{"id":39521,"date":"2026-03-09T08:54:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T15:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/?p=39521"},"modified":"2026-03-09T08:58:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T15:58:14","slug":"260309-thief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/260309-thief\/","title":{"rendered":"The Penitent Thief"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: right;\">by Max Lucado<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-39522 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/260309_1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/260309_1.jpg 600w, https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/260309_1-300x150.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Much has been said about the prayer of the penitent thief on the cross next to Jesus. But dare we forget the one who didn\u2019t pray? He offered no request. He, too, could have requested mercy. He, too, could have asked Jesus to remember him in the new kingdom. But he didn\u2019t. He offered no prayer of repentance. And Jesus didn\u2019t demand one.<\/p>\n<p>Jesus gave both criminals the same choice. One said, \u201cRemember me.\u201d The other said nothing. There are times when God sends thunder to stir us. There are times when God sends blessings to lure us. But then there are times when God sends nothing but silence as he honors us with the freedom to choose where we spend eternity.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-39467\" src=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1-unnamed-4.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"197\" height=\"300\" \/>Read more\u00a0<a title=\"He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart\" href=\"https:\/\/maxlucado.us2.list-manage.com\/track\/click?u=bed511e434184985961d50fcb&amp;id=1c377a84be&amp;e=0716428f80\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" data-saferedirecturl=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/url?q=https:\/\/maxlucado.us2.list-manage.com\/track\/click?u%3Dbed511e434184985961d50fcb%26id%3D1c377a84be%26e%3D0716428f80&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1772583866612000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0df-PrEkRsQJ3BHvDcyXZU\"><em>He Chose the Nails: What God Did to Win Your Heart<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Much has been said about the prayer of the penitent thief on the cross next to Jesus. But dare we forget the one who didn\u2019t pray? He offered no request. He, too, could have requested mercy. He, too, could have asked Jesus to remember him in the new kingdom. But he didn\u2019t. He offered no prayer of repentance. And Jesus didn\u2019t demand one.<\/p>\n<p>Jesus gave both criminals the same choice. One said, \u201cRemember me.\u201d The other said nothing. There are times when God sends thunder to stir us. There are times when God sends blessings to lure us. But then there are times when God sends nothing but silence as he honors us with the freedom to choose where we spend eternity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39522,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[148],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-upwords"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39521","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39521"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39521\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39523,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39521\/revisions\/39523"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}