Tag Archives: snake

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE – CAN WE ASK TOO MUCH?

December 9, 2019Bible Studyegg, fish, snake, spiderLuella Campbell

CAN WE ASK TOO MUCH?

“If your little boy asks for a serving of fish, do you scare him with a live snake on his plate? If your little girl asks for an egg, do you trick her with a spider? As bad as you are, you wouldn’t think of such a thing – you’re at least decent to your own children. And don’t you think that the Father who conceived you in love will give the Holy Spirit when you ask Him.” Luke11:11-13.

Again Jesus uses an exaggerated contrast to teach me the scope of God’s generosity to His children. Fathers give their children the simple things they ask for because it is within the scope of what they are able to do. They are generous to their children as good fathers because they are able to meet that need, and they do it because they love their children.

But what about our heavenly Father? How does He respond to the children to whom He gave spiritual birth through the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus? According to Romans 8:32, “If God didn’t hesitate to put everything on the line for us, embracing our condition and exposing Himself to the worst by sending His own Son, is there anything He wouldn’t gladly and freely do for us?”

In this teaching on prayer in response to the disciples’ request, Jesus pins my attention on three questions:

Who and what is the focus of my prayer?
What is my attitude to Him?
What do I expect of Him?

If I can answer these three questions from His perspective, I have grasped the real meaning of prayer and can expect to nurture my fellowship with the Father as Jesus did.

In His model prayer, Jesus teaches me that prayer is primarily about who and what I must become aware of. Prayer is not prayer if it is all about me and my concerns. Prayer is the simple act of turning my head to face the One who can bear the burden. Why can I have confidence in Him to handle whatever my issues are? He is my Father, my life-source who is as near to me as my breath. He brought me to physical and spiritual birth and He has accepts full responsibility for me as His child.

Although He is unseen, He is real, more real than the world around me. He knows me more intimately than I know myself. I can hide nothing from Him; therefore I can best nurture my relationship with Him by being transparent and direct. As a tiny child comes to its father in dependence and trust, so I come to my Father with an open heart.

Although little children sometimes think that daddy can give them the world, they ask in innocence and ignorance, but there is nothing my Heavenly Father cannot supply according to my need. I have no need greater than the Holy Spirit and He has promised to give Him to me if I ask Him. He has already given me His Spirit and, because He leads me, I know that I am His son or daughter.

And so my understanding of prayer comes full circle back to the fundamental issue of sonship. Prayer is only prayer in the environment of God and me as Father and ‘son’. Prayer is not prayer unless it is the intimate interaction between Father and son.

THE BOOK OF ACTS – A MARKED MAN

August 25, 2019Bible Studyisland, Malta, snakeLuella Campbell

CHAPTER 28

A MARKED MAN

“Once everyone was accounted for and we realised that we all made it, we learned that we were on the island of Malta. The natives went out of their way to be friendly to us. The day was rainy and cold and we were already soaked to the bone, but they built a huge bonfire and gathered us around it.

Paul pitched in and helped. He had gathered up a bundle of sticks, but when he put it on the fire, a venomous snake, roused from its torpor by the heat, struck his hand and held on. Seeing the snake hanging from Paul’s hand like that, the natives jumped to the conclusion that he was murderer getting his just deserts. Paul shook the snake off into the fire, none the worse for wear. They kept expecting him to drop dead, but when it was obvious he wasn’t going to, they jumped to the conclusion that he was a god!” Acts 28:1-6 (The Message).

Talk about drama! Never a dull moment with Paul around! It was obvious that Paul was a marked man. If it was not one thing, it was another. Since the storm had not taken him out at the end of a long line of assassination attempts, here’s another trick up Satan’s sleeve. A venomous snake was just the thing to finish him off and this time no one could help him.

But there was a word from God to cover even a situation like this one. “And these signs will accompany those who believe. In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands, and when they drink deadly poison it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people and they will get well.” Mark 16:17-18 (NIV).

Paul was not fazed by the sight of a deadly snake dangling from his hand. Why should he be? Was he not walking on the Word of God? He shook it off as though it were a bug and carried on feeding the fire. Unlike his hosts, he wasn’t expecting to drop dead because he was going to Rome!

The reaction of the islanders was typical of people who interpreted life from a superstitious world view. To them everything was a series of cause-and-effect events as a tit-for-tat response to their behaviour. When the snake struck, according to their understanding Paul was being punished because he was an evil-doer but when nothing happened to him, they changed their tune. He must be a god!

There is a valuable spiritual lesson for us even in this bizarre happening. What was it that prevented the serpent’s venom from circulating through Paul’s body and doing its fatal damage? Was it not Paul’s attitude? Had fear taken hold of him so would the snake poison have done? He was protected from death by his confidence in the words Jesus had spoken.

How many times we are “bitten” by the venomous words spoken to or about us! Words have the power to strike and latch on to our minds like a viper’s fangs. We have one of two options: receive them and allow the poison to seep into our minds and affect and infect our lives, or shake them off and remain immune to their deadly intention. “Words kill, words give life; they’re either poison or fruit — you choose.” Proverbs 18:21 (The Message).

How we deal with them depends largely upon what we think of ourselves. A few days ago we looked at the reason why Paul was so unaffected by his circumstances. He was already a dead man. He died on the day he met Jesus. Since you can’t kill a dead man, not even a poisonous snake could kill him. He was in the hands of God, not circumstances, so he could shake off the circumstances and stake his life on what God had spoken.

What a way to live! Carefree in the care of God! When you are walking on the Word, your feet are more securely planted than on solid earth!

History Or His Story?

December 25, 2013Bible Studybelieve, lifted up, Nicodemus, snake, teacherLuella Campbell

HISTORY OR HIS STORY?

“‘How can this be?’ Nicodemus asked. ‘You are Israel’s teacher,’ said Jesus, ‘and do you not understand these things?’

“‘Very truly I say to you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony.

“I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven — the Son of Man. Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in Him.'” John 3:9-15 (NIV).

Such familiar words that we can almost recite them from memory! But what do they mean?

Although Nicodemus was a prominent teacher in the ranks of the religion scholars and was familiar with the Word of God, it was obvious to Jesus that he did not understand the truths he was teaching. It had been so long since God has spoken and actively intervened in the affairs of His people that Nicodemus was essentially teaching history.

Jesus must have startled him by saying that, although He was also a rabbi, He wasn’t teaching history; He was teaching truth from experience. He was speaking about reality because He had been in the heavenly realm; He had come from there and was relating what He knew, hence He could speak with authority.

How does one move from history to experience? Once again John brings his readers back to the main theme of his gospel — believing in Jesus. Nicodemus had nothing more than sterile religion to pass on to his learners. He needed something much more than that to have access to the “heavenly things” of which Jesus spoke.

Eternal life is not just unending life somewhere out there when we die. It begins here and now with a transfer from the dimension of existence in a purely self-dominated and soulish way to a dimension of living in union with God, experiencing His presence and His power to live unselfishly for other people and to submit lovingly to His will and purpose.

How can this transfer happen? Jesus put it in a nutshell and in the imagery of what was familiar to Jewish readers — Moses and the snake. This was familiar history to the Jews and to the Gentiles who had embraced the Jewish religion. They knew about Moses and the snake.

During their journey from Egypt to the Promised Land, the children of Israel were familiar with the inhabitants of the desert — the “nasties” of that kind of terrain. But God protected them from their deadly neighbours until they infuriated Him so much with their complaining and rebellion that He withdrew His protection and let the fiery serpents loose on them. Many of them perished from the poisonous bites until the people cried out in desperation.

God instructed Moses to fashion a model of a snake out of bronze and lift it up on a pole. Whoever looked at the snake and trusted God for healing would be saved from the effects of the snake’s venom.

‘This, Nicodemus, is the key to understanding what I am telling you.’ The key to their healing lay in the condition and the promise — if they looked at the snake and believed what God had said, the miracle happened. They were rescued from death and given back their life.

Jesus would also be “lifted up” on a wooden stake for everyone to see, but not everyone would experience the life He promised. Only those who gazed at Him with faith in His promise would make that transfer from death to life. Something supernatural would take place in their spirits. They would literally “come alive” to God; they would have a spiritual awakening to a dimension of living they have never “seen”, a new life thrumming with God, everywhere.

That’s what changes history to His story, and our story.

A Marked Man

September 13, 2013Christian Lifebit, fire, natives, Paul, snakeLuella Campbell

A MARKED MAN

“Paul pitched in and helped. He had gathered up a bundle of sticks, but when he put it on the fire, a venomous snake, roused from its torpor by the heat, struck his hand and held on. Seeing the snake hanging from Paul’s hand like that, the natives jumped to the conclusion that he was murderer getting his just deserts. Paul shook the snake off into the fire, none the worse for wear. They kept expecting him to drop dead, but when it was obvious he wasn’t going to, they jumped to the conclusion that he was a god!” Acts 28:1-6 (The Message).

The reaction of the islanders was typical of people who interpreted life from a superstitious world view. To them everything was a series of cause-and-effect events as a tit-for-tat response to their behaviour. When the snake struck, according to their understanding, Paul was being punished because he was an evil-doer but when nothing happened to him, they changed their tune. He must be a god!

There is a valuable spiritual lesson for us even in this bizarre happening. What was it that prevented the serpent’s venom from circulating through Paul’s body and doing its fatal damage? Was it not Paul’s attitude? Had fear taken hold of him, so would the snake poison have done. He was protected from death by his confidence in the words Jesus had spoken.