Friday, April 30, 2010

Luke 13:10-21 Commentary

Jesus Heals a Crippled Woman on the Sabbath
10 On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, 11 and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, "Woman, [a] you are set free from your infirmity." 13 Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.
14 Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue leader said to the people, "There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath."

15 The Lord answered him, "You hypocrites! Doesn't each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? 16 Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?"

17 When he said this, all his opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing.

The Parables of the Mustard Seed and the Yeast
18 Then Jesus asked, "What is the kingdom of God like? What shall I compare it to? 19 It is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his garden. It grew and became a tree, and the birds perched in its branches."
20 Again he asked, "What shall I compare the kingdom of God to? 21 It is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into about sixty pounds [b] of flour until it worked all through the dough."


Dig Deeper
One of my favorite things to do in the whole world is to take my wife and kids shopping at Sam’s Club on Saturday mornings. It’s not that I really enjoy shopping that much, mind you, although if I do have to shop anywhere I’ll take Sam’s Club every time. It’s not about the shopping at all really. What I love about Sam’s Club on Saturday morning are the samples. It seems that virtually every aisle in these rather large warehouse-type stores has some nice older lady giving out free food samples. They offer samples on everything from cake and juice to steak and pizza. Oh, it’s absolutely wonderful. On a good day you can almost get a lunch’s worth of food just from walking around and sampling the many different items throughout the store. The question that is interesting, though, is why would the store give out samples like that? It’s got to be fairly expensive to give out that many samples, so why do it at all? The reason that they do it is because there is a point to giving out samples that goes beyond just the samples themselves. The store doesn’t give out that sample just so I can enjoy it and have a slightly better shopping experience. They give out the sample hoping that it will help me to see that I need to actually but that product. That’s the purpose of the sample. It is a small little portion given out that points me to my need for the full product.

It’s important to remember that, as incredible as the miracles of Jesus could be, they had a point beyond just the miraculous action itself. Jesus just didn’t go around healing people so that their lives would be more comfortable and to show how powerful he was. The miracles were like little samples of the kingdom of God. They were intended to be small bits that pointed people to the larger thing that God would bring to those who would embrace his kingdom. The miracles were small little portions intended to point others to their need for the full kingdom of God.

As this scene opens up, Luke tells us that Jesus was teaching in a synagogue. We don’t know enough facts about how individual synagogues went about their normal business in the first century to say for sure how the situation would have come about that Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, and Luke doesn’t tell us. It doesn’t take much speculation, however, to realize that this would have been an uncomfortable situation for the synagogue leader. He would have been, presumably, under a fair amount of pressure to deal with this “Jesus situation.”

Jesus certainly valued teaching as a central component of his kingdom announcing vocation, but as Jesus was teaching, he was interrupted by the sight of a crippled woman. As committed as Jesus was to his teaching, he was never more committed to that than to the people to whom he was teaching. Jesus knew that the needs of those he was teaching came first, but he also knew that this was a teachable moment. He could verbally teach the people of Israel about the nature of the kingdom of God and what God wanted to do for them as a people or he could stop and show them by giving this woman a sample of the kingdom of God itself.

Luke doesn’t give us all of the details concerning this woman’s sickness that we might like but we do know that it had crippled her for nearly two decades. This is no short-term illness. This was a debilitating problem that kept her from living a full life. The mention of the detail that she was crippled by a spirit does not infer that Luke saw her as being demon-possessed, but instead points to the fact that her crippled state was grounded in some sort of satanic bondage that extended beyond a mere physical ailment. Many theories have been put forth as to what exactly her ailment was but the reality is we don’t know and never will, but that’s not the point that Luke wants us to see. This is yet another occasion to remind ourselves as biblical readers that if the text doesn’t answer the questions we are asking, we are probably asking the wrong questions.

As she slowly approached Jesus, he freed her from her bondage instantly by the authority of his word and touch. She did not have to do anything more than come to Jesus in faith and she was freed and healed. Her immediate and appropriate response was to praise God for surely she at least understood that Jesus was the agent of God at the very least.

Her instinct to praise God as a result of this amazing act of liberation was fitting and we might expect that the response of the synagogue leader would be equally appropriate, but we would be wrong. Rather than praising God as the woman did, he found something wrong with what Jesus’ was doing. He points out that this could have been done on any day but not on the Sabbath, a day that was to see no work, so as to honor God. He appealed to Deuteronomy 5:13 to make his case that there are six other days in which to work, but not on the Sabbath.

Jesus’ response is sharp and to the point. If he wants to refer to Deuteronomy 5:13, then Jesus will go right there with him but show him his error in that he neglected to consider Deuteronomy 5:14. The prohibition on work extended to animals too, not just human beings. Yet, they had no problem with untying their ox or donkey on the Sabbath to lead it to a drink of water. Their animal’s lives were not in danger, but they found it okay to untie them them just the same. If that was acceptable behavior under the law why would he be opposed to a daughter of Abraham, who had been bound up for eighteen years under Satan’s dominion, being set free. How could he possibly be opposed to this woman being unbound from satanic oppression? If people were ready to show compassion to animals on the Sabbath, why would they deny compassion to this woman?

The fact was, said Jesus, that they were hypocrites, not in the sense of saying one thing while doing something else but in the sense that they were completely unable to discern the purposes of God. They were missing the nature of God, the point of the law, and even what Jesus was doing right there in front of them. He wasn’t just healing this woman. He was offering samples of the kingdom of God. He was showing them all that God longed to do for Israel and for all human beings what Jesus was doing for this woman. Jesus desired to free them from their satanic bondage, but ironically, they were so beholden to their version of God and his law that they were unable to see what Jesus was really doing. They had so tightly gripped their own expectations that they were unable to grab hold to the kingdom vision that Jesus was offering to the nation of Israel.

That Luke is showing us something about the kingdom of God is made clear by the fact that verse 18 begins with a linking word “therefore” (which is somewhat obscured by the TNIV’s “then”). Jesus had given them a sample of the kingdom of God and now he was going to return to teaching to drive the point home. To what could he compare the kingdom of God? From one angle the kingdom is like a mustard seed. It is a tiny and insignificant seed when put to the ground, but in time it becomes so large and treelike that birds can perch in it. The imagery likely comes from Ezekiel 17:22-24, where the Messiah would be the source of rest for his own people and for birds of every kind, meaning people of all nations. Another source of the imagery probably comes from the contrast of Daniel 4:10-12 where the Nebuchadnezzar’s kingdom starts with the promise of being a tree where the birds of all nations could rest but it ultimately ended in ruin as a stump.

From another angle, the kingdom of God is like a small amount of yeast that can be mixed into enough dough to feed 150 people and will work its way through the entire batch and change it.

That’s what the kingdom of God is like. It starts out seemingly small and insignificant. In fact it is perhaps somewhat shocking that when Jesus wanted to compare the kingdom to something he didn’t grab something royal and impressive but talked of ordinary, everyday things. Yes it starts out hardly noteworthy, but it doesn’t stay that way for long. The kingdom of God can break forth even through seemingly inconsequential acts like the making whole of a stooped, little old lady. It can come through tiny things like that but it would continue to grow to become the family tree in whose branches the people of all nations could perch. It would be small and hidden but pervasively work it’s way through the whole batch.

Now, if they would but take the sample and realize that the restoring wholeness that had just been poured out on this woman, was exactly what Jesus wanted to do for the whole nation of Israel. It is, in fact, precisely what Jesus wants to do for us, for our friends, our neighbors, our communities, and for the whole world one day.


Devotional Thought
How are you at giving out samples of God’s kingdom? Do you tend to limit yourself to just talking about God’s kingdom or do you make efforts to give out small little samples to those around you of what God’s kingdom looks like when it breaks into our present age? Spend some time considering how you can give out samples of God’s kingdom to those around you.

Thursday, April 29, 2010

Luke 13:1-9 Commentary

Repent or Perish
1 Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. 2 Jesus answered, "Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? 3 I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. 4 Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? 5 I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish."
6 Then he told this parable: "A man had a fig tree growing in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it but did not find any. 7 So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, 'For three years now I've been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven't found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?'

8 " 'Sir,' the man replied, 'leave it alone for one more year, and I'll dig around it and fertilize it. 9 If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.' "


Dig Deeper
I think we all have songs that we are slightly embarrassed to admit that we like because they’re just not cool in the eyes of others. As I sit here and type this, I am listening to one of my favorite songs that would fall in that category. The song is none other than “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” by Gordon Lightfoot. The song is written about a boat that sank in a terrible storm and killed all 29 people on board, and it happened not too awfully far from where I live. I love that song and it always causes me to ponder about our lives and how quickly they can come to an end. This morning though, as I listened to this song and read this passage in Luke one more time, my thoughts turned to the Titanic. Here was a ship that was the wonder of its day. People were on board going around enjoying some of the greatest luxuries that could be offered at that time, and were completely unaware that they were hurtling towards their own impending deaths. The captain of the ship had made the decision to try to impress everyone in the world with how fast this brand new ship was by arriving at port a day early, so he continued to go as fast as they could even though they were cutting through iceberg infested waters. The simple fact was that the leader of that ship had made a decision and everyone on that ship was going to die. If they stayed on that ship, they were going to sink and die because the only place the Titanic was heading was the bottom of the ocean. Of course no one knew that but what if they had? What if someone had come and warned them days before the crash that this was the fate of the ship and everyone on it? What would we think then of those who dismissed those warnings and stayed?

We often think of Jesus’ long and intentional march towards Jerusalem and his own death as a strangely wonderful thing, and for us it is a wonderful thing in many ways. But it is easy to forget that this was also a national tragedy. It was the time when God’s long awaited promise to return to his people was being fulfilled. Yet, the very people who were waiting for his return failed to see that this was it. Jesus’ march towards Jerusalem was the return of YHWH (the personal name for God in the Old Testament as it was revealed to the nation of Israel) to Zion. This was an incredibly wonderful event for those that embraced Jesus. But it was incredibly tragic for the nation of Israel that was on the verge of rejecting Jesus. He and his followers were furiously trying to warn them that the nation of Israel was sinking fast and they needed to get on the lifeboat that Jesus was offering. It was such a tragic scene that when Jesus stands with Jerusalem in his sights, he feels nothing but anguish over the whole situation and the fate of the people that were rejecting their own God (Lk. 13:34-35).

Many commentators over the years have reduced verses 1-5 to being nothing more than a moral warning from Jesus concerning those who think that only evil meet bad ends in the present age. Jesus was, they argue, trying to correct the perception that only bad things happen to bad people while good things happen to good people. Although the principles of that argument are certainly contained within these sayings of Jesus, it would be, I believe, a mistake to simply limit Jesus’ words to just that. Not to mention, to do so is to not really consider the context of this passage and the larger context of Luke 9-19. That Jesus is speaking of things larger than just the individual is made clear by Jesus’ parable in verses 6-7, which clearly have to do with Israel.

The topic brought up to Jesus concerning the Galileans is deeply ironic when we consider that Jesus and his band of Galileans are themselves on the road to Jerusalem. The topic of the Galileans, though, concerned a recent event in which a group of Galileans were on pilgrimage to offer sacrifices at the Temple and were slaughtered at the orders of Pilate, presumably for suspicion of starting a rebellion or riot of some kind against the authorities. Jesus had been speaking of the judgment that would come upon those who spurned his call to abandon the desire to join the nationalistic fervor and desire to defeat Rome and expel them from the land of Israel and to embrace the way of the kingdom of God which called for a defeat of the true enemies of sin and death rather than Rome. In light of this horrible end for the Galileans, would Jesus continue to Jerusalem? Was this a sign that those Galilean pilgrims were the ones that Jesus had spoken of? Were they being judged for rejecting Jesus’ teaching and embracing their own way? Were they being punished by God for continuing along the path of rebellion and violence?

Jesus’ answer is pointed. The problem was not that they were any worse than any other Galilean, or any other Jew for that matter. The problem was not that they had distinguished themselves within Israel as being particularly worthy of God’s wrath. The real problem was that all of Israel was heading down the path of confrontation with Rome, a confrontation that was not part of Jesus’ kingdom agenda. It wouldn’t be enough to simply sit back and not engage in overt acts of violence or rebellion because the leaders of Israel had already set the course for the nation. They were streaming through an iceberg field and had no intention of turning the other way and embracing God’s will.

In the same way, those who were crushed when the tower in the small section of Jerusalem known as Siloam (just South of the Temple) crashed upon them, were no worse than any other Israelite. They had not done anything to distinguish themselves as worthy above all others of God’s wrath. Pilate had the Galilean pilgrims killed but they were no different from any other Galilean pilgrims. The people who died under the falling rubble at Siloam were no different than any other citizens in Jerusalem. The point was that unless they repented from the path set for Israel by her leaders, then everyone was going to die in the same way. This was a dire warning about the fate of Jerusalem and her inhabitants unless they turned from their preconceived notions of how they wanted God to work and quickly followed Jesus’ path of what it really meant to be part of God’s family.

To make his point clear, Jesus told a parable using the familiar symbol of a fig tree growing in a vineyard. The fig tree and vineyard were common Old Testament images for the nation of Israel, but it seems rather likely that Jesus drew upon Micah 7 as the primary source for his imagery, considering not only the contexts of this passage and Micah 7, which has to do God looking for the fruit of covenant faithfulness (cf. Isa. 5:1-7) and finding none in Israel, as well as the fact that Jesus already strongly alluded to Micah 7 in Luke 12:49-53.

It is possible that the imagery of looking for fruitfulness for three years comes from Deuteronomy 14:28-29, according to commentator C.F. Evans, who believed that Luke would have seen that there should be special evidence of fruitfulness on the third year. It is doubtful that Luke was making a direct correlation to the traditional view that Jesus had three years of ministry, but rather saw the three years as a sufficient amount of time for the tree to bear fruit if it was ever going to do so.

The point of the parable, however, was that there was no fruitfulness as far as the fig tree was concerned. There was, in fact, no evidence that Israel was repenting of her wholesale rejection of Jesus’ kingdom announcement. It was time to cut down the tree. Yet, the man who was in the vineyard day-in and day-out, taking care of it, asked for just a little more time. Israel had been given more than enough time to bear fruit and deserved to be cut down, but Jesus hints, perhaps she would be given just a little more time to repent before being cut down completely. It gives the reader pause, though, to know that Jesus has already made clear that he is going to Jerusalem to die, so we are left to wonder about the connection between that fact and the impending fate of the city that is alluded to here. It also should cause us to stop and think about the sad fact that Israel did not repent. The nation did not stop its course of fruitlessness and rejection of the Messiah and would indeed feel the full brunt of the ax as the fig tree was cut down.

At the same time, passages like this always leave us wondering what we can take away from this for our own Christian communities right now. The principle is actually fairly clear. Jesus had laid out a plan of what it meant to follow him and be God’s people, a plan which relied on joining God’s family as defined by the Christ and taking part in his reconciling project throughout the whole world. In rejecting that plan for their own ideas, Israel found themselves outside of the purposes of God, outside of the family of God, and ignoring the dire warnings of what would happen if they put themselves in such a position. This should be just as clear a warning to us of the consequences of rejecting a similar call to be part of God’s people and partner with him in his great reconciliation project. If we reject God’s kingdom and go our own path we too will find the same judgment awaits us as everyone else. It is also a stern reminder that God will not wait forever for repentance. He is patient and loving but he is also just. We must be patient with those who have yet to accept Jesus’ family and constantly try to keep fertilizing it, while at the same time giving them the clear warning that the master may return at any moment to cut down the fruitless trees.


Devotional Thought
What does God want to do in your church family and your community right now? How does he want to use you and your entire church to go about that? Are you truly embracing his plan with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength or do you spend an awful lot of time taking care of your agenda? What would happen if you and those around you really grabbed hold of God’s dream and the project that he is up to in your community right now? How might you go about doing that today?

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Luke 12:49-59 Commentary

Not Peace but Division
49 "I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! 50 But I have a baptism to undergo, and what constraint I am under until it is completed! 51 Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division. 52 From now on there will be five in one family divided against each other, three against two and two against three. 53 They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law."

Interpreting the Times
54 He said to the crowd: "When you see a cloud rising in the west, immediately you say, 'It's going to rain,' and it does. 55 And when the south wind blows, you say, 'It's going to be hot,' and it is. 56 Hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of the earth and the sky. How is it that you don't know how to interpret this present time?

57 "Why don't you judge for yourselves what is right? 58 As you are going with your adversary to the magistrate, try hard to be reconciled on the way, or your adversary may drag you off to the judge, and the judge turn you over to the officer, and the officer throw you into prison. 59 I tell you, you will not get out until you have paid the last penny."


Dig Deeper
The last semester in college that an education major typically has is a semester of student teaching where they spend the entire day at a school with a mentor teacher, eventually taking over that teacher’s classes and teaching them for the balance of the semester. I had a particularly good experience with that, as my mentor teacher was an incredible teacher who had actually been named the National Geographic teacher of the year. He was an amazing teacher and I was somewhat intimidated to have to take over his classes and teach them but what amazed me even more was his ability to know his students. I was taken a bit off guard in my first few weeks by how volatile the behavior of the students could be from day to day. One day they would be quiet, respectful, and in learning mode, while the next day they would be bouncing off the walls, so to speak. My mentor teacher had years of wisdom, discernment, and experience, however, that offset all of that. He would stand with me in the halls in the morning as the kids were arriving at school for the day and, based on a number of factors that he would explain, including the stage of the moon, the weather, the day of the week, and the time of the year, he would tell me how the kids were likely going to behave as a group that day. He would then readjust his lesson plans for the day based on that. What was amazing was that he seemed to always be right about his assessment. He could look at the signs and know what kind of day it was going to be and how to act accordingly. I realized then and there that I had a lot to learn about teaching that hadn’t been taught in our classrooms or I was going to be in big trouble.

In 1 Chronicles 12:32, praise is given to the tribe of Issachar because they had “men who understood the times and knew what Israel should do.” Training, privilege, and ability can all be good things but they pale in comparison to the ability to discern a situation and act on that information correctly. Israel, during the time of Jesus, had signs swirling about it everywhere. They had been waiting for God to act and to return to Israel to fulfill his promises for a long, long time. The Pharisees and Jewish religious leaders were constantly looking at Jesus and demanding signs, but they wanted to see certain signs that fit with their expectations. What they really needed to do was to open their eyes and look at the signs that were all around them. They had a lot to learn and needed to wake up or they were going to be in big trouble.

The Jews had been waiting for the return of God to Israel for many generations, thinking that this would be a time when God would defeat Israel’s enemies, presumably the Romans, and would exalt Israel in a position to rule with God over the whole world forever. This would be the much-anticipated day of the Lord that Israel waited for so expectantly, but they had seemingly forgotten or ignored the words of Amos, “Woe to you who long for the day of the LORD! Why do you long for the day of the LORD? That day will be darkness, not light. Will not the day of the LORD be darkness, not light—pitch-dark, without a ray of brightness? ‘I hate, I despise your religious festivals; I cannot stand your assemblies’” Amos 5:18, 20-21). The Day of the Lord (which was any day of specific judgment by God, but most immediately fulfilled in 70 AD with the destruction of Jerusalem, an event which points ahead to the final day of resurrection and judgment) would be a day of judgment and fire, and Jesus longed to see it come because it would be the day that would reveal who the children of God really were. The coming crisis and judgment upon Israel would vindicate the Messiah’s people as the true people of God.

But Jesus would undergo his own crisis as the deciding factor that would set in motion the wheels of final judgment upon Israel. His complete immersion in suffering and shame on a cross would not signal his defeat or failure as a Messiah. He would walk into death in the most shameful way possible in the first century, on a cross, but he would walk right into death and come out on the other side, declaring himself to be the true Son of God, starting the clock on the final judgment of those who opposed him as God’s agent, and vindicating his own disciples as people of the light.

Certainly Jesus’ kingdom message was one of peace (Lk. 2:14) but Jesus did not want his disciples to miss an important point that the religious Jews of the day had apparently missed. He would also be the “cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed” (Lk. 2:34-35). Jesus referred them to the prophet Micah, who declared that when the Messiah came that his message would divide families, neighbors, indeed the nation of Israel itself (Micah 7:6). This was one of the signs that people should have been looking for. A Messiah who came as a great military leader would have been extremely popular throughout most of Israel, as Judas Maccabeus had been a popular military leader a century earlier. But the true Messiah would divide right down the middle of households as some embraced him as their true inheritance as the people of God and others rejected him.

His behavior would force a choice that would divide families. His message of peace would not bring peace within all of Israel but only to those who entered into his community. The rejection of traditional values and badges that normally demonstrated Israel the people of God would cause Jesus’ disciples to behave in ways that would be regarded as deviant and distasteful by their unbelieving family members. The continued deconstruction of the normal family bonds in favor of God’s new family was something that was a central tenet of Jesus’ teaching in Luke (Lk. 8:19-21; 9:57-62; 14:25-35; 18:28-30) but one that has been largely watered down if not altogether ignored in our time.

This division causing message should have served as a sign along with many other aspects of Jesus’ ministry but the Jewish leaders had already made up their mind as to the type of Messiah they wanted. With their preconceived notions firmly set, they were looking for signs in all the wrong places. This was particularly troublesome to Jesus who chided them for their ability to read signs everywhere except where it really mattered. Oh sure, they could read all the signs in the environment and tell when it was going to rain or be hot, a skill which was valuable in a time when there were no television weathermen, but these were still of limited importance. How could they pay such careful attention to all the right signs in things of limited value but miss the things that really matter? How could they observe all that was going on around Jesus and through his ministry and not see that this was the Messiah that God had promised? God was returning to Israel and they were completely oblivious to all the tip offs of that. Those who failed to discern those signs, said Jesus, were hypocrites, by which he meant not what we tend to think of when we hear that word, which is the idea of saying one thing and doing another, but rather the idea of being completely void of God’s purposes in their lives.

Jesus’ ministry forced people to read the signs of the time, and to discern rightly and make a choice as to whether they would pay attention to those signs or not. We would do well here to remember that Jesus’ warnings here were primarily referring to the near-future fulfillment of the coming crisis on the nation of Israel rather than specific warnings to individuals concerning the final judgment at the resurrection. This is likely why Jesus transitions into an example in verses 57-59 that come from the Roman world rather than a specifically Jewish context. If someone were to be taken before a Roman magistrate by another party they had better make every effort to drop their agenda and surrender quickly. The majority of the Jewish leaders had decided that a war with Rome was what God wanted, but it was really their projection of their own desires of how God should be working. If they continued running towards that end, they would be in trouble. In Jesus’ example, the stubborn subject of the parable would wind up paying for his stiff necked behavior with every last penny unless he repented. This was a stern warning to Israel to abandon their agenda and embrace Jesus’ way of peace in the kingdom of God.

This does not, however, mean that there is nothing in this passage for us. Quite the opposite actually. The disaster that was coming upon Jerusalem is a foreshadowing and teaching point to warn those who would reject God’s covenant family as to what will happen to the family of fallen humanity at the resurrection and final judgment. That does not mean that every single prophecy about the coming destruction of Jerusalem will have a corresponding fulfillment at that time, but as a whole the principle is the same. We are called to be a people that can discern and understand the times and to preach the true message of the gospel, calling people of all nations to join the family of Christ and escape the coming wrath of God. If that message, like Jesus’, causes division between those who would embrace it and those who would reject the truth of this message, then so be it. That is the nature of the gospel.


Devotional Thought
It is one thing to read that Jesus’ message would cause division and even to say that ours should do the same. But it is a whole other thing to stand firm and boldly proclaim the gospel wherever we are in the face of that division amongst our fellow students, co-workers, and family members. Are you really prepared to face the consequences of the dividing message of the need for all people to join the family of God? Do you proclaim that gospel boldly? Does your proclamation of the gospel have the divisive effect that Jesus’ true message will always have? These are all things to take some time today to consider carefully.

Monday, April 26, 2010

Luke 12:35-48 Commentary

Watchfulness
35 "Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning, 36 like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks they can immediately open the door for him. 37 It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes. Truly I tell you, he will dress himself to serve, will have them recline at the table and will come and wait on them. 38 It will be good for those servants whose master finds them ready, even if he comes in the middle of the night or toward daybreak. 39 But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. 40 You also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him."
41 Peter asked, "Lord, are you telling this parable to us, or to everyone?"

42 The Lord answered, "Who then is the faithful and wise manager, whom the master puts in charge of his servants to give them their food allowance at the proper time? 43 It will be good for that servant whom the master finds doing so when he returns. 44 Truly I tell you, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. 45 But suppose the servant says to himself, 'My master is taking a long time in coming,' and he then begins to beat the other servants, both men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk. 46 The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the unbelievers.

47 "The servant who knows the master's will and does not get ready or does not do what the master wants will be beaten with many blows. 48 But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.


Dig Deeper
Not too long ago someone asked me about a debate that they were having with some friends. The friends were skeptics of the Bible and they were taking issue with some passages in the book of Isaiah that were typically viewed as passages that were prophecies of the Messiah. From time to time these types of debates will pop up with the skeptics arguing that the passages seem to be about things that would happen during Isaiah’s lifetime and, therefore, cannot be prophecies about Jesus as the Messiah. Christians will usually counter back that, of course, these passages are about the Messiah. They seem to point directly to aspects of Jesus’ life as well as the fact that the New Testament writers saw in those passages clear prophecies concerning Jesus. The case is settled in the mind of both sides. The problem is, and this may surprise you, neither of those two arguments are actually correct. In fact, they both are wrong and they both are right. It’s quite a riddle, actually. How can both be right?

The answer to this riddle lies in the fact that we must understand that God is a master teacher. He is always communicating with and teaching his people through different means. One of the most effective methods that God uses to teach is through experience. When we experience something we learn it a lot better and in a more lasting way than if we simply read about it. Virtually everything ancient Israel did as recorded in the Old Testament pointed to something about God and their relationship with him that needed to be learned. For instance, all of the festivals that Israel celebrated contained truths about thecoming Messiah that God wanted his people to learn in a very real and memorable way. It is no different with the majority of those prophecies in Isaiah, and the other books of the Old Testament. Things would be prophesied by Isaiah that would be fulfilled in an immediate way by some event during his lifetime. But that event, including the fulfillment of the prophecy were intended by God as a real-world example of what would happen when the Messiah came. Thus, the prophecy was both about the near-event fulfillment and the ultimate fulfillment in the Messiah. Both my friend and the other person in the previous mentioned case, you see, were partly correct.

I mention this principle because I believe it applies to passages like this, and several others in Luke. We tend to read this passage and assume that Jesus is talking about his return at the second coming and the final judgment at the time of the resurrection. This is certainly the majority view, but others would argue that this passage is all about events that would be fulfilled in Jesus’ lifetime. They would assert that Jesus was speaking of the national calamity that was quickly coming upon the nation of Israel if she refused, as a nation, to repent of her sins and continued to reject the Messiah. Just as with the Isaiah example, though, both arguments are partly correct. Jesus was, I believe speaking of the near-time events that would come upon the nation of Israel if they rejected the Messiah-shaped family that God had always promised and would now be available through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. But that event would also stand as a testament and a teaching tool to point to that final judgment at the time of the resurrection for the enemies of God.

The disciples of Jesus needed to be constantly on their guard, that much was apparent. They were not on a pleasure cruise. Things would be coming at them hard and fast for the remainder of their lives as a result of their decision to follow Jesus. Whether it was the events that would swirl around them as Jesus marched straight into the jaws of death, the incredible events surrounding his resurrection, the amazing outpouring of the Spirit weeks after that resurrection, the constant advance of the gospel throughout the world and the accompanying persecution, or the national disaster that would strike the nation of Israel as God sent his final judgment on them as a nation in AD 70 through the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. Whatever the circumstances, the Christian family must always be ready and alert. Because we are to be a people that lives by the values of the age to come but we live in the present age, we must be constantly alert and thinking through each situation so that we don’t fall into conforming to the patterns of this age (cf. Rom. 12:2).

To make this point of the need to be constantly ready, Jesus used three common examples that would have been familiar to all of his listeners. The first was that of a servant who was eagerly waiting for the master to return from a banquet so that he could be let in immediately and find a house that was in the same order in which he left it. When the master does return and find that his servants were prepared for his presence, he will come with them and eat with and serve them, signifying that they were truly accepted by him. But is Jesus speaking of the disciples need to be ready when the soldiers come to take Jesus to his death, or when they are huddled together praying after his death, or many years later when it was clear that the judgment of God was about to be unleashed on Israel through the might of the Roman army, or was he talking about the coming resurrection one day? The answer to all of those would be “yes.: Whatever the situation, they must “be dressed and ready for service,” a phrase that was literally in the Greek, “gird up your loins” (which referred to a person who had wrapped up his clothes around his thighs and waist so that he could run or hurry) This meant to be in a constant state of readiness as Luke borrows language from Exodus 12:10 and thus continues the motif of identifying Jesus’ current mission, the new exodus, with that of the first Exodus.

As Jesus makes the point that the servants need to be ready, even when it seems darkest (see Romans 13:11-14 where Paul urges the Christian community to live as though it is already daytime even though the world is still in the darkness of the present age because the day is coming and we are a family that lives by reality of the coming day of the age to come), he switches images a bit to another familiar scene, that of a thief breaking into a house. Thieves operate on the element of surprise. If you knew when they were coming, they would not be very successful. Those who are not ready for the coming of the Son of Man will likewise not be very successful. Although Jesus has been speaking in terms that can be understood and applied to disciples in all times in all situations, this is a warning that obviously referred primarily to his present mission to warn Israel to repent, to join the family of God, and to avoid the coming day of judgment, the day of the Lord, that would descend at an unexpected time like a thief in the middle of the night. Yet, it is important to remember that this return of the Son of Man and the subsequent judgment of the nation that had rejected him, would be a foreshadowing, a teaching moment, that pointed to the final return of the Son of Man at the resurrection and the final judgment. Jesus’ people should always be ready, always be living like it is the day, despite how thick the darkness of night seems, because we know, not only that the day is surely coming, but that it can come at any moment.

Peter’s question then, was designed to make sense of what Jesus was saying. Was this warning for just his disciples or for everyone, including the nation of Israel? Interestingly, Jesus never directly answered that question. He instead did what he did so often, which was to describe his answer so as to redefine it. His warning, in other words, was for all who would act as a faithful and wise manager. God’s people were being put in charge of the kingdom and they needed to act as careful managers. They needed to act like that faithful servant who was careful about handling the master’s business and respected him enough that they did not mistreat the other servants that had not been put in a role of authority and responsibility.

If they do not, the consequences will be dire. Just as the servant that is not prepared for the coming of the master is dismembered and treated like any other outsider, so would God’s servant that did not act like God’s servant. This is a stark warning, one that we would probably like to ignore. Those who did not act as faithful members of God’s family would, during the coming judgment on Israel, find themselves being sucked up into that judgment in the same way that anyone who was an unbeliever in the Messiah’s family. This passage, though, holds deep relevance for us today. Each generation of God’s people must live as people of the day even though it is the middle of the night. It is our vocation to be the faithful and wise managers of God’s kingdom. To fall asleep during the night like everyone else would be to open us up to the very real possibility of not being ready when the master returns.


Devotional Thought
Are you ready for the bright light of the age to come? Even though it is night all around us and it is easy to get sleepy, this passage urges us to constantly be on guard, to be ready for whatever life may bring. Are you living as a readied servant or have you dosed off a bit lately? In what area do you need to wake up and get back to work, preparing for the return of the master?

Friday, April 23, 2010

Luke 12:13-34 Commentary

The Parable of the Rich Fool
13 Someone in the crowd said to him, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me."
14 Jesus replied, "Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?" 15 Then he said to them, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions."
16 And he told them this parable: "The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest. 17 He thought to himself, 'What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.'
18 "Then he said, 'This is what I'll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain. 19 And I'll say to myself, "You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry." '
20 "But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?'
21 "This is how it will be with those who store up things for themselves but are not rich toward God."

Do Not Worry
22 Then Jesus said to his disciples: "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. 23 Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. 24 Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! 25 Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to your life [b]? 26 Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?
27 "Consider how the wild flowers grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 28 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will he clothe you—you of little faith! 29 And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. 30 For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. 31 But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.
32 "Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. 33 Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.


Dig Deeper
My dad worked at one place for over thirty years before he finally semi-retired a few years ago. Growing up he got up every day at 4 AM to go to work and often didn’t get home until about twelve hours later. It was a demanding job that he didn’t particularly care for, although he never really complained about it to my sister and I. Yet, in all those years of me growing up and seeing him work at that job, I can probably count on one hand the number of times he missed work. Simply put, my dad is and always has been a model of hard work, consistency, and reliability. But I had friends who weren’t so lucky. I have had friends who had dads who were not at all reliable. Some had left them and their mothers completely, others were constantly getting fired and going from job to job. I even knew a few who didn’t work regularly at all and did more gambling and drinking than working. For these friends, things that I took for granted growing up were a constant source of worry. They worried about having clothes to wear, food to eat, and a place to stay. I never had to worry about those types of things.

That seems all rather straightforward, but what if while growing up I constantly worried about where my next meal was coming from or if we were still going to have a house next month? What if I constantly hoarded food and tried to hustle to get extra clothes or money because I was so worried about having my basic needs met? That would have been ridiculous wouldn’t it? The real question, though, is why would it have been so? When it comes down to it, the reason that it would have been silly for me to worry about those things is because of who my father was. I knew who my father was and I didn’t have to live like those who had a different father. It was as simple as that. This is, in essence, the principle that lies behind this entire challenge from Jesus to trust in God rather than spending one’s life in going after material possessions.

The man who approached Jesus on an inheritance matter, brought no small issue forward to Jesus. This was a major issue. Family descent, inheritance rights, and possession of the land that God had given Israel as their lot as God’s people (see Ps. 135:12, for example), were vital issues for a people for whom land and inheritance were important religiously and economically. As important as all this was, the law simply didn’t cover every single complex case and disputes could be heated and in need of arbitration. But the point here is that Jesus was not about further defining the inheritance laws regarding land. He didn’t come to call people to hold even tighter to their family and land inheritance and identity. This man trusted the security of his possessions and his inheritance rather than trusting in God and his kingdom. This was a wonderful opportunity for Jesus to declare that this was not the mindset of the people of the Messiah-shaped family of God. To follow Jesus means to consider carefully the difference between the self-focused position of trusting in possessions and treasures of this present age, and trusting in God as our provider.

To make his point clear Jesus told a story of rich man who had experienced a very prosperous year. He had brought in so many crops that he didn’t have barns big enough to store his surplus. So what would he do? Would he recognize that God had provided his abundance so that he could share with those in need? No, he decided to act in an implicitly selfish manner. He would build bigger barns so that he could store up his crop and presumably sell it during a time when crops were not so good, and thus make even more money. Rather than thinking of others and honoring God he saw this as an opportunity to get more so that he could live a life of ease, comfort, and enjoyment rather than a life of concern and generosity.

This man was not acting like one of God’s people. He was operating by the values of the family of fallen humanity rather than God’s family, like the world rather than the kingdom. If he would embrace the values of those opposed to the will of God then he would be treated like those opposed to the will of God. He was trusting in possessions rather than in God but when his life was demanded of him, his possessions would do him no good. He would face an eternal reality of putting his hope in temporal things rather than God.

What does all that mean for those who have committed themselves to be followers of Jesus? It all comes down to the simple statement in verse 30, “the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them.” That’s the heart of the matter right there. Who is really your father? To what family do you belong? Is it the family of fallen humanity that has no providing father or the family of the Messiah who has the creator of the universe as our caring Father who knows that we have certain needs and who longs to provide them for us if we will but live lives of trust in him.

When God created humans in his image, he created an environment in which we could represent God (the meaning of being in God’s “image”), partnering in his work to care for his creation, and he would, in turn, provide for humankind’s needs. But sin separated us from God and corrupted our ability to be God’s image bearers. Part of the disastrous results of this separation, according to Genesis 3, was that man would have to toil and sweat to provide for himself. No longer would we represent God and have him provide for us. But in Christ, we can be restored back to the original intent of relationships with God and be part of his family, sharing his work (see Matt. 28:18-20, for example), and be confident that God would provide.

But this passage is not just about individuals. It was aimed at Israel as a nation as well. They were going the same way of the man in the parable. They wanted to rely on their possessions and their inheritance as their security. All of Israel, and indeed all people, need to think about which family they are going to be part of and who their father is based on the family that they have chosen. If you were a pagan who thought that your god was not the almighty ruler of the universe, then it would make sense to worry about where your provision was coming from. It would be reasonable, in fact, for a people who had a very limited number of clothes and a precarious source of ongoing food and provision if that were the case.

But Jesus’ people have God as their Father and are restored to the relationship with God as provider. To worry about all the little provisions in life would be to act as though God were not really our father and not really able to provide. If God can provide for his creation, like he does so splendidly, then why would his children worry about the things that he has promised to provide for them. Why, it is downright insulting. If I worried about having a place to live when I was a child, it would have not only been to be out of touch with reality but it would have been a declaration that I didn’t believe my dad to be the man that he was and had always shown himself to be. It was my knowledge and trust of him that allowed me to not worry or think about such things.

Why then, are we so worried about our day-to-day needs? Why do we cling to our jobs and possessions the way the man at the beginning of this passage clung to his inheritance? Why don’t we trust God, based on who he is, to do what he says he will do for his children?

God wants to provide for his children. He wants to bring us into the comfort and security of his kingdom. But what, many of us still wonder, is the kingdom of God and what does it mean to seek it? Does it mean that we should just do our best to go to church for every meeting? No, the kingdom of God, simply put, is the rule and reign of God breaking forth into the present age. It is people living by the reality of the age to come right now in anticipation of the full coming of God’s kingdom in the new heavens and new earth one day. Thus, seeking God’s kingdom means to do God’s will, to share in his reconciliation project for the whole of creation (2 Cor. 5:14-21).

Rather than the greed, clutching, and constant worry of the pagans, God’s people should live by the opposite values. Verse 33 makes the point of what kind of people we need to be. Jesus is not saying that these things must be done in order to follow him. These are principles that God’s people will live by. Rather than clinging to the possessions of this age, we are to be people that live by the values of God’s age to come rather than the greed and rampant anxiety that has captured the nations of the world. When we store up treasures in heaven, meaning we invest our time, energy, heart, and resources in God’s will and his rule and reign in the hearts of humans, then we invest in a treasure that will never be lost. The man in the parable clung to treasures on earth but would find at his death that others would enjoy the possessions that he clung so tightly to. When we invest in God’s kingdom, we invest in a treasure that will never be lost and enjoyed only by others, one that will never be destroyed, and one that will never fail.

There is one important principle that we should note. Jesus said that where your treasure is, there your heart will be. We tend to think the opposite. We tend to operate by the idea that I should invest where my heart is; in the things that I’m emotionally drawn to. But Jesus taught us the opposite. Rather than our investment following our heart, our heart will follow our investment. So invest carefully.


Devotional Thought
What characterizes your life? Do you rely on God’s provision and invest your time, energy, and resources in his kingdom? Or do you constantly struggle with anxiety and the temptation to hoard and worry rather than trust God as your Father? What will it take for you to truly trust God to provide for you?

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Luke 12:1-12 Commentary

Warnings and Encouragements
1 Meanwhile, when a crowd of many thousands had gathered, so that they were trampling on one another, Jesus began to speak first to his disciples, saying: "Be [a] on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. 2 There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. 3 What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs.
4 "I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. 5 But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after your body has been killed, has authority to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him. 6 Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. 7 Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

8 "I tell you, whoever publicly acknowledges me, the Son of Man will also acknowledge before the angels of God. 9 But whoever publicly disowns me will be disowned before the angels of God. 10 And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven.

11 "When you are brought before synagogues, rulers and authorities, do not worry about how you will defend yourselves or what you will say, 12 for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that time what you should say."


Dig Deeper
I recently have taken to watching a rather obscure television show called “Stargate: Universe.” It is a spin-off of the show “SG1,” which itself is a spin-off from the original move “Stargate.” In this show, a group of earthlings have found themselves on an ancient starship which is billions of light years away from planet earth. They want to get back to earth but don’t understand the technology of the ship enough to make that happen. The ship is full of civilians and military personnel and increasingly a rift has grown between those two groups. At first, the rift could simply be categorized as uneasiness and dislike but still tolerating one another. In the most recent episode, however, as they continue their journey through space and try to reach their desired destination, things have taken a dramatic and serious turn. To this point they were going along on their journey without much intentional opposition. Now suddenly they are facing a dangerous threat from an alien ship. This has changed everything. The rift between factions has grown wider and become much more serious because the stakes are now much higher. As the episode this week came to an end, they showed the scenes form next week’s show. In those scenes, they made it clear that the rift was going to come down to an outright battle for control of their ship between the military and the civilians. Some will find themselves in the middle and have to choose which side they are going to be on. When things get serious, there is no time for the partially committed. You have to know precisely whose side you are own and what that will demand of you.

This seems to me to be something of the tone that Jesus is striking and that Luke has captured in this section. At first, the differences between Jesus and the Pharisees was clear but not as completely mutually exclusive as they are now being shown to be. Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem where he will have a final showdown with Satan and all the forces of evil that he can muster, including his greatest weapon, death itself. As he comes closer to that violent confrontation, the stakes are getting much more serious and things are urgent. With that coming fight as a reality, choices have to be clearly made. People need to know whose side they have chosen and what it will demand of them. The stakes could not be higher.

One important clue of how to understand this passage is often overlook but is given by Luke quite clearly in verse 1. Many thousands were pressing in around him but Jesus specifically addressed his disciples. Thus, Luke has given us a clue that Jesus’ words are to be understood as part of the specific instructions to his group of dedicated followers rather than as a universal call to all. The principles of the truths that he espouses are certainly applicable to all but we shouldn’t forget the detail that Jesus was on a specific urgent mission and was addressing his disciples with that in mind.

At the heart of the reality of this mission and their coming lives as his disciples was the fact that they would be persecuted. He was going to Jerusalem to be put to death in a violent manner which would open up for all of Jesus’ disciples the opportunity to enter into his life and grab hold of the life of the age to come (cf. 1 Tim. 6:12), but that would not remove from the reality that following Jesus would mean going the way of persecution and laying down your life for others. In fact, Jesus does not really warn them here that persecution is coming their way. That is basically a given. What he warns them about is their reaction to the inevitable persecution.

They should, as a matter of first importance, be on their guard for the yeast-like hypocrisy of the Pharisees. Hypocrisy has been well documented to have come from the Greek word that referred to play-acting, but usually the use of the word had a much sharper bite to it, carrying the idea of one who was godless but considered themselves as religious. Their conduct and behavior, then, were not determined by God at all but by their own will and desires. They were wrong at a very fundamental level about how to be God’s people and follow God’s purposes and could, then, never do any more than present a pretense of walking with God. To call them hypocrites, then, didn’t so much mean that they were pretending to be something they knew they were not, but rather that they were completely ignorant of God’s true purposes and completely unable to follow those purposes or help anyone else to follow them. This reality was particularly dangerous, though, because, like yeast, it could remain virtually unseen and quietly work it’s way through the entire loaf.

They needed to be careful that the yeast of the Pharisees, the unwillingness and inability to embrace God’s true purposes, did not find root in their own community. Why? Because things that might be hidden and concealed now would eventually come out and be obvious to the whole world. Jesus was proclaiming a new reality that was breaking into the present age, one which was so deeply radical that it was almost to the point of being nonsensical unless one had embraced the desire to understand the world from the perspective of this new reality. This reality was not yet visible just as the full yeast of the Pharisees was not visible to all, but soon it would all be quite clear to the whole world and they needed to be very sure that they had embraced the quiet reality of the new family of the kingdom of God and had rejected the old perspective of the Pharisees.

When it came down to the brass tax of following Jesus and holding up under the persecution that would come their way, and even just the general difficulty of the Christian life, they needed to not hold fear of those who could kill them in the body only. They needed to be people who would have resurrection faith. This is something that they would not fully understand when Jesus was telling them this, but it would become clear soon enough. Those who truly believe in resurrection cannot be controlled because they have no fear of the primary enemy of all tyrants and persecutors, that of death. Having resurrection faith is to have a proper respect, or fear, of God. It is to realize that the reality of God and his resurrection and the age to come is far more real and worthy of dictating one’s actions than anything that humans can do to disciples, including death. Nothing that could happen to them, after all, is outside of the realm of God’s control. The sparrow is sold and probably eaten but God knows about it and has allowed it to happen. Yet they are far more important to God than a sparrow. They will be persecuted and possibly even put to death, but God knows it. This would not be a sign that they were outside of God’s purposes.

This mission, and indeed the Christian life as a whole, would come down to recognizing God over man, fearing God over man. The one who would acknowledge God, regardless of the pressure or threat of persecution or hardship at the hand of man, will be acknowledged by the Son of Man before God. Thus, it could be said that a necessary component of being embraced by the Son of Man, the Son of God, is to embrace him before man, especially when the chips are down. The one who disowned Jesus would be disowned by him because doing so, even in the face of persecution or death, would be a loud statement that one feared man and death more than God. The stark reality following the resurrection of Jesus is that the one who disowns Jesus in the face of death is one who calls the Spirit a liar because it is the Spirit that would raise Jesus from the dead and serve as the deposit guaranteeing the inheritance of resurrection as part of God’s family. To deny Jesus and the promise held out by his Spirit in the face of persecution would be to blaspheme the Spirit. This is something that simply will not forgiven.

But Jesus didn’t want them to become fearful of what might happen to them should they find themselves in the fear-inducing position of being persecuted. He didn’t want them to fear men nor did he want them to be in fear that they might fail and be found wanting when they did find themselves in such a position. When they were brought before the Jewish authorities or any other authorities and called to renounce their Messiah, they need not worry. They need not spend countless hours pouring over what they would say or dwelling on how they would respond. The Holy Spirit would take care of that if they continued to have faith and stay loyal. When the time came the Spirit would give them the strength that they needed to stay faithful and acknowledge Jesus boldly and eloquently (see Stephen’s example in Acts 7 for an example). We should note that verses 10-11 should absolutely not, as some recent American movements have done, take these verses out of context and create a doctrine that argues that preachers should not prepare sermons but should instead trust in the spontaneous guiding of the Holy Spirit. These verse, indeed the whole passage, has everything to do with holding up under persecution. The mission had begun. They had better be ready and firmly know what it meant to be on the side of Jesus. Things were serious and there was no room for not being sure. Our mission today is not the same as they were on when Jesus first spoke those words but it was born of their mission and it is similar in many ways. Our mission, then, is no less dangerous or urgent than theirs. This was not a quest for happiness, it was a very real spiritual battle. Whose side are you on?


Devotional Thought
It is one thing to think about how trusting in the Spirit and how valiant we would be in the face of severe persecution but sometimes it seems like it’s more difficult to acknowledge God and be bold in little ways. What characterizes your life more a fear of God or a fear of man when it comes to the little day-in and day-out moments? How does this passage help challenge you to stand up and live according to the Spirit’s guiding rather than the subtle influence of the fear of man?

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Luke 11:37-54 Commentary

Woes on the Pharisees and the Experts in the Law
37 When Jesus had finished speaking, a Pharisee invited him to eat with him; so he went in and reclined at the table. 38 But the Pharisee was surprised when he noticed that Jesus did not first wash before the meal.
39 Then the Lord said to him, "Now then, you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. 40 You foolish people! Did not the one who made the outside make the inside also? 41 But now as for what is inside you—be generous to the poor, and everything will be clean for you.

42 "Woe to you Pharisees, because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter without leaving the former undone.
43 "Woe to you Pharisees, because you love the most important seats in the synagogues and respectful greetings in the marketplaces.
44 "Woe to you, because you are like unmarked graves, which people walk over without knowing it."
45 One of the experts in the law answered him, "Teacher, when you say these things, you insult us also."
46 Jesus replied, "And you experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them.
47 "Woe to you, because you build tombs for the prophets, and it was your ancestors who killed them. 48 So you testify that you approve of what your ancestors did; they killed the prophets, and you build their tombs. 49 Because of this, God in his wisdom said, 'I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and others they will persecute.' 50 Therefore this generation will be held responsible for the blood of all the prophets that has been shed since the beginning of the world, 51 from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, this generation will be held responsible for it all.
52 "Woe to you experts in the law, because you have taken away the key to knowledge. You yourselves have not entered, and you have hindered those who were entering."
53 When Jesus went outside, the Pharisees and the teachers of the law began to oppose him fiercely and to besiege him with questions, 54 waiting to catch him in something he might say.


Dig Deeper
In the past few years in the United States a new movement has arisen that just did not exist when I was younger. It is called the “green” movement. This is an interesting phenomenon because it’s not really a formal or official organization (although there is a rather insignificant political group called the green party but that’s not what we’re talking about here). This is not a formal group and yet it seems to be everywhere and wield a great deal of influence and power. The group is also interesting because they are not a religious group of any type and yet they are a mixture between political and moral influence. To disagree with or go against their influence is seen to be a moral violation that can take on a religious fervor in many ways. I am simply amazed at the influence that this group has gained in the last few years. The idea of “going green” is now everywhere from my kid’s schools to television advertisements for many companies.

The reality of that movement is that it is very influential and to go against it can bring one a great deal of negative reaction. Many people that are part of that movement are very sincere about it. They genuinely believe that human beings are ruining our planet and causing it to spiral into an irreversible typhoon of climate destruction. Many do live sincere and consistently environmentally conscious lives. There are two aspects of this movement, however, that are a bit concerning. One is the incredible opposition faced by those who are of a sincerely different opinion. They are treated as though they are the cause of all that is wrong in the world and that they must be eliminated. The other problem is that many of the leaders of this movement have been shown to be rather hypocritical. They chide others for using too much energy whilst they jet about all over the globe. They put massive pressure on others to change their lives for the benefit of the global environment but usually investigations into their own lives show a rather lavish lifestyle that doesn’t match up to what they propose to put on everyone else. There are some good things about this movement, surely. But there also many things which are very concerning.

I say all of this, not because I’m particularly political or because I have an agenda one way or the other with the green movement. I bring it up because there are many points of contact that I see between this movement and the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. There tends to be a perception of the Pharisees as a legalistic religious movement that simply called for everyone else to a very rigid form of religious fervor but were themselves not at all following their own rules. A study of the actual history of the time, however, shows that this was not entirely the case. The Pharisees were not a formal religious group. They were more of a pressure group. They were a mixture of politics, legal guardians, and religious behavior. They had become extremely influential although they had no specific role or power. They firmly believed that following God’s law was the way to show themselves to be God’s people. So they created more and more rules so that people could correctly follow God’s law in any situation that might arise. They firmly believed that this would save the world and God’s people by bringing about the kingdom of God on earth and make the way for God to return to Jerusalem. To oppose them brought a great deal of criticism and pressure. And just like the green movement, there were good and sincere Pharisees but they also had the dual problem putting heavy loads on everyone else and making them appear to be the problem, as well as the problem of many of them not really caring about anything more than their own advancement and opportunity. Their hypocrisy wasn’t so much a case of saying one thing and doing another, but of focusing on small issues to the neglect of the more important things (a charge similar to that made against the green movement as well) that God cared about.

The common meal was an important aspect of the Jewish life and culture. It was viewed as a constant reminder that everything comes from and belongs to God. Because a feast together was often always seen as a symbolic proclamation of the great feast that would be the age to come (it was often spoken of in terms of a great banquet with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob), it was of particular offense to the Pharisees to neglect aspects of the ceremonial laws that had been created so as to help people follow God’s law to the smallest detail. The Pharisee took notice that Jesus had not taken part in the ceremonial pre-meal washing. Knowing their hearts, however, Jesus took this as an opportunity to deliver one of the harshest rebukes in all of the gospels.

There was actually a sharp debate between factions in Jesus’ day as to whether a dish needed to be ritually cleansed once or whether two ceremonial washings had to take place for both sides of the cup. In bringing up the argument, Jesus was really rejecting all of that kind of nonsense. The real issue was not how they washed the dish but whether they were focusing on external rules as the uniform of God’s people rather than having hearts and lives that were truly transformed from within. Loving others, especially in the context in that culture, by being generous to the poor, would demonstrate that they were embracing the kind of heart that God wanted his people to have.

After laying that down as an opening salvo, Jesus turns to offer up three specific challenges to the Pharisees and three to the teachers of the law, so as to not leave them out.

First for the Pharisees. They would meticulously count everything they had right down to small amounts of spice so that they could tithe on it and show themselves to be God’s people but they neglected the true heart of being part of God’s family which was to be people of justice and love. It’s not that they shouldn’t have tithed but to do all of those external things without being transformed internally by the love of God was worthless (see 1 Cor. 13:1-3). Their motivation to meticulously follow God’s laws, however, went beyond their devotion to God. They loved to be important. They loved to use the position that they had to be noticed and to receive special attention. They had lost sight of the fact that God’s true family was focused on serving not on being served.

This made them very much like an unmarked grave. Pilgrims would come from all over Israel to worship at the Temple. Just outside of the Temple walls, a few hundred yards away, were tombs. These tombs would be whitewashed each year so that they could be easily seen. Otherwise someone could trip over one without seeing it and make themselves unclean. Jesus’ point was a directly confrontational one. They were like these tombs that made people unclean because they were full of putrid death on the inside. They thought they could save the world by calling people to be conformed to a series of ritual behaviors but they were neglecting the truly important task of being transformed. Only the kingdom could do that.

The compatriots of the Pharisees, the teachers of the law, were no better. They tied people down with all kinds of burdens and rules but never offered anything that would actually help them to achieve that. His point was not that they were burdening people with more and more rules and sitting back and looking down on them while they failed. His point was that they were giving more and more rules claiming that they were helping them to truly be God’s people. But the reality was that they were not lifting a finger towards actually solving the problem. People needed transformation not conformation.

In fact, they were taking part in the long tradition of the rebellious people of Israel in rejecting the prophets that God had sent them. They were like their ancestors who built tombs for prophets but also put them in those tombs. They wouldn’t accept it, but the fact was that they were just like their forefathers who rejected God’s word through his spokesmen. This was clearly demonstrated by their rejection of Jesus. They were continuing in the long line of the family of fallen humanity.

What was far worse was that not only did they not have God’s ways in mind, they were actually keeping others from finding God’s kingdom. Teachers influence others and will always be judged more strictly than others (see James 3:1). They believed that they possessed the key to knowledge that would bring about the kingdom of God on earth but the truth was quite the opposite. Not only were they not entering into the door to the true life that God has in store for his people, they were barring the way for others to enter in as well. There is no greater charge against teachers of God’s word than this, so this would have had a particularly sharp sting to it.

In the previous passage, Jesus spoke of their need to repent and embrace the light that was coming through his message. The door was left open for them to repent and this message was part of that final plea. Would they realize that they were unmarked graves that were barring the door for themselves and others to find the true path to being God’s people? Sadly, the woes did not lead to their repentance but to a further hardening of their heart. That’s the way the truth is. It softens the hearts of some while the same truth hardens the hearts of others.

Warnings like this are an important reminder for us. Christianity is living a life. It is learning to embrace the will of God and cling to Jesus’ life as our own. Christianity is not and can never be about a list of rules that take away our need to choose and the demand to think through what we do and make the right choices. We so often get frustrated because we want a religion that is easy and shows us exactly what to do in each and every situation. That type of thing will never lead to transformation. When we partner with the Spirit and work towards our true transformation into the life of Christ we realize that those times when we’re unsure of what God wants and we have to search, pray, think, and wrestle; those are the times when we are truly transforming.


Devotional Thought
Do you really prefer a walk with God that transforms rather than conforms? What are ways that you fall into a pattern of spiritual life that is more about conforming than genuine Spirit-led transformation?

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Luke 11:29-36 Commentary

The Sign of Jonah
29 As the crowds increased, Jesus said, "This is a wicked generation. It asks for a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of Jonah. 30 For as Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites, so also will the Son of Man be to this generation. 31 The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with the people of this generation and condemn them, for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon's wisdom; and now one [h] greater than Solomon is here. 32 The people of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and now one greater than Jonah is here.

The Lamp of the Body
33 "None of you lights a lamp and puts it in a place where it will be hidden, or under a bowl. Instead you put it on its stand, so that those who come in may see the light. 34 Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eyes are healthy, [i] your whole body also is full of light. But when they are unhealthy, [j] your body also is full of darkness. 35 See to it, then, that the light within you is not darkness. 36 Therefore, if your whole body is full of light, and no part of it dark, it will be just as full of light as when a lamp shines its light on you."


Dig Deeper
Imagine a scenario where a father walks into a messy playroom. His oldest child and their friend were playing in the room but failed to clean it up so he wants his child and their friend to take care of that situation. He doesn’t have the time to go upstairs where they are hanging out so he sends one of his younger children up to the room to tell them that Dad wants them to go back to the playroom and clean up. The guest immediately realizes their error and goes down to the playroom to begin cleaning up the mess that they made. After a while the Dad realizes that the guest has listened and sprung into action but his own child is still sitting upstairs and has disregarded the warning of the younger child. So, the father decides that he needs to go up and have a talk with this wayward child himself and give him an opportunity to obey. He goes up and personally asks the child to go down and clean up the room along with his friend who is down there already cleaning up. The father goes away to work on something else thinking that this will clear things up, yet when he returns a few minutes later, he finds that the guest is still downstairs cleaning and the son has done nothing. This is outrageous and unacceptable. The very behavior of the guest has made the disobedience of the son look even worse. There is simply no excuse. The guest sprung into action at the word of a small child but the father’s own son has rejected his own far more authoritative word. In this hypothetical situation, the heart of the son has been exposed not only by his own action but even more so by the action of the guest.

Luke is continuing to describe Jesus’ journey towards Jerusalem and his urgent mission to warn the Jewish people that the time is short. They must make the choice to either embrace or reject the Messiah. With each passing scene and moment, though, it is becoming increasingly clear that the leaders of the Jewish nation, representing the entity of the nation of Israel, are rejecting Jesus’ kingdom message. They were completely rejecting the notion that something was askew and needed to be put to rights. They are showing their true colors and their true humility before God, but there is something that is making matters even worse; the behavior of the guest. Israel was God’s son but was not obeying his call to come to the Messiah. When the guest behaves and the son doesn’t, it speaks volumes about the heart of the son, especially when the guest responded to one with far less authority than the father.

As the crowds increased, they asked more and more for a sign. This was no act of honestly seeking truth, however. They were not asking for a sign because they hadn’t been given opportunities for faith. They were more like children who are asked by their parents to clean their room but don’t want to so they claim later that they didn’t start cleaning because they weren’t sure that’s what the parents wanted. Everything Jesus had been doing and saying were signposts showing them the way to God’s will. He was simply not the kind of Messiah that they wanted which meant that if he really was the Messiah that God was not working in the way that they desired. But rather than humbly and radically changing their expectations, as the disciples were having to do, they simply rejected what Jesus was doing and demanded signs that more fit their perceptions of what he should be doing.

Jesus stated plainly that their continued request for signs were showing their true hearts. To fully understand this section it helps to understand that the basic understanding of the physiology of the body in the Greco-Roman world was that the eyes did not function by allowing light to come into the body, rather they allowed the body’s own light to go out from the body. Thus, whether one’s eyes were full of light or darkness had everything to do with what was already in their hearts. If they had wicked and dark hearts then their eyes would be full of darkness and spread it everywhere they went. If they had good hearts that were full of light then their eyes would be full of light and their actions would follow.

This is the line of thinking that runs behind this whole passage until Jesus says it outright in verses 34-36. They were a wicked generation because their hearts and eyes were wicked (Jesus used the same word, “poneros” for both the “wicked” generation and the “unhealthy” eye). The only sign, then, that they were going to get beyond what Jesus had already been doing was the sign of Jonah. There were likely two points of contact that Jesus intended by saying that they would be given the sign of Jonah. The first was that Jonah had preached to Ninevah about their wickedness and their need to repent prior to their judgment. So would Jesus proclaim the wickedness of the Jewish generation of his day and their need to repent prior to their impending judgment. The second was that just as Jonah, by spending three days in the belly of a great fish, had become a sign to the people of Ninevah for their dire need to repent and the overwhelming power of God, so would Jesus, by spending three days in the heart of the earth, become a sign to the people of this generation of their need to repent (cf. Matt. 12:38-42).

Jonah’s sign and his preaching caused the extremely wicked people of Ninevah to repent. In the same vein, the Queen of the South, the Queen of Sheba, came from far away to see if Solomon really was the agent of YHWH, Israel’s God. She had many reasons to doubt but instead she found that Solomon was indeed God’s agent and that she needed to recognize that. The one thing that the Queen and the people of Ninevah had in common, besides their recognition of their need to humble themselves before God, was that they were both foreign pagans. Just as Jesus had used examples of faithful pagan aliens in 4:24-27, he does so again here. The rightful son was ignoring the Father by rejecting the son. It would be those who were foreigners and aliens who would recognize the Father’s call to action just as Ninevah and the Queen of the South had.

They were testing Jesus as the Queen had come to test Solomon but were not recognizing his wisdom as she had recognized Solomon’s. They were listening to Jesus just as the people of Ninevah had listened to Jonah but were not repenting as the Ninevites had. Jesus had wisdom that far surpassed that of Solomon but they would not submit to it. Jesus was far greater than Jonah but they would not recognize him. On the day of resurrection and judgment both the Ninevites and the Queen would rise with Jesus and that very action would condemn the Jews who had turned his back on God’s promised family.

It would, of course, be ridiculous to light a lamp and then hide it under a bowl. That would make no sense. Yet, this is precisely what they were doing with the light of his teaching. Rather than putting it on a stand and realizing that through his teaching Israel would become the light of the world that it was always intended to be (Isa. 49:12), they were rejecting his kingdom message. This was about as wise as putting a lit lamp under a bowl. It was foolish, make no mistake.

But why would they be doing this? Why would they be shrinking back from the light? For the same reason that so many do in our own time. They had dark eyes. Their eyes, in fact, were simply letting out the darkness that was welling up within them. If they were full of light then their eyes would be healthy and light-filled but they were not. They were not only full of darkness and self-will but they were shrinking back from the true light, going farther and farther back into their caves. This is important because light was also a fundamental biblical image for one who had embraced God’s presence while darkness indicated one that was removed from God. They were rejecting God’s ways because their hearts were full of the darkness of their own will. One cannot embrace God’s will while clinging to their own will anymore than a room can be dark and full of light at the same time.

The die had not yet been cast, though. They could still choose to have the light shine on them and to well up from within them. They could turn from their wickedness as the people of Nineveh had and be forgiven. There was still a chance for repentance but they had to stop looking for the types of signs that they wanted and simply look for the light. They had to come to the realization that their true hearts were continually being broadcast through their outer actions.

This is a stern reminder for us that there is no such thing as the idea that our actions don’t really reflect what’s in our heart, despite how often we would like to tell ourselves that. What comes out through our eyes, our actions, does reflect the light, or the darkness that we have embraced in our inner self. Actions, then, cannot be dismissed as unfortunate but insignificant moments. What we do reflects who we are in our hearts. Who do your eyes says you really are?


Devotional Thought
Have you found yourself in a situation recently where your behavior was worse and less “godly” than some non-believers around you? How does that challenge you to make sure that you are always committed to doing the Father’s will in every situation? What can you do on a daily basis to ensure that the virtues the Father values will shine forth in your life at the right times?

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Luke 11:14-28 Commentary

Jesus and Beelzebul
14 Jesus was driving out a demon that was mute. When the demon left, the man who had been mute spoke, and the crowd was amazed. 15 But some of them said, "By Beelzebul, the prince of demons, he is driving out demons." 16 Others tested him by asking for a sign from heaven.

17 Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them: "Any kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and a house divided against itself will fall. 18 If Satan is divided against himself, how can his kingdom stand? I say this because you claim that I drive out demons by Beelzebul. 19 Now if I drive out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your followers drive them out? So then, they will be your judges. 20 But if I drive out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.

21 "When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are safe. 22 But when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up his plunder.

23 "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.

24 "When an evil [g] spirit comes out of anyone, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, 'I will return to the house I left.' 25 When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order. 26 Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that person is worse than the first."

27 As Jesus was saying these things, a woman in the crowd called out, "Blessed is the mother who gave you birth and nursed you."
28 He replied, "Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it."

Dig Deeper
There is a remarkable scene in the movie, Amistad. It is a movie about Joseph Cinque and his amazing journey as he was captured by another tribe, sold to slave traders, taken to a slave auction in Cuba, and then escaped and took over the ship that was taking him to lifelong slavery. He and the other Africans on the ship were eventually captured and there was a trial that had to determine whether they were free Africans and would be released or would be put into slavery after all. The movie covers real events but it is to a fictional scene in the movie that I want to refer. In it, Cinque’s lawyer asks him, while he is still in jail, about rumors that Cinque had killed a lion with his bare hands while still in Africa (the event actually happened but the scene of discussing it with his lawyer is historical fiction). The lawyer was deeply impressed as were all of the Africans who had relayed the story to him. But Cinque thought it was nothing for which he should be honored. He went on to tell the lawyer that he been hailed as a great man in his village for killing this lion who was threatening his village but he shouldn’t have been. He then quietly tells his legal representative about how afraid he was and that he picked up a large stone in near desperation and threw it at the lion. The stone hit the lion just right in the head and actually killed it. He was no hero, said Cinque, because it all happened by sheer luck.

We often times, I think, tend to have that view of Jesus. No Christian doubts that he was brave and courageous and went through incredibly harrowing circumstances. But it seems that we often depict Jesus as a great preacher and teacher who was caught up in terrible opposition and awful circumstances during his final week and had to really keep his chin up and be brave as things swirled around him and violently blew him towards a tragic death, one that he, to make matters even worse, knew was coming and couldn’t avoid. That is just not the reality. Jesus was no Cinque. He didn’t get thrust into a fight that he didn’t want and then make it through with luck. That’s not the picture that the gospels give us of Jesus. Instead, we find a warrior. We find a Messiah that knew that his vocation included an assault on death, sin, and evil. And because of that we find a Jesus who made war wherever he went. He made war with the demonic. He made war with Satan. And ultimately he would make war death. No, he wasn’t a tragic figure who bravely faced a tragic end. He was a warrior who came to pick a fight.

As we look at this passage it becomes obvious that Luke is not so interested in this particular exorcism as he is the response to it. Jesus had won an initial victory over Satan after walking into the wilderness, the place of Satan’s victory over Israel in the war to get them to grumble against God, and had continue to make war with Satan’s demons ever since. There was no denying that Jesus had demonstrated some kind of incredible authority over the demons that could not be simply explained away or denied. This left two options. Either Jesus was working within the power of God or he was somehow in league with Satan. Some of his opponents claimed that he was working through the power of Beelzebul (a derogatory term for Satan that meant “Lord of the flies”). Others wanted a specific sign from heaven. Luke doesn’t tell us what that sign might be, but it may be the specific sign described in John 6 where we see that many Jews were expecting that when the Messiah returned he would bring back the provision of manna (which may have been the connection in Luke’s mind between the Jews asking for that sign and the previous passage which alluded to the daily bread of manna).

Jesus knew their thoughts though, something that tips his readers that he was far more than some charlatan operating under the dark forces of Satan. He then answers the objections that were being thrown out against him and shows the lack of logic and strength to those arguments. How could Jesus be operating by the power of Satan? His ministry was one of freedom and making people whole, calling them to do the will of God. Satan is certainly a counterfeiter and a trickster but surely he wouldn’t be engaging in the types of activity that were bringing down his own little kingdom. Satan’s strength comes through slavery, robbing people of their humanity, and persuading humans to do their own will rather than God’s. If Jesus was working with Satan, then Satan would be engaging in bringing down his own kingdom. This was war language that Jesus was using. A kingdom or a royal house that went to war against itself would make no sense but it would also be destroyed.

No, Jesus was not operating under the power of Satan. That should be obvious. And if they wanted a sign they wouldn’t get one. That was the whole problem was that they would not drop their preconceived notions of what the Messiah should be. The only sign they would get right now would be his word that he was driving out demons by the finger of God, a clear allusion to Exodus 8:19. The Pharaoh’s magicians conceded that Moses was doing things that their dark magic could not reproduce. It was only the finger of God that could do such things. But Pharaoh rejected that. His heart was hardened further by claim that this was the almighty God at work. The choice was now up to Jesus’ opposition. Would they accept the obvious point that this was the finger of God at work or would they harden their hearts like Pharaoh to the new exodus that was breaking forth as Jesus continued his march towards Jerusalem?

Make no mistake, though, this was a war that Jesus was engaging in. Satan had his own kingdom that he had set up on earth but Jesus was here to make war. Satan might be a strong man that was fully armed and prepared to guard his own house but a strong man can do nothing when a stronger man makes war on him. Jesus was that stronger man. He was attacking and overpowering Satan. This was a war. This was fight that Jesus was intentionally picking. Yet, he knew that this fight would end in his own violent death. That is what his disciples had such a hard time understanding. How could one defeat their enemy by dying? That didn’t make sense, of course, until they could grasp that Jesus was not just attacking Satan but was going to rob him of his most potent weapon, death itself.

With any war, sides must be carefully chosen. There is no sitting on the fence in this fight. One is either with Jesus, working to bring the kingdom of God into the world and continuing the assault on Satan’s stronghold or they are working against him, scattering what he is trying to gather. At first glance, this might seem at odds with Jesus’ words in 9:50, “Do not stop him, for whoever is not against you is for you.” Yet, his point there was that the disciples should not try to limit the kingdom to a small group of insiders. If someone was doing the work of the kingdom then they should be accepted as part of God’s people. The point here is not contradictory but complimentary. Those who have not taken up with Jesus in his fight will be fighting against him by default.

Jesus was on a mission to cleanse Israel and subsequently the whole world from the influence of evil and to reconcile the ruptured relationship between the family of fallen humanity and God. He was calling people to join God’s promised family and engage in the work of brining the kingdom of God to every part of Israel and the world. But before that could truly happen Jesus would engage in the fight. He would sweep the house clean and defeat the foes that Israel could not on their own. But that was also a serious warning. Jesus was fighting the evil that was in Israel and exercising authority. He was giving Israel the chance to follow him and find the salvation that they had waited for so long but if they didn’t truly embrace him there would be trouble. The time was short. He was sweeping the house so that they could see what God’s kingdom looked like but they needed to realize, in a sense, that they need not a cleaned house but a new one altogether. They needed to realize that the house of Israel was doomed and that Satan and his minions would come down upon Israel in a much more complete and final way than they were now after Jesus was gone. They needed to abandon their path and realize that the relief that Jesus was brining to Israel was only temporary. If they stayed where they were, things would be far worse than were originally.

As Jesus was wrapping up his remarks, a woman cried out to him a standard Jewish blessing upon his mother. If a son was acting in a honored way, then the honor and blessing extended to the whole family. The family, after all, was the source of their identity as the people of God. Yet, Jesus used this as an opportunity to make the point again that he was redefining family. Physical descent was not what showed one to be blessed or the people of God. The family of God were those who heard the word of God and obeyed it. They were those who engaged in the war. This is a stern reminder for us who can so easily slip into the comfortable thought that what we do doesn’t matter as long as we’re part of the right church and have the right doctrines. Those things are important, but the real question is this: “are we engaging in Jesus’ work”? Are we with him or against him? Are we truly acting like his family?


Devotional Thought
In John 8, Jesus said that the Jews showed themselves, by their actions, to not be part of God’s family but to be part of Satan’s. If someone were to look at your life right now, what signs would they see that you were part of the family of God? Would they see the family resemblance of the Father in your life?