“Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah.
For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father.
And so I say to you, you are Peter,
and upon this rock I will build my Church,
and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.
I will give you the keys to the Kingdom of heaven.
Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven;
and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”
With great power comes great responsibility. The power to decide what happens to enter heaven and not is massive and Jesus chose Peter after much thought as the right man for the job.
He did not have a PhD or a degree in theology or did he have experience in such a role before. He was a fisherman and that was his life before he followed Jesus. Yet, God chose him for such an important task and appointed him . The rock on which the church is built. Did he not feel out of place? did he not wonder .. maybe I cannot talk to these educated pharisees or the learned men of temple? Did he not wonder why did Jesus pick him ?
In our lives when we feel we are on a path determined by us maybe professionally or personally, we deal with feelings of doubt or imposter syndrome!! I do! Often I wonder if I am good enough at some situation or if I am capable enough to get through a difficult situation at work or personal? Some times the anxiety crops up in my mind and makes me doubt everything I believed in including the power of the Lord…
But, it is the Holy spirit filled into Simon Peter which helped him to fight through his doubts and overcome and inch of worry and anxiety! I want to build my faith stronger on this rock of Jesus and have no doubt that I can do everything my Lord put me up to.
Today as each one of us gets by the day worrying about the future or regretting about the past, let us pause, say a prayer to the Holy spirit to guide us and help us believe in ourselves and the Lord for a better today and a stronger faith.
PRAYER:
Thank you Lord Jesus for your spirit to guide me. Help me to get through it and have no doubt or anxiety in every role you let me perform. I ask for the strength to face every hard decision and you to be my rock forever!
AMEN.
