Tag: parable

  • Running from God

    Running from God

    Are you running from God? I have.

    Do you run after Satan? I have.

    Do you walk with Jesus and then run away some other direction?

    I have. Even the most faithful followers of God and closest Disciples of Jesus have turned tail and run from the adversity we imagined is on the road ahead.

    The seeker-friendly easy-grace gospel would easily fill our mega-churches will non-believers, like the brother in Jesus’ parable who said he would do the will of his father, but then did not do it, as opposed to the brother (or sister, if you are) who says, “NO. I can NOT do that,” yet later repents to do the will of the Father.

    [If you are unfamiliar with this parable Jesus taught in Jerusalem during the events of Holy Week, read Matthew 21.]

    No doubt in this Lenten season of preparation of consideration of the Cross, you will remember later incidents during Holy Week of twelve apostles who ran and hid: an apostle and friend entrusted with the treasury of the whole group showing ‘faithfulness’ by complaint of the wasting of the oil of love and anointing poured forth generously on our Lord by a repentant woman. We all remember a bold proclamation that, “I will never deny you,” from a rock of leadership; the ironic tragedy of all of Jesus’ friends sleeping in Gethsemane and running away in helplessness from the authorities of the Law.

    We are too harsh on Peter and the others, as if we ourselves do not tend to run away every Monday (or even Sunday the minute the sermon finally finishes).

    God has always used reluctant, yet zealous believers. Take Saul of Tarsus (Paul), for instance.

    And who cannot recall a voyage of God’s Prophet, running in the direction away from Nineveh (in modern day Iraq) to a ship crossing the Mediterranean, before falling into the depths of helplessness in the belly of a fish at the bottom of the sea?

    Most of God’s Prophets suffered as God warned Israel and Judah of the destruction to come because of the evil done by the people with God’s Name.

    Is it appropriate witness of GOD for the people of His Name to always do evil?

    Is it right for a witness claiming the Name of Christ (a christian) to show unbelievers evil? Are we not commanded to bear fruit of Christ’s overflowing love, His unfailing faithfulness to the redeemed?

    I will repay,” says the LORD.

    Therefore, do not fear. For what can a mere man (even an evil woman) bring upon you that does not pale by comparison to the wrath of the vengeance of the Living God?

    What terrible judgment must await the one who has dismissed the Blood of the Cross and run toward the pit of perdition.

    To be continued…

     

  • The House You Build

    The House You Build

    Isaiah 66:1-2

    Thus says the LORD:
    “Heaven is my throne,
    and the earth is my footstool;
    what is the house that you would build for me,
    and what is the place of my rest?

    All these things my hand has made,
    and so all these things came to be,
    declares the LORD.

    But this is the one to whom I will look:
    he who is humble and contrite in spirit
    and trembles at my word.

    5 Hear the word of the Lord,
    you who tremble at his word:
    “Your brothers who hate you
    and cast you out for my name’s sake
    have said, ‘Let the Lord be glorified,
    that we may see your joy’;
    but it is they who shall be put to shame.

    15 “For behold, the Lord will come in fire,
    and his chariots like the whirlwind,
    to render his anger in fury,
    and his rebuke with flames of fire.
    16 For by fire will the Lord enter into judgment,
    and by his sword, with all flesh;
    and those slain by the Lord shall be many.

    Our Lord is a consuming fire.

    He will burn away into flames of fire the chaff of our sins.

    He will send away into the darkness of Hades the souls who refuse His refining Word.

    What does the Lord require?

    Matthew 13
    English Standard Version (ESV)

    That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea. 2 And great crowds gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat down. And the whole crowd stood on the beach. 3 And he told them many things in parables…

    18 “Hear then the parable of the sower: 19 When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart…

    … one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy, 21 yet he has no root in himself, but endures for a while, and when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately he falls away.

    … one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.

    23 As for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it. He indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.”

    Is your heart the good soil of your soul? What is the fruit of your receiving the Gospel of Christ Jesus?

    The Parable of the Weeds

    24 He put another parable before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field, 25 but while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away. 26 So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also…

    Satan has been sowing seeds of wickedness among the good seed of the Gospel for two millennia beyond the Cross and Resurrection.

    Is the time of harvest not certainly near?

    isaiah-662_barn and wheat30 Let both grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.’”

     “… what is the house that you would build for me,
    and what is the place of my rest?

    But this is the one to whom I will look:
    he who is humble and contrite in spirit
    and trembles at my word.

    1 Corinthians 3:16 Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? 17 If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple…

    1 Corinthians 6:15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ?

    … do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, 20 for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

     Take Up Your Cross and Follow Jesus

    Luke 9:23 And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. 24 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.

    25 For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? 26 For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.

     

  • The Good Galilean

    The Good Galilean

    Mark 10:17-18 And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

    And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.

     Luke 9

    A Samaritan Village Rejects Jesus

    51 When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. 52 And he sent messengers ahead of him, who went and entered a village of the Samaritans, to make preparations for him. 53 But the people did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. 54 And when his disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” 55 But he turned and rebuked them. 56 And they went on to another village.

    Luke 10

    English Standard Version (ESV)

    Jesus Sends Out the Seventy-Two

    10 After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them on ahead of him, two by two, into every town and place where he himself was about to go. 2 And he said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. 3 Go your way; behold, I am sending you out as lambs in the midst of wolves.

    Jesus, as we know was born in Bethlehem, which makes Him technically, a Judaean. The Jews, knowing He was raised and lived in Nazareth would call Him a Galilean (in a derogatory manor) or a Nazarene.  Judaeans loved their heritage and their city of Jerusalem. Many looked down on outsiders from anywhere else in this world (not unlike we look upon ‘outsiders’ or ‘foreigners’ in this present day).

    Jesus appoints twelve Apostles, teaches throughout Galilee, Judea and other states (all under Roman government and rule) for three years and sets out to completion of His earthly destination of the Cross in Jerusalem.

    He then appoints and sends out not just twelve, but seventy two disciples to go into ALL of the towns and villages along His way to Jerusalem to announce the Good News to ALL (seventy-two evangelists, if you will: advance men for the soon-to-come Messiah, God Incarnate, coming to your very town – He IS sent by God.)

    Jesus tells His audiences in these towns, synagogues, and on the mountaintops thousands of stories and hundreds of parables, not all recorded in the Bible (as the Apostle John points out to us.)  Imagine for a moment a parable with a familiar ring to it, yet not recorded in the Gospels; even as if in a more familiar context of our twenty-first century life as followers (disciples) of Jesus:

    Parable of the Man Who Needed Help

    A man had left his hometown on a journey to a new place through a hostile land when he was attacked and robbed. He was left alone in a place where no one from his home or the place to which he was sent would see the extent of his suffering.

    Because in this day, when a man may ‘reach out and touch’ anyone, anywhere, from any place (without really touching them or reaching them), the man took out his cell phone and texted five friends. (Jesus often used humor in His stories.)

    The man’s text read: Would you pray for me?

    Immediately the man’s pastor answered: I will pray for you now.

    After a short time, one friend from another church called the man, talked with him and then asked if he and his wife could pray for the man over the phone (for they lived in another town).

    A third man texted the next day that his friends had prayed for him in their men’s prayer group the previous day.

    A fourth man never called, texted or encouraged him in any way, as also his christian wife had not.

    Which of these five, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who needed help?”

    Sometimes we do not think of Jesus’ stories or parables in terms of the immediate needs of the people. We might think of His parable of the good Samaritan:

    We have cell phones now. That could never apply to me in this twenty-first century. OR

    Jesus pointed out that Pharisees, Priests, Levites and the like were not very nice people (even though they were the leaders of the “religious” establishment) and that Samaritans treated people better than the religious people treated their own. BUT that doesn’t apply to me. I have never run across a Pharisee, Levite or Samaritan.

    The Bible, and specifically the Gospel, is not just a collection of stories from history of little relevance to us. In fact, the stories and parables of Jesus should always be heard and seen in the light of these times and heard with our heart broken by the Cross of Christ.

    Do you see a face you know in the parable? When you have been the man beaten on the road, whose faces do you see pass you by?

    When you see the beaten man on the road, which of the five or ten or thousands (or even just three) are you?

    Now look to Jesus question:  Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man…?

    Now look to your neighbor’s and your own face and read the too-familiar parable from Luke 10:

    The Parable of the Good Samaritan

    25 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” 27 And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” 28 And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.”

    29 But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” 30 Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. 34 He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine.

    Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him.35 And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ 36 Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” 37 He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”

    Note that the good neighbor first saw to the man’s immediate needs.  It did not matter to the beaten man who needed help that he was a Samaritan, Galilean, Judaean, American, Englishman, Indian, African or any other. It did not matter what race or perceived station in life was the man who was beaten: the Samaritan man (he was just one man like me or you) just helped him, because the man needed mercy in his present situation.

    Secondly, note that the man who was a good neighbor to the beaten man saw to his needs beyond his immediate circumstances. Though the story of the five neighbors remains incomplete in this day, I ask:

    Which of you have seen to “take care of him” and has shown the mercy of hope that indeed you will continue your mercy for the man?  (“I will repay you when I come back.)

    Are you a good Samaritan? Do you show mercy to your neighbor and grace to your loved ones?

    Is the Cross of Christ a convenience for you in your weekly life? Or is your cross one of sacrifice of love and compassion for others – a sacrifice of your time and grace for our neighbors along this rough road of a path through unknown times to a reward or a Judgment where He could say: “I never knew you.” – which neighbor are you?

    For our Lord has commanded:

    Love your neighbor as yourself and love one another as I have loved you.

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