Mark Bradford's Bible Blog

A Crippled Woman Healed on the Sabbath

¹⁰On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, ¹¹and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all. ¹²When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, “Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.” ¹³Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.

¹⁴Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue ruler said to the people, “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

This is the second instance of Jesus healing someone in the synagogue on the Sabbath in Luke’s gospel. The other is in 6:6-11. See my post on that passage here. When Jesus healed the man with the shriveled hand in chapter 6, he simply told the man to stretch out his hand. But this time, he told the woman she was free, and then he put his hands on her and she was healed. A word and a touch from Jesus is all we need to set us free from anything that binds us.

Surely Jesus knew the reaction this would cause. But the synagogue leader did not reprimand Jesus for healing the woman, he reprimanded the woman for coming to be healed (v. 14). Perhaps this woman sat in a more prominent seat than she was supposed to, hoping Jesus would see and heal her. Maybe this infirmity kept her from coming to the synagogue on most Sabbath days, but when she heard Jesus was going to be there, she made a special trip, hoping to be healed. How much trouble are we willing to go to to meet with Jesus? Do we come to him with hope and expectation that he will free us?

What Jesus had just done could not be considered work by any reasonable definition, but there were all kinds of unreasonable, man-made rules about what constituted work on the Sabbath in Jesus’ day. Jesus makes the same point here that he made in chapter 6, that God’s commandment concerning keeping the Sabbath was never intended to keep us from doing good for others.

¹⁵The Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? ¹⁶Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?”

¹⁷When he said this, all his opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing.

The synagogue ruler, like many of his day, was more concerned with rules than people. It was more important to him to keep the rules than to help this woman. It’s easy to get so comfortable with the way we “do church” that we lose sight of the needs all around us. Right now my church is going through the process of adding a second service, and it seems everybody has their own ideas of what that service should look like. Some people are upset that it’s not shaping up like they think it should. I have been guilty of that myself. What upsets us, little things that don’t matter much in the light of eternity, or the needs of people right in front of us? Are we like the synagogue leader, critical when things don’t happen the way we think they should, or like the people in verse 17 who were delighted with what Jesus was doing, even if the methods used aren’t what we’re used to?

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A Call to Repentance

¹ About this time Jesus was informed that Pilate had murdered some people from Galilee as they were offering sacrifices at the Temple. ² “Do you think those Galileans were worse sinners than all the other people from Galilee?” Jesus asked. “Is that why they suffered? ³ Not at all! And you will perish, too, unless you repent of your sins and turn to God. ⁴ And what about the eighteen people who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them? Were they the worst sinners in Jerusalem? ⁵ No, and I tell you again that unless you repent, you will perish, too.” (NLB)

Jesus talks here about two tragedies that had happened recently. Apparently the murder of these Galileans had just happened, and someone told Jesus about it. Since Jesus was a Galilean on his way to Jerusalem, it’s easy to see why people would want him to know about this and would want his reaction to it. We don’t have any records in secular history of this tragedy, and this is the only place in the gospels where it’s mentioned. The scholarship I’ve seen thinks that some Galileans were making their sacrifices in the Temple, and Pilate sent soldiers in and slaughtered them in the Temple courts, during their act of worship. In the NIV and Amplified Bible, what the NLB translates “Pilate had murdered some people from Galilee as they were offering sacrifices” is translated, “the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices”. That’s why scholars think they were murdered while their sacrifices were being made, because their blood was “mixed” with the blood of their sacrifices. This would have been a terrible outrage to Jews of that time. But rather than rail against Pilate for this crime, Jesus used that tragedy and another, the fall of the Tower of Siloam which killed 18 people, to illustrate the importance of repentance.

In that culture, the popular view was that if something bad happened to you, it meant you were especially guilty, and the tragedy was God’s judgment on you. Sadly, some still think that way today. The age-old question, “Why do bad things happen to good people?” still haunts many. We’d still like to think that the wicked should suffer, but the innocent should not. But Jesus didn’t say the people killed were innocent, he said they were not worse sinners than anyone else. We are all guilty. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). The people Jesus was talking to probably felt that those who had died tragically must have been more guilty than they because of what had happened to them. Some today may feel the same way toward a gay AIDS victim, or a guy whose meth lab blows up and kills him. But those people are no worse sinners than any of us, and if we don’t repent, our fate will be the same as theirs.

The Amplified Bible translates the word repent in verses 3 and 5, “change your mind for the better and heartily amend your ways, with abhorrence of your past sins”. Is that our definition of repentance? Do we go that far in changing our ways? David Guzik, in his commentary on this chapter, says that the tense for the Greek word for repent is different in verse 3 than it is in verse 5. In verse 5, it’s a “once and for all” repentance, and in verse 3, it’s a continuous repentance. Both are necessary for following Jesus. We must repent when we first accept Jesus as our Savior, but then, as we grow in him, we continue to repent in areas of our life that God is not pleased with. Repentance is both a crisis event and a process.

Parable of the Barren Fig Tree

⁶ Then Jesus told this story: “A man planted a fig tree in his garden and came again and again to see if there was any fruit on it, but he was always disappointed. ⁷ Finally, he said to his gardener, ‘I’ve waited three years, and there hasn’t been a single fig! Cut it down. It’s just taking up space in the garden.’

⁸ “The gardener answered, ‘Sir, give it one more chance. Leave it another year, and I’ll give it special attention and plenty of fertilizer. ⁹ If we get figs next year, fine. If not, then you can cut it down.’”

After warning them about repentance, Jesus uses this parable to talk about God’s patience and judgment. One thing I’m not sure about in this parable is who the man who planted the tree is supposed to represent, and who the farmer is supposed to represent. Do they both represent God? God is the one who “plants” us, and God is the one who looks for fruit in our lives. But God is also the one who cares for us and nurtures us to try to get us to produce good fruit. Perhaps the man who planted the tree represents the judgment of God, and the farmer represents the patience and mercy of God.

So what does “fruit” mean? Jesus told another parable about a tree and its fruit in 6:43-45. See my post on that passage here. In that parable, Jesus seems to be saying that our words and actions show what’s in our heart. Galatians 5:22-23 tells us what the fruit of the Spirit is. Certainly love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control are evidence of Jesus living in us and through us. If our lives show those characteristics, God will be pleased with the fruit that our lives produce. But there’s one other aspect of fruit. Fruit is how some trees reproduce. If left unattended, a fruit tree will drop its fruit in the fall, and the rotting fruit on the ground fertilizes the seeds, producing more fruit trees. If our lives are really producing good fruit, the kind that God wants, we will be reproducing ourselves as Christians. That’s also the kind of fruit God is looking for from us. He wants to see more people coming to Jesus because of us.

But God’s patience is not infinite. In the parable, the farmer gets one more year to try to nurture the tree so it will produce fruit. In the context that Jesus was speaking, I think his immediate message was to Israel. Jesus’ presence with them in the flesh was the “one more year” they were getting to repent. They actually had almost a full generation of witnesses preaching about his resurrection to repent and believe before the “tree” was cut down when Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 AD. God’s patience is also not infinite with the church today. If our lives individually, and the church collectively, do not produce the kind of fruit that God planted us for, our fate will be no better than Jerusalem’s was in the first century.

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Interpreting the Times

⁵⁴He said to the crowd: “When you see a cloud rising in the west, immediately you say, ‘It’s going to rain,’ and it does. ⁵⁵And when the south wind blows, you say, ‘It’s going to be hot,’ and it is. ⁵⁶Hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of the earth and the sky. How is it that you don’t know how to interpret this present time?

A few verses earlier, Jesus had been warning his disciples to be watchful, dressed and ready for his return. Now he turns to the crowd and asks why they can’t interpret the times they are living in. It wasn’t that they weren’t expecting the Messiah to come. They all were. Yeshua was the most common name given to Jewish boys of that era, because every mother hoped her son would grow up to be the Messiah. Yet the true Messiah was standing right in front of them, and they didn’t recognize him. They knew the prophecies, but had completely misinterpreted them. They expected a political Messiah to free them from the Romans, rather than one who would be the ultimate sacrifice for their sin. This passage is often quoted by those who believe they know the scenario by which Jesus will return. But the current popular belief about the second coming of Jesus, the whole Hal Lindsey/Left Behind scenario, could well be just as wrong as the popular belief was about his first coming.

One of the beliefs about the second coming that is seemingly accepted by everyone is the belief that the Temple must be rebuilt on the Dome of the Rock before Jesus returns. But that belief is dangerous, because people might well see that the Temple has not yet been rebuilt, so that means Jesus can’t return yet. So why repent now, when they haven’t even begun tearing down the mosque that sits there now? All of those who are so sure that they know what will happen and how would do well to heed Jesus’ warning this this crowd, who also were sure they knew what the Messiah would do when he came the first time.

⁵⁷“Why don’t you judge for yourselves what is right? ⁵⁸As you are going with your adversary to the magistrate, try hard to be reconciled to him on the way, or he may drag you off to the judge, and the judge turn you over to the officer, and the officer throw you into prison. ⁵⁹I tell you, you will not get out until you have paid the last penny.^[c]“

Did Jesus call the crowd hypocrites because they misunderstood the prophecies? I don’t think so. He called them hypocrites because they were not making every effort to reconcile themselves to God. Like a person who owed someone money in that culture would try to negotiate with their creditor to stay out of debtor’s prison, Jesus is urging them to make every effort to reconcile themselves to God before it’s too late. None of us knows how much time we have. Jesus may return in our lifetime, or he may not. I may live a long life or be hit by a bus tomorrow. But we are to make every effort to be reconciled to him, and to be dressed and ready and about the tasks he has given us to do. Then we will prove ourselves good and faithful servants, and no matter what happens, we will be ready to meet him.

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Jesus Causes Division

⁴⁹ “I have come to set the world on fire, and I wish it were already burning! ⁵⁰ I have a terrible baptism of suffering ahead of me, and I am under a heavy burden until it is accomplished. (NLB)

Jesus had his mind fixed on the task ahead of him. The fire he speaks of in verse 49 must be the tongues of fire at Pentecost (Acts 2:1-3). Jesus knew that after Pentecost, the Gospel would spread like wildfire across the Roman Empire, and eventually reach around the globe to everyone. He was anxious to get that fire started, but first he had to go through his baptism of suffering. Because of his baptism of suffering, we can be baptized with the Holy Spirit. Because of his baptism of suffering, his purifying fires can cleanse us from every impurity. Jesus did not come to make us comfortable, he came to set the world on fire.

⁵¹ Do you think I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I have come to divide people against each other! ⁵² From now on families will be split apart, three in favor of me, and two against—or two in favor and three against.

⁵³ ‘Father will be divided against son
and son against father;
mother against daughter
and daughter against mother;
and mother-in-law against daughter-in-law
and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.’^[e]” (NLB)

Jesus is prophesying that families would be divided over him. This was certainly true of the early church, and it’s still true today. If you are the only Christian in your family, hopefully your family is tolerant of your faith and open to your witness. But in the first century AD, when the church was being persecuted, families would turn Christian family members in to the authorities to be imprisoned for their faith. Doubtless this still goes on in some parts of the world.

Jesus gave his disciples other warnings similar to this in Matthew 10:21, 35-36 and Mark 13:12-13. See my post on Mark 13:12-13 here. Salvation is free, but following Jesus will cost us something. Jesus wants us to count the cost and make sure we are willing to face whatever rejection we may come up against when we profess to belong to him (Luke 14:27-30). By talking about these things here, Jesus is warning his disciples of the persecutions to come. Jesus would soon suffer, and so would his disciples. But as a result of their willingness to endure it all for the sake of the Gospel, the Good News of Jesus Christ set the world on fire. Are we willing to endure the same kind of suffering in order to see the world ablaze for him?

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Watchfulness

³⁵“Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning, ³⁶like men waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks they can immediately open the door for him. ³⁷It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes. I tell you the truth, he will dress himself to serve, will have them recline at the table and will come and wait on them. ³⁸It will be good for those servants whose master finds them ready, even if he comes in the second or third watch of the night. ³⁹But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. ⁴⁰You also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”

Jesus now turns to the subject of readiness for his return, which seems like an abrupt change of subject at first glance, but it’s not. Jesus had been talking about greed and worry. If we worry or are greedy, we focus on the wrong things. If we seek his kingdom and his righteousness, we focus on the right things. Jesus now illustrates what it means to seek his kingdom. These illustrations show what will happen with servants who seek his kingdom by being ready and about their master’s business, and what will happen with those who don’t. Remember that Jesus is not talking about those who are not servants at all, those who are outside the master’s house. He’s talking about his servants, those who are already pledged to serve him. Believers, in other words.

Jewish weddings of that time were often at night, and if the master of a house went to a wedding, there would be no telling when he would return. There were no electric lights then, so the master depended on his servants to keep the lamps burning so he could see when he came home. If all the servants went to bed, and weren’t dressed and ready for his return, they weren’t doing their job. Jesus has entrusted us, his servants, to keep his light burning, and to be about his business, dressed and ready. Readiness doesn’t just mean waiting by the door doing nothing. It means doing the work that he has entrusted to us. That’s seeking his kingdom and his righteousness. If we do that, we will be ready to meet our master, whether at his return or at the time of our death. Not only will we partake at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb, but Jesus himself will serve us the way he served his disciples at the Last Supper (John 13:1-16).

⁴¹Peter asked, “Lord, are you telling this parable to us, or to everyone?”

⁴²The Lord answered, “Who then is the faithful and wise manager, whom the master puts in charge of his servants to give them their food allowance at the proper time? ⁴³It will be good for that servant whom the master finds doing so when he returns. ⁴⁴I tell you the truth, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. ⁴⁵But suppose the servant says to himself, ‘My master is taking a long time in coming,’ and he then begins to beat the menservants and maidservants and to eat and drink and get drunk. ⁴⁶The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the unbelievers.

⁴⁷“That servant who knows his master’s will and does not get ready or does not do what his master wants will be beaten with many blows. ⁴⁸But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.

In the first paragraph, Jesus talks about faithful servants who are doing their job, and what their reward will be. Now he talks about what will happen to unfaithful servants. Again, he is not talking about unbelievers, but his own servants. Peter asks him if he is talking just to his disciples, or to everyone. Jesus replies by talking about managers, which indicates that he’s not only talking about his servants, or disciples, but managers, those who minister to believers. Who was Jesus hardest on during his ministry? The religious leaders, those who presume to teach others. Perhaps there were some Pharisees and scribes in the crowd, but Jesus wasn’t really talking to the crowd here. He was talking to his disciples, and holding them to the same standard that he held the leaders of Judaism to. If those who are in positions of spiritual authority don’t take their responsibility seriously, or worse, abuse their position of authority like the unfaithful manager, their punishment will be more severe than it will be for servants with less authority. Ask any former pastor or Christian leader who has lost his ministry due to scandal if he feels he has been beaten with many blows. And if he is called Home while the abuses are still taking place like in verse 46, he will be assigned a place with unbelievers, and his hell will be worse than it will be for those who never believed.

Then Jesus concludes this lesson by talking about two groups; those who have been given much (servants), and those who have been entrusted with much (managers). Those of us who have accepted Jesus as our Savior and serve him (not to mention those of us who have been blessed with a godly upbringing and have spent our lives in the church) have been given much, so much is demanded of us. If we don’t keep the light of Jesus burning, who will? If we aren’t dressed and ready for his return, how can we tell others to be? And those who have been called to ministry have been entrusted with much, and much more will be asked of us. If you’re in ministry, you know how true that is! The more we show ourselves to be faithful servants and managers, the more God asks of us. But we have to be careful not to get lazy, or feel entitled to be served ourselves. Whatever authority we have comes from him, and we ourselves are under authority. It’s not our church, it’s his church, and one day he will call his church home. Therefore let us make sure we are faithful servants and faithful managers of his church.

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Do Not Worry

²²Then Jesus said to his disciples: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. ²³Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. ²⁴Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! ²⁵Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life^[b]? ²⁶Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?

Jesus continues his teaching on our attitude toward material things. Look at verse 23. Then Jesus said to his disciples: “Therefore I tell you”. This was a follow-up to what he had just taught in the parable of the rich fool. He was still responding to the man who asked Jesus to take his side in a financial dispute. As the old expression I’ve heard since I was a kid goes, whenever you see a therefore in the Bible, go back and see what it’s there for. This same lesson appears in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 6:25-34. The fact that Jesus used this same lesson here shows that he did teach the same lessons and preach the same sermons everywhere he went. But he tailored those lessons for each crowd he spoke to.

The man who wanted Jesus to tell his brother to share his inheritance with him was obviously worried about money, so Jesus took the opportunity to teach him and his disciples about greed and worry. The rich fool’s problem was greed, this man’s problem was worry. I maintain that what Jesus is saying here is that worry is sin. Can we not agree that if Jesus himself, more than once, dedicated an entire passage, not just one verse, to specifically telling us not to do something, if we do it, it’s sin? But somehow, I never hear sermons that put it that way, probably because so many pastors worry.

In verses 25 and 26, Jesus points out how useless worrying is. It doesn’t help anything, and it’s very destructive to us. Though Jesus is specifically talking about worrying about material things, those two verses also apply to worrying about anything. The health or safety of a loved one, for example. What good does it do our loved one if we worry about them? None at all. Worrying about whether or not we will have enough to meet our needs, or anything else, shows a lack of trust in God. If we worry about those things, how can we say we trust God to meet our needs or take care of those we love?

²⁷“Consider how the lilies grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. ²⁸If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith! ²⁹And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. ³⁰For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. ³¹But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.

The Amplified Bible translates worry “being overly anxious and troubled with cares”. If we are overly anxious and troubled with cares, we are focused on ourselves rather than God. So what should we do instead of worrying?

1. Seek his kingdom and his righteousness. If we’re seeking him first, we’re focused on God rather than on ourselves.

2. Pray (Phil 4:6). Instead of going over and over your worries in your mind, like a dog worrying a bone, present your requests to God and leave them with him. Trust him with them.

3. Work. Don’t worry about whether you’ll have enough money coming in, do something about it.

³²“Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. ³³Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. ³⁴For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Why should we worry about how much or how little we have when our Father is pleased to give us the kingdom? If we are rich toward God, no stock market crash can affect our treasures in Heaven. He is the source. If we have much, our attitude should be that all that we have is his. If we have little, we should trust that he will meet our needs out of his glorious riches in Christ Jesus (Phil 4:19).

Verse 34 is a simple statement of fact. If you came to my house, you would see that much if my treasure is in musical equipment. That shows you where my heart is. It would be good for all of us to take a good look at where our treasure is and ask what it says about where our heart is.

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The Parable of the Rich Fool

¹³Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”

¹⁴Jesus replied, “Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?” ¹⁵Then he said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”

This man in the crowd obviously came to Jesus with his own agenda. He wasn’t there to learn from Jesus, he was there to get something from him. We can’t come to Jesus with our own agendas. Too many of us only approach Jesus because we want something from him rather than simply wanting him. He thought he could get Jesus to take his side in a financial dispute with his brother. The law of that time was that in an inheritance, if a man had two sons, the eldest son got two thirds, and the younger got one third. We don’t know if this was the case here, but it seems this man was not satisfied with his inheritance, and thought it should have been divided equally. Of course, if he was the older brother who got two thirds, he probably would have thought it perfectly just.

Jesus pointed out that he was not a judge between this man and his brother. This makes me wonder if the man had already gone to a judge and not gotten the result he wanted, so he went to Jesus. Then Jesus used the opportunity to teach about the dangers of greed and covetousness, which is idolatry (Colossians 3:5). Idolatry is placing anything above God. In verse 15, Jesus says, “a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” Our life should be in God, not in how much or how little we have. Then Jesus told this parable to illustrate his point.

¹⁶And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop. ¹⁷He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’

¹⁸“Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. ¹⁹And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.” ‘

²⁰“But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’

²¹“This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God.”

The rich fool’s problem was not that he had riches on earth, but that he was not rich toward God. Jesus had many wealthy friends, like Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. But what did they do with their riches? They supported Jesus’ ministry. There is nothing wrong with being rich. As I’ve heard many times, there is nothing wrong with owning things, as long as things don’t own you. It’s what you do with your riches that matters. The problem for many of us is that if we are financially well off, we don’t learn how to depend upon God. We think we can take care of ourselves.

But the man who wanted Jesus to make his brother give him a bigger share of the inheritance was not rich. His problem was not the same as the rich fool in the parable, self satisfaction in his wealth. It was covetousness. He was jealous of those who had more than he did. Most of us never face the issue of being “set for life” like the rich fool in the parable. Our issue is not being satisfied with what we have like the man in the crowd. Read what Timothy 6:9-11 says about the desire for wealth.

⁹People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. ¹⁰For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.

I struggle with this issue myself. Like many people, I used to make a lot more money than I do now. I’m not that far from retirement age, and if things keep going like they have been the last few years, it’s hard for my wife and me to see how we will ever be able to retire. I have always tended to fantasize about being rich someday, and if I did receive some sort of financial windfall that enabled me to take it easy like the rich fool, what would I do? First, we’d tithe on our windfall and pay off our debts, but then what? What would you do? I must admit that if, for example, I suddenly had millions of downloads on iTunes, I might think it meant that I could retire comfortably and do whatever I wanted. But then my attitude would be the same as the rich fool. It’s easy for people to say that we would give large gifts to our church and support missions, but if those things are not priorities for us now in our current financial state, there’s no reason to believe our priorities would change if we suddenly got rich. In fact the evidence shows just the opposite. We’ve all seen many examples of athletes, celebrities, and lottery winners who went from rags to riches. How many of those stories have unhappy endings?

The rich fool did not have a happy ending. He couldn’t take his riches with him, and he had not used his wealth to help anyone else. He was not rich toward God. So how do we become rich toward God? The good news is, we don’t have to be financially rich to be rich toward God. What did Jesus tell the rich young ruler?

When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” (Luke 18:22)

What did Jesus say about treasures in Heaven?

¹⁹“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. ²⁰But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. (Matthew 6:19-20)

What did he just say about the poor and rich in chapter 6?

²⁰Looking at his disciples, he said:
“Blessed are you who are poor,
for yours is the kingdom of God.

²⁴“But woe to you who are rich,
for you have already received your comfort.

These are hard concepts. The issue, I think, is in our attitude. It’s not money that’s the root of all evil, it’s the desire for money. Is our attitude one of giving of whatever resources we have to help others, or is it all about what we receive? Is what we have ours, or does it really belong to God?

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Warnings and Encouragements

¹Meanwhile, when a crowd of many thousands had gathered, so that they were trampling on one another, Jesus began to speak first to his disciples, saying: “Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. ²There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. ³What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs.

Jesus warned about the “yeast” of the Pharisees at other times, but here he identifies that yeast as hypocrisy. Yeast, or leaven, was a symbol in ancient Judaism for pride, because of the way it “puffed up” bread. Pride and hypocrisy go hand in hand. Jesus had just chastised the Pharisees and experts in the law for their hypocrisy, and now he warns his disciples not to be be hypocrites like them. Hypocrisy relies upon concealment, but God exposes hypocrisy, especially in those who presume to teach others. Just ask Ted Haggard about that. When his sin was exposed, I was bothered by the fact that many in the church saw it as the devil attacking a prominent Christian leader, when in reality, it was a case of verses 2 and 3 of this chapter being proved true. Be sure your sins will find you out (Numbers 32:23).

⁴“I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. ⁵But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after the killing of the body, has power to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him. ⁶Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies^[a]? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. ⁷Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

Jesus is telling his disciples not to fear the men who will persecute them, but to fear only God. Fear of death is a natural instinct, but if we believe that death is not the end, why should we fear it? Many say that when the Bible tells us to fear God, it only means that we are to have a healthy respect for God, but I think that’s baloney. At the Transfiguration, when Peter, James and John were enveloped in the presence of God, they were terrified (Matt 17:5-6). Whenever God, or even an angel, makes direct contact with anyone in the Bible, the first reaction of the people involved is always fear, no matter how righteous they are. I can’t help but wonder if the reason we have lost our fear of God in this culture is that we don’t get that close to him.

God doesn’t want us to live in fear of him, he wants us to approach him boldly. But he wants us to fear the consequences of not obeying him. There is no conflict between fearing God and loving God. On some level, we all fear those we love. We don’t want to displease them, and we want to avoid the consequences of displeasing them. We love them so much we don’t want to disappoint them. I think fearing God on a day to day basis is a lot like that. But if the presence of Almighty God filled the room you’re in right now, in a cloud of his Shekinah glory like at the Transfiguration, and you heard his voice speak to you audibly, I think you would understand very clearly what fearing God means.

Then Jesus turns around and assures his disciples of their value to God. Jesus’ reference to the sparrows is a familiar one. Living in Colorado, we see many birds that winter here in huge flocks. You can watch them in the sky flying in groups of many thousands, swirling in amazing patterns, and it’s incredible to realize that God knows each of them individually. Not one of them is forgotten by God! By the same token, God also knows the how many hairs are on each of our heads. Insert your own bald joke here. The point is, God knows every detail of his creation intimately, from the largest galaxy to the smallest subatomic particle, and out of all his creation, he took our form in order to save us. That’s how valuable we are to him.

⁸“I tell you, whoever acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man will also acknowledge him before the angels of God. ⁹But he who disowns me before men will be disowned before the angels of God. ¹⁰And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven.

How clear are we in our testimony for Christ? Is there anyone we know well who has no clue what we believe? More importantly, do our lives back up our testimony? If we are not our front about our Christianity, or if we talk the talk but don’t walk the walk, we are disowning Christ as much as Peter did.

I don’t want to get into a long discourse about blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and the unforgivable sin, because lots of people smarter than me have written volumes about it. Let me just say this. Jesus said that when the Holy Spirit came, he would “convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment” (John 16:8) so most Biblical scholars say that the unforgivable sin is to continually reject the overtures of the Holy Spirit when he tries to draw us to Jesus. Way too many people torment themselves by thinking they have somehow committed the unpardonable sin. Relax. It’s not something you can do one time and be condemned. All you have to do to make sure you don’t commit this sin is accept Jesus Christ as your Savior, repent and be saved.

¹¹“When you are brought before synagogues, rulers and authorities, do not worry about how you will defend yourselves or what you will say, ¹²for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that time what you should say.”

Jesus is describing exactly what will happen to the apostles after Pentecost. They were brought before synagogues, rulers and authorities as witnesses for Christ. A powerful example of what Jesus is talking about can be found in Acts 4:1-22, when Peter and John testified before the Sanhedrin. If they had prepared a speech for that trial, it would not have had the power of the Holy Spirit that their testimony had. This part can definitely be applied to us. We must be prepared to defend our faith, but if we come at people with prepared speeches or scripts, they will see through them. And Jesus is talking about persecution here, not laziness in ministry. If we are persecuted for our faith, if our faith is challenged, we must rely on inspiration from the Holy Spirit to answer our accusers. But this verse should not be taken as a license not to prepare our sermon, Sunday School lesson, or song for ministry, because we’re “relying on inspiration from God”. God wants us to study, prepare for ministry, and “present ourselves as one approved, who correctly handles the Word of Truth” (2 Timothy 2:15).

Note: I am going out of town this weekend for two ministry events, and may not be able to blog again until Tuesday.

admin Bible fear of God, hypocrisy, Jesus, Luke

Six Woes

³⁷When Jesus had finished speaking, a Pharisee invited him to eat with him; so he went in and reclined at the table. ³⁸But the Pharisee, noticing that Jesus did not first wash before the meal, was surprised.

³⁹Then the Lord said to him, “Now then, you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. ⁴⁰You foolish people! Did not the one who made the outside make the inside also? ⁴¹But give what is inside the dish ^[j] to the poor, and everything will be clean for you.

An exchange similar to this appears in Mark 7:1-23. See my post on that passage here. That incident and this one start in similar ways, but then go in different directions, which means they were most likely separate incidents rather than different gospel accounts of the same incident. The fact that controversy arose more than once over the issue of ceremonial hand washing makes me wonder if Jesus did this purposely in order to provoke a reaction from the Pharisees. This was not the kind of hygenic hand washing with soap and water that we do today. It was strictly ceremonial, was done in a very specific way, without soap, and was done even between courses of a meal. It wasn’t that the Pharisees thought Jesus was eating with dirty hands. They were offended that he, as a rabbi, did not observe all the rituals that they thought were so important.

It may seem rude of Jesus to have accepted a dinner invitation from one of these Pharisees and then insulted him in his home. But these were probably the same Pharisees who had just been accusing Jesus of casting out demons with the help of Beelzebub and asking for signs. I can’t help but wonder if Jesus, after having put up with their criticism all day, accepted this invitation and purposely snubbed their silly customs in order to get them to open the door for him to tell them what he thought of them. The Pharisees were like a lot of people today, more interested in outside appearances than inward cleanliness. I love the Amplified translation of verse 40;

⁴⁰You senseless (foolish, stupid) ones [acting without reflection or intelligence]! Did not He Who made the outside make the inside also?

Senseless, foolish, stupid ones acting without reflection or intelligence. He’s calling them idiots! At their own dinner table! His solution in verse 41 is interesting. The New Living Bible puts it like this:

⁴¹ So clean the inside by giving gifts to the poor, and you will be clean all over.

So many of us think living the Christian life is just about the things we don’t do. But there are more do’s in the Bible than dont’s. If we’d do the do’s, we wouldn’t have time to do the don’ts. And compassion toward others is a big part of the do’s. Many of us ignore the “social justice” stuff in the Bible and only pay attention to rules of personal behavior. But Jesus was all about helping the poor, the sick, and the unlovable. If we are unwilling to help others in need, all the rules we kept will mean nothing at the Judgment.

⁴²“Woe to you Pharisees, because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter without leaving the former undone.

Again Jesus stresses the same point. The Pharisees were so meticulous in their tithing, they would count out individual leaves and seeds in their gardens to give a tenth to God. That’s admirable, but what had they left out? They did not show others justice and the love of God. We shouldn’t neglect our tithe, and frankly, I’m shocked at how many who consider themselves Christians do just that. But if we tithe but don’t show the love of God to others, will tithing save us?

⁴³“Woe to you Pharisees, because you love the most important seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces.

⁴⁴“Woe to you, because you are like unmarked graves, which men walk over without knowing it.”

The Pharisees were divas. They loved getting attention and flattery, and being thought of as righteous. Can you think of anyone in your church like that? It’s easy for those of us on the platform on Sundays to fall into that trap. In Judaism, if you touched a grave, even without knowing it, you were ceremonially unclean for 7 days (Numbers 19:16). For that reason, Jews of that time would always clearly mark graves, usually by whitewashing them so they could be easily avoided. Rather than being the spiritual examples they thought they were, the Pharisees were actually defiling those who came into contact with them, like an unmarked grave would. We need to be careful that our lives match our image, especially if we are in positions of spiritual leadership.

⁴⁵One of the experts in the law answered him, “Teacher, when you say these things, you insult us also.”

⁴⁶Jesus replied, “And you experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them.

The expert in the law would have been better off keeping his mouth shut. I can just picture Jesus, after this guy objects to what he is saying, looking at him like, “Oh, you want some too?” The experts in the Mosaic law had added so many ridiculous rules to the actual law of Moses that it was impossible for anyone to get through a day without breaking some rule or other. I quote here from David Guzik’s commentary:

For example, they taught that on the Sabbath, a man could not carry something in his right hand or in his left hand, across his chest or on his shoulder. But you could carry something with the back of your hand, with your foot, with your elbow, or in your ear, your hair, or in the hem of your shirt, or in your shoe or sandal.

They had made it impossible for people to live lives without guilt, even if they observed the scriptures and made their sacrifices for sin. Have you ever had the feeling, when pulled over by a police officer, that even if you were obeying the law to the best of your knowledge, they could find something to give you a ticket for if they wanted to? The experts in the law made all Jews feel that way all of the time.

⁴⁷“Woe to you, because you build tombs for the prophets, and it was your forefathers who killed them. ⁴⁸So you testify that you approve of what your forefathers did; they killed the prophets, and you build their tombs. ⁴⁹Because of this, God in his wisdom said, ‘I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and others they will persecute.’ ⁵⁰Therefore this generation will be held responsible for the blood of all the prophets that has been shed since the beginning of the world, ⁵¹from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, this generation will be held responsible for it all.

The religious leaders of Jesus’ day erected monuments to the prophets of old, but persecuted the prophets of their own day, like John the Baptist and Jesus. The rejection of the prophets through the ages culminated in their rejection of Jesus, which brought down judgment on the whole nation when Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 A.D. Jesus would illustrate this in his parable of the tenants. The age of law was about to give way to the age of grace, but no one could see that but Jesus.

⁵²“Woe to you experts in the law, because you have taken away the key to knowledge. You yourselves have not entered, and you have hindered those who were entering.”

⁵³When Jesus left there, the Pharisees and the teachers of the law began to oppose him fiercely and to besiege him with questions, ⁵⁴waiting to catch him in something he might say.

The scribes, Pharisees, and teachers of the law played a central role in the plot to kill Jesus. Within one generation of the crucifixion of Jesus, the temple was destroyed, and the whole house of cards that the Pharisees and their cohorts had set up came crashing down. But the worst thing they did was hinder others from knowing God. If we are more focused on rules than people, and don’t live lives that are as holy as they appear on the outside, we too hinder those who look to us as examples from knowing God.

admin Bible Jesus, Luke, Pharisees

Receiving the Light (NLB)

³³ “No one lights a lamp and then hides it or puts it under a basket.^[k] Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand, where its light can be seen by all who enter the house.

The “lamp under a bowl” analogy was a favorite of Jesus. It appears in 4 different places, by my count (Luke 8:16-18, Mark 4:21-25, Matt 5:14-16), including here. In Mark and earlier in Luke, it has one meaning, in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, it has another, and here, it has a third meaning. See my posts on Luke 8:16-18 here and Mark 4:21-25 here.

This paragraph is a continuation of the warning to those who attributed his miracles to demons and demanded more and greater miraculous signs, in addition to what they had just seen. These were people who considered themselves righteous, and Jesus is warning them to be careful that the light that they think is within them is not darkness.

³⁴ “Your eye is a lamp that provides light for your body. When your eye is good, your whole body is filled with light. But when it is bad, your body is filled with darkness.

When your eye is good or bad? What is he talking about? The smart aleck in me wants to say, “Yeah, my eyes used to be bad, but then I had lasik surgery.” I’ve thought at times that maybe Jesus was talking here about the things we look at, to make sure we’re not looking at the wrong things. Though it’s true that we need to be careful about that, I don’t think that’s what he’s talking about here. Look at how the Amplified Bible puts this verse;

³⁴Your eye is the lamp of your body; when your eye (^[p]your conscience) is sound and fulfilling its office, your whole body is full of light; but when it is not sound and is not fulfilling its office, your body is full of darkness.

He’s talking about our conscience. The people who were asking for signs and attributing his miracles to Satan were saying those things because their hearts were hard. Their consciences weren’t working properly. If you’ve allowed your heart to become hard by ignoring the overtures of the Holy Spirit, your conscience isn’t fulfilling its office, or doing its job. Then you can’t recognize God working right in front of you. The Pharisees that Jesus was talking to were not unique. There are people just like them today, people who consider themselves Christians, but have not really listened to God for a long time. They’re more interested in keeping rules and outside appearances than in having the light of Jesus light up their lives.

³⁵ Make sure that the light you think you have is not actually darkness. ³⁶ If you are filled with light, with no dark corners, then your whole life will be radiant, as though a floodlight were filling you with light.”

Why might some of us resist the idea of letting Jesus shine his floodlight inside of us? Maybe because we don’t want our dark corners exposed. But the more we keep those dark corners hidden, the more darkness will take over. Even though we think we’re trying to live a Christian life, as long as we try to keep things hidden from his light, it will never work. The light we think we have will become darkness. Think about it. Why does no one put a candle under a bowl? Because if you do, not only will you not see its light, soon the candle will go out. But the light Jesus wants to shine within us is not a candle, it’s a lamp. It’s a floodlight. If we don’t let Jesus expose all of our dark corners with his floodlight, the light within us will be smothered like a candle under a bowl.

But if we do let Jesus fill us with his light, that light will reveal any areas of our lives that need to be cleaned up. And once we’re clean on the inside, then his light within us will shine so brightly that others will be able to see it. Our consciences will be working like they should, alerting us to right and wrong and making us sensitive to his voice. Here’s the thing about light and dark. All darkness is is the absence of light. All evil is is the absence of God. When you walk into a dark room and flip the light switch, what happens? The room is filled with light. Darkness can’t fight it. All you need to defeat darkness is a light source. The darkness within us is nothing. If we let the light of Jesus shine within us, the darkness has to flee.

The image I keep thinking about is of Jesus at the Transfiguration and at the Resurrection, when Jesus’ face shone like the sun (Matthew 17:6), and his appearance was like lightning (Matthew 28:3). The wording of the Greek in both of those cases indicates that it wasn’t an external light shining on Jesus, it was a brilliant light shining out from within Jesus. What the best reason to let Jesus’ light illuminate every part of our lives from the inside? It’s Christlike. If we let him do that, we will be like him.

admin Bible Jesus, Luke, Parable of the Lamp