Stay and Praise (Luke 24)

I mentioned this in a post awhile back, but one of the amazing things out of today’s reading (Luke 24) is that Jesus tells His’ disciples to stay. He is always sending them, always telling them to go, but in 24:49 He tells them to stay. Why? Because they shouldn’t go without the power of the Holy Spirit. Once they have the Holy Spirit, it’s all go, go, go. And that just scares me, because I wonder how many times I’ve gone out (to counsel, to preach, to share Jesus) in my own power, thinking I was doing the right thing, when really I should have just stayed and prayed. Prayed for the Holy Spirit to empower and guide me, then go, go, go.

The other thing that jumped out at me in Luke 24 is that at the beginning of the chapter the disciples are depressed – Jesus is dead. Then in the middle they’re confused – Is Jesus dead? But at the end they “worshiped … with great joy … continually praising God.” And all because Jesus defeated death and proved Himself savior. So … You and I, we live at the end of Luke 24, right? We know Jesus defeated death and proved Himself savior, so we should spend a whole lot more time “worshiping with great joy and continually praising God.”