Remembering a miracle

I wanted to take a few moments to express the gratitude I have in my heart to the Lord for who He is, and for what He has done.  It was on this day – April 24 – that God miraculously healed me.  I wasn’t even a year old yet, and I had developed a disease called Infantile Spasms.  To give you the short version for today, I was having multiple seizures.  Infantile Spasms either kills its host, or leaves them as a vegetable for the rest of their lives.  However, with God all things are possible!  I was in death’s grasp, but the Lord breathed life back into me, and when He did, the disease was also gone.  No seizures for over 4 decades now.  To God alone goes all the glory.

There are several monumental episodes in my life; I make it a habit to choose to look back and remember just how faithful God has been to me.  This is so important because life can be difficult and, in the midst of the storms of life, it’s easy to forget.  The Bible speaks of an amazing episode where the recipients set up a tangible reminder to celebrate God’s power and help.  Check out this helpful article – which you can find at this link.

“The name “Ebenezer” actually comes from the Bible.  In 1 Samuel 7, during the end of the times of the judges, Israel experiences revival under the leadership of Samuel.  The nation repents of their sin, destroys their idols, and begins to seek the Lord (1 Samuel 7:2-4).  Samuel gathered the people at Mizpah where they confessed their sin, and Samuel offered a sacrifice on their behalf (verses 5-9)  

It was during this time of repentance and renewal that the enemy attacked: “While Samuel was sacrificing the burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to engage Israel in battle” (1 Samuel 7:10).  The Israelites went out to do battle against the invaders, and the God sent them supernatural help: “The day the LORD thundered with loud thunder against the Philistines and threw them into such a panic that they were routed before the Israelites” (verse 10).

Israel’s victory over the Philistines was decisive.  Several cities the Philistines had captured were restored to Israel, and it was a long time before the Philistines tried to invade Israel again (1 Samuel 7:13-14).  To commemorate the divine victory, “Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen.  He named it Ebenezer, saying, ‘Thus far the LORD has helped us’” (verse 12).

Ebenezer means “stone of help.”  From then on, every time an Israelite saw the stone erected by Samuel, he would have a tangible reminder of the Lord’s power and protection.”  Today, I relay my own Ebenezer, and I do so with worship and thankfulness to God.

God bless,

Kevin

"He is not here; for He is risen" - Easter 2025

Today, like millions around the world, I celebrate the culmination of the events of Holy Week: the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.  Romans 1 states that Jesus’ resurrection declares that He is exactly who He claimed to be, the Son of God, God in human flesh.  Jesus had the divine power to rise again from the dead.  But before I get into that, let me back up.

On Friday – commonly referred to as Good Friday – we celebrate the fact that Jesus died on a cross.  Have you ever stopped to consider why we do that?  Why celebrate an excruciating and violent death?  I submit that it’s not how He died, but why He died.  In Isaiah we read, “But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities…We all, like sheep, have turned astray, each of us has turned to his own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”  “You can’t atone for your sin,” C.J. Mahaney writes, in his marvelous book “Living the cross centered life”, “That’s why Jesus did it for you.”

However, the disciples didn’t understand that Jesus had to die, to pay the penalty of their sin, as well as yours and mine.  They were plunged into grief, uncertainty, and pain that Friday.  If you’ve ever lost a loved one unexpectedly to death, like I have with my father 10 years ago, then you have a gripping illustration as to how they were feeling.  Their friend, teacher, and rabbi, the one that had left everything to follow, unexpectedly died – even though He repeatedly told them He was going to die and raise to life again.

Jesus’ disciples went to that borrowed tomb of their fallen Messiah on that Easter morning, completely unaware of how their sadness was about to turn to joy.  They found angels there, who said these glorious words: “He is not here; for He is risen, as He said” (Matthew 28:6).  Some doubted the resurrection.  In fact, Matthew 28 even goes on to state that the soldiers were bribed to say that the disciples stole Jesus’ body at night, while they slept.  OK, if you were asleep, how do you know this?  Ridiculous theories like this, attempting to disprove the resurrection of Christ, persist even to this day.  It is so much easier to believe the truth: Jesus conquered death itself. 

The 2011 game “Spider-Man: Edge of Time” surprisingly provides an emotional illustration for these events.  This game’s story sees Walker Sloan (voiced by Val Kilmer) use time travel to manipulate events in the past for his own purposes; this included the impending death of Peter Parker/Spider-Man.  Miguel O’Hara, the Spider-Man of the year 2099, knew about this and managed to warn Peter of the danger he was in.  Ever the hero, Peter chose to face off against the behemoth killer, rather than let the beast hurt innocent people.  I couldn’t help but think of Jesus when I saw Spider-Man die, to save others.  To subsequently witness Spider-Man 2099 carry the limp, lifeless body of the heroic Peter/Spider-Man was a striking picture of Jesus’ body off the cross.  It was a sad, somber moment.  Thankfully, that was not the end of the story.

Miguel O’Hara had one final, desperate attempt to revive Peter.  He put his fallen friend in a machine from 2099 called a “cellular regenerator.”  While it took some time, the machine worked.  Like the disciples, Miguel had trouble believing the news at first, but Peter was very much alive again!  Parker even states, “Thanks for bringing me back from the dead.  Now I know how Captain America feels, and Jean Grey, and Colossus, and…” “Just don’t die again,” Miguel interrupts, “And we’ll call it even.”  This is a type, a shadow, a picture of Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection from the dead.  He didn’t even need a fictitious cellular regenerator from the future to do it.

In conclusion, someone wants to ask ‘so what?’  Some know me as a writer, others know me as a Chick-fil-A employee, still others as an avid superhero fan, but ultimately I am a man who had his life forever changed by Jesus Christ.  Essentially, I have nothing to say of any lasting value aside from my faith in Jesus.  The resurrection of Jesus Christ changes everything.  Because He lives, we know Christianity is true; we know Christ spoke the truth – in fact, He is the truth, just as He declared (John 14:6).  This same Jesus can change your life.  If you’ve never taken advantage of His offer of a life of forgiven sin and intimacy with Him, today is a great day to do so. 

God bless,

Kevin

"Like a flint"

After a month off, I’m back.  While I am happy to share this content with you today, understand that there is a certain challenge to jumping back into this.  You see, I have so much I want to cover, so I have to reel it in or I might inadvertently write three blogs when it’s supposed to be just one.  One thing I did want to mention, with a heavy heart, is the death of Val Kilmer, who passed back on April 1.  He was 65.  Again, I could write a whole blog just on Val’s legacy today; I could go on and on describing how, in my view, his performance as Batman/Bruce Wayne in 1995’s “Batman Forever” was vastly underrated.  The movie itself may be over-the-top and implausible at times, but Val himself carried the film capably.  He was wise to get off the Bat-franchise ride after just the one film, because the next installment – 1997’s “Batman and Robin” – was a train wreck.

One of the lesser-known roles that Val Kilmer was involved in was a 2011 Spider-Man video game called “Spider-Man: Edge of Time”.  Here Val played a villain named Walker Sloan, a character who managed to create a gateway in the year 2099 to go into the past, and use his knowledge of the future to change it for his selfish, greedy purposes.  The Spider-Man of 2099, Miguel O’Hara (voiced by Christopher Daniel Barnes, the actor who voiced Spider-Man in the 90’s cartoon show) works with Peter Parker/Spider-Man (voiced by Josh Keaton) to undo the damage Sloan did to the timeline.

What is intriguing about the plot of this game is that Peter/Spider-Man is fated to die, thanks to Sloan’s actions, at the hands of a powerful enemy named Anti-Venom.  O’Hara/Spider-Man 2099 warns Peter Parker of this; ever the hero, Peter’s first thought is protecting the lives of the people, were he to run away.  The witty banter between Parker and O’Hara is the highlight of this game.  Like this zinger from Peter after O’Hara urges him to leave the building: “So a crazed killer can wander around the building without me to stop him?  No way…I’m going to do what I think is right.  And that means going after bad guys.  You want a Spider-Man who’ll do whatever you want?  Go play a video game.”  

For a portion of the game, the major thread of the story is Peter’s imminent death.  I actually want to leave that storyline dangling for now – as we contemplate once again the vitally important week we are in – perhaps this will create tension.  Let me pick it up again next time.  As I was putting all of this together, as I contemplated Peter Parker’s example in the face impending death, a passage in Isaiah 50 came to my mind.  Isaiah 50:6-7 reads, “I offered my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard; I did not hide my face from mocking and spitting.  Because the Sovereign Lord helps me, I will not be disgraced.  Therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know I won’t be put to shame.”  This is a prediction fulfilled by Jesus Christ.

One helpful resource (which you can find right here) puts it this way, “Set your face like flint is the figure of speech the prophet uses to describe the Messiah’s unwavering determination to persevere in the excruciating task set before Him.  Christ would endure humiliation on His journey to the cross to die for our sins.  Nearly 800 years before it happened, Isaiah foretold the suffering of the Lord’s servant…Luke echoes this resolute image of Christ set on saving His people: “When the days grew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem” (Luke 9:51; ESV).  In Jerusalem Jesus would face arrest, torture, and agonizing death.”

To be continued!

Kevin