2024_08_19 Insight Post- Kim Feld
This week’s reading- Matthew 27:56, 61, Matthew 28:1-10, Mark 15:40-47, Mark 16:1-19, Luke 8:1-3, Luke 24:1-12, John 19:25-27, John 20:1-18
Happy First Day of School to you, students, and parents! I don’t know about you, but summer seemed to fly by to me. It doesn’t seem like it should be time for school to start back already. I’m also thinking of all of you moms and dads who are sending kids away for the first time to college or a trade school. Wow, I know how hard that is—whether it’s the first year or subsequent ones!
This week’s reading about Mary Magdalene had stirred my thoughts in many ways. I’m intrigued by her and what we know of her life. Scripture tells us that Jesus cast seven demons out of her. I can’t even imagine what her life must have been like before Jesus and the dramatic change she experienced after meeting Him. We also learn that she was the first that Jesus appeared to after His resurrection. That’s amazing to me. Given the time, it seems more likely that He would have appeared to one of the remaining eleven men who were His disciples or even someone with prestige like Nicodemus, a somewhat secret follower of Jesus. But instead, He chose Mary Magdalene.
Knowing what Jesus freed Mary from, I can only imagine her gratitude toward Him. Gratitude is the natural reaction when a gift has been given, and to Mary, the gift she received was enormous. I wonder if she thought of what He had done for her every time she saw Him. I imagine she did, and her gratitude led to devotion.
Gratitude is a mindful quality that we should all be working on. Remembering what Jesus did for me ought to fill me with overwhelming gratitude. Still, too often, I allow myself to become distracted and lose focus on it. Lack of attention is one of the greatest roadblocks to spiritual growth, including developing a lifestyle of gratitude. Regarding spiritual growth and health, Dallas Willard famously said that we must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from our lives. I believe he was spot on. Our hurried lives lead to stress, which can take a toll on our health both spiritually and physically.
I am finishing a doctoral program, and the final project that I am doing is a course on Biblically-based mindfulness as a means of stress reduction for teens. The coping strategies, both positive and negative that our teens are developing now will likely be carried with them into adulthood. I will be leading the course on Tuesday evenings during the Landing. The Landing is hosting an Open House on August 27th, where you can get more information, or parents can attend a Zoom meeting with me on August 28th. For more information and to register for either, please go to nhc.click/mindfulness or you can email me at kim.feld@newhope.org
Gratitude is a mindful quality because it brings our focus to what we are grateful for right now, in this present moment. I believe gratitude permeated Mary Magdalene’s life, and perhaps that was one of the reasons Jesus chose her as the first to experience His resurrection. In Luke 7:47, after Jesus’ feet have been washed with perfume by a woman Luke refers to as a “woman who lived a sinful life” (some speculation has been made that this was Mary Magdalene, but we have no confirmation of that), He gives the Pharisees and His disciples who are present this word, “whoever has been forgiven little loves little.” Mary Magdalene knew she had been forgiven greatly, and her gratitude led to much love and devotion. We should follow her example.
Kim Feld
Executive Director of Education and Outreach