Monthly Archives: March 2020

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE – A HEAP OF RUBBLE?

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A HEAP OF RUBBLE?

“One day people were standing around talking about the temple, remarking how beautiful is was, the splendour of its stonework and memorial gifts. Jesus said, ‘All this you’re admiring so much — the time is coming when every stone in that building will end up in a heap of rubble.’

“They asked Him, ‘Teacher, when is this going to happen? What clue will we get that it’s about to take place?'” Luke 21:5-7.

Amazing, isn’t it, how things that seem so permanent and indestructible can disappear without warning in a moment! The Israelites had put such confidence in the durability of their temple that they could not believe that it would ever be destroyed.

Jeremiah warned them, centuries before, about putting false hope in their temple.

“Hear the word of the Lord, all you people of Judah who come through these gates to worship the Lord. This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel says: ‘Reform your ways and your actions, and I will let you live in this place. Do not trust in deceptive words and say, ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord!’ If you really change your ways and your actions and deal with each other justly, if you do not oppress the alien, the fatherless and the widow and do not shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not follow other gods to your own harm, then I will let you live in this place, in the land I gave your forefathers for ever and ever. But look, you are trusting in deceptive words that are worthless.'” Jeremiah 7:2b-8 (NIV).

The Babylonians came and did exactly what Jesus predicted was about to happen again – they reduced their temple to rubble and plundered all its treasures. Perhaps the people who commented to Jesus on its beauty had forgotten its history.

There are lessons for us to learn from this incident. God places no value on things if they do not serve the purpose of enhancing our relationship with Him and the fruit of that relationship. How many people foolishly put their confidence in inanimate things like crucifixes, St Christopher images or even a rabbit’s foot or family photograph to keep them safe instead of trusting in the living God! Even our money is not infallible!

Of course we have to remember that we live in a world where “stuff” happens. No one is immune from the problems and tragedies that affect all human beings. Jesus warned us that these things are inevitable (John 16:33), but He also promised that in Him we have a place of refuge – peace – that will protect us from the effects of these adversities.

Sometimes bad things happen just because we are part of an imperfect world; sometimes we are the victims of other people’s choices and sometimes we bear the consequences of our own poor choices. In this case, destruction was coming on Jerusalem because God’s people had rejected their Messiah and called down His blood on their own heads.

We may not escape the troubles that inevitably happen but we can have an eternal safeguard that carries us beyond the confines of this life. God’s promise to those who love Him is infallible:

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose. For those God foreknew He predestined to be conformed to the likeness of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brothers.” Romans 8:28-29 (NIV).

We must never be caught up in foolish superstition that trusts in things and not in God. God and His word are reliable in a world that is fragile and transient. “The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.”  1 John 2:17 (NIV).

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE – WHOSE PERSPECTIVE COUNTS?

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CHAPTER 21

WHOSE PERSPECTIVE COUNTS?

“Just then He looked up and saw the rich people dropping offerings in the collection plate. Then He saw a poor widow put in two pennies. He said, ‘The plain truth is that this widow has given by far the largest offering today. All these others made offerings that they’ll never miss; she gave extravagantly what she couldn’t afford – she gave her all.'” Luke 21:1-4.

He noticed! Isn’t that just like God?

I don’t think Jesus was sitting near the temple treasury specifically watching and judging people as they dropped in their offerings. He just happened to notice an obviously poor woman, mingling with the rich people, giving her gift as they put their offerings in the collection box.

Why did she stand out among the crowd? Did her threadbare clothing give her away? Was she wearing widow’s garb? The wealthy people would have dressed accordingly, and she would not have blended in with them. Perhaps she attracted Jesus’ attention because His heart was always for the underdog.

In the Sermon on the Mount, He has spoken out against the practice of the ‘hypocrites’ who gave their money in such a way that they wanted to attract attention to their ‘generosity’. The collection boxes were trumpet-shaped containers which prevented would-be thieves from helping themselves because the base was too narrow to get their hands in. If a person wanted to be noticed, he would toss his coins into the funnel so that it would make a ringing sound, hence the saying, ‘Don’t blow your own trumpet.’

Amid the ostentation of the rich, this poor widow slipped in and unobtrusively dropped in her two small coins, the smallest denomination in their currency. And Jesus noticed! Once again His comment puts our ‘generosity’ into God’s perspective which differs so much from our own. He noticed, not how much she gave, but how much she had left.

Of course, that should not put us on a guilt trip. God is realistic. He does not expect us to give our entire livelihood away. What would be the point of that? But He does hold us accountable as stewards of what He has entrusted to us. The difference between the attitude of God’s people and the people who refuse to acknowledge Him should be, but is not always, that we are guided by God’s requirements and not by greed. He gives generously so that we will share our resources with others.

The first thought that comes to me is that this widow’s generosity was prompted by her identity with poor people. As a widow, if she had no family to support her, she was dependent on the generosity of others. She knew what it felt like to depend on others for her livelihood. She also knew what it was like to have nothing. Her two little coins were not much, but it was all she had to share with others.

Secondly, to give all she had meant that she had faith in God to supply her need, risking, everything on the faithfulness of God. That introduces another dimension to our responsibility to obey God — faith, which is spelt r-i-s-k. It is not difficult to take faith-risks in other areas of our lives but in the money category…that’s different!

This little woman caught Jesus’ attention because her action lined right up with God’s perspective. He did not see her as a poor nobody because of her appearance or her station in life. He saw her as great in God’s kingdom because she understood, believed and put into practice God’s will, and God always responds to obedience.

God works, not by giving to us according to our need but by meeting our need when we take care of the needs of others. When we give, we create a current that brings God’s supply to us through the generosity of the others. That’s God’s wisdom!!

THR GOSPEL OF LUKE – WATCH OUT!

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WATCH OUT!

“With everybody listening, Jesus spoke to His disciples. ’Watch out for the religion scholars. They love to walk around in academic gowns, preen in the radiance of public flattery, bask in prominent positions, sit at the head table at every church function. And all the time they are exploiting the weak and helpless. The longer their prayers, the worse they get. But they’ll pay for it in the end.'” Luke 20:45-47.

Why did Jesus issue such a strong warning to His disciples about the danger of coming under the influence of the religion scholars? These men had power because of their so-called ‘learning’ which they used to subjugate ordinary people and exploit them for their own ends.

When we examine His motive for warning His disciples, we have to ask ourselves, ‘Was Jesus jealous of their power? Was He trying to turn public opinion against them because of their opposition to Him or was He sincerely alerting His disciples to the danger of being impressed and coming under their influence?’

History would give them the answer. Both their Master, and later they, would suffer at the hands of the Jewish religious leaders. Jesus had no personal axe to grind with them. He knew them. He knew the depth of their hypocrisy that fooled ordinary people. He knew how dangerous their power was, how ruthlessly these men would use it to protect their own position.

John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton, first Baron Acton (1834-1902) said, “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely…” This is true when we see what power religious leaders have over the hearts and consciences of people. Terrible things happen because of the use of this power – massacres like the Inquisition – when millions of believers were slaughtered by the Church in the Middle Ages, the Crusades – the slaughter of Muslims in the name of Jesus, the Jim Jones suicides, the Waco, Texas, tragedy, and many more.

Jesus neither pulled rank nor used emotion to persuade people to believe Him. He had one weapon that was infallible – the truth. Real power lies, not in intimidation, manipulation or domination, which are the ways of the devil, but in revelation. God’s intention is not to enslave by fear but to set us free by the knowledge of the truth.

“To the Jews who believed in Him, Jesus said, ‘If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.'” John 8:31-32 (NIV).

Jesus was so sure of the power of the truth of His words that He could say, “‘As for the person who hears my words but does not keep them, I do not judge him. For I did not come to judge the world but to save it. There is a judge for the one who rejects me and does not accept my words; that very word which I spoke will condemn him at the last day.'” John 12:47-48 (NIV).  

There is a sob in Jesus’ voice as He warns of the ways of the hypocrite. ‘Be careful,’ He said, ‘not to be taken in by the image they portray. The real test is in their fruit.’ Their fruit was slavery to the rules and ritual they imposed on the people because they were the ‘educated ones’, but they distorted the understanding of God until He appeared as a slave driver, not a loving Father.

Any spiritual leader who rules over people instead of connecting them to Jesus is as suspect as the Jewish religious leaders of Jesus’ day. Jesus’ warning is as relevant today as it was then. Whoever they are, if a Christian leader ties people to himself and his teaching and not to Jesus, he is suspect and dangerous. Stay away from him.

How can we identify them? Simply by measuring them against our infallible test – the Word of God, both Jesus, the living Word, and the Bible, the written Word. Jesus said, “‘Take my yoke and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.'” Matthew 11:29 (NV).

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE – DAVID’S SON

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DAVID’S SON

“Then He put a question to them, ‘How is it that they say that the Messiah is David’s son? In the book of Psalms, David clearly says,

“God says to my Master,                                                                                                                                                   ‘Sit here at my right hand                                                                                                                      until I put your enemies under your feet.'”

“David designates the Messiah as ‘my Master’ – so how can the Messiah also be his son?'” Luke 20:41-44.

That got them!

This was no trick question. The one thing that stuck in the throats of His religious opponents was that Jesus, an obviously perfectly ordinary human being, whom they rejected because, to them He was only the son of Joseph and Mary, was claiming to be the Son of God. That was blasphemy, and blasphemy was punishable by death.

Had the claim come from anyone else, they would have had every reason to have him tried and executed, but from Jesus…that was another story. They had all the evidence they needed but they refused to examine it objectively. Jesus was a man; He was claiming to be God; He must die.

Their questions were designed to trick Him into incriminating Himself either by contradicting Moses or teaching something treasonable against Rome. Jesus was too smart to be outwitted by these religious ‘experts’ who were actually ignorant of the truths concealed in their ‘Law’.

So He asked them a question, one that would get them to the crux of their issue with Him. ‘Who are you?’ they kept asking.  Moses, David…these were the heroes of their religion. What they said went. What they failed to realise was that Moses and David wrote about Him and what they said accurately presented Him.

David’s statement, quoted from Psalm 110:1, highlights two of Jesus’ qualifications which they refused to believe and which, incidentally, are still rejected by some sects today. Two phrases are glaringly contradictory — ‘my (David’s) Master’ and ‘his (David’s) son.’ That was a teaser for the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and one which focuses on one of the central truths of our faith.

The Bible clearly teaches that Messiah was fully God and fully man. He is both David’s Master and his son. He is God and He is man of the lineage of David, Israel’s greatest king and the model of kingship in the Old Testament. Therefore Jesus is the rightful king of Israel even though the religious leaders refused to acknowledge Him.

In His own masterful question, Jesus’ answer to their persistent interrogation, ‘Who are you?’ was always the same. ‘The evidence is right in front of you. You decide.’

This is the question that everyone must answer for themselves. Our eternal destiny depends on it. ‘Who do you say that I am?’ Even if we ignore the question, we have still answered it. Whether willingly or reluctantly, this will be our final response:

“And being found in appearance as a man,

He humbled Himself                                                                                                                              and became obedient to death –                                                                                                          even death on a cross!                                                                                                                                                Therefore God exalted Him to the highest place                                                                            and gave Him the name that is above every name,                                                                      that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,                                                                          in heaven and on earth and under the earth,                                                                                  and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord                                                                                      to the glory of God the Father.”                                                                                                          Philippians 2:8-11 (NIV).

Guess what! Even the devil himself will bow on that day, and that will seal his final doom and the doom of those who refused to acknowledge that Jesus is Lord! That was their choice.

What’s yours?

WATCH OUT!

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE – GOD OF THE LIVING

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GOD OF THE LIVING

“‘Even Moses exclaimed about resurrection at the burning bush, saying, ‘God: God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob!’ God isn’t the God of dead men but of the living. To Him all are alive.’

“Some of the religion scholars said, ‘Teacher, that’s a great answer!’ For a while, anyway, no one dared put questions to Him.” Luke 20:37-40.

Hidden truths! Did anyone notice that the truth about resurrection is hidden in that short and seemingly insignificant statement – “God of Abraham”?

Every Jewish boy would have known that because his text book from birth was the Torah, the five books of Moses. He would have heard the Shema – “Hear O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one,” (Deuteronomy 6:4) – every time he suckled at his mother’s breast. By the age of six he would have memorised the book of Leviticus and by twelve, the whole Torah. In the Torah are the seeds of every major doctrine in the Bible, including the truth about the resurrection.

God created time and lives in a realm which is not subject to time. Unlike Him, human beings are not eternal. Our existence begins at a point in time but, from that point, we never cease to exist.

Because of Adam’s choice, we are subject to death, but death is not the end. It is the transition from time to eternity, from the realm of the physical to the realm of God where we shed all the imperfections of our fallen humanity and stand before God in the perfection of Jesus which He gave to us because of His death on the cross.

Because Jesus came from that realm, He could speak of as fact, that which we receive by faith, that God is the God of the living because Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are still alive in His presence.

Had the Sadducees paid a little more attention to the Torah, they would not have made fools of themselves by posing a question to Jesus that revealed their ignorance.

In His reply, Jesus shows us how we can find the answer to many of the questions that puzzle us about our faith. There is a principle of Biblical interpretation that will help us, called the Law of First Mention. The first time something is mentioned in the Bible is the key to understanding what it means in the rest of the Bible.

There is an example of this principle that will help us to understand God’s original intent about prayer. The first mention of prayer is found in Genesis 4:26: “At that time men began to call on the name of the Lord.” In the original Paleo (picture) Hebrew, the word for “call” meant “to turn the head to face the One who can bear the burden.”

That’s it! We have made prayer into something quite complicated whereas the Bible presents prayer as the simple act of changing our awareness! When Adam and Eve chose to ignore God’s command, they lost their God-awareness and became self-aware, (“’…I was afraid because I was naked, and so I hid.’ And He said, ‘Who told you that you were naked?'” – Genesis 3:10b-11a), a preoccupation that has never changed

To change our awareness means to recognise and acknowledge God in the centre of whatever our concern is. We don’t have to bring God into our situations – He’s already there! When we change our awareness, we move from worry and panic to peace because He is there, He is good and He is in charge.

Jesus was saying, in essence, ‘Go back to the beginning where God has revealed His original intent. That’s where you’ll find His answers to your questions.’