Luke 13:22-24  And He went through the cities and villages, teaching, and journeying toward Jerusalem.  Then one said to Him, "Lord, are there few who are saved."  And He said to them, "Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I say to you, will seek to enter and will not be able."

Thursday, January 26, 2017  Another narrow place is the narrow path, with walls on either side, where the Angel of the Lord confronted Balaam while he was riding him mule. (Numbers 22:22-40)  Perhaps one characteristic of the "narrow way" is that we cannot avoid being confronted by the Lord in prayer.  We must be vulnerable, honest and willing to be convicted of sin.  There is no "sneaking by" on a narrow road.  There is if the road is crowded and wide.

Tuesday, January 11, 2017

Luke 12:1-12 (NKJV)

¹  In the meantime, when an innumerable multitude of people had gathered together, so that they trampled one another, He began to say to His disciples first of all, "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.

            The word for "hypocrisy" literally means "a reply".  The word indicated an actor-someone playing a role.  It later developed the negative connotation of being false, insincere, acting like someone you're not.  Think of an actor who wears a mask in order to portray a role.  The hypocrite wears a "mask" by being insincere, unreal and untruthful; by acting like they're someone other (usually better) then they really are.  An interesting application of this is in Galatians 2:13 in which the Apostle Paul confronts Peter and other Christians who have separated themselves from other Christians of a Gentile background because they do not keep the proper dietary laws, etc.  Paul knew that Peter and his friends did not, could not, adequately keep those laws so he confronts them for thinking of themselves better than they ought.  Perhaps also because they did not consider these other Christians with a different background and different habits and attitudes as unworthy of fellowship; that they were someone less than who they really are.  Could it be that we are hypocrites not only when we act like we are better, or other than who we really are, but also when we treat others as someone less than who they really are.  Maybe we are hypocrites when we force others to wear a "mask" as well as when we wear a "mask" ourselves?

Tuesday, January 3, 2017

To Fear or Not to Fear

Luke 12:4-7

"And I say to you, My friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do.  But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear Him who, after He has killed, has power to cast into hell; yes, I say to you, fear Him!  Are not five sparrows sold for two copper coins? And not one of them is forgotten before God.  But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.

In this challenging passage Jesus gives what appears to be impossible advice:  Do not fear those who can kill the body.  I, for one, find the thought of confronting people willing to kill my body pretty frightening, so I move on to the next verse, which I believe tells me how one overcomes a fear of murder.  It is the fear of God.  The word for "fear" also can mean "awe" or "reverence" and I tend to lean more toward that connotation because for the follower of Jesus, God is our Father.  We are invited to approach Him boldly.  Jesus clearly depicts the Father as God who loves us most dearly.

Yet, the word "fear" as in "do not fear therefore; you are more value than many sparrows" is the same word for "fear" that we find in "fear Him...who has power to cast into hell".  So we are to fear and yet not fear, and I think there is a balance in this somewhere.  There is hell.  There is damnation, and a person trifles with God at their own risk.  Perhaps, while still holding on the understanding of God as our loving Father in Christ, we should dare to pray for a vision of God as Judge of justice and wrath.  Perhaps those people who have a clear understanding of that side of God find that is the reason they have in themselves the resolve to choose death rather than to face Him in such circumstances.  I am not suggesting that we back away from the understanding of God is our loving Father, but perhaps just a little bit of trembling in the midst of our awe and reverence wouldn't be such a bad thing after all.  

Luke 11:2

And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth.

I was reflecting on the second point of the Lord's Prayer, "hallowed by Thy Name", and spent some time thinking about the nature of holiness.  What does it mean that our Lord is holy?  I think this passage in Exodus, in which Moses encounters the Lord in the burning bush, give me some things to think about.

Exodus 3:5-7

Then He said, "Do not draw near this place.  Take your sandals off your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground."  Moreover He said, "I am the God of your father-the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob."  And Moses hid his face for he was afraid to look upon God.  And the Lord said; "I have surely seen the oppression of My people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows." 

Note:  We approach the Lord His way and in His timing.  He chose to wait until Moses was 80, and told him to stand at a distance and to be vulnerable, removing the sandals from his feet.  Moses was afraid, and if we understand the holiness of the Lord we should be in awe as well.  God is the God of his ancestors, and ours.  We stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us and they should be remembered.  Our Lord is also the Lord who knows, intimately the sorrows people feel today.  He knows them as if He experiences them Himself.  Even in glory He is a "man of sorrows, acquainted with grief."  He is authoritative, august, yet intimate and well aware of our challenges and difficulties.  We need to grasp both sides of this to understand His holiness. 

Wednesday, November 9, 2016-

Luke 9:27  "But I tell you truly, there are some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the kingdom of God."  (New King James Version of the Bible)

And now for a blog entry that has nothing to do with politics. 

Jesus, shortly after He said this, took Peter, James and John to the top of a mountain to pray and there was transfigured before them.  His appearance was altered, made bright and the disciples saw Elijah (representing the Prophets) and Moses (representing the Law) in consultation with Jesus.  Their presence affirmed that that the mission of Jesus supported the Law and the Prophets, and vice versa.  I have wondered, however, how the disciples were able to recognize Elijah and Moses?  Still, this episode strikes a nerve with me because I want, in both my private devotions and in the public worship of the church I serve, to experience the Kingdom of God. 

If the assertion that some would not taste death before they saw the kingdom of God was fulfilled in the Transfiguration, then could we consider that the kingdom of God involved the Presence of God with power and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, including visions?  If we experienced the Kingdom of God in some fashion in our lives, would it not also possibly involve the same power and gifts involved with the Presence of God, if not an actual vision just like the one the disciples encountered on that fateful day?  I don't want to overstate my desire here and be overly enamored with "experiences" but I yearn to meet with God when I pray, and when we worship on Sunday.  I want people to walk away from worship feeling like they have, in a profound way, truly met with God.  But then I noticed the subject of the conversation between Jesus, Moses and Elijah.

It's interesting to note that the topic of discussion between Jesus, Elijah and Moses was Jesus' death in Jerusalem, literally His "exodus".  The vision, power and Presence sounds wonderful, but the topic was death.  Am I ready to face death for the Presence of God in the here and now?  How far have I gone in dying to self?  In an attempt to gauge "death to selfishness" I considered the places where my mind will wander.  All those times I dreamt of "what if I had done this with my life?"  I've wondered what would have happened if I had made one or more different choices?  Are they not all self serving?  Are they not all attempts to glorify self?  

Imagination can be a good thing, but I need to face life as it is right now and die to self-serving wishful thinking.  That is one small part of dying to self.  Perhaps my next step to a deeper spiritual life, a deeper experience of the Kingdom of God, is to meditate and pray about death to self.  How far have I gone with this?  I suspect that I have a long way to go.   

Luke 6:35 (NIV)

³⁵But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.

Note:  "kind" is translated "easy" in Matthew 11:30:  "For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."

Compare this passage with the Old Testament precedent for it in Leviticus 25:35-38:  "If one of your brethren become poor, and falls in to poverty among you, then you shall help him, like a stranger of a sojourner, that he may live with you.  Take no usury or interest from him; but fear your God, that your brother may live with you.  You shall not lend him your money for usury, nor lend him your food at a profit.  I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan and to be your God."

I find that loving my enemies does not come naturally, in fact I have a hard time even thinking about how I would do this.  I would greatly prefer to simply avoid such people and have nothing to do with them.   Considering the context, we know that the Empire of Rome ruled over Israel at the time, so people probably couldn't avoid people who were troublesome, which makes this even worse for me.  While I know that the words of our Lord do not mean to be a "doormat" or never stand up for your rights, I understand Him to mean that when justice is denied us, such as those who are persecuted, we are not allowed to stoop to vengeance.  We are to demonstrate love to all whether they deserve it or not, but I struggle with that.  

Perhaps my first step in responding to this passage is to meditate on the last phrase of verse 35, "for He is kind to the unthankful and evil."  Our heavenly Father is kind to people who show no gratitude in return.  I don't think I've ever really pondered that before.  What does it mean to serve a God who kindly provides for people who hate Him and take Him for granted?  

Luke 4:19  "...to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord"

Part of what Jesus read from Isaiah in His hometown of Nazareth.  Luke 4:18-19

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed; to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord."

Wednesday, July 20, 2016-The phrase "acceptable year of the Lord" is a reference to the Year of Jubilee, the background of which is in Leviticus 25.  It speaks of restoration of property to families and tribes every fifty years.  How it works is that every seventh year the fields are to be left alone and the people are to trust God to provide enough food to survive.  That would be a sabbath year for the fields.  After the seventh sabbath year (the fiftieth year), all property returns to the original owners.  God instructed the people to keep the Year of Jubilee in mind when transacting business, and I think the point is that the poor need a way out of misfortune and poverty, and it probably worked better than some bankruptcy laws do today.

   How does this apply today?  There are the obvious agricultural applications, that I think are applied in some form among farms today in the form of crop rotation.  In the rotation process one field yearly is left fallow.  I do not know of a farmer, however, who plants no crops on the seventh year and trusts that the harvest from the sixth year will carry him over through the seventh and until the harvest of the eighth year.  It does give me pause to think, do I consider my food supply beyond the grocery store shelves?  The answer is "no".  Perhaps I would do well to give more thought about the food that I buy and how it gets to market? Also, I find that the Law of Jubilee is a wise law to protect against reckless riches and against poverty.  One that we could use in some version today. 
How does this affect my politics?

Saturday, July 23, 2016

I've been left with the feeling that I've not reflected enough on the Year of Jubilee and the fact that Jesus refers to it when reading the "mission statement" for Him left by the Prophet Isaiah.  I know that Old Testament instructions about agriculture have meaning that goes beyond the obvious applications.  The Apostle Paul, in 1 Corinthians 9:9, wrote "For it is written in the law of Moses, 'You shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain.'  Is it oxen that God is concerned about?" His point, I surmise, is that there is much more to this verse than allowing oxen to eat when farming.  In fact, Paul used this verse to point out that he would be within his rights if he made a living off of itinerant preaching, as did Peter.  By the same token, I suspect that the Year of Jubilee has more to do than farming and giving suffering families another chance every fifty years.  Those are good applications, but I suspect there is something in this that applies to us, today, especially since it find its way into such an important passage of Scripture.

     Jesus makes this a part of His mission statement.  How does He fulfill this?  Does such restoration involve the Kingdom of God at the end of the age, or is there anything applicable to this age?  How does this affect my prayers for people who need life to be restored in some fashion?