to do – pray about it.