Tag Archives: return

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE – HAVE YOU ACTED THE FOOL?

Bible Study, ,

HAVE YOU ACTED THE FOOL?

“When He had their attention and because they were getting close to Jerusalem by this time and expectation was building that God’s kingdom would appear any minute, He told this story:

“There was once a man descended from a royal house who needed to make a long trip back to headquarters to get authorisation for his rule and then return. But first he called ten servants, gave them each a sum of money, and instructed them, ‘Operate with this until I return…’

“When he came back…he called those ten servants…to find out how they had done.

“The first said, ‘Master, I doubled your money.’

“He said, ‘Good servant! …I’m making you governor of ten towns.’

“The second said, ‘Master, I made fifty percent profit on your money.’

“He said, ‘I’m putting you in charge of five towns.’

“The next servant said, ‘Master, here’s your money safe and sound. I kept it hidden in the cellar. To tell you the truth, I was a little afraid. I know you have high standards and hate sloppiness, and don’t suffer fools gladly.’

“He said, ‘You’re right that I don’t suffer fools gladly – you’ve acted the fool! Why didn’t you at least invest the money so I would have gotten a little interest on it?’

“Then he said to those standing there, ‘Take the money from him and give it to the servant who doubled my stake.’

“They said, ‘But Master, he already has double.’

He said, ‘That’s what I mean. Risk your life and get more than you ever dreamed of. Play it safe and you end up holding the bag…’ Luke 19:11-27.

Another kingdom story that turns what we value on its head and exposes some of the faulty thinking of the church!

Jesus told a number of stories about noblemen or landowners who entrusted their property to servants before going away for a period of time and then returning. To His disciples, He spoke plainly of His return to the Father for an interval before He came back to claim His kingdom and restore all things to their original perfection.

This same idea is reflected in the Hebrew marriage custom where the bridegroom-to-be, after proposing to his prospective bride, returns to his father’s house to build his bridal chamber in preparation for the consummation of his marriage. After his father has approved his work, he is released to marry his bride and carry her over the threshold into the bridal chamber to become one with her.

What is the significance of the interval before His return? In this story, Jesus focussed on the responsibility of the servants to carry out the Master’s instructions while He was away. To every believer, He assigns a task in keeping with his gifting and role in God’s kingdom.

His commission to every believer is to know Him and to make Him known wherever He has placed us in the world. He has woven into every person unique abilities in seed form. Like the sums of money given to the servants in our story, we can either multiply or bury what we have been given, but we will not escape accountability. We are not only given gifts, but we have also been given time…time to use those gifts to make His name known in our world.

Unfortunately there has crept into the church’s thinking an escapist mentality – the world is bad so let’s just hole up and hold on until Jesus comes to get us out of here. This mind-set is in keeping with the general attitude of the world – we do not take responsibility for what we think, believe and do. We are merely the victims of other people’s actions or our circumstances. We are part of the ‘White Knuckle Club” that cowers in the corner and waits to be rescued!

This is contrary to Jesus’ intention for His church. His idea is that we are serving our apprenticeship in the interval until He returns. What we do with the resources He has entrusted to us will determine how much responsibility He is able to give to us in the life to come.

So what is our job in this life? To develop our unique gifts so that we may know Him and make Him known.

“Now this is eternal life that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.” John 17:3 (NIV).

“He said to them, ‘Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation.'” Mark16:15 (NIV).

This involves making all sorts of sacrifices; time, money, name, reputation, comfort, ambitions, family, or whatever else it may cost to obey the Master.

As always, Jesus takes the long look, taking into account the eternal rewards for present suffering. Is the sacrifice worth it? It all depends on where your focus is – you can rationalise and take your ease now, like the third servant in the story, but there is a terrifying price to pay for this kind of faulty thinking. The servant blamed the Master for his laziness but his reasoning didn’t stick.

So, what’s the bottom line? Jesus didn’t intend for us to spend the time in between desperately hanging on, waiting for Him to pull us out of a bad situation. He left us here with a commission to live out our lives where He has put us, in the energy of His Holy Spirit, and to do whatever we can, through our unique abilities, to show the world what He is like. When He comes, will He find the resources He has entrusted to us much more than we started with, and will He, with confidence, be able to entrust greater responsibilities to us according to our faithfulness in the small things?

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE – EMPTY IS DANGEROUS

Bible Study, ,

EMPTY IS DANGEROUS

“When a corrupting spirit is expelled from someone, it drifts along through the desert looking for an oasis, some unsuspecting soul it can bedevil. When it doesn’t find anyone it says, ‘I’ll go back to my old haunt.’ On return, it finds the person swept and dusted, but vacant. It then runs out and rounds up seven other spirits dirtier than itself and they all move in, whooping it up. That person ends up far worse than if he had never gotten cleaned up in the first place.” Luke 11:14-16.

According to Jesus, just as it is impossible to be neutral when it comes to my attitude to Him, it is also impossible to remain empty of a spiritual ‘master’. The human spirit was created to be in submission to God. Satan’s lie is that a person can be his own master. He sold that lie to Eve and it landed her, Adam and the whole human race under his dominion.

The attitude of the human being is expressed in Psalm 2:3, “Let’s get free of God! Cast loose from Messiah”, with the mistaken notion that he can be independent of any controlling spirit.

The opposite is true. If Jesus is not invited in to become the master of my heart, once I have repudiated demonic occupation of my heart, I must not think that I can go it alone. He will return and if he finds no-one in charge, he’ll invade with a whole hoard of controlling spirits worse than himself.

How does this work in practice? Many believers think that they cannot be influenced by demons, but this is not true. What happens when someone is falsely accused, insulted or offended in some way by another person? The first reaction is to be hurt. Anger follows, to cover up the hurt, self-pity, feeling like a victim, the desire to pay back, taking it out on someone else, usually a family member…these are all sinful responses to emotional pain.

An even worse scenario when life deals a believer a blow is to blame, turn on and abandon God as though He were responsible for the suffering. “Why did God allow this to happen?” is the question asked, as though God somehow manipulates people’s wills to do things His way. Man chose to turn from God, (and he still does) and there are always consequences, often involving innocent people.

This leaves the vacuum of which Jesus was speaking and demons, under Satan’s direction, capitalise on the opportunity to invade and occupy. How often it happens when a believer abandons faith in God because of false expectations; he throws all caution to the wind and becomes more sinful than he was before he believed in Jesus.

This is a warning every believer ought to heed. God is not responsible for our woes but He is always ready to bring good out of evil if we choose to keep trusting in His goodness. He never disappoints those who put their trust in Him.

MOLLY AND ME – RETURN

Christian Life, , ,

I recently took a trip to Johannesburg to visit my son and daughter-in-law for a few days. I arranged with a friend to “dog-sit” Molly rather than put her in the kennels. My friend happens to have a nine-month-old dachshund puppy who is great friends with my Molly. Molly has an exaggerated maternal instinct although she has not had puppies and, to her, Layla was a rambunctious creature who needed training and discipline!

Despite their companionship during the day, Molly missed me terribly. My friend sent a picture of her sitting on the couch, staring at the front door as though she expected me to walk through it at any moment. In the evenings, she settled herself on my friend’s lap, under the red “blankie” which had my smell on it, as if to reassure herself that I was near.

I missed her too. I missed her warm little body next to me in bed and her happy little presence in the home, squeaking her ball or nestling on my lap when it was cold. I counted the days to my return, just to see her joy when she heard my voice and saw me at the door.

Is that how Jesus feels about our physical separation from Him? Oh, I know we have His presence with us by His Spirit, and even in us, but does He long for the day when He can hold us in His arms and we can talk to each other face to face? Does He count the days until He hears the Father say, “Go, my Son, and claim your bride.”

Although Molly was well cared for and loved by her foster mom, nothing, not even a favourite ball, could compensate for my presence with her. On my first night home, she could not creep close enough to me in the bed. All she wanted to do was to be cuddled against me so that she could feel me near her.

Do we miss the presence of Jesus so much that we stare at the sky, waiting for Him to appear? Do we ache for Him, just to be near Him and to hear His voice?

I told my friend to tell Molly, every night, that I would be home after so many sleeps… four sleeps…three sleeps…two sleeps…one sleep… then, finally the day arrived when I flew home to her.

Jesus said He would return. We don’t know how many sleeps until He comes, but we can be certain, because He promised, that He will return, and then we will never be apart from Him again.

 

A Callous Cop-out

Christian Life, , , , ,

A CALLOUS COP-OUT

I call passionate prayers for revival a callous cop-out! I guess that shakes you! Let’s start at the beginning.

The ancient Hebrew concept of life was a journey. The children of Israel’s journey from Egypt through the wilderness to the Promised Land was often used in the Bible as a picture of our journey through life. It was a dangerous journey through unknown territory. In order to reach their destination, they had to follow the instructions God gave them – the so-called Ten Commandments which were not commandments but directions for the journey.

Without landmarks to guide them, it was easy for them to wander from the path and get lost, taking them away from the source of food and water God provided to sustain them until they reached their destination. The concept of “righteousness” for the ancient Hebrew was to stay on the path, and “unrighteousness” was to stray from the path, get lost and die in the desert.

The ”landmarks” on the way that would show them that they were on the right track were those opportunities to do the right thing. When they followed God’s instructions regarding their relationship with Him and with one another, they would be on the right path, going in the right direction which would take them to Zion – their final destination. If they disobeyed His instructions – contained in His Torah (the five books of Moses), they were lost, in darkness and needed to “repent” or “return” to the path in order to reach the Promised Land.

Repentance was not an emotional response when their disobedience was exposed but a decision to return to God’s way so that they could follow His path and reach their destination.

What has this got to do with revival? The Bible is, among other things, a “GPS” which shows us the way to the Father. He is our ultimate destination. He sent His Son not only to show us the way but to be the Way by which we come to the Father. Jesus promised that, if we follow Him, we will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.

The Bible speaks of God’s Word as light.

Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path (Psa. 119:105).

When we walk in obedience to God’s Word, we are on the path, walking in the light and following the directions which will take us to our destination.

What has all this got to do with revival? Life is a steady walk on the path towards God, not a series of spectacular emotional and spiritual spurts with periods of cold-heartedness and lethargy in between out of which God has to shake us by sending His Spirit to wake us up and get us going again.

Our attention on and prayers for revival have spawned many erroneous ideas. This is not to say that revival is not of God. It is to say that revival is not God’s “Plan A” for His people. If we follow the path of the great revivals in the Old Testament, they happened when f the fellowship of God’s people with Him was at its lowest ebb, and the effects of revival were short-lived. His people were often more in a state of apostasy than walking in obedience to God and in fellowship with one another because they refused to stay on the path, following the way of the pagans around them rather than God’s way.

Praying for revival is a cop-out because it transfers responsibility for our spiritual health from ourselves to God. Instead of returning from our disobedient ways to God’s path – following Jesus who is the Way and walking in the light of God’s Word, we continue in our disobedience, praying and waiting for God to do for us what He told us to do – repent, i.e., return to the way of trust and obedience.

God has done everything for us that He will ever do – He has blessed us with every spiritual blessing (Eph. 1); He has given us everything we need for life and godliness (2 Pet. 1); He has given us His Spirit to change our hearts, fill us, lead us and empower us to obey Him.  He can and will do nothing more to provide directions for the way and the power to live in fellowship with Him.

Consider these verses:

When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command locusts to devour the land or send a plague among my people. if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land (2 Chron. 7;13-14).

Did you notice that I included verse 13 in the quote? How often we interpret hardships in our lives as punishment for sin or God’s indifference to our suffering! Have you ever considered that God is trying to get your attention because He wants you to return to His way? Waiting for Him the “revive” you or to revive your church or your land, is not the answer. God calls you to return.

Nature abhors a vacuum. Air or water fills every empty space and will flow into every space where there is a vacuum. God’s presence is just like that. The Bible declares that He fills heaven and earth. Sin in our lives occupies what belongs to God. When sin is forsaken, He will fill that empty space with Himself with no need for us to beg and plead for His presence.

We do not need revival to heal our hearts, our churches and our land. We need to return to God Word and God’s ways. He always responds to those who make room for Him by getting rid of sin. When we return to Him, He will hear, forgive and heal. Guaranteed!

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

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3,                                                                              eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or Kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

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Jesus Did Not Say That He Didn’t Know When He Was Returning

Apologetics, , ,

JESUS DID NOT SAY THAT HE DID NOT KNOW WHEN HE WAS RETURNING

Now don’t get me wrong. I didn’t say that Jesus didn’t say it, full stop. I said that He didn’t say it in the sense that we understand it. Again we must look at the context to understand His meaning.

One of the images God used to symbolise His relationship with His people was a marriage. The Bible is full of wedding talk, Hebrew style. Hebrew courtship between a man and woman was conducted in five stages, and specific Hebrew words or expressions were used which the prospective bride would understand and with which the prospective bridegroom would communicate His intentions.

The first step was called lachah – which meant “I want to make you mine.” The young man, after getting to know the girl, would let her know that he was serious about his intention with her. God signalled His intention with Israel, using the very word in Ex. 6:7:

I will take (lachah) you as my own people, and I will be your God.

The second step was segulah – “I want to make you my treasured possession”. Listen to God’s words before He made His formal proposal to Israel:

Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations, you will be my treasured possession (segulah).

The thirst step was a preparation for the proposal and took place three days before the formal proposal. It was called mikvah – “Go and wash.” It was more than just cleaning up. It was a ritual bath that signified leaving the old life behind and stepping into a new one.

And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. Have them wash their clothes and be ready by the third day, because on that day the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people.’ (Ex. 19: 10-11)

The fourth step was the drawing up of the ketubah – the prenuptial marriage contract, witnessed by the fathers, and the formal proposal. In the presence of their fathers, the young man would propose marriage to the young woman. Included in the proposal was the promise, “I am going to prepare a place for you and I will come again to receive you to myself that where I am you may be also.” Does this sound familiar?

Her response would be, “When will you come to receive me?” and he would reply, “I do not know the day or the hour, but when my father is satisfied with the bridal chamber, I will return for you.”

The final step was the wedding ceremony. When the father was satisfied with his preparation, the bridegroom would return without warning. It was the bride’s responsibility to be ready for his return. She had two duties to perform while he was away preparing the bridal chamber at his father’s house. She had to separate herself from all other men, and she had to prepare her bridal gown.

Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder, shouting:

‘Hallelujah! For the Lord God Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give Him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and His bride has made herself ready. Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear.’ (Fine linen stands for the righteous acts of the saints). (Rev. 19: 6-8)

The wedding ceremony was conducted under the chuppa – the canopy usually constructed by suspending a talith – a prayer shawl – on four posts. God came down on Mount Sinai under a canopy – chuppa – of smoke and gave His people His ketubah – the “Ten Words” which was the declaration of how they were to live in fellowship with Him in a marriage relationship.

After the wedding ceremony, the bridegroom, accompanied by the wedding party, would lead his bride to the bridal chamber, pick her up and carry her (rapture her!) over the threshold where they would consummate their marriage. After that would come the wedding feast.

God’s people proved their unfaithfulness to their betrothal to Him by going after other gods and by their disobedience to His covenant. Jesus renewed His proposal to His people and, on the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came to indwell them forever, the church was born which is the bride of Christ.

Now can you fit Jesus’ words into the whole courtship and marriage symbolism? He was not telling them that He was not God or that He was not omniscient in His divine nature. As a man, He deliberately set aside His rights as God in order to be a perfect Son under the power of the Holy Spirit. He was under the authority of His Father and, as a Son, He would return for His bride, the church at the Father’s instruction.  

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.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3,                                                                              eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or kindle version or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.

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