Admiration in the Absence--Mk 3:1-6

(copyright:  bigstockphoto)

I'm just so glad it wasn't me.  I couldn't have not done what Jesus didn't do.  Especially if I had heaven powers behind me.  Here's the scene:

Jesus heals a man with a shriveled hand.  Therefore the Pharisees plotted to kill him.

Seriously?  Kill him for...healing someone?  Even Jesus was angry and deeply distressed.  They cared more that it happened on the Sabbath than for the man who had an incapacitating, mocking magnet deformity.  No telling what I would have done.

And that's why we have to admire Jesus.  For what he didn't do.

1)  He didn't call down 10,000 angels and strike them with lightning, sending them straight to hell without passing go.

2)  He didn't pass judgment against the Pharisees that went something along the lines of "Pharisees are always ________" or "Pharisees never _________".

3)  He didn't vow never to return to a synagogue because they were "so full of hypocrites" even though almost every synagogue was full of hypocrites.

4)  He didn't get discouraged in the ministry or develop a hard heart even though the church leaders wanted to kill him for preaching love and truth.

Instead he let the Pharisees live, he continued to minister to other Pharisees, he intentionally went to more synagogues every week and he didn't lose heart in his mission, even if he did lose his life.

Admirable.

Totally admirable.

No one will ever be ashamed to follow a man/God like this.  Praise Jesus.

Jesus, The Caregiver

One of my Middle Eastern friends tells the story of when his sister was being courted by a suitor.  The older brother in typical culture gathered his 4 younger brothers to meet with the young man.  They came looking tough and intimidating.  They would meet with him 5 times to find out if he was good enough for their sister.  They would also try to add an intimidation factor.  If at the 3rd visit they liked the guy, they would begin by offering him tea as a sign they were warming up to him.  After 5 visits they would give their blessing.  If after they married and the husband was harmful to their sister, they would investigate.  If they found their sister in the wrong, they would let him deal with it.  If they found he was wrong, they would deal with him.

In Middle Eastern culture (and many African cultures) the responsibility of the family falls on to the oldest brother.  He is to protect the family name and make sure the family is protected.  An older brother is also oftentimes expected to financially send the young siblings to school.   It's double the honor, double the responsibility.

Jesus is Middle Eastern.  And he is the oldest brother.  He had the responsibility of caring for his family, especially his mother and the other siblings.  (According to tradition his father died young.)  At one point his brothers thought he had gone crazy so they tried to pull the "mom-card" to get him to stop (Mk 3:30-34).  Didn't work.  Jesus knew what they were up to.  "Whoever does God's will is my brother and sister and mother."

But on the cross it was different.  Jesus had a responsibility to his mother.    And it wasn't pretty as Michaelangelo so shockingly reminds us in his painting--Jesus was naked.  They gambled away his under garments.  And the Romans wanted the greatest possible shame.  There was a reason that "All those who knew him, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things" (Lk 23:49).

But it was different with family.  Jesus' mother was there.  It was her son.  And the disciple Jesus loved.  And in the moment of his greatest agony as he became the sin of the world, he still was focused on the one in front of him--his mother.

"When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, "Dear woman, here is your son," and to the disciple, "Here is your mother."  From that time on, this disciple took her into his home" (Jn 19:26-27).

It wasn't his brothers or even his sisters but it was the man who came to the horror of the cross to look after his mother.  To this man he handed over the care giving responsibilities.  Ironically it was this man who would live the longest.

Jesus was indeed a caregiver.  Not in her sickness but in his crucifixion.  This tells us much about the kind of man we follow.

God, My Protector

I've been thinking off and on over the years of God being my protector.   I know He has protected me countless times.  It really is the question, how does he protect my heart?  Not that life is not full of hardships.  In fact we know it is.  "In this world you have many troubles," he says.  I've experience my truckloads of challenges.  But how does he protect my heart?

In thinking tonight of Jesus as a male/as a man, I was thinking through how he protected while he was on earth:

• When the children came to him and the disciples were trying to shoo those annoying kids out of the way, Jesus invited them to them and elevated them, saying the kingdom belonged to such as these (Mt 19)
• When they were stoning the woman caught in adultery, he asked a question that was really a rebuke.  They dropped their stands. (Jn 8)
• When the Roman soldiers came to arrest him, he stepped forward and told them it was him they were looking for, and to let the disciples go (Jn 18)

Jesus was their protector, even on this earth.  It didn't mean they weren't exposed to hardship, but they knew he was in their corner.  There is so much more to understand and know.

Jesus--The Scary One

The job of the Roman soldier was to invoke so much fear into the life of the citizens that there was no room for disobedience.  When a Roman soldier appeared, people ran for their lives.  It was trained into them to be brutal and heartless.  Their very presence invoked fear.  People ran from them and the Romans expected it.

But things don't always work out the way they're supposed to.

A detachment of soldiers was sent out to get Jesus.  Blood was in the air but orders were to bring him back alive.  They confidently marched to the grove of olives, hardened and tough.  Judas was going to lead them to him and they would hunt him down.  This one would be easy.

But as they drew near, instead of Jesus running in fear, he "went out" to them.  He stood up and instead of running from them, he went to them.  Instead of the Romans demanding answers, Jesus asked them the question.  "Who is that you want?"

"Jesus of Nazareth," they responded.

"I am he."  

With that the Roman soldiers drew back in fright and fell to the ground all over each other.  A bumbling mess. 

"If you are looking for me, then let these men go.”

His concern?   To protect his disciples.  He didn't run from the battle, he ran into it, protecting his men (who all ran away). 

Jesus is the true warrior.   The one turning the tables on the enemy.

Where men try to invoke fear, He is their fear (Is 8:13).

Two Betrayers--John 13-14

"I tell you the truth, one of you is going to betray me."

Who is it?  Surely not me!   That was the thought on everyone's mind.

"His disciples stared at one another, at a loss..."

It was a troubling statement.  Peter asked John to ask Jesus who it was. 

"It is the one to whom I will give this piece of bread."

Jesus told them plainly, but they didn't get it.  Perhaps because he had spoken so often parabolically.  So the question lingered in the air.

Then Jesus told them he was going away to a place where they couldn't come yet.  Peter asked why, swearing he would lay down his life for him.

Then Jesus said the words that stopped the proud man cold:

"I tell you the truth, before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times!"

Was it him?  Was he the betrayer?  Jesus just said he would disown him.  Peter shut up.

And then it came down.  Judas betrayed Jesus for money.  And Peter, the bold fisherman, disowned Jesus from fear.  Even all the other disciples would run away, one of them even naked.

But what marked their journey was not how what they did, but how they responded.

Judas hung himself.

Peter repented.

The disciples who had run away returned.

Jesus knew Judas and Peter and his disciples would turn tail in the difficult hour but he loved them anyway.  He not only loved them but he restored them.  Judas was in the grave with guilt so there wasn't anything left to do.  For the disciples that had run away he appeared to them and broke bread (and fish) with them, a sign of restoration.  And for Peter he had a special message,

"Go tell the disciples...and Peter" about my resurrection.  (Emphasis mine)

God is extraordinarily good.  He's the God of restoration.    The question is not that we will fail as we will.  But where do we go when we fail.  Do we try to pick ourselves up by our own bootstraps?  Or do we run to Jesus in repentance.

After Jesus was killed Peter had gone back to fishing for a bit.  He was on the lake when a man told him to throw over to the other side of the boat.  He caught a large number of fish.  It was the second time in his life this miracle would happen.  And he knew who it was.  He donned his clothes and jumped into the lake, swimming frantically toward a reunion.  It was sweet.  But then there was the moment of truth.

"Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?"

That hurt.

"Simon, son of John, do you truly love me?"

Love redefined.  Another reality barb to the heart.

"Do you love me?"

Peter couldn't take it anymore.

"Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you."

"Jesus said, "Feed my sheep."

A recognition of truth.  Yet with a mission restored.  Just stripped of the pride.

It's the sweetness of failure.



 

Jesus Walked! John 6:16-24

People, Jesus walked on water!!  Not that this is any surprise to anyone.  But we generally we are more focused on Peter walking on water because it preaches better.  But if you look at Jesus, or in fact all the miracle of Scripture, supernatural power was always used to serve other people, never for show.  Parting of the Red Sea?  Well the Egyptians were about to face genocide.  Casting out demons?  These people were being tortured.   Power is always meant to serve, never to impress.  This is clear in Scripture.

What this means is that Jesus' walking on water was not about him just needing to get to the boat.  (Power is not meant to serve self).  I believe it was a provocation to increase their faith.  Peter responded.  Perhaps that is why he becomes such a prominent disciple. 

We often forget that Jesus was a man.  We expect him to do miracles as Son of God. But he acted and functioned as a man first, fully connected to God.   Something to perhaps provoke our faith.

Helpless, but not.--John 5:1-15

Between a rock and hard place.  Or feeling smashed between impossible and impossible.  This is how I've felt lately.  Desperate, angry, frustrated and unable to feel like I can change the situation.

Perhaps that is what the man at Bethesda felt.  Supposedly the waters were healing.  All the invalids hung out there hoping for a chance to get well.  But he couldn't get in the water he needed for healing because no one would take him.  Maybe because his family didn't care.  Or he was such a jerk he had no friends.  But I do think self-pity had set in.

"Do you want to get well?" Jesus asked.

Instead of a simple, "Absolutely!"  The self-pity shows up:

"I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred."

Some people like their maladies.

But Jesus commanded him to get up, take his mat and walk.  The man responded.  Later Jesus would tell him,

"Stop sinning or something worse may happen."

Even invalids can sin in big ways.  Perhaps that's why he was alone.

But here I am.  Angry.  Frustrated.  Ready to explode.  Caught in the awful territory of having responsibility with no authority.  And it's something close to my heart and has HUGE implications for life.   I'm not in the place of self-pity.  Right now just in the place of angry frustration and feeling so utterly helpless.

I remembered the previous post of the values of Iris ministries:

1)  Commune with God
2)  Expect the miraculous
3)  Minister to the poor
4)  Embrace suffering
5)  Live a lifestyle of joy.

I deviated from every. single.  one. of those.  My eyes have seen the walls.  But I haven't seen Jesus.  Come Lord Jesus.  Come.

"I lift my eyes up to the hills.  Where does my help come from?  It comes from you, Maker of heaven and earth."  Ps 121

Gutted at the cross--John 19:26

I was thinking earlier today that something that must have been beyond painful was for Jesus to look down and see the utter grief and despair of his mother.  The road of obedience and his purpose in life caused excruciating pain to the one on earth he most loved.  And he couldn't even put his arm around her to comfort her.  Thus John.  One of the most touching and moving moments of a terrible crucifixion.

Triumphal Entry In all Four Gospels

Matthew 21:1-17; Mark 11:1-10; Luke 19:28-38; and John 12:12-18

Summary: 

1.   Jesus had been the day before with Martha and Lazarus at Bethany where Mary broke the bottle of perfume and it put it on his feet.  Judas was upset.  Many Jews were there to see Jesus and also to Lazarus who had been risen from the dead.  The chief priests were plotting to kill Lazarus because on account of him many of the Jews were going over to Jesus and putting their faith in him. 
2.  After Jesus told the parable of the 10 Minas, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem.
3. Jesus & his disciples approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage (Mk; Lk adds “and Bethany”) on the hill called Mt of Olives
4. Jesus sent 2 disciples to the village ahead of him
5. They would find a donkey and a colt, untie them, tell them the Lord needs them and he will send them right away.  Mk, Lk add a “colt that has never been ridden.”
6.  Mk:   “Went and found a colt outside in the street, tied at a doorway.” 
7.  Mk:  As they untied it, some people standing there asked, “What you doing, untying that colt?"
8.   Lk:  The owners asked them why they were untying the colt 
9. They told them what Jesus said and the people let them go.
10. This fulfilled Zech 9:9—“Say to the Daughter of Zion, Do not be afraid, O Daughter of Zion, See, your king comes to you, gentle and riding/seated on a donkey, on a colt/young donkey, the foal of a donkey. 
11. At first his disciples did not understand all this.  Only after Jesus was glorified did they realize that these things had been written about him and that they had done these things to him.
12. The disciples brought the donkey, placed their cloaks on them and Jesus sat on them 
13.  Threw their cloaks on the colt and put Jesus on it. 
14. Now the crowd that was with him when he called Lazarus from the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to spread the word.  Many people, because they had heard that he had given this miraculous sign, went out to meet him.  So the Pharisees said to one another, “See, this is getting us nowhere.  Look how the whole world has gone after him!” 
15. The next day the great crowd that had come for the Feast heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem.  They took palm branches and went out to meet him 
16. A very large crowd [Mk—“many people”] spread their cloaks on the road as he went alone
17.  Others cut branches [Mk:  “cut in the fields.] from the trees and spread them on the road 
18. When he came near the place where the road goes down to the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen.  
19.  The crowds that went ahead of him and those that following him.

20. They shouted, “Hosanna!  Blessed is he/the king who comes in the name of the Lord!  Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.  Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David!  Peace in heaven and glory in the highest.  Blessed is the King of Israel! Hosanna in the highest!”

21. Some of the Pharisees in the crows said to Jesus, “Teach, rebuke your disciples!” “I tell you,” he replided, “if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”

22. As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it and said, “If you, even you had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes.  The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side.  They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls.  They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God’s coming to you.”

23. When Jesus entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred.

24. They (?) asked “Who is this?”

25.  The crowds answered, “This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth in Galiliee.”

26.  Jesus entered Jerusalem and went to the temple. 

27. Jesus entered the temple area and drove out all who were buying and selling there.  He overturned the tables of the money changes and the benches of those selling doves.  “It is written,” he said to them,” ‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it a ‘den of robbers.’”

28. The blind and the lame came to him at the temple, and he healed them.  But when the chief priests and the teachers of the law saw the wonderful things he did and the children shouting in the temple area, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they were indignant.

29. “Do you hear what these children are saying?” they asked him.  “Yes,” replied Jesus, “have you never read, “’From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise’?”

30. And he left them and went out of the city to Bethany, where he spent the night.

He looked at everything but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the Twelve.

31. Every day he was teaching at the temple.  But the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the leaders among the people were trying to kill him.  Yet they could not find any way to do it, because all the people on his words.”
  
 Triumphal Entry in Short:

Jesus has been staying at Lazarus' house.  Word had gotten out locally and even to Jerusalem about the resurrection.

Jesus goes to the hill of the Mt. of Olives and sends the two to get the donkey& colt.  They return and lay their cloaks on the donkey and on the road.

Meanwhile back in Jerusalem people hear Jesus is coming and run out to the field and cut palm branches and spread them on the road along with more cloaks.

As Jesus was descending the hill of the Mount of Olives there was exceeding joy of the disciples.  

But as Jesus began to draw near to Jerusalem he began to weep, not for the cross he would face but for the lostness of this beloved people.

Upon entering the temple he saw all the money-changers and over-turned their tables.  Joy and praise at Mt of Olives, turned to sorrow and sadness upon entering Jerusalem,  changed to temple chaos and anger at business being set up in the temple..  A wild day.

Jews were turning to the faith and the chief priests and Pharisees were jealous and with violent intent.

Jesus returns to Bethany for the night with the Twelve. 
 

The Holy Spirit: Conceiver of Life

I do not have to be married to be fruitful and multiply.  Anyone in Jesus has that ability--whether it is those with severe physical limitations, the mentally disabled, the elderly, the young widow, singles, etc... Why?  Because the Holy Spirit births life.  He has from the very beginning:

"In the beginning God."  Verse 1.
"The Spirit of God was hovering over the waters."  Verse 2.

What happened next?  Life.

Why?

Covenant communion brings life. 

We see this also in the beginning of the New Testament.  The book of Matthew.  Chapter 1.

"Mary was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit...because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit" (Mt 1:14)

When the Holy Spirit is around, he brings conception that births radical creation. It's not just something that happened with the birth of the world, it is a necessary prerequisite for Christian "life":

John 3:

3 Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council...

⁴ “How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”
⁵ Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. ⁶ Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit^[b] gives birth to spirit. ⁷ You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You^[c] must be born again.’ ⁸ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”^[d]
9 “How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.
¹⁰ “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? 
 
Whenever life happens the Holy Spirit is right there in the process of conceiving this new form of greatness, whether it be the creation of the world, the birth of God Almighty into a human baby, or the causing of someone to be "born again."  This is life.  And this is the command:  Be fruitful and multiply.  How?

By our union with God Almighty.  Our times of greatest intimacy with our God, when our spirit is united with his Holy Spirit, life is conceived, grows and is birthed.  And not just once.  Because fruitfulness is not just once.  Multiplication is not just once and one time.  Life in communion with God's Holy Spirit is life that happens over and over in an abundance with fruitfulness that cannot be contained.  It may not be as obviously seen as in one's own child but it is seen in the life of the hardened heart that becomes tender to the Lord, it is observed in the move of God that brings the rebellious sons and daughters back to the heart of the Father and the family, and we watch it happen in the life of a nation that nationally repents and commits itself to the Lord (go Uganda).  THIS is life.  Conceived and brought to fruition by the Holy Spirit.  Available to ALL.

Go.  

Be fruitful and multiply. 

The Things that Hinder Us--John 8

 The seed is holy.  And it falls on the soil.  But the soil has some challenges.  And these things cause the death of the seed.  And when I look at them, they can be quite disturbing:


"Trampled on"--This was the reason for the first seed not growing.  People squashing the seed.

Testing
Worries
Riches
Pleasures