New Year’s Resolutions: 2. Proverbs 20:25 – First, be thoughtful:
One of the pieces of advice my dad frequently gave me was, “Look before you leap.”
Like most boys, I was impulsive, ‘leaping’ to conclusions or ‘leaping’ into action without taking the time to first think it through.
Jesushad a couple of parables with similar messages inLuke 14. 1. Verses 28-30 – First, count the cost:
2. Luke 14:31-32 First, make sure you can:
3. Luke 14:33 The context of these parables is discipleship…
…and that is the context of these first four verses of the 26 for 2026–resolving to make advances in your growth as a Christian disciple for the New Year.
Today’s message from Joel Osteen was from Joshua 3:5. Joshua told the people,
The verb translated here as ‘purify’ is also translated as ‘sanctify’ and ‘consecrate.’ DEFINITIONS:
📖 Sanctify: a. Set apart as or declare holy, consecrate. b. Free from sin; purify.
📖 Consecrate: a. Make or declare sacred. b. Dedicate formally to a religious or divine purpose.
📖 Sacred: a. Sanctified by connection with God. b. Dedicated to a religious purpose.
As you can see from the definitions, these concepts are all closely intertwined.
Joel explained that the idea of the Hebrew verb is to put some separation between you and those things God doesn’t approve of, those things that are not consistent with who He is.
Joel used a football illustration, appropriate for this NFL playoff season, explaining that in order for the quarterback to successfully throw a receiver the football, the receiver had to create some separation between himself and the opposing player defending him. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be safe to throw him the football, so the quarterback then checks other possible receivers.
In the case of the Israelites in the Book of Joshua, the first miracle coming up was the parting of the Jordan River, similar to, but on a smaller scale, than God parting the Red Sea for Moses. In order to participate in this miracle, Joel pointed out, the people needed to purify / consecrate / sanctify themselves.
Next miracle up was the walls of Jericho tumbling down, but if the Israelites didn’t purify themselves, then Joel said they would be left behind and miss out on the miracles to come.
Joel then applied the concept to us in our time. He said that he believes God has miracles planned for us, but first we must purify ourselves from those things that hold us back in our Christian walk and separate us from God. We need to put some separation between ourselves and our sins.
Paul listed some of those sins that we need to throw off in Ephesians chapter 4:
“Put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life… Therefore, putting away falsehood… Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice…”
These qualities are like the uniform for the other team. God is not going to toss us the ‘football of blessing’ if we’re wearing the uniform of the Enemy!
And Paul doesn’t just write about those negative qualities we should cast off, he also lists those positive qualities we should put on in their place:
“…and put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. …let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. …and be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you”.
THIS is the uniform for GOD’S team.
• Instead of being sinful, we’re to be holy and righteous. • Instead of lying, tell the truth. • Instead of being bitter and angry, we’re to be kind. • Instead of ‘clamor and slander, ‘ that is making a fuss and bad-mouthing each other, we’re supposed to be forgiving. And, • Instead of treating each other with malice, we’re to be tenderhearted toward one another.
📖 Definition: ‘Malice‘ means the desire to cause harm or injury to another, stemming from a hostile impulse, deep-seated meanness, or revenge, often without justification. It’s a key concept in law for proving crimes like murder (malice aforethought) or defamation (malicious intent). The Bible calls all that ‘sin.’
Our church is beginning it’s annual 21 Days of Prayer and Fasting today. For the next 21 days, we’re supposed to give up something–a meal, watching a TV show, time on social media, etc.–and spend that time in prayer asking God this question, “God, what do you want?” and then LISTEN for His answer.
We’re supposed to be seeking God in prayer for the purpose of finding out what HE wants us to do for Him individually, and corporately as a church.
One implication of asking God what HE wants of us is that we are committing to do whatever He tells us.
Our second verse for 2026 suggests we should first be thoughtful before we commit to obey. Are we really willing to do what God asks of us? Are we ready to act in F.A.I.T.H? Are we ready and willing to carry it through? Consider these questions first, before you commit yourself to a new resolution.
Happy New Year everybody! My life has been changing at the speed of light the past few weeks, but we mortals still react to change at the same plodding pace. I’ve plenty of opportunities to trust God and to show His grace, but I can always use some inspiration.
I was looking for some inspiration on the Internet the other morning and I came across “26 Verses for 2026.” Just what I was looking for! (Funny how that happens…) So, I’m going to share one each week, along with my thoughts. Maybe you’ll find inspiration from them too.
January: Verses About Resolutions
1. Ecclesiastes 5:5 – Be Commited:
I heard on the news this week that most people are making the same New Year’s Resolutions they made last year–to exercise more, to eat better, to save money, to lose weight–but since resolving to do those things last year didn’t work, what’s the likelihood it will work this year?
You might also have seen practical suggestions for being more successful with your resolutions:
1. Break your goals down into smaller steps and focus on accomplishing one step at a time. 2. Set specific, realistic, and small goals, like something for each day, week, month…3. Focus on developing positive habits rather than just stopping bad habits.4. Find someone you know who is doing the same thing and do it together. 5. Celebrate your progress, but not by breaking your resolution!
One of my resolutions, when I got off my oral chemo last month, was to lose the weight it had caused me to gain. So far I’ve lost 7 pounds. Woo-hoo! Much farther to go, though, but I’m committed to following my plan…
Making changes to your physical and mental habits is hard! But do you know what is even harder? Making SPIRITUAL changes.
You see, God made us in His glorious image, not on the outside, but on the inside. Our character is supposed to be a reflection of who God is. For example:
God is the Creator–we are creativeGod is all-powerful–we are powerful in our own ways.God is all-knowing–we are capable of learning and knowing things.God is just–at our best, we know what is fair and just.God is love–at our best, we too are capable of great love.
Notice my qualifier “at our best.” You see, there’s this thing called “sin.” Humankind at the beginning turned from God in disobedience and this forever scarred our psyche. Instead of living to the glory of God, our nature was turned upside down and inside out, and now we live to glorify ourselves.
That doesn’t sound so bad, until you realize we are supposed to love each other to the point of sacrificing our own needs and desires for other’s good. Turn that around and you get people who love themselves most of all, and who are willing to sacrifice anything and everything of the people around them, to fulfill their own needs and desires. That results in some very ugly things in this world.
Mankind often exercises it’s power for destroying rather than creating.
When we choose to come to God by faith in Jesus Christ, God begins a process of reversing the harm of sin in our lives, both from our sin within and from others’ sin from without. That means fundamentally changing who we are on the inside.
Just as I am…I come
You might wonder, “Doesn’t God accept me as I am?” Yes, He does. He doesn’t require that we try to make these changes before He accepts us, because WE CANNOT!
God meets us wherever we are in life when we come to Him–He accepts us as we are, but then He redeems us from sin and darkness, and He brings us into His glory and light. He loves us so much, He won’t leave us where we are–in a pit of sin, darkness and despair.
But real, deep down change of who we are doesn’t happen immediately. We have to walk out what this means for the rest of our lives. You see, every day is a New Day in the Christian life. Therefore, every day requires a New Day’s Resolution.
So, let’s start each day in our relationship with God by making a committment to Him. Follow through on that PROMISE YOU MADE TO GOD when He first redeemed you.
Even as ‘little Christs,’ we’re not going to be called upon to lay down our lives for the salvation of the world. Actually, we’re being asked to do something much more difficult…
There are several authors who printed variations of a saying used by Lin-Manuel Miranda in his play, “Hamilton,” which premiered in January 2015.
“Dying is easy, beloved. It is living that is difficult.” Leonide Martin, Dreaming the Maya Fifth Sun, published 2006.
“Dying is Easy, its Living that’s hard,” Alden Bell, The Reapers are the Angels, published 2010.
That is the difficult thing God is asking us to do as Christians, to live for Him. Paul puts it this way,
So then, looking at the three divisions of my study summary, here are some ideas about how we can live as Jesus died.
I. Foreknowledge. Have you ever felt like you already knew what was going to happen in a familiar situation? Maybe you knew there would be a person who would argue with you. Maybe you knew someone would get their feelings hurt. Our tendency as ‘nice’ people is to try and avoid controversy or hurting people’s feelings.
If we overcompensate and sacrifice our Christian imperatives, then we end up doing what Charlie Kirk warned about:
Jesus did not run away from what He believed in–His Heavenly Father and God’s plan of salvation–and neither should we.
Jesus did not stay silent about what was right and wrong about the Jewish leaders when it came to God’s commands, and neither should we.
Not arguing and not hurting others’ feelings are good goals, but maybe not the priority they often are over other more important goals. In the Navigators, we tried to always remember that “The good is the enemy of the best,” from Oswald Chambers:
This means accepting something that is merely good can prevent us from achieving something better. Like Jesus, we should prioritize the things that matter most to God. Those things are–being in right relationship with our Heavenly Father; and telling others about Him, His Son, and God’s plan of redemption for humankind.
However, we SHOULD be gracious in how we present Jesus and the gospel. Following are a couple of New Testament guidelines for doing that:
II. INTENTIONALITY / DETERMINATION:
A. There were words in the King James Bible I read in the 60’s that were not a part of common vocabulary. One of those was ‘diligent.’ I had a difficult time figuring out it’s meaning without any real-world usages. Here are a couple of examples from the Bible:
📖 DILIGENT is defined as by Websters as meaning:
Comparing to synonyms, DILIGENT suggests earnest application to some specific objective or pursuit.
B. Use of the word ‘intentional’ in Christian circles is a relatively new one. Websters defines it as meaning: 📖
A comparison of synonyms fleshes out the definition: Intentional stresses intent, an awareness of an end intended to be achieved. (I know our English teachers taught us not to use a word to define itself, but…)
I see the concepts of diligence and intentional as being very close in meaning, which I think is best summed up by a famous sports quote–
III. Those things related to our passage this week that I think we need to be intentional / diligent about are:
A. Sacrificial giving: John takes the concept of laying down one’s life introduced in his gospel a step further in his first letter,
At first glance, we might think John is advocating we be willing to die for each other. Maybe…, but he goes on to explain more specifically what he means,
:18 “Dear children, let us not love with words or speech only, but with actions and in truth.”
So, John makes it clear that our sacrifices for each other are to be more material–to sacrificially give of our possessions to meet the needs of our brothers and sisters in the faith (firstly), but also of all those around us.
B. Sacrificial living. As seen in Romans 12:1, we’re supposed to be living sacrifices. Paul elaborates on this concept in 2 Corinthians 5:15,
Peter himself put it this way in his first letter, 1 Peter 4:1-2,
:2 “As a result, they do not live the rest of their earthly lives for merely human desires, but rather for the will of God.”
Ultimately there should be a crucifixion going on in our lives. Paul fills out this concept in Galatians,
And most dramatically, Paul’s personal testimony in Galatians 2:20,
Whew! Very high standards indeed.
C. Sacrificial going. In our last section of Mark coming up next week, Jesus commissions His disciples by saying, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” (Mark 16:15)
⛪️ Our church is very much a sending church. Every week, our services end with the phrase, “Summit, you are sent.” (A church ‘sends,’ a person ‘goes.’)
❤ We’re in the middle of our giving commitment month and some of the stats and testimonies for how the church spent our donations this past fiscal year, and the results obtained, are quite impressive. Here is a summary of how our sacrificial giving should be used for the things that are on God’s heart:
1. The Great Commission:
🌎 Fulfilling the Great Commission includes preaching the gospel, baptizing those who believe, making disciples by teaching them, and taking these activities into all the world; and don’t forget, our city, our state and our country are all part of ‘the world.’
2. The Compassion Ministries:
🤟 Looking over the above two lists of ministries, you might think, ‘I can’t do that.’ But there are many things that anyone can do. Rather than focusing on the specialty ministries, such as proclaiming the gospel, teaching the Scriptures, baptizing someone, look at the compassion ministries. Anyone can give necessities–food and clothing–to the poor and needy. Get started somewhere, if you’re not already, and see where God takes you.
3. Widows and orphans (in our time, single mothers and their children, as well as orphaned children):
We have a ministry where single parents can bring their children for an evening of supervised fun while the parent takes a night off. There are a lot of other giving ministries focused on single mother families too.
😇 Anyone can donate a Christmas present in an Angel Tree ministry for children who otherwise might not receive anything for Christmas. (We’ve got one of those too!)
👫 For our small group Christmas project this year, we bought Christmas presents for a boy and a girl in a Christian orphanage from their wish lists.
👀 We are surrounded by people with needs. Be intentional / diligent in finding ways you can give to meet those needs in the Name of Jesus.
✨️ CONCLUSION:
🎁 At work, our Christmas project this year is buying Christmas presents for three needy military families through a Service Assistance organization. One family lost their father to an IED in Afghanistan. Another family has their father, but he was totally disabled by an IED. In the third family, the mother is the service member whose husband divorced her and left her with six children. The other two families have 4 and 5 children.
Gifts for service family #3
🎄We have almost 1,000 employees scattered across the US, with about 100 in the office. Already the stack of presents for each family is impressive, along with many generous donations of cash from our distant employees to buy more. However, in my opinion there is going to be something very important missing; there will be nothing about God or Jesus Christ, except in the word ‘Christ’mas.
👑 We in the church body should not only exceed the generosity of those who are still separated from God, but we should also be taking a witness of who Jesus is, and what He did for us, to others via these compassion ministries. Meeting the material needs is important, but the spiritual and eternal needs need to be met too.
🤓 SUMMARY:
✝️ So, live for Jesus, give and minister to the needy, and take the message of God’s salvation in Jesus Christ everywhere you go. If you’ll do these things, you’ll be living up to the name you bear as ‘Christ’ians. 🙂
This blog is based on my participation in the above Bible study.
In this week’s study, we looked at some of the major events at the end of Jesus’ time on earth: The Last Supper, praying in Gethsemane, betrayal by Judas, and arrest, trials by the Sanhedrin and Roman governor Pilate, denial by Peter, and the crucifixion. Any one of these events would be worthy of a full day’s study. Pastor Chan zoomed in on the love Jesus must have had in order to endure this suffering.
In trying to pull out my one word to describe the study this week, what stood out to me was the determination of Jesus to endure the indignities, the physical and emotional suffering, and even a torturous death, in order to carry out His heavenly Father’s plan of salvation for humankind.
Following are some of the elements I saw in these chapters that affected and portrayed His determination to undergo them.
I. Foreknowledge: Even knowing what was to come, Jesus had to be very determined to follow through.
A. Three times prior to the events in these chapters, Jesus told His Twelve chosen disciples what was going to happen when they got to Jerusalem.
1. Mark 8:31 Jesus Predicts His Death
2. Mark 9:31 Jesus Predicts His Death Again Jesus… was teaching his disciples…
3. Mark 10:32-35 Jesus Predicts Death 3rd Time They were on their way up to Jerusalem with Jesus leading the way…
“We are going up to Jerusalem,” He said, “and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn Him to death and will hand Him over to the Gentiles, who will mock Him and spit on Him, flog Him and kill Him. Three days later He will rise.”
Hansel and Gretel painting
Like leaving bread crumbs along the path so you can find your way back, Jesus was dropping these ‘crumbs’ of prophecy throughout Mark to point the way forward. A lot of attention has been focused on Jesus predicting His death, but note He also predicted His resurrection!
In this week’s chapters, we also saw Jesus reveal more foreknowledge about what was to come. Note that this foreknowledge was both from prophesies of Scripture that He had come to fulfill, and revelation from the Holy Spirit within Him.
The first was at the Last Supper.
A. The Betrayal
Mark 14:18 While they were reclining at the table eating, Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, one of you will betray Me—one who is eating with Me.”
19 The disciples were saddened, and one by one they asked Him, “Surely you don’t mean me?”
20 “It is one of the Twelve.” Jesus replied, “It is one who dips bread into the bowl with Me. The Son of Man will be led away just as it is written about Him.”
The Prophecy
B. The Desertion Jesus also quoted a prophecy from Zechariah 13:7 about what would happen to His disciples when He was arrested:
C. The Denial. Peter, called ‘Bold Peter’ in an old song about the Denial, said, “Even though everyone else deserts You, I will NEVER leave You.” You can almost hear Jesus’ sigh as He delivered a word of prophecy in response. “Peter, Peter, I tell you that on this very night, before the rooster crows to announce the dawn, you will deny even knowing Me three times.”
But Peter was insistent, “Even if I have to DIE with You, I will NEVER deny You.”
D. The Arrest. The praying in the Garden of Gethsemane, what we would call a park, brought Jesus’ humanity fully forward. No more the calm in the face of a storm, no more the self assured, all-wise Annointed One we’ve been seeing. Now, He is all human fears and doubts, wanting out at the last minute. Prophecy and His Divine foreknowledge has informed Him of exactly what to expect. His human nature, anchored by the instinct for self preservation, wants to avoid the suffering and painful execution at any cost.
Understandable, but the key to the heart of Jesus at the end was His total submission to God’s will.
And the last bit of foreknowledge displayed was He knew when the mob sent to arrest Him was approaching. In preparation, He woke His sleeping disciples and warned them, but there was no running away, no attempt to flee or to avoid His fate.
II. Intentionality
There were several ways that I saw Jesus being intentional In His actions in response to these prophecies of coming dangers and sufferings, as indications of His determination.
A. Jesus ‘ran’ toward danger. We’ve all heard about how first responders ‘run toward danger.’ They do it for the purpose of providing aid and rescue.
I was thinking more along the lines of Charlie Kirk. I was chatting recently with a man in my small group who told me he had been listening to some Charlie Kirk podcasts. I asked him what he had gotten from those. He stated, ‘To not avoid controversy, but to run toward it.’
I had only heard Charlie Kirk speak once on a radio program. My impression of him was of a singularly gifted man who was able to respond to those who disagreed with his conservative beliefs in a clear and convincing way. Because of his gift, he was able to ‘run toward controversy’ with the confidence that he could hold his own with those who disagreed with him.
That is what I think Jesus did. From His human side, He had doubts and fears, as we see in His prayers in the Garden of Gethsemane, but despite those understandable ‘human’ weaknesses, He was 100% submitted to God the Father, and 100% committed to do His will, even to His death, which was actually the plan. That commitment to God and His plan of salvation gave Him the confidence to ‘run toward’ the physical, emotional and spiritual suffering He knew was waiting for Him.
B. Jesus didn’t just let the events happen to Him at random. He was intentionally where He needed to be, when He needed to be, in order that each step of God’s plan would go forward. Jesus even shepherded things along as needed to minimize collateral damage. When Peter whipped out a sword and started swinging it around, cutting off a servant’s ear, Jesus performed a miracle of healing and defused the potentially violent fight between the disciples and the mob by refocusing their attention on why they were there–to arrest Him.
🤓 Personally, I can’t help but think that keeping the situation from erupting into a melee of violence was another exercise of Divine, miraculous power by Jesus.
C. Jesus chose to make the sacrifice.
In the middle of Jesus’ teachings about the Good Shepherd in John 10, Jesus makes the following statement,
10:17 “The reason my Father loves Me is that I lay down* my life—only to take it up again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down* of My own accord. I have authority to lay it down* and authority to take it up again.”
This was not the only time John records Jesus mentioning laying down* one’s life. During the Last Supper in John 15:
13b “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down* one’s life for one’s friends. You are My friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from My Father, I have made known to you.”,
*Strongs G5087, tithémi: To place, to set, to lay, to appoint, to establish. 100 occurrences.
D. Jesus Prioritized His Relationships…
1. …with His disciples, who had also become His friends (see John 15 quote above). How did He do that?
a. By spending quality time with them. “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you.”
b. By warning them about what was to come.
c. By providing final words of assurance, comfort and instruction, mostly recorded in the Gospel according to John.
2. Jesus prioritized His relationship with His Heavenly Father. How?
a. By worshipping God, along with His disciples. The ‘hymn’ they sang at the end of the dinner (Seder in Hebrew) would probably have been the last song in the Hallel (means ‘praise’ in Hebrew). The Hallel consists ofPsalms113–118, traditionally sung to celebrate God’s deliverance, especially during Passover.
• Psalms 113–114 were typically sung before the meal.
• Psalms 115–118 were sung after the meal.
• Psalm 118 is the last hymn and is particularly relevant to Jesus’s experience.
In Psalm 118, Jesus was singing about Himself, including His own eventual victory and resurrection, while facing betrayal arrest and death. His followers, like the apostle Peter, later quoted from this same psalm in proclaiming Jesus as the Messiah.
b. Jesus prioritized His relationship with His Heavenly Father…by spending time with Him in prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane, as was His habit.
III. Determination
Jesus respond to His foreknowledge of what would happen to Him and His chosen Twelve in Jerusalem with determination, as well as intentionality. Following are ways I see Jesus exhibited determination in each of the events He foreknew, both from prophecy, and from the revelation of God’s Holy Spirit within Him.
1. In response to the predictions about what would happen in Jerusalem, Jesus was commited to the inevitable.
Jesus “Set His face to go to Jerusalem,” signifying Jesus’ unwavering determination to go to Jerusalem, despite knowing it would lead to His death.
2. Knowing that Judas would betray Him, Jesus accepted the unchangeable.
John 13:27: After Judas had taken the morsel, … Jesus said to him, “What you are going to do, do quickly.”
3. Prophesying that Peter would deny even knowing Him, Jesus prayed for the redeemable.
In an expanded telling of this scene in Luke, Jesus told Peter,
4. Knowing when He was about to be arrested, Jesus submitted to the inescapable.
In John’s expanded version of the arrest in his gospel,
18:4 Jesus, knowing all that was going to happen to Him, went out and asked them, “Who is it you want?”
“Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied.
“I am He,” Jesus said.
5. Knowing the trials, torture and crucifixion He faced after He was arrested, Jesus set Himself to endured the insufferable.
And He kept trusting God:
So, how are we to emulate Jesus in these events? After all, that is our responsibility as ‘little Christs.’ I’ll look at some suggestions from the Bible about how we can do that in Part B.
This blog is based on my participation in the above Bible study.
In this week’s lesson, Pastor Chan pointed out that there were a lot of different kinds of power on display. Here is a summary of each kind of power as I saw it and some of the implications.
I. The Power of Popularity: There are several places in Mark chapters 11 and 12 where we see that Jesus was popular with the masses.
A. (As Jesus entered Jerusalem riding on a donkey…) 11:8 …many people spread their cloaks on the road, while others spread branches they had cut in the fields. Those who went ahead and those who followed shouted,
“Hosanna!” (Hebrew, “Pray you, save us!)
“Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!”
“Blessed is the coming kingdom of our forefather David!”
B. Reaction of the Jewish Religious Leaders
11:18 The chief priests and the teachers of the law heard this and began looking for a way to kill Jesus, for they feared Him, because the whole crowd was amazed at His teaching.
11:27 … while Jesus was walking in the temple courts the next day, the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders came to Him and asked, “By what authority are you doing these things? And who gave you authority to do this?”
29 Jesus replied, “I will ask you one question. Answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I am doing these things. John’s baptism—was it from heaven, or of human origin?”
31 The Jewish leaders discussed it among themselves and said, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will ask, ‘Then why didn’t you believe him?’ But if we say, ‘Of human origin’ …” (They feared the people, for everyone held that John really was a prophet.)
12:12 Then the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders looked for a way to arrest Him because they knew He had spoken the parable against them. But they were afraid of the crowd; so they left Him and went away.
12:37 David himself calls him ‘Lord.’ How then can the Messiah be his son?” The large crowd listened to Jesus teach with delight.
🤓 COMMENTARY
1. The advantages of popularity.
A. If you’re popular, people will be very welcoming, they’ll want to give you meals and gifts for free. Essentially, people want to be seen being with popular people to enhance their own reputation. However once you are no longer popular, all that will disappear.
B. Popularity affords you protection from those at the opposite end of feeling for you– those who want to hurt, destroy or even kill you, and remove you as the source of their anger and discomfort. As long as you’re seen to be popular, you’re safe from your enemies. But as we see in the gospels, the Jewish leaders who hated Jesus figured out how to catch Jesus away from His screen of admirers and arrest Him.
2. The Dangers of Popularity
A. Disappointing Expectations: Pastor Chan pointed that the people welcoming Jesus to Jerusalem were expecting the Messiah promised in their Scriptures, who would establish an eternal kingdom and rule from Jerusalem, with the Israelites being His favored people.
Unfortunately, that was not the Messiah that Jesus had come as. First He had to suffer and die so our sins could be forgiven by God, THEN He would come again and establish His kingdom on Earth.
So, the first source of Jesus’ popularity was the expectation that He would give them something they wanted, something they had dreamed of and prayed for after chaffing under Roman rule for so long.
The downside of being popular for the wrong expectation is that when it becomes clear the expectation is not going to materialize, the people will turn on the one who disappoints them and go just as far in the negative direction. We’ll see this later when the crowd shouted, “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!.”
B. The other reasons we see that Jesus was popular was His teachings amazed and delighted the crowds. Note that these are emotional responses.
So, what happens when what you say doesn’t ‘amaze’ and ‘delight’ the crowds anymore? They drop you like yesterday’s leftovers and go looking for someone new to ‘delight’ and ‘amaze’ them.
CONCLUSION. The point is, whether individually or en masse, people are fickle and quickly change their attitudes and interests. That is the danger of depending on the power of popularity.
II. THE POWER OF PRAYER
Pastor Chan pointed out there is an incident in the middle of Jesus’ week in Jerusalem that has been difficult to understand to many theologians.
A. Jesus Curses a Fig Tree
11:12 The next day as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry. Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, He went to find out if it had any fruit. When he reached it, he found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. Then he said to the tree, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again!” And his disciples heard him say it.
11:20 In the morning, as they went along, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots. Peter remembered and said to Jesus, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree you cursed has withered!”
Pastor Chan explains that the fig tree is a metaphor for Jesus coming to Israel. The leafy fig tree represented the nation of Israel. It was vibrant and alive, but when looked at closely, there was no godly fruit.
God had expected Israel to be a light to the world. That people would hear and come to Jerusalem, the city of God, and go to the temple, the House of God, and find out who God is. There was even an outer court, called the Court of the Gentiles, for non-Jews to visit. However, in Jesus’ day, it had been turned into a place of business where visiting out-of-country Jews had to exchange their foreign currency for local currency, at a highly unfavorable rate, and buy Temple approved sacrifices at outrageous prices. This was a source of much revenue for the Jewish leaders.
Jesus first public act in Jerusalem this final week was to drive out the money changers and condemn their actions. This immediately put Jesus on the wrong side of the Jewish leaders who then sought to arrest Him and have Him put to death, but Jesus’ popularity with the crowds prevented that.
Immediately after Peter’s observation that the cursed fig tree had died, Jesus launched into a series of teachings on prayer, cementing the connection between the lesson of the fig tree with what Israel had become.
C. Jesus made these points about prayer:
1. Believe and don’t doubt, it will be granted.
2. Believe you have received it, and it will be yours.
3. Make sure you’re not holding a grudge against someone so God can forgive you when you pray and then listen to your request.
This one might seem out of place, but the implication is God will answer our prayers when we are in right relationship with Him and that means being in right relationship with each other.
II. Power versus Authority
Did Jesus have the POWER to curse The fig tree to death, or did He have the AUTHORITY?
People often use the two terms interchangeably, but they don’t mean the same thing. Therefore, I think it is essential that we understand that difference.
The way I had it explained to me was using the example of a police officer directing traffic.
When the police officer holds up his hand indicating you are to stop, he doesn’t have the actual ability to MAKE you stop. You could choose to keep going and there is nothing he can physically do to stop your vehicle. But you can bet that he will take note of your license plate (if you don’t run over him) and you will become involved with the criminal justice system shortly afterward.
So, the point is the police officer didn’t have the personal POWER to enforce his command, like imagined super heroes, but the officer represents a larger organization that has the power to arrest you, to judge you, to fine you and even to incarcerate you. The police officer represents a GREATER POWER, the power of the government, and he has been given the AUTHORITY to give those commands and expect them to be obeyed.
Remember when Jesus commissioned the Twelve and sent them out? Jesus gave them the AUTHORITY to heal the sick and cast out demons. When they spoke the command to be healed, they had no power to heal, but they represented a GREATER POWER, the POWER OF GOD. GOD’S POWER healed people. GOD’S POWER cast out the demons. When Jesus cursed the fig tree, GOD’S POWER worked overnight to kill it. When we pray correctly, it is GOD’S POWER that acts to answer.
Therefore, there isn’t POWER in prayer, there is AUTHORITY in us, disciples of Jesus Christ, when we pray believing. The POWER comes from GOD.
III. CHALLENGES
The Chief Priests Question Jesus’ Authority, by James Tissot
The Jewish leaders understood what ‘authority’ meant. The next day, while Jesus was teaching the crowd in the temple and amazing them with what He had to say, they sent a delegation to ask Him, “By whose authority do you do these things?
We would say, less formerly, “What gives you the RIGHT?”
They were asking, “What gives You the RIGHT to come into our temple, overturn the tables with the money and sacrifices, and run the money changers out with a whip of rope cords? What gives You the RIGHT to come in here and tell us what we can and cannot do?”
“What gives you the RIGHT to speak a parable of condemnation against us, the leaders and teachers of the Jews? What gives you the RIGHT to say who’s right and who’s wrong?”
“What gives you the RIGHT to come here and teach the people something different than what we teach them, the traditions of the Fathers? What gives you the RIGHT to say what is right and wrong?”
Notice that Jesus never answered their question. Instead, He traps them with a question about where they thought John the Baptist’s authority came from. They couldn’t answer what they really thought, that John was not really a prophet sent from God, but just another wannabe who caught the attention of the masses for a short while and rode that wave of popularity for as long as he could. That is, until his big mouth got him in trouble with Herod. If the Jewish leaders had said that, they would have had a riot on their hands as the people attacked them. So, they didn’t answer Jesus’ question.
The Jewish leaders were looking for something they could use to discredit Jesus, arrest Him, and then have Him executed, which they eventually did. The rest of our passage this week shows how each Jewish religious and secular sect tried to trap Jesus the same way He had trapped the temple priests. They weren’t able to because each time, Jesus showed them just how much smarter He was than any of them. You can do that when you’re God.
IV. APPLICATION 🍎
Pastor Chan ended his lesson by referencing where Jesus warned His disciples that they could expect the same kinds of attacks and persecution.
John 15:18 “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated Me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.
20 Remember what I told you before: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will persecute you also…
21 They will treat you this way because of My name.”
The whole thrust of Pastor Chan’s presentation of Mark’s gospel has been discipleship. Jesus came to accomplish three purposes. One of them was to leave behind a cadre of trained and experienced replacements to carry out God’s plan of saving the entire world through the preaching of the gospel. As we approach the imminent departure of Jesus in the story, Jesus doubles down on His time and instruction of His disciples in final preparation.
If we call ourselves ‘Christians,’ that means we have accepted the responsibility to be one of those ‘little Christs’ in our own generation, in our own place in the world.
Approaching the study of Mark for the purpose of learning what Jesus did and taught so that we can do the same as His disciples is very different from the intellectual approach to study that I learned in school, and it’s hard to change how I’ve been studying for so many years.
I began this study because I wanted to learn to be a worshipper of God with my whole heart. What I’ve been learning instead is how to follow Jesus with my whole life.
God is funny that way. He guides you into what you think is one thing, only to find out it is something else…, actually something better, closer to God’s plan, rather than to my own desires.
In the process, I have realized that He’s been changing me behind the scenes in ways I had never imagined possible. I hope as we approach the holiday season, that you are yielding your life to our Lord and Savior in new ways too. AMEN!
This blog is based on my participation on the above Bible study.
In this week’s study, Pastor Chan made this observation:
“In the middle of Mark 9 is a heart-wrenching yet comforting moment. The father of a demon-possessed child knows that faith is the key to rescue. But he needs help. So he asks for it.
“Compare that response to a rich man’s over in Mark 10. In many ways it’s the same request—each man asks something of Jesus. Each time the obstacle is the same: to trust Jesus and surrender. But the response is different. The wavering father asked for help in overcoming his unbelief.
“But the young man left discouraged because he didn’t want to divest his riches and surrender his life to Jesus’ call.
“At the end of Jesus’ conversation about rich people entering heaven, Jesus makes a comforting statement,”
In the vein of what is possible for God, but not for us, following is a summary of my study of Mark chapters 8 through 10.
First Prediction of His Death – Mark 8:31
Your Messiah telling you that He is going to die soon might sound foolish.
But not to God.
God has chosen the foolish things of this world to confound the wise…” (1 Corinthians 1:27)
2. Way of the Cross – Mark 8:34-38
Jesus saying, “For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me and for the gospel will save it,” might seem ludicrous.
But not to God.
The cattle on a thousand hills are His (Psalm 50:11).
“He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.” attributed to Jim Elliot.
Mark 10:29 Jesus promised, “No one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for Me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much—and in the age to come, eternal life.”
3. Transfiguration – Mark 9:2-20
You’re so frightened when God shows up, what to do or say seems unknowable.
But not to God.
God made us and He will teach us what to say when He calls us to speak. (Exodus 4:10-12)
Also, when faced with a ‘God moment,’ God will give you the words to say to others. In Peter’s case, he should have just stayed silent. Sometimes that’s the best thing to do, just listen.
4. Father and Demon-Possessed Son – Mark 9:14-29
Expecting Jesus to be able to help you when no one else was able to might seem hopeless…
But not to God!
For with God, all things are possible if you’ll just believe Him.
Besides, God, our Heavenly Father, delights in giving good gifts to His children.
5. Second prediction of death and resurrection – Mark 9:30-32
Out of the blue Jesus says, “The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men. They will kill Him, and after three days, He will rise.”You don’t understand what He means, you’re afraid to find out and you don’t know what to do…
But God does. Trust Him, because-
6. Divorce – Mark 10:10-12
Your marriage has deteriorated to the point where you hate each other and you just want a divorce because you can’t redeem it.
But God can.
God is in the redemption business.
7. Don’t Hinder the Children – Mark 10:13-16
Obstacles in the way of getting to Jesus for a blessing might seem insurmountable.
But not for God!
God helps us overcome the insurmountable.
8. The Rich Young Man – Mark 10:17-31
Giving up all your worldly riches in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven might seem impossible.
But not for God.
God can help you accomplish the impossible.
9. Third Prediction of Jesus’ Death and Resurrection – Mark 10:32-34
That Jesus would die and rise again from the dead on the third day might seem incredible.
But not for God.
God can accomplish the incredible. He does it all the time, and so did Jesus. They’re called ‘miracles.’
In Part 2, I’ll go back through and look at when the answer was not, “Yes.”
The following is from my participation in the above Bible study.
Just who is Jesus, anyway? That is the main theme of Mark and that is what Peter was asked to testify about to the Roman magistrates.
We’ve seen a lot already about who Jesus is from Mark chapters one through six. It is interesting to note from the middle of chapters 6 through 8, there is obvious DUPLICATION in the content. There are some new themes introduced in our study passage for this week, but there are also some repeated themes.t
Between chapters 7 and 8 is the break between Peter’s 2nd and 3rd presentations. We don’t know what the interval was between his presentations, whether they were daily or further apart, but we see an important presentation principle utilized by Peter, repetition.
So, let’s look at the six points Peter repeats between the end of session 2 and the beginning of session 3, to see what he’s emphasizing about Jesus to the Roman magistrates.
1. Two miraculous feedings: • Mark 6:39-44, Jesus Feeds 5,000 with 5 loaves and two fish. 🍞🍞🍞🍞🍞🐟🐟 • Mark 8:1-9, Jesus Feeds 4,000 with seven loaves and a few fish. 🍞🍞🍞🍞🍞🍞🍞🐟🐟🐟
🤓COMMENTARY This was a new supernatural power demonstrated by Jesus, the ability to take a relatively small amount of food and multiply it, multiply it and multiply it until after 5,000 had eaten their fill, the leftovers exceeded the original amount. I can almost see the magistrates looking back and forth at each other. They have already heard some miraculous things attributed to Jesus, but the healings and demon expulsions they probably could explain away. Even the calming of the storm at sea might have been a coincidence exaggerated by worshipful believers. I’m sure they had heard many such coincidences claimed by various religious followers in their polytheistic society as being caused by one god or another. They might even have become jaded by repeated claims of miracles that could not be proven. But this was something different, thousands of people were involved in this miracle. And Peter drives the point home when he begins his third presentation with the second, similar miracle of feeding 4,000 people.
I suspect what Peter had said about Jesus so far had been interesting, but now the magistrates were interested.
2. Two trips across the sea: • Mark 6:45 to 56 (end) – walking on water with healings at the end. 🌊 • Mark 8:9b-10, 13,14 – crosses to east bank, the Decapolis*, then returns to west bank, Galilee. ⛵️
🤓COMMENTARY: Peter follows up his first bomb of the 5,000 with Jesus walking on water. I think without the first bomb, the magistrates would have been able to easily dismiss this claim with a, “Yeah, right…”
But still reeling from the first bomb, like a boxer who’s just taken one haymaker, they’re still so dazed, they cannot muster the skepticism to dismiss Peter’s claim. I see them as being uncomfortable at this point. If this Jesus of Nazareth really was able to do these things, not only witnessed by His 12 dedicated disciples, but by thousands, then this was a person who demanded people’s attention. Maybe even demanded a response. And they were not ready or willing to do that.
In Mark chapter 8, the boat trips back and forth across the Sea are fairly mundane. Just boat trips this time. So, what’s the point? There are six boat trips or sea crossings mentioned in the Gospel of Mark, but only two in Matthew and two in Luke. The extra trips suggest Peter is showing not only how busy Jesus was in His ministry, but that He didn’t limit it to just His home province of Galilee.
It’s interesting to note that Peter left out the part where he got out of the boat and walked on the water himself. One wonders how the magistrates might have reacted if he had included that part? Might they have escorted him to the nearest body of water and asked him to walk across it? Or might this part of the event have caused other problems for Peter? Might he have been seen as less reliable a witness, maybe lying to inflate his reputation?
I’m certain one thing Peter didn’t want to do was come across as a supernaturally powerful person who might have been a threat to Rome. This omission also shows astuteness on Peter’s part, to know his audience and avoid unnecessary, controversial topics.
For whatever reason, Peter thought it was a good idea to leave out this part. It might be helpful for us to develop this skill too, that is, to know what about our testimony to share with a particular interested person, and which details to leave out.
In Speech 101 they taught a very important element of a successful speech was to know your audience and tailor your speech to them. It would appear that Peter knew this principle and was very much tailoring his presentation to the Roman magistrates.
* Decapolis, “The Ten Cities,” were Helenistic (Greek culture) cities mostly east of the Jordan River and Galillean Sea. The 10th city, not pictured, was Syrian Damascus.
3. Confrontations with the Pharisees, et al. • Mark 7:1-13 – Why don’t your disciples wash their hands before they eat? 🤲 • Mark 8:11-13 – Give us a sign from heaven. 🌠
🤓COMMENTARY: The different sects of religious leaders who questioned, opposed and ultimately had Jesus executed, figured prominently in this week’s chapters. Peter mentions Jesus had many run-ins with the Jewish religious leaders, often just generically referred to as ‘scribes,’ and modernly translated as “Teachers of the Law.” The Greek word, grammateus, (Strong’s G1122) would have been familiar to the magistrates as it was used as the title for a Town Clerk. The names of the other Jewish religious sects would have been meaningless without more explanation, as Peter does provide in brief, enough to help the story of what happened make sense. Also, Peter almost always pairs the Jewish sect name with ‘and Scribes’ to help the magistrates follow who’s involved by including this familiar title.
However, Peter specified the Pharisees in Mark 7 and 8, as well as in chapters 2 and 12, which also includes the only named reference to the Sadducees, relevant to their belief there was no resurrection. Most often the Sadducees are referred to as ‘Chief Priests,’ once again a title that would have been familiar to the religiously eclectic Romans who would frequently have to deal with self-important ‘chief priests’ of one god or another.
These words and descriptions are another example of Peter knowing what his Roman audience would understand, and using more familiar terms with them or providing a brief explanation as needed. Once again, something we can learn from him when sharing our testimony or the gospel with others.
Exhortation_to_the_Apostles_by James_Tissot
4. Two lessons based on food. • Mark 7:14-23 – It’s not what you eat that defiles you, it’s the sinful acts that arise from your sinful heart. 💔 • Mark 8:14-23 – Beware the leaven of the Pharisees! 🥣
🤓COMMENTARY Jesus used a lot of common things and everyday events to communicate spiritual truths. In these two instances in Mark 7 and 8, Jesus transitioned from a confrontation with the Pharisees, et al., to instruction. This is what we call in education a ‘teachable moment.’
And as the ‘Walking on Water’ story was distinguished by what Peter omitted, the lesson from the first Pharisee conflict is characterized by what Peter added to the Matthew account.
The list of sinful characteristics that flow from a sin-filled heart in Matthew are:
“For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.”(last part omitted in Mark.)
Peter’s list as recorded by Mark: “For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.” (underlined words added.)
This extended list of sins suggests that Peter is trying to portray the conflict between Jesus and the Jewish religious leaders as not a religious one, but as a moral one.
The Roman view of morality was complex. Key aspects of Roman morality were:
• There was no abstract, codified moral law from any of the various religions. Instead, morality was tied to personal character and social norms.
• Mos maiorum(Customs of the ancestors): Cultural customs and traditions provided the foundational moral code, which emphasized duty, honor, and respect for tradition.
• Pietas(Dutiful respect): This was one of the cardinal Roman virtues–a deep, personal respect towards the gods, family, and the State.
• Fides(Faithfulness): Trustworthiness was crucial for all social and political relationships. A magistrate, for example, was obliged to act in accordance with both the public interest and his own moral senseof faithfulness to his position of responsibility.
• Virtues: Moral behavior was expected to be characterized by virtues like bravery, tenacity, and frugality.
To be honest, this moral code of faithfulness, respect and commitment to duty are some of the things that made Rome great. But I wonder if the moral decay that eventually led to the fall of the Roman Empire were already evident? The next emperor was Nero and the moral turpitude became increasingly obvious.
The magistrates would probably have been as aware as anyone of the moral decay at the heart of Rome because of their legal duties. I wonder if Peter was emphasizing the immoral acts listed by Jesus to get their attention? Once he had their agreement with what would be considered ‘sins,’ the next step would have been to show them how Jesus came to both pay for our sins so we won’t have to, and to deliver us from those sins to a more moral life coming from the heart, not social norms. It almost sounds like Peter is sharing the gospel with them, wily old fisherman that he was! Stay tuned to see how Peter not only tells the story about Jesus, but tailors it into a gospel presentation to the listeners…
5. Two professions of faith. • Mark 7:24-30 – Jesus, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.” 🐕 Gentile woman, “But even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the table… • Mark 8:27-30 – Peter answered, “You are the Christ.” ✝️
🤓COMMENTARY There is so much going on in these two declarations of faith, but I’ve reached the end of my weekend and go back to a new week’s study tomorrow.
I hope you are spending time yourself studying God’s Word. I must admit it takes a while before you can go as deep as I’m able to delve after 50+ years of doing it, but it’s important to present yourself to God as a student of His Word. Over time, you will learn more from Him and, hopefully, become more obedient in your walk with God.
The best place to start is to listen to messages from Biblical teachers who simply and clearly lay out what the Bible says. Eventually, with enough of a foundation laid by those ahead on the path, you’ll be able to find gems of meaning and understanding in the Bible yourself!
6. Two healings • Mark 6:27-31 – Healing the deaf and mute man. 🙉🙊 • Mark 8:22-25 – Healing a blind man at Bethsaida.**🙈
🤓COMMENTARY The significance of both healings is they are unique to Mark. These are both events Peter shared from memory rather than referring to either of the two scrolls of Matthew or Luke. Although, since each apostle had their own copy of Matthew when they left Jerusalem, it has been suggested they annotated it with additions from their own memory. 📜
**Bethsaida means “house of fishing”🎣 a name that reflects its origins as a fishing village on the Sea of Galilee. Significant as the hometown of the apostles Andrew, Peter, and Philip; it was also the setting for many of Jesus’ miracles.
🍎APPLICATION So, where are you on the continuum with Jesus? Are you close to the far positive end like Peter–a 100% committed disciple, doing your best to share the story of Jesus Christ and His teachings with those who will listen?
Or are you maybe closer to the other end–in need of healing, of provision, of deliverance–and wondering if maybe Jesus Christ can provide that for you?
Wherever you find yourself in your faith, who Jesus is demands a response. The powers He demonstrated, the things He said, these demand you accept Him as God’s chosen Messiah, sent to Earth to represent God’s, calling all to repentance, calling all of us back to right relationship with the Lord God Almighty, Creator of the Universe, our Heavenly Father. AMEN!
🙏I pray that you respond appropriately to that call today.
This blog is based on my participation in the above study.
In Mark 6, we continue to see the themes we’ve been seeing develop and intensify:
I. Intensification of people’s response to Jesus, His message and His miracles.
A. POSITIVE RESPONSES.
We’ve already seen several instances where Jesus attracted a large crowd and they grew larger and larger as His reputation spread. To review:
1. Mark 1:32-33 First we see the whole town of Capernaum gathered where Jesus was staying, bringing those who needed healed. At least they stayed outside this first time.
2. Mark 1:45 “Jesus could no longer enter a town openly but stayed outside in remote places. Yet the people still came to him from everywhere.”
3. Mark 2:1-2 “Later, when Jesus returned to Capernaum, the people heard that He had come home. They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even near the door.”
4. Mark 3:7-8 “Jesus withdrew to the sea with His disciples; and a great multitude from Galilee followed; and also from Judea, and from Jerusalem, and from Idumea, and beyond the Jordan, and the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon, a great number of people heard of all that He was doing and came to Him.”
5. Mark 3:20 When Jesus returned to Capernaum again, the house was so crowded He and the disciples couldn’t even eat.
6. Mark 5:21 When Jesus had crossed over again in a boat to the other side, a large crowd gathered around Him; and so He stayed by the seashore.
7. Mark 5:24 While Jesus accompanied Jairus to his house, “a large crowd pressed around Him.”
8. Mark 6:31 We see the same thing in this week’s chapter, but now Jesus responds to it. “Then, because so many people were coming and going that Jesus and the disciples didn’t even have a chance to eat, Jesus said to the them, “Come with Me by yourselves to a remote place and let’s get some rest.”
9. And then we have the feeding of the 5,000 where we get an idea of the size of the crowd and we also see Jesus’ attitude about these ever-increasing mobs.
Mark 6:32-34 “So they went away by themselves in a boat to find a remote place. But many who saw them leaving recognized them and ran on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things.”
Here we see Jesus had compassion for the crowd and He began teaching them. You can think of this as feeding their spiritual hunger. Later Jesus also takes care of their physical need for food.
So, in summary, we see that Jesus tried to avoid having His reputation spread about when He could, and He tried to avoid large crowds, but when He couldn’t avoid them as His reputation intensified, He ministered to their physical and spiritual needs.
B. NEGATIVE RESPONSES.
A Prophet Without Honor
Mark 6:1-6 Jesus went to his hometown, Nazareth, accompanied by his twelve disciples. When the Sabbath came, as was His habit, He began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard Him were amazed.
“Where did this man get these things?” they asked. “What’s this wisdom that has been given Him? What are these remarkable miracles that we’ve heard about Him performing? Didn’t He used to be our carpenter, the Son of Joseph and Mary? Isn’t this the brother of James, Little Joseph, Jude and Simeon? Aren’t His sisters here as wives with us?” And they took offense at Him.
Jesus answered them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own town, among his relatives and in his own home.” As a result of their lack of faith, He could not do any miracles there, except lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them.
1. Rejection. The key word describing why His hometown rejected Jesus was they were offended. This is a common problem when we become Christians and return home a changed person. Everyone there knows who we used to be, what we used to be like. Even though they had heard stories of what Jesus had done and said, and even had gotten a sample of it, they were not able to look beyond their preconceptions and see the Prophet that God had appointed and anointed with the Holy Spirit when He was baptized.
The Greek word for offended is skandalizo, (Strong’s G4624, 29 occurences) from which we get the English term “scandalized.” We consider it a ‘scandal’ when seemingly good people do an egregiously bad thing–they have an affair, they embezzle money, they get drunk and act inappropriately in public. These are good people doing bad things that scandalize us. In Jesus’ case, He was a seemingly ordinary man doing and saying extraordinary things.
So, what is Jesus’ preferred response when He is rejected? He just leaves. They reject Him, so He rejects them by removing His presence. No calling down a curse from heaven. The curse is that the people are robbed of blessings they might have received. As the passage says, He was not able to perform any miracles there, except heal a few individuals who DID believe in Him.
The sad thing is faith begets faith and unbelief begets unbelief. Most people start at a neutral position, kind of a ‘wait and see’ attitude. But there are always those who already believe, and then there are always the skeptical disbelievers. What tends to happen is, whichever of the decided ones goes first tends to tip the undecided their way. If the believing people step up first and receive a healing or other miracle, then many are tipped over to at least a little faith. However, as at Nazareth, the skeptics stepped up first and spouted their skeptical disbelief, then the undecided were tipped to their side.
There are some lessons for us in there somewhere…
(c) Free Bible Images, used by permission.
2. Intrigued, but uncommitted. We see this uncommitted response from Herod, the Tetrarch of Galilee, not officially a king since his father’s kingdom was divided between four of his sons, hence the official title, ‘tetrarch,’ meaning ruler of a fourth. But Herod had pretentious to be much, much more.
John the Baptist had gotten in Herod’s face about having divorced his wife, and then marrying his brother Philip’s ex-wife, Herodias, when he divorced her.
This confrontation was a risky move, but consistent with the role of a prophet to confront the king when they sin. The only problem was, despite Herod, who was an Idumean, a descendent of Esau, trying to act like the Jews somewhat, in order to appease them and keep them under control, he was anything but a believer of the Jewish faith.
Herod really didn’t have a choice when John publicly confronted him with what was a sin in Jewish eyes. He had to arrest and imprison John. But Herod was intrigued by John. He knew John was a “righteous and holy man,” so Herod protected him from his wife Herodias’ fury. Because of John’s public denouement of the couple, she wanted John dead, dead, DEAD!
Herod would trot John out from time to time to talk with him, but never made a commitment to believe the gospel. Messages I have heard over the years point out that Herod’s sin and his unwillingness to repent kept him from making this step of faith.
The problem with sitting on the fence of faith and not deciding is it makes you vulnerable to being manipulated by those who are committed to something else. In this case it was Herodias’ commitment to see John dead for his insults. She waited until Herod’s pride also made him vulnerable and she was able to manipulate her husband into finally having John the Baptist executed.
C. Revenge. Herodias represents the extreme reaction of those who are offended by the gospel and its implications. That is, they try to exact some type of revenge on those who offend them.
Throw Jesus Off the Cliff!
And don’t think an overt sinner such as Herodias would be the only type of person who would respond to the offense of the gospel with life-threatening revenge. Peter read from the shorter account of the rejection in Nazareth for his presentation to the Roman magistrates. In the longer version researched by Luke (4:28-30)…
“All in the synagogue who heard these things were filled with rage. And they rose up to throw Jesus out of the city. They led Him to the brow of the hill on which the city was built, intending to throw Him down the cliff. But Jesus passed through the middle of the mob and continued on His way.”
These were ‘righteousness’ Jews, neighbors and family friends, even relatives by marriage. They had known Jesus as the oldest son of Joseph the carpenter who had taken over the family business when his dad died. Then on His 30th birthday, out of the blue, He had turned the family business over to his next older brother and just left. To where and for what reason? No one seemed to know.
Sure, they had heard the crazy rumors about what Jesus had done in and around Capernaum, all the way on the other side of the country. Those rumors caused Jesus’ mother and brothers to travel there and try to bring Him back home to Nazareth. The rumors were crazy, so that meant Jesus had gone crazy, right?
But here was this eloquent, itinerant rabbi speaking to them. How had He suddenly become such a wise teacher? Did He really perform the miracles they had heard about in Capernaum? It wasn’t possible, in their experience, so there had to be another, more mundane explanation, didn’t there?
II. Intensification of Jesus’ display of supernatural power.
I don’t have time to go into detail with the rest, but in Mark 6, we see…
A. Jesus casually walking on water to catch up with His disciples rowing their boat against a headwind. Peter left out the part here where he walked on water too. B. We see Jesus multiply 5 loaves of bread and two fish to feed 5,000 men, with the Twelve each collecting a basket full of leftovers.C. And we see Jesus back across the Sea of Galilee healing multitudes of sick people who lined the road just to touch the edge of His cloak as He walks by.
III. Intensification of the training of His twelve disciples
And Jesus had another agenda, the training of the twelve men that He chose to be with Him all the time.
A. In Mark 6, we see Jesus give them authority to heal the sick and cast out demons, just like He could, and send them two by two to surrounding villages to proclaim the gospel. When they return to Him, they excitedly share stories of their success.
B. And the walking on water was supposed to be a faith-building exercise for the disciples.
C. As too the feeding of the 5,000. That miracle was supposed to help the disciples grow in their trust in the abilities of Jesus and God, who He represented.
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Pastor Chan has been focusing on this last aspect of what’s portrayed in Mark–discipleship.
His point in chapter 6 is, we need to realize that if we try to be true disciples of Jesus, we will face opposition from some, and we may even lose our lives. His question was, “Are you ready to give your life for Christ as well as give your life to Christ?
An intriguing and challenging thought! Guess you can tell by my choice of words where I am on that issue?
Most people don’t seem to pick up on how important training His disciples was to Jesus. I look at the gospels and see three intertwined, but equally important, objectives that Jesus accomplished while He was in Israel.
1. SACRIFICE Most people know that Jesus came to die for our sins so that we can be restored to a right relationship with God and avoid His wrath against sin at the Judgment. Less well known is the aspect that Jesus’ life had to be completely righteous and without sin. That is the only way His sacrifice could be acceptable to God as sufficient payment for all the sins of everybody in the world, past, present and future. Peter mentions this purpose a little later in Mark:
2. MINISTRY: Many people are also familiar with Jesus’ statement of His purpose in Mark that we saw in chapter 1. We also frequently see Jesus teaching the multitudes, although He often spoke to them in parables. A couple of quotes Jesus made from Isaiah elaborate on this ministry aspect of His purpose for coming.
a. The first is in Luke’s expanded account of Jesus’ Rejection at Nazareth.
Luke 4:16 Jesus came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up. And as was His custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to Him to read from. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written,...to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Isaiah 61:2)
21 And He said to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
b. The other time Jesus quoted from Isaiah where the ministry of the Messiah, His ministry, is described was in response to a doubting John the Baptist languishing in Herod’s prison. Matthew 11:3-5 (NIV)
The disciples of John asked Jesus, “Are you the One who is to come, or should we expect someone else?” Jesus replied, “Go back and report to John what you hear and see.”
Putting these verses together with some others, we can say in summary, Jesus’ MINISTRY was to proclaim the gospel to as many in Israel as He possibly could, to teach them God’s word, and to do so with miraculous signs of God’s power as a testimony to His authenticity as the Messiah.
3. MAKING DISCIPLES. Which brings us to Jesus’ third mission, the one most often overlooked, and the one Pastor Chan is focusing on in this study of Mark.
Jesus said, as recorded in Luke, “A disciple Is not greater than his teacher, but all, when fully trained, will be like their teacher.”
That is one of God’s goals for our salvation, that we should become ‘little Christs’ and continue to carry the good news and God’s Word around the world and down through history, as was done for us.
SUMMARY:
To put the whole set of intertwined purposes into perspective, the GOSPEL is meaningless and powerless without the SACRIFICE of Jesus, which is useless without APOSTLES, those who are sent to take the GOSPEL message to the WORLD, and you cannot become an APOSTLE until you’re completely trained as a DISCIPLE.
The sequence for us, then, is, we hear the GOSPEL, we believe, we become DISCIPLES and learn from the TEACHING of God’s Word. Then we are SENT to take the GOSPEL to other people and other places, where we DISCIPLE other new believers, etc.
Yes, this will involve SACRIFICE on our part to go, and it might lead to the ultimate SACRIFICE of our lives, but that is God’s plan for the salvation of the world. We should feel privileged to be a part of that plan.
APPLICATION
So, make sure you are involved in the process of discipleship–either as a learner or as a teacher–and share the gospel and God’s Word with the lost around you. That is God’s plan for the world, that is God’s plan for you.
NOTE: This series of blogs is from my participation in the above Bible study
Week 5 of our study covered 4 events in Jesus’ life and ministry where He demonstrated that He was Lord over something. Some of these things, like showing His authority over sickness and demons, Jesus had already demonstrated, but this week we see He takes even those to a new level.
4:35-42 Jesus is Lord over the storm. 5:1-20 Jesus is Lord over a Legion of demons.
5:24-35 Jesus is Lord over chronic illness.
5:23-24 and 35-43 Jesus is Lord over death.
We see that each of these encounters contain four elements that we can use to improve our own walk with Jesus:
Q1. How did they approach Jesus for help?
Q2. How did Jesus demonstrate His Lordship when He helped them?
Q3. How did Jesus stretch their faith in Him by how He responded?
Q4. How did they and/or those who witnessed what Jesus did, respond?
I. JESUS, LORD OVER THE STORM
Mark 4:35 That day when evening came, Jesus said to His disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” 36 Leaving the crowd behind, they took Him along, just as He was, in the boat. There were also other boats with Him. 37 A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. 38 Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”39 Jesus got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.
40 He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”
41 They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”
(See note at the end for an explanation of the underlined text and fingerprint sticker in some of the images )
Q1. How did the disciples approach Jesus for help? The disciples came to Jesus for help in desperation. Maybe they waited until the boat started to be swamped, because four of them were fishermen and thought they could handle the storm, as they had handled so many before. Maybe they waited because they didn’t want to disturb Jesus, who was obviously deep in an exhausted sleep in the back of the boat. I can almost see them frequently glancing back at Him, expecting that the violent tossing by the storm would wake Him up and He would take charge. A key to their feelings at the time was how they started their question, “…don’t you care…?”
A book by our pastor on how to pray.
For whatever reason or however we ask, we can learn that Jesus will help us, even if we wait until we reach the end of our resources and come to Him in desperation as our final option. Our tendency is to become impatient when we don’t see God act on our behalf. Maybe He’s waiting for us to ask Him? We tend to become impatient, maybe even desperate, when God doesn’t work on our timetable and then we start to look around for other options. Faith is in the asking, but faith is also in the waiting.
If we will do these things in our needs, the rewards are a new understanding of who God is and what He can do…and a fall-to-your-knees awe that creates in you a deep worship of this God of the Universe who DOES care for us.
Q2. How did Jesus demonstrate His Lordship when He helped them? Jesus demonstrated a new ability to His disciples when He showed that He was Lord over the storm. They believed that Jesus was the Promised Messiah with a special anointing from Jehovah God, and they had left everything to follow Him and be His disciples based on that belief, but they did not yet understand the full extent of Jesus’ power.
From this we learn that God and Jesus have powers beyond whatever we might understand or expect. Rather than try to figure out if God can help us or not, we should realize we’ll never understand what He can do, but we should just approach Him in humility and believe that He is able to help us, that He is willing help us, but it will be in a way and time of His choosing.
Q3. How did Jesus stretch their faith in Him by how He responded?
BEFORE: Jesus criticized the disciples for their lack of faith. There were lots of clues that they missed that should have led them to trust Him, no matter what was happening. First He had said they were going to the other side of the Sea. They needed to understand that what Jesus said they were to do, and that He would make sure it happened.
The second clue was that He was blissfully asleep, even during the height of the storm. However, they did not understand how much they should and could trust Jesus, even in the middle of the most desperate situation.
This is the first lesson we can learn from this. Just because He’s not calming the $#!+storm when we think He should, doesn’t mean He cannot. We just need to continue to trust in Him and keep doing what we’re supposed to be doing.
AFTER: When Jesus dealt with the storm by commanding it to calm down, this was a totally unexpected response from Him. The disciples knew they needed help, but apparently they did not know that Jesus could calm the storm, they just knew they needed help, and that Jesus had already exhibited supernatural powers. They found out that Jesus was able to do beyond what they could ask or even imagine!
That is another lesson for us. We have to trust God in how He chooses to respond. We cannot try to fit God’s capabilities into a tiny box defined by our past experience or limited imagination. God’s ways are as far beyond us as the objects in the night sky are from Earth. Ask Him, trust Him, and prepare to be amazed…and you’ll have your concept of God stretched.
Q4. How did the disciples respond to this awesome and unexpected display of Jesus’ power and authority? Jesus rebuked them for being cowardly before they woke Him, Strong’s G1169, deilos, overcome by dread and unable to act, always used in a negative sense. But after they saw the storm calmed and were ‘afraid,’ Strong’s G5399, phobeo, used not only for an overwhelming fear that stops you in your tracks, but also used in a positive sense of a healthy, reverential awe of God’s power and authority.
This is the appropriate response to God, a reverential awe that overwhelms us and elicits worship of the God who is so much greater than we are. That’s what happened to the disciples, and that’s what will happen to us when God answers our prayers in a totally unexpected way. But we won’t have this experience of God if we don’t ask Him, with what little faith we have, and then humbly wait for Him to act.
====================================There were so many wonderful lessons from our study of Mark this week. I don’t have time to write about them all this weekend. For example:
The woman who had been sick for 20 years who had faith that she would be healed if she could just sneak up behind Jesus and touch the edge of His robe, AND SHE WAS!
The Legion of demons which did not have any more power to resist the authority of Jesus than one demon did.
And the demon possessed man who was in his right mind and clothed properly again. He wanted SO badly to go back with Jesus across the Sea, but instead, he was sent back to his people as a witness for what Jesus had done for him.
Then there was the synagogue ruler who tracked down and asked Jesus to come and heal his sick daughter, but before they could get back to his home, she died!
____________________________________________There are so so many wonderful stories and wonderful lessons in the gospels. I hope I whet your appetite for more to the point you will begin to study them for yourself.
After all, it’s not just general knowledge we seek to gain from Bible study. Through Bible study AND prayer, we can receive personal messages from God of affirmation, of guidance, of reassurance, and much, much more. Jesus and God wait for you in the pages of your Bible. Take the time to meet with Them there!
Sandra Combrink, Revelations Artwork
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NOTES: The underlined parts of the narrative are unique content to Mark. I believe what modern scholarship says, that Mark is the third gospel in time, not the first, and it is based on a series of oral presentations by Peter to the magistrates in Rome who had been assigned to investigate the charges against Paul.
When Peter came to Rome to visit Paul, word got back to the magistrates and they wanted to hear about this ‘Jesus fellow’ from an eyewitness. Matthew was the only official gospel at that time, written as a collaborative effort by the Apostles just before they left Jerusalem due to the increased persecution against them.
During Paul’s three years of imprisonment in and near Jerusalem, Luke had personally investigated the stories of what Jesus had done and taught, using Matthew’s gospel as his source material, and then had written his own gospel. Paul asked Peter to legitimize Luke’s gospel, and Peter chose to do so by using both his copy of Matthew and Luke’s gospel as his source material for what appears to have been five presentations, based on internal structure. That is, each section is about 100 verses long and has a clear ending, followed by a clear beginning for the next session, with the verses between mostly starting with ‘And.’
You can often tell which of the two gospels Peter is using for each story, but there are omissions and additional, unique content. As an exercise, I’ve been comparing all three accounts to identify Peter’s additions. I call these ‘fingerprints of Peter,’ and view them as his personal contributions to the gospel narrative.
Peter’s omissions are interesting also. He seems to be portraying Jesus and the disciples in such a way that the Romans won’t see them as a threat. His careful portrayal of Jesus comes across as provincial and something easily dismissed as a ‘local matter among the heathens way down there on the fringes of Roman civilization.’
Peter also portrays the disciples as clueless provincials, certainly no threat to the Roman Empire either. I especially note that Peter omitted anything that would make himself appear as a threat, without minimizing his key role among the disciples, thus maintaining his position as a reliable eyewitness for the magistrates.
This is largely just an interesting exercise for me. But in whatever way Jesus and the disciples are portrayed, the Gospel of Mark still communicates the truth about what Jesus did and said, and we as Christians can still learn about who Jesus is and what He taught by reading and studying the Gospel of Mark. AMEN! ====================================
NOTE: This series of blogs is from my participation in the above Bible study
Week 4 of the Gospel of Mark study showed some interesting changes in Jesus’ interactions and in His teachings. Here’s a summary.
I. Four Groups. We saw there were four distinct groups of people who interacted with Jesus and vice versa.
A. The Masses.
3:7 Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the lake, and a large crowd from Galilee followed. 8 When they heard about all He was doing, many people came to Him from Judea, Jerusalem, Idumea, and the regions across the Jordan, and around Tyre and Sidon. 3:20 Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that He and his disciples were not even able to eat.4:1 Again Jesus began to teach by the lake. The crowd that gathered around Him was so large that He got into a boat and sent it out on the lake, while all the people were along the shore at the water’s edge. 2 He taught them many things by parables.
This is the change we saw in Jesus’ interactions with the masses–He had started out proclaiming the gospel and teaching from the Word. Now He is no longer speaking plainly to them, but teaching in parables. ————————– B. His Disciples.
3:13 Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to Him those He wanted, and they came to Him. 14 He appointed twelve that they might be with Him and that He might send them out to preach.
Up until now, we had seen Jesus surrounded by many disciples. Now He chooses a special group of twelve to always be with Him and that He can send out to multiply His work. At that point they will be called Apostles, “sent ones.”
4:10 When Jesus was alone, with only the Twelve and the other disciples around Him, they asked him about the parable. 11 Jesus told them, “The secrets of the kingdom of God have been given to you. But to those on the outside, I speak in parables.”4:33 With many similar parables Jesus spoke the Word to the crowd, as much as they could understand. 34 He did not say anything to them without using a parable. But when He was alone with His own disciples, He explained everything to them.
With the change to teaching the masses in parables, Jesus now begins teaching deeper truths about the Kingdom of God to the twelve and any other disciples who are with Him at the time.
C. His Opponents. The opponents of Jesus had been increasing in their opposition to His actions and His teachings. Identified variably as ‘teachers of the Law,’ ‘Scribes,’ (those who made the copies of what we call the Old Testament and who taught the people what it said), and Pharisees (a sect of Jewish lawyers who emphasized purity by avoiding any kind of impure person or thing.) They had began by questioning Jesus’ teachings and lack of conformity to current mores. Then they began criticizing Him. Now we see their opposition take a sinister turn.
3:22 And the teachers of the Law who came down from Jerusalem said, “He is possessed by Beelzebul! It is by the prince of demons that He is driving out demons.” 23 So Jesus called them over to Him and began to speak to them in parables: “How can Satan drive out Satan? 24 If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand…”
3:28 Truly I tell you, people can be forgiven all their sins and every slander they utter, 29 but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; they are guilty of an eternal sin.” 30 He said this because they were saying, “He has an impure spirit.” —————-‐–‐ Whoa! Jesus was still willing to address their accusations, but it looks like His opponents had crossed a line as He now pronounced one of the most controversial things that He was recorded as saying, they were guilty of the “Unpardonable Sin.” ———————– D. His Family: Mark has not made mention of Jesus’ family until now, but apparently word of what He was doing and saying had gotten back to them in Nazareth, so they came to see Him where He was teaching and ministering along the Sea of Galilee.
3:21 When His family heard about this, they went to take charge of Him, for they said, “He is out of his mind!”3:31 Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call Him. 32 A crowd of disciples was sitting around Him, and they told Him, “Your mother and brothers are outside looking for You.”3:33 “Who are my mother and my brothers?” Jesus asked. 34 Then He looked at the disciples seated in a circle around Him and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! 35 Whoever does God’s will is My brother and sister and mother.”
Wow! Doubly harsh! First His family rejects who He is, and then He rejects His family. ———————- II. SUMMARY So here are the transitions we see in this week’s section of Mark:
A. The masses–Jesus dissociates from the masses by teaching them using stories, leaving the hearers puzzled about what He is saying. It’s like He’s accomplished His first goal to attract those from the masses who want a deeper relationship with Him as disciples, and now He’s moving on.
B. His disciples. Apparently having accumulated a critical mass of followers, Jesus selects 12 for special teachings and assignment. He now focuses more of His teachings to private sessions with them and other, local disciples who aren’t following Him from place to place.
C. His opponents. The Jewish religious leadership increase their attacks on Jesus and Jesus accelerates right back at them. This is going to set up the final confrontation when they have Jesus arrested and crucified, actually what God has planned.
D. His family. Jesus makes a final break from His family and shows how He is ‘all in’ as far as His commitment to His disciples. By the way, this is the first time we see that there are woman disciples as well as men, even if all the chosen Twelve were men.
III. PARABLES I’m just going to skip over the parables we looked at this week because what caught my attention was at the end of Jesus’ parable about the lamp and lampstand.
A. To set the scene:
4:11 Jesus told them, “The secrets of the Kingdom of God have been given to you. But to those on the outside, I speak in parables.”4:23 If anyone has ears to hear, let them hear.” (This is a quote from Isaiah 6:9, but similar statements appear throughout the Old Testament.)
4:24 “Consider carefully what you hear,” he continued. “With the measure you use, it will be measured to you—and even more, 25 whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.” ————————— B. This is the SECOND harsh pronouncement in our reading this week. For some reason I had not taken note of this statemrent at the end of the parable before. But, I WAS familiar with it at the end of another parable. (Images (c) Mark Young Bible Cartoons)
Three stewards were given some money to handle, according to their demonstrated abilities, while their master went on a long journey (Matthew 25:14-30 and Luke 19:12-28).When the master returned, he called the stewards in to give an account of their handling of the money. The first two received rewards for investing their share and for receiving a good return on their investment.But the steward who received the least just buried the money until the master returned, then dug it up and gave it back to him.
And then, as the moral of the Parable, we have that same statement by Jesus:
C. Now, it was never clear to me exactly what the ‘talents’ (KJV) were, translated by modern versions as gold in Matthew and and coins in Luke. The happenstance of the match with the modern English word, ‘talent,’ referring to natural gifts and abilities we are born with, had always led to the passage being taught as meaning we should use our natural gifts and abilities to serve God and to advance His Kingdom.
I think the repetition of this moral in Mark 4 makes the answer to the question clearer, though. The parable about handling money is definitely about accountability, and so too is Mark 4. However, now we see it is not about something of worldly value or natural ability, but rather of spiritual, eternal value–the gospel, which gives us eternal life when we believe, and God’s eternal Word, which is able to redeem our souls unto righteousness.
I believe Jesus is warning His hearers, and us down through history, that we have to be intentional in listening to what God is saying, we have to be intentional in thinking about what it means, and we have to respond in obedience to the message and truths that God reveals to us, AND that God is going to hold us accountable for how we use His spiritual treasure.
The first ‘coin’ is the gospel, and the next two parables are about planting the ‘seed’ of the gospel to establish and grow God’s Kingdom here on Earth. The method of ‘investing’ it is to proclaim it to those around us. The implication is, if we are successful in sharing the gospel, God will entrust more ‘treasures’ from His Word to us and we will have another opportunity to invest it in others by teaching and guiding them into obedience. But what if we don’t?
IV. APPLICATION
In the Law, there were blessings for following it and curses for not. We live in a different spiritual age, the Age of Grace, so there are increasing blessings for obedience, and removal of those blessings for not. No punishment, no curses, just loss of God’s hand of blessing in our lives. For example:
Where God promises to take care of our essential needs if we seek first His Kingdom and His Righteousness, He stops, and now we have to take care of everything we need by ourselves, but we’ll find we cannot.Where God promises to keep our hearts at peace beyond our understanding, He stops, and we become filled with worries and anxiety.
There are many, many more blessings that I think we as Christians take for granted until we lose them. I know, because I have.
I was a success at everything I did until I graduated from college and moved to the big city. One of my own transitions. I had spent the last 10 years involved with the Navigators as a part-time volunteer–first in the military, then in college. The Navigators are a para-church organization specializing in disciple-making.
During that 10 years, I had shared the gospel with many people, although no one ever made a decision for Christ. After completing their study curriculum, I began teaching their class on how to study the Bible, as I was very good at that. I met individually with many young men during those years, but I never made any disciples. What I now understand about those 10 years is God didn’t hold me accountable for my success, He held me accountable for my obedience.
After college, starting my career became my focus–teaching, coaching and continuing my education. Although I wanted to bring what I had learned about discipleship to the church, I had limited success and soon settled into a standard Sunday-morning-church kind of Christian.
Sharing the gospel was never a big part of my life, anyway. Without being a part of an organization that did those things, very slowly all of my newly learned Christian disciplines began to fall away. Then everything else I did began to fail. Small failures at first, but bigger and bigger failures until the career arc, and the life I had envisioned having, began to fall apart until it completely disappeared.
Now, I’m in another transition, the final one to the end of my life. I’m under treatment for several potentially terminal health conditions, any one of which could take me out at any time.
As I’m walking this final journey, two things have become prominent in my thinking. First is the verse, “The judgments of the Lord are just; they are always fair.” (Psalm 19:9b, Good News Translation) I’m willing to accept God’s judgments in removing the blessings of success and health, resulting in failure and sickness, as being justified because I have not been faithful with the treasures of the gospel and Biblical truths that God entrusted to me.
The other thing that has been filling my thoughts has been an almost overwhelming desire to leave a legacy for the Lord. Since i received my terminal diagnosis, I’d been praying for something I could do that would make a difference for God’s kingdom on Earth in the little time I have left, but my options were limited due to my disability and now being debilitated. Through a roundabout series of events, I came to write this blog. I hope that my thoughts, insights and experiences are helpful to you, my few subscribers, in your own walk with Jesus.
There is a possibility, though, that gives me hope for something better. In a recent sermon at Summit Church about Psalm 32 by Pastor Brian Loritts, he showed how David finally came to a place of repentance and confession to God after his sin with Bathsheba…and God forgave and restored him!
Another example he shared was Peter. Peter had denied he even knew Jesus while He was on trial…THREE TIMES! But Jesus forgave a repentant Peter and used him to deliver the Pentecost message where 3,000 responded in faith and were added to the church.
Pastor Loritts pointed out that God is in the restoration business. Jesus is a safe place to take our sins, failures and shortcomings to, because He loves us, He’ll accept us in our repentance, and forgive and restore us to right standing with Him–not condemn or punish us.
That is my hope and prayer before I leave this Earth; that as I lean into Jesus in my brokenness, He will restore His hand of blessing, and as David said in Psalm 51, which Pastor Loritts said was linked to Psalm 32:
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. 11 Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. 12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation and uphold me by Your generous Spirit … 17 My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, Such sacrifices I know you will not disdain.
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