For anyone who didnt see the video piece done on Jose Maria, here it is.
Now more of the story.
Ezekial 36:26
And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you.
And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
Jose Maria continues to grow and blossom into a man who lives in joy.
When we first met him, he would say next to nothing.
If you tried hard, you might get him to respond with a “si.”
But Jose is a new man now.
He is a beautiful picture of the healing love of God.
The morning that he came to us in the church, he came as a tired, old, lonely man.
That is when he cried out to God, “Lord!
Give me a new heart!”
God heard his cry.
In that tearful moment, Jose bore his soul to us and to God.
He let down the walls that he had been building for seventy-some years.
And he allowed God to fulfill His promise.
We saw Jose again last Sunday.
I sat next to him during the service, and I just felt something different about him.
Afterwards he began to tell some stories to our group.
He laughed even before he began his story.
“I saw them first!… HAHAHA”
Confused, we asked more.
Jose stands up tall, proud to tell his story.
“The other day I was going to the river to bathe.
And there are these two fishermen who regularly fish there and know that I come bathe there.
Well, they set their fishing nets to catch me instead!
But I picked up two big rocks and threw them into the nets!
I saw them first!”
A roar of laughter comes forth from this tiny man.
I didn’t even understand the story, but just seeing Jose belly laugh made me nearly cry.
“This cannot be the same man.”
I thought to myself.
I think I was right.
This was not the same man.
He asked for God to come and change him.
Jose got down on his knees and pleaded with God because he saw no other way.
In his long life, he had never experienced anything quite like the overwhelming love of God.
In just one short week, God has taken out the heart of stone, He has lifted his permanent frown from his face, He has allowed Jose to remember what it is like to have your stomach hurt from laughing.
God’s love is so good.
God runs
to us.
We see a picture of that in the prodigal son.
When the son was returning, the father saw him “when he was still a long way off!”
The father ran to him!
The son tried to explain his reasoning to come back, but the father did not stop kissing him and putting clothing and rings on him long enough to even hear what the son had been doing.
Before the son knew what was happening, he was partying with his father!
The father threw him a feast!
God wants to throw feasts for us.
He will not just throw us scraps off his table when we beg him.
He will kill the fattened calf for you!
Jose Maria is a beautiful picture to me of God’s love.
Jose asked God to come to him, and boy has he!
Before Jose knew it, his house was cleaned, he had food brought to him, the bug infestation was gone, light was brought into his house.
God
loves us so much it is ridiculous.
God’s love is unimaginable.
When we allow it, we will be blown away by His abundant love.
For anyone who is hurting, for anyone living in darkness, for anyone just tired, cry out to God.
“Lord, put in me a new heart!”
His promise is to fill you with a heart that burns, a live, new, strong heart.
Jose has meant so much to me.
Through him, God has shown me so much about His love.
Even though Jose is old, has no teeth, and has hair growing out of his ears, God loves him.
And God couldn’t wait to show him how much he has always loved him.
The same goes for everyone else, and the same goes for me.
Even though I am ugly, and rarely get things right, God loves me.
GOD LOVES ME!!!
