God is with us in our darkest moments Ceilon Aspensen, February 12, 2024February 12, 2024 The most important message I picked up from today’s readings overall is in our darkest moments, we won’t just feel abandoned, we will be actually abandoned by all those we know. Only God remains with us. My primary takeaway from each of the passages was this: Exodus 35 & 36: More on furnishing and building the sanctuary. Mark 15: In our darkest moments, we won’t just feel abandoned, we will be actually abandoned by all those we know. Only God remains with us. Psalms 43: More on the importance of continuing to hope and have faith in God, praying always, when we feel abandoned. Proverbs 12: More on what to do and how to live during any time, whether dark and treacherous or when things are going our way. Discipline keeps us on the right path. In Exodus, now that Moses and the Israelites have gotten past a crisis of faith, it’s back to business as usual, and they continue furnishing and building the sanctuary. In Mark, Jesus continues his dark journey toward the end of his life. He is taken before Pontius Pilate, who really doesn’t want to have anything to do with this thing he considers to be a local squabble. However, being a politician, Pilate chooses to placate the people and succumbs to their demands that Jesus be crucified. As a result, Jesus is mocked, humiliated, beaten and tortured, and finally sent on a long walk to his crucifixion carrying the very cross he will die on. He continues to feel forsaken, but says not a word in his own defense. Just before he dies, he cries out to God asking why he has been forsaken, and then breathes his last breath. His disciples had also abandoned him. Only the women who had followed him remained with him until the end. I think this is the most important message from Mark today: In our darkest moments, we won’t just feel abandoned, we will be actually abandoned by all those we know. Only God remains with us. There are times in our lives when we must pull ourselves through with nothing more than our own willpower, surrendering to the inevitable, while continuing to pray and be faithful in the tasks we are given to do. Later, after the worst is over and Jesus is resurrected from the dead, his disciples will gather around him again. But for now, in his darkest hour, he is completely alone. In the words of Captain Mal from the show Firefly, “Everyone dies alone.” When it is darkest, it is just us and God. I am obviously overlooking the women who stayed with Jesus until the end; but so did everyone from that time period. Women were of no consequence to anyone. They were considered property. They had no rights at all. Even so, they are the ones who remain the most faithful to Jesus and stay with him until his death, and beyond. That’s what I got out of it. What did you get out of the readings today? To participate in a discussion about the posts, please join us in our private Facebook group that I set up specifically for sharing what we take-away from the readings each day. If you haven’t gotten the FREE “Read the Bible in a Year” worksheet yet, you can download it here. It is not necessary for you to start on January 1st–you can start from the beginning on whatever date you get the worksheet. Join us! Learn more about why I read the Bible all the way through every year, and feel free to share with anyone you think could benefit. This post is part of the series, “Read the Bible in a Year.” To see other posts in this series, go to the Chronological Index of Read the Bible in a Year Posts. Please follow and like us: Uncategorized