"You are my friends if you do what I command you." – Jesus How does what Jesus said sit with you? Are you okay with a friend who makes demands? …whose friendship is a condition based on submission to him? Is that true friendship? Is it love? I'll admit, I've had difficulty understanding what Jesus said here. It appears His love is conditional, offered on the basis of works. I have to earn His favor somehow, or He won't be my friend. This doesn't fit in with my understanding of Jesus from other parts of the Bible. If you've had problems with what Jesus said here, it's time to take another look. Here it is in context: "If you keep …Continue reading →
The twelve disciples just came back from an exhausting mission trip. Jesus had sent them out into the villages to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom and call people to repentance. I presume this took several weeks in that they also spent time healing the sick and casting out demons. As each day ended, they would spend the night in someone’s home. Now that they were all together again, Jesus called His tired and hungry disciples to come away from the crowd to get some much needed rest. But it was not to be… And he said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while.” For many were coming and going, and they had …Continue reading →
For let this mind be in you which also was in Christ Jesus, who subsisting in the form of God thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a slave, having become in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, having become obedient until death, even the death of a cross. Philippians 2:5-8 (Green) The journey of the Son of God from heaven to earth can be described in one word: humbling. The One who created all there is and holds everything together became a helpless baby. Even if Jesus were born into great royalty, it would be a mind-boggling descent from where He …Continue reading →
(From sermon of December 4, 2005) A teenage girl got lost in her car in a snow storm. She remembered what her dad had once told her: “If you ever get stuck in a snow storm, wait for a snow plow and follow it.” Pretty soon a snow plow came by, and she started to follow it. She followed the plow for about forty five minutes. Finally the driver of the truck got out and asked her what she was doing. She explained that her dad had told her if she ever got stuck in the snow, to follow a plow. The driver nodded and said, “Well, I’m done with the Wal-Mart parking lot. You can follow me over to …Continue reading →
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places… – Ephesians 1:3 (ESV) I’ve been thinking about God’s mercy and grace lately. He doesn’t deal with us the way we deal with those around us. It’s easy to say we prefer grace and mercy to justice until someone steals the car or robs the house… then suddenly we want justice! Sometimes we seek justice when we shouldn’t: Ibn Saud, king of Saudi Arabia (1932-1953), once had a woman demand the death of a man who had killed her husband. The man had fallen out of a palm tree while picking dates and fell on …Continue reading →
(We recently hosted a couple’s fellowship/retreat in Beatty. The following comes from a talk I gave on the last day of the retreat.) Practially speaking, all marriages are based on one or more models. Much of what we think marriage is supposed to be like came from observing the relationship between our parents when we were children. If we are very loving towards our spouses, there’s a good chance that we saw that same kind of love in mom and dad. If we fight all the time, chances are it’s because mom and dad did too. It can be a sobering thought to realize that we’re also setting the prime example of marriage for our children. But parents are not …Continue reading →
“…I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness and died. This is the bread which comes down out of heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread which has come down out of heaven: if any one shall have eaten of this bread he shall live for ever; but the bread withal which I shall give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” – John 6:48-51 (JND) While the Israelites were in the wilderness, God miraculously sustained them with bread from heaven for forty years. Manna was not a supplemental food source – it was something God’s people had to rely …Continue reading →
Two people, joined together into one flesh by God. This is a picture of our union with Christ. Paul wrote: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. – Ephesians 5:31-32 (ESV) The bond between husband and wife is a great picture of the Church’s union with Christ. But in an age of easy divorce, this image may loose some of its significance in our minds. Today, many couples split up because the marriage was one of convenience. Living together becomes difficult for various reasons, either internal or external. So …Continue reading →
"Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart; and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." I once heard someone put what Jesus said this way. It is like an advertising slogan that the carpenter's son put on a sign outside of his shop: "Jesus Christ's Easy Yokes." You may think of a yoke as a big wooden contraption that is placed on the neck of oxen to harness them to do work. You may think of a yoke as work, but it is actually something designed to make work much easier. In some countries people bear a yoke, a stick, …Continue reading →
And Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer, which is the ninth hour; and a certain man who was lame from his mother’s womb was being carried, whom they placed every day at the gate of the temple called Beautiful, to ask alms of those who were going into the temple… – Acts 3:1-2 (JND) We’re going through the book of Acts on Sundays in adult class, and while looking at this portion of the book, it occurred to me that Jesus never healed this man during His earthly ministry. It says here that the lame man was laid daily at the temple to beg money from those going in to worship. This …Continue reading →
