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Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy
Welcome to Day 819 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.
This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom
People Count Most – Meditation Monday


Thank you for joining us for our five days per week wisdom and legacy building podcast. This is Day 819 of our Trek, and it is time for Meditation Monday.  Taking time to relax, refocus, and reprioritize our lives is crucial in order to create a living legacy.  For some, it may just be time alone for quiet reflection.  Some may utilize structured meditation practices. In my life meditation includes reading and reflecting on God’s Word, and in prayer.  It is a time to renew my mind, refocus on what is most important, and making sure that I am nurturing my soul, mind, and body.  As you come along with me on our trek each Meditation Monday, it is my hope an prayer that you too will experience a time for reflection and renewing of your mind. 

We are broadcasting from our studio at ‘The Big House’ in Marietta, OH. Let me ask you a question today as we take time to meditate on the most important aspects of our life.  How do you treat those people who you know don’t like you and oppose you?  Would you go to their house for dinner if they invited you?  In today’s meditation let us explore how Jesus reacted to his opponents in a lesson called:
People Count Most
Let us look at Jesus’s example and hear His words in the verses which we will explore today. They merge into one, simple, clear message: People count most!

We find Jesus at a dinner in the house of a leader of the Pharisees, His most vocal opponents. Why? Why go to a meal with people who are hounding Him and trying to trap Him? Because He loves them! They matter to the triune God — Father, Son, and Spirit. Their hearts need the opportunity to be exposed to His truth, and seeds need to be planted in their hearts, seeds that can blossom into faith and bear fruit after these people see His Crucifixion (referred to as His passion) and hear about His resurrection. The Father, The Son, and The Spirit desire that all people have an opportunity to change their hearts and come to faith in Jesus as their Savior. Jesus goes to the house of this leader and a dinner with his friends, people who regard Him as their enemy, for one simple reason: People count most!

Jesus challenges this leader and his Pharisee and scholar friends to see this same truth in their own religious understanding. They help their children who are in trouble on the Sabbath. They help their animals that are in distress on the Sabbath. They do not see these gracious actions as a violation of their traditions of the Sabbath rest. When they have the ability and opportunity to help, comfort, encourage, or ease a brother or sister's distress or trouble, the Pharisees and scholars must come to see that a person in trouble must be helped regardless of the day. People count most!

As a Christ-follower and disciple, we need to understand this truth as we seek to apply His teaching — this principle that Jesus taught and lived as an example for all of us to follow. People count most! Jesus came to seek and to save lost people, to ransom you and I and all of humanity from the grip of sin and death in our lives, and to bring His grace to all. That is why Jesus went to the house of those who wanted to get rid of Him. That is why He emphasized the need to help people on the Sabbath even if it violated the tradition of the Pharisees. Most of all, that is why Jesus voluntarily headed to Jerusalem to die as the Lamb of God Who will take away the sins of the world. Because people count most!
·       Verses to Live
As we read through the verses that follow, ask the Holy Spirit to help you visualize the scene. What are the expressions on the people's faces? What are the smells in the room as we get ready to share this meal?