Category Archives: Gospel

OUT OF HIS MIND?

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OUT OF HIS MIND?

“Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that He and His disciples were not even able to eat. When His family heard about this, they went to take charge of Him for they said, ‘He is out of His mind.’” Mark 3:20,21 (NIV).

They thought He was out of His mind, but He could not have been saner! It was not Jesus’ behaviour that was the problem. It was the madness of the crowd. They wanted what He could do for them. In typical mob fashion, they had no respect for Jesus or for one another, everyone pushing and shoving, everyone trying to get near Him for what they wanted, impatient, disorderly, rude, and demanding.

Family and friends heard about it and tried to get Him out of there as though He were unable to take care of Himself. They thought He was helpless to do anything about it. They wanted to disconnect Him from the suffering and need of the unruly crowd, but they could not. Mark’s record tells us nothing about the outcome. They wanted to rescue Him, by force, if necessary, but did they? No! Jesus would not permit anyone to do anything to Him that was not allowed by His Father. Even though they were not aware of it, no-one could do anything to Him that was not part of the Father’s plan.

Jesus showed His total command of the situation by His response to the Pharisees’ accusation and His family’s attempt to intervene. The religious leaders thought Jesus was in league with demons. He was using black magic to deceive the people. He was deliberately stirring up this irreligious mob because He had a hidden agenda. By seducing them with magic, He wanted to raise an army of followers who would stir up trouble against Rome!

Jesus’ reply was masterful. With the deft strokes of a master artist, He painted a word picture of the implications of their accusation. It was not Rome that was the people’s problem but dark spiritual forces that held them captive – deformities, diseases, depravity that held them in their grip. Would Satan be so foolish as to use someone in league with himself to break his power over them? Not likely! Think again, you fools! Jesus was no magician!

What does this mean for us today? Jesus cares about human suffering. He cared enough when He was here on earth, to risk the anger and hatred of the religious leaders. When He healed people on the Sabbath, they accused Him of breaking the law of God. But Jesus’ attitude was different. Was it better to love people enough to make them well on the Sabbath or to ignore their needs just because of laws for which their tradition demanded obedience?

Jesus loved people enough to heal them wherever He went even if the Pharisees didn’t like it. He wasn’t interested in setting them free from Rome. He wanted them free from bondage to the devil. That’s who Jesus really is! 

HAVE YOU BEEN BORN AGAIN?

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HAVE YOU BEEN BORN AGAIN?

“In reply, Jesus declared (to Nicodemus- author’s note). ‘I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.4 “How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”
5 Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. 6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. 7 You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ John 3:3-7

Humans have the strange compulsion to reduce everything to formulae so that we can apply what we understand better. Our attempts at evangelism are no different. We approach people with the “Four Spiritual Laws”, Evangelism Explosion and even “The Born Again” message.

However, when we watch Jesus’ way of interacting with people, He was different. He treated every person as unique. To the woman at the well He offered water that would satisfy her thirst to be truly loved. To Zaccheus, He was the one who freed him from dishonesty and greed, which Jesus called “salvation”. To the woman caught in adultery, He showed mercy by not stoning her, and He delivered her from guilt. To the woman who was bleeding, who touched the tassels of His prayer shawl and was healed, Jesus said, “Go in peace. Your faith has made you whole.” To the paralysed man whose friends let him down through the roof, Jesus responded to their faith and forgave his sin. Now how can we turn any of that into a formula?

Where did the “born again” idea come from? Nicodemus was a Pharisee, a man schooled in the religion and practice of Judaism. He understood what it meant to be “first-born”. In Hebrew culture, the firstborn son in every family stood in the position of privilege and responsibility. He represented his father in making decisions and taking responsibility for his younger siblings’ actions. Hence it was Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn, who tried to protect Joseph from his brothers’ murderous intentions because he was responsible for him. Adam was God’s firstborn son and, as the firstborn, he was responsible for his wrong choice and the sin of the whole world. According to the Apostle Paul, then, “In Adam, all die.”

All the other children in the Hebrew family were “second born”. Because the firstborn took their judgment, they received mercy. It is equally true that, since Jesus was the firstborn of the Father, as a human being, he received justice. He is also called the “second Adam”, so that, in Him, people receives mercy.

Nicodemus knew that, in Adam, he was subject to God’s justice for his sin. Hence, as a Pharisee, he tried to keep the Law of God as best he could. Jesus explained that it took a supernatural act of God’s grace to move him from firstborn in Adam to second-born in Christ so that he would receive mercy and not justice. He could not earn mercy by keeping the rules. He could only receive it by faith in the one who would be lifted up like the serpent in the wilderness.

By an act of grace through faith in Jesus, we are moved from justice to mercy by being “born again.” It’s not a formula but a fact. (LAC)

The Crushing Weight of the Gethsemane

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The Crushing Weight of the Gethsemane

By Ray Vander Laan

    The culture and land of Israel offer great evidence and testimony to God’s truths in Scripture. That’s one reason I’ve never tired of leading numerous study tours there. By examining the customs of ancient times, we in the 21st Century are able to glean more knowledge and insight into the life of Christ and His teachings.

    The scene of Christ’s passion in the Garden of Gethsemane the night before He died is a familiar story – one of supreme sorrow and blood-wrenching anguish. And yet there’s much about the significance of the setting that we in the modern world have missed.

    With Easter upon us, let’s revisit the Garden of Gethsemane to explore the cultural elements that would have been so well understood in Christ’s time.

Gethsemane

    The word gethsemane means ‘olive press’ and symbolizes the weight that Jesus carried as He went to the cross. The gethsemane was symbolic of a human burden in Christ’s time, too, but it was on the shoulders of the Jewish people. The gethsemane was an economic leash, tying the lower classes of society to the purse strings of the wealthy who owned the olive presses. The masses looked to the promised Messiah, who would come from the ‘stump’ – understood to be an olive tree – of Jesse, to release them from their burdens.

A Valuable Commodity

    When considering the symbolic meaning of the gethsemane, it’s important to understand both the economic and religious importance of the olive and its oil in biblical times. Much of Israel was, and still is today, olive producing. The olive was much more than food. Its oil was burned in lamps and served as a preserving agent and a lubricant for skin care. It had great value in daily life.

    The process used to extract olive oil was a laborious one. Whole olives were put into a circular stone basin in which a millstone sat. A donkey or other animal was then harnessed to the millstone and walked in a circle, rolling the stone over the olives and cracking them.

    The cracked olives were scooped up into burlap bags, which were then stacked beneath a large stone column – a gethsemane. The enormous weight forced the precious oil to drip from the fruit into a groove and on into a pit at the base of the gethsemane, from which it was collected.

    The gethsemane and mill were large and expensive tools, and private citizens could rarely afford to own them. Whoever controlled the equipment, the wealthy elite or government officials, had economic power over the local population. People had to pay steep fees in order to process their olives. The gethsemane and mill were a burden born by many, because olives were an economic mainstay of society.

Deeper Meaning

    The olive tree and its oil had even greater cultural importance as religious elements. The word ‘mashach’ – from the same root word for ‘messiah’ in Hebrew-means ‘to be anointed with olive oil.’ Priests, kings and prophets were anointed with olive oil, indicating that they were gifted and called by God. So it was understood that the anticipated Messiah would be specially anointed with olive oil.

    The tree also represented the purpose of the promised Messiah – to renew Israel. When an olive tree gets old, it is cut down because there’s too much trunk for the leaves to nourish. The following year, a new shoot comes out of the old tree, eventually producing new fruit and lots of healthy branches.

    In Isaiah 5, God says to the unbelieving nation of Israel (paraphrased), “You didn’t produce any fruit. But I was patient. I dug around you. I fertilized you. I kept you growing. And after a while, I looked. There was still no fruit, so I cut you down.” And then He says in chapter 11, “Behold, a new shoot will come out of the stump of Jesse and will become a new tree with new fruit.”

    The Jews believed that the new shoot, which was going to renew, restore and revitalize the nation of Israel, was the Messiah. The Messiah is the shoot or branch out of Jesse. If Jesus is the branch or stem, then we, as Gentiles, have been grafted in, according to the apostle Paul. That means our roots are the Jewish people. That’s our stump. We can’t exist and bear fruit without the Jewish roots. Second, it means Jesus is where we get life and energy.

    But the key is the olives we produce. Paul says in Romans 11:21 (paraphrased), “If God cut down the natural tree, what do you think He would do to you who have been grafted in if you don’t bear fruit?” Jesus came to be the new shoot for what reason? So we would have life to bear fruit.

    The word for shoot or branch in Hebrew is of the same root as the word ‘Nazareth’: ‘netser’. The Bible says Jesus’ parents went back to Nazareth in order that prophecy might be fulfilled: “He will be called a Nazarene.” Therefore, a Nazarene is someone from ‘shoot town’ or ‘branch town.’ Jesus came from Nazareth to indicate to us that He (Jesus) is the branch. And while on Earth, Jesus gave lessons and examples of how to be grafted into His Tree of Life.

Greatly Pressed

    Near the end of His life, while in northern Israel, Jesus said to His disciples, “Now, you go take on the gates of Hell.” And then, as a great teacher, He said, “Let me show you how.” Down He walked to Jerusalem, past little cities and towns, past all the crowds that had followed Him around. He got to Jerusalem and, after a week’s ministry there, had His last supper. Then He went out to the garden of the olive press – the Garden of Gethsemane.

    He got down on His knees and began to experience the weight of what was going to be laid on Him. That weight was so incredibly heavy that it squeezed out of Him His own blood. He was heavily pressed. This Jesus, who taught and preached and performed miracles and was raised from the dead, went to the Garden of Gethsemane. Laid on Him was the sin of the entire world.

FOR THE LAST TIME

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FOR THE LAST TIME

“When it was time, He sat down, all the apostles with Him, and said, ‘You’ve no idea how much I have looked forward to eating this Passover meal with you before I enter my time of suffering. It’s the last one I’ll eat until we all eat it together in the kingdom of God.'” Luke 22:14-16 (The Message).

Was Jesus crazy? It almost sounds as though He was looking forward to His coming crucifixion. He had shared Passover meals with them in the past. He knew this was the last one He would eat with them as a human being. He referred to other Passover celebrations in the future but they would take place “in the kingdom of God”. 

In spite of the glimpses He gives us into the significance of His suffering, both to Him and to the Father, we will never fully understand what the cross meant – neither the experience nor the outcome.

The cross of Jesus – the pinnacle of history and the dividing line for all people for all eternity! For every person, the cross determines our eternal destiny, depending on our choice.

It was because of the cross that God’s plan to build a family of people just like His Son was put back on track. Satan’s deception in the Garden of Eden derailed it for a season, but Jesus paid the debt of man’s sin, reconciled His alienated human race and reinstated every son and daughter into His family through faith in Him. 

It was through the cross that Jesus exposed the devil for the liar he is. In spite of the injustice of His trial and death sentence for who He was – the Son of God and the king of the Jews, He submitted Himself to their cruelty and to the Father’s will without a murmur. His death spelt the end for Satan. His judgment was coming and he knew it!

“When they hurled their insults at Him, He did not retaliate. When He suffered, He made no threats. Instead, He entrusted Himself to Him who judges justly. He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by His wounds you were healed. For you were like sheep going astray, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.”  1 Peter 2:23-25 (NIV).

Jesus looked forward to the cross because it would be the completion of His mission on earth, the culmination of His revelation of the Father and the cue for His return to His place in glory with the Father and the Holy Spirit. So great was His love for the Father that He even relished His suffering because it was the Father’s will to rescue mankind from death and bring them back home to Himself.

‘Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith who, for the joy set before Him, endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of God.” Hebrews 12:3 (NIV).

For Jesus, this Passover meal would be the opportunity to reveal the full significance of the historical event they were celebrating. Passover was a picture of the greater redemption from slavery to sin and Satan that He was about to accomplish as the sacrificial Lamb of God whose blood on the lives of those who believe in Him would protect them from death and open the door to everlasting life.

No, Jesus was not crazy! Once again, in His self-forgetful love for human beings, He relished the outcome of His suffering – redemption, rescue and reconciliation and the door to eternal life flung open to anyone who will receive His forgiveness and His invitation to return to the Father’s house and the Father’s arms to be a beloved member of His forever family.

THE POWER OF THE CROSS – THEY OVERCAME HIM BY THE BLOOD

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THE POWER OF THE CROSS

THEY OVERCAME HIM BY THE BLOOD


They triumphed over him
by the blood of the Lamb
and by the word of their testimony;
they did not love their lives so much
as to shrink from death. Revelation 12:11

Spiritual warfare is big on the agenda of Christians today. Many “weird and wonderful” teachings abound about spiritual warfare – most of which originate from the Old Testament, as though the death of Jesus means nothing when it comes to the devil.

People do prayer walks and Jericho marches; we are taught to identify the principalities and powers that hold countries or regions in their power (the “Jezebel spirit” is a big one); we have to identify and pull down altars; we must “bind” the evil spirits and “take authority” over them; we must “loose” the power of God and we must “pray against” whatever it is that we must pray against!

Now all of this sounds very “spiritual”. It gives us something to do when we are discouraged by the situations and circumstances around us. We feel better when we have done “spiritual warfare”,even if nothing changes. We do it again and again in the hopes that it will eventually “take” and give us immunity – like a measles vaccine!

But where in the world do we see the apostles doing this in the New Testament? Even Jesus, who should have known better than anyone else how to do spiritual warfare, didn’t do all this stuff. After all, wasn’t the devil after Him? The most Jesus ever did was to send His disciples ahead of Him into the villages and towns where He was to go, not to do prayer walks and Jericho marches, but to proclaim and demonstrate the presence of the kingdom of God. It was the reality of God’s presence and power in the person of Jesus, not their ritualistic prayer efforts that sent the devil and his squatters packing.

Another glaring problem lies in the fact that we don’t understand how God works. When stuff happens in our lives, we blame the devil and go to “war” against him. We are “under attack”, so we declare, almost triumphantly as though being “under attack” somehow makes us important in Satan’s eyes. We must be a threat to him, or he wouldn’t “attack” us!

But that is not what the Bible says.

Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as His children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? If you are not disciplined – and everyone undergoes discipline – then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all . . . (Our fathers) disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in His holiness.  (Heb. 12: 7-8; 10)

Satan may be responsible for the hardship, but God uses it for our good. So why fight the devil? James and Peter said that we must resist the devil by submitting to God. (James 4: 7; 1 Pet. 5: 8-9)

As a matter of fact, the very hardships we go through, which we so eagerly attribute to the devil, are the evidence of our sonship and the means of God’s grace. If we understood that, would we so enthusiastically launch into spiritual warfare against Satan, using all the tactics we have learned from the self-proclaimed “generals” of spiritual warfare? By doing that, we are fighting, not the devil as we may think, but the very means God uses to purify our faith in Him.

Take Peter, for example. Jesus warned him of what was to come and even said that Satan would do it. He promised to pray for him – not that God would get him out of it but keep him through it because there were important lessons Peter had to learn.

Did you notice, for example that Jesus did not pray that God would stop the devil from sifting him. Instead, He said, “I have prayed for you, that your faith will not fail.” Did you get that? Trials and hardships are not “attacks” from the devil, as though God were powerless to do anything about it. No! They are God’s means of strengthening our faith in Him.

In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith – of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire – may result in praise, glory, and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed. (! Pet. 1: 6-7)

How do we overcome the devil? Not by fighting him but by trusting in God. What guarantee do we have that we have the right to trust the Father?

They triumphed over him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. (Rev. 12: 11)

It was the cross that made all the difference. Jesus dealt with our sin – the very reason for the devil’s power over us – and He exposed the devil as a liar and a thief. He is not Lord; Jesus is.

What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all – how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things? (Rom. 8: 31-32)

The devil loves the limelight. He wants to be noticed and he’ll get attention by any means if he can take our attention away from Jesus. God gave us weapons – faith and truth, all directing our attention away from the devil and onto the One who gave us the victory by His blood.

This is the power of the cross!

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.