Limited Time Offers ...

 

Going once, going twice, sold.  If you are a prospective buyer at auction, those words can deeply infect your thinking.  You make a bid for something.  Before those words are uttered anyone else could choose to outbid you.  Even as they are being spoken someone else could choose to once again up the bid for the item in question.  But those words act as a warning, that if you really want what is up for bid at auction you must take action, or lose it forever to whoever it was sold to.  Merchants understand this concept and attempt to employ it in advertising of regular items all the time, through the use of “limited time” offers.  Effectively they are sales of items we may all be familiar with, but if we want to acquire them at a reduced price, we must take action and secure them before the sale goes away.  Then it is right back to the regular price, which the sale offer has just proven, is unnecessarily high.  So where it comes to the mind and words of God, are there not some limited time offers there as well?

Imagine the folks in the time of Noah.  It took Noah 120 years to build that ark.  And he preached salvation to the curious onlookers even as they made fun of him for building a boat nowhere near water, in a time that had never before seen rain.  The dew watered the earth.  They had no need of rain from the sky.  And so to hear Noah speak of a flood was against common sense.  Yet, they also had 120 years to change their minds and enter that ark.  When the time finally expired, Noah went inside.  But he did not go in alone, his wife went with him.  Further his sons went in, along with their wives.  8 people in a boat meant to house quite a few more, in a time when the flood may never have even come if the world back then had repented of its evil and chose to live another way.  But the world chose not to repent.  And only 8 folks were saved accepting the offer of God.  As it was back then, so would it be right now, as we face the end of all things.

But there are also some things of God that are not meant to be limited time offers.  They are fundamental and given no expiration date by God Himself.  Marriage, Procreation, and the Sabbath were meant to be 3 of those fundamental ideas from the mind of our God.  Man did not invent them God did.  It was God who looked at us and decided we were not meant to be alone.  That a man needed a wife, and she would need him. That they should literally be of one flesh, and through the union of becoming one flesh, become fruitful and multiply.  There were no time limits set aside for this.  God did not say it should only happen once every “x” number of years for example.  He offered it to us as often as we wish to employ it.  And His Sabbath was of a similar nature, existing before sin, and meant to be eternal, as our God is eternal.  The Sabbath has no expiration date in mind, and why should it?  Our creation is a thing that is meant to be eternal, our communion with our God eternal, our reconciliation to Him eternal.  So without God saying He has had enough, and without even a reason to do.  These things were meant to be eternal, that is not just relevant in this life, but in the next one as well.  Think of it, if we had never sinned, all of these institutions would have continued on without interruption forever as God intended.

While the offer of our salvation may only be here for us for a little while; at least while we live we can choose to embrace it.  Our marriages and the celebration of His Sabbath were meant to start here and have no end in the next life.  Which means – we are doing it wrong.  At least our marriage vows most fundamental tenant is stating it wrong.  It is not meant to be “until death do us part”.  That clause is present because of sin, and meant to allow the living to start over not bound to the dead.  But like the idea of divorce, it exists because of sin, not because it was supposed to be a happy “out” clause of any marriage we just got tired of.  Yes the sins driving divorce include adultery, but they also include abuse, and a litany of others as well.  It does not have to be a particular sin alone that drives divorce, but at a minimum it requires selfishness to see it implemented, perhaps not on your own part, but at least on one partner’s part.  And yet, even in marriage there can be repentance, forgiveness, and re-creation.  I wonder what would happen if we removed that clause from our vows and our thinking.  What if there was not meant to be divorce at all, nor a reset with someone else just because one partner dies.  What if we were meant to be as Adam and Eve, married forevermore.  Because in truth, this is what I believe was truly meant to be for us all.  We just choose not to think about it this way.  Even those who accept the idea of an eternal Sabbath, choose to abandon the idea of an eternal marriage.  And why?  Because of what Jesus said during a trick question?

Luke records the incident in his 20^th chapter of his gospel letter to his friend about what we believe and why.  But be careful to note, this was not a speech Jesus was making about life in the next world.  It was an answer to a trick question, posed by those who did not even believe in a next world.  How many of those folks still live and walk among us?  The incident picks up in verse 27 saying … “Then came to him certain of the Sadducees, which deny that there is any resurrection; and they asked him,”  The folks posing this question still considered themselves part of the Jewish faith, even though they differed on perhaps the most fundamental doctrine of all time.  They threw out the idea of an afterlife entirely.  It was not that you just slept until a resurrection when all would be put right.  It was that you slept forever, and you became nothing more than a memory.  Gone meant gone forever to them.  This was a far cry different than the Pharisees and an endless source of debate between the two of them.  Yet both factions were represented in the Sanhedrin, and neither could seem to change the mind of the other.  To any modern Christian, it is easy for us to see how the Pharisees were right on this, and the Sadducees were wrong.  But we have the light of Jesus to prove it out.  They refused that light.

The false premised question was then posed as Luke continues in verse 28 saying … “Saying, Master, Moses wrote unto us, If any man's brother die, having a wife, and he die without children, that his brother should take his wife, and raise up seed unto his brother. [verse 29] There were therefore seven brethren: and the first took a wife, and died without children. [verse 30] And the second took her to wife, and he died childless. [verse 31] And the third took her; and in like manner the seven also: and they left no children, and died. [verse 32] Last of all the woman died also. [verse 33] Therefore in the resurrection whose wife of them is she? for seven had her to wife.”  So they laid out a scenario where one woman was married to seven different brothers while on earth, and now that all 8 folks were raised up in the next world whose wife would she be?  But before we attempt to resolve this dilemma we must break down their question a little for there is a ton of wrong in it, before it even begins.

Let us start by what drove the policy Moses handed out in the first place.  Chauvinism.  Or perhaps even better stated, good old fashioned greed.  You see women were not allowed to own property back in the “good” old days.  Property was only allowed to pass from father to son.  Daughters had to be married, or live at home with dad and mom till they died.  And a wife’s worst fear, was to lose a husband, without first having a son that the family wealth could be passed down to.  To become a widow, was to become homeless.  It meant you would become instantly poor, with no place to call home.  And many a poor widow died of starvation, or exposure to the elements.  NONE of this was what God intended or wanted for a woman, any woman.  ALL of this was driven by men who believed they were authorized by God to drive it.  They were dead wrong.  Unfortunately, it was the women who usually wound up dead, not the men.  So what to do? 

We must now engage in lesser sin, to cover up our greater sin.  We will “add” the recent widow to the wife collection of the next older brother in line in the family.  In fact marrying the widow will become his responsibility and should he fail to marry her, and attempt to give her a son to resolve the passing of family wealth to, the next older brother could be killed for avoiding his responsibility.  If he already had a wife, too bad, he is getting another one.  Better to have forced multiple marriages, than to have a widow dying of starvation and exposure.  Of course NONE of this would be needed, if we simply let women carry the rights to own property.  She could have maintained the family wealth on her own.  And all of this requirement would have become moot.  But greed prevented that.  So now a system of marriage corruption must be invented to cover for greed and prevent avoidable murder.

This was the marriage scenario the Sadducees laid out.  They were careful to avoid the divorce scenario entirely.  These were all “legitimate” marriages having only occurred after the death of a partner.  Even without the tradition of remarriage to a brother, the widow could have chosen a random new husband as widows still do in our day and time.  Should they lose that partner to death, they may still choose again.  And so on, and so on, leading to a very similar scenario – only worse this time, for each of these modern day marriages could have been done for love.  Now upon waking up in the resurrection, the heart of the modern widow may be split in a love for several former husbands who may each be looking to spend eternity with the wife they thought only to be theirs.  But here is where eternity begins to reset.  It seems even the Sadducees had the notion that marriage was intended to be forever.  “If” there was an afterlife, then the marriage bond was meant to continue in it.  They at least built that idea into their trick question.

Jesus responds in verse 34 saying … “And Jesus answering said unto them, The children of this world marry, and are given in marriage: [verse 35] But they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage:”  The phrase “marry and are given in marriage” has a few significant meanings.  It implies we treat marriage casually.  It implies we choose to marry and with equal choice choose to get divorced as though we have the right to do both, as often as we choose.  Or we remarry upon the death of a partner, staying true to the older vows of limiting marriage “until death do we part”.  In either case our ideas of marriage are transient at best, convenient at worst.  Jesus says in “that” world this is not the practice.  “Neither marry, nor are given in marriage”.  By the way “given” in marriage implies daughters do not have much of a choice.  Which is in itself another less ideal idea.  If we are to be bound eternally, we should freely choose to be bound eternally, not given to it, by the choice of someone else.  But back to marry and are given in marriage; how we do it here, is NOT how it is done in a world where eternal really means something.  Notice the next words of Jesus.

Jesus continues in verse 36 saying … “Neither can they die any more: for they are equal unto the angels; and are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection.”  Jesus immediately follows up the last concept with the next one where death is no longer an “out” for marriage as death is no longer a reality for anyone.  For we will live forever as the angels do, and have.  The children of the resurrection will not take marriage the same we do, as something casual that can be undone on a whim.  Bonds made there are bonds made to last.  Soul mates are truly soul mates.  So what happens to the women with seven former husbands?  Or to the modern woman or man who has married after a partner dies? 

It would seem that sin has left us a lot of clean up that God will have to do.  First I believe this happens by trusting God above all else with our hearts.  When we reach a place where we trust God this much, we give God license to clean up our mess.  To remove love for one we are not meant to eternally be with.  And to channel our love to one we were meant to eternally be with.  This can only happen though if we trust God enough to let Him be in charge of our love life.  And anyone in that Kingdom will do just that.  I believe our God will clean up the mess we have made with our hearts due to sin and errant choices.  I believe he will lead each one to where he or she should have been, or is destined to be with, in His Kingdom according to His will, which our will be overjoyed at.  Former loves become old friends we love no differently than everyone else.  And eternal spouses become uniquely loved that everyone else respects and never interferes with.  In this alone can perfect harmony be achieved with no jealousy, and no pain.

I believe however, for those of us rare folks who have only ever known one wife or one husband, for those who even after the death of a partner remain steadfast to the hope of that partner returned in the resurrection; that this faith and commitment will be honored by God in that Kingdom that is yet to come.  For it does not make any sense to undo a commitment freely given, that actually embraces the idea of eternal both in this world and in the next.  God will clean up what He must.  But God can also reaffirm and honor a marriage that endures as He planned for them to endure.  Imagine Adam and Eve raised to be in the next kingdom, do you truly envision Jesus saying, well time is up.  Your marriage was a limited time offer and for the rest of eternity, you are going to be celibate.  That makes no sense.  They were meant to be together, literally created to be together, considered incomplete until they were together, and told never to part from each other.  What part of that sounds temporary?  What part of that implies a limited time offer?  Its not.  It is eternal the way God intended marriage, not the way we have messed marriage up in the countless ways sin has figured out how to mess marriage up.  Adam will forever be the husband of Eve.  And I imagine for all those who honored marriage forever, the same will be true.  The rest can be cleaned up by God as recovery from our sin requires Him to do.

Now some parse this passage to separate “marry” from “given in marriage” as if Jesus was speaking about 2 entirely different things.  In that light they presume Jesus does not want us to divorce, but He does not want us to marry either.  In this world or the next.  That would of course destroy the concept of marriage that Jesus Himself created all the way back in Genesis before sin ever entered this world.  These folks who believe this use the follow on phrase equal to angels to believe that since angels do not marry, we don’t need to either.  Really?  How do you know what angels live like?  Have you had extensive conversations with them?  I have not.  I do know there are a variety of types of angels, some have 2 wings, some 4 and some 6.  I have no idea if there are male or female angels.  And I have no idea if marriage is a concept they embrace and understand and who am I to judge that.  But take the angel equality phrase out of it for a minute and come back to the practical side of Jesus saying anyone saved needs to be single.  First that does not agree with anything found anywhere else in scripture.  And it was offered during a trick question from folks with screwed up beliefs across marriage, widows, divorce, and life after death.  And guess what life after death was the main reason Jesus was here in the first place.  To offer that to us through His own sacrifice.

So Jesus continues to now address the much bigger problem the Sadducees continue to embrace, their incorrect doctrine about hope in the world to come.  Jesus picks back up in verse 37 saying … “Now that the dead are raised, even Moses shewed at the bush, when he calleth the Lord the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. [verse 38] For he is not a God of the dead, but of the living: for all live unto him. [verse 39] Then certain of the scribes answering said, Master, thou hast well said. [verse 40] And after that they durst not ask him any question at all.”  These men had tried to use the edict of Moses to care for widows as a trap to snare Jesus in.  Now Jesus would turn our attention back to the same Moses and point out the obvious, that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were meant to live again and live forever.  God is after all not the God of the dead, but of the living.  So on the greater point of life after death, here is Jesus affirming there will be such a thing.  Jesus is here to live and die for us, for just such a purpose.  To restore us back to how it was before sin ever entered this world.  We may have a limited time, to accept this gift or reject it.  But the life He offers is limited in no way shape or form.

There are those who say that procreation was meant for humanity to replace the number of angels who fell with Satan, and then quit multiplying as it were.  Really?  Is that what God said?  Seems to me God told Abraham his descendants would number like the stars or grains of sand on a beach.  Perhaps not just a metaphor.  Perhaps a real number.  And have you counted the galaxies lately?  Imagine the number of stars within each galaxy.  Now I cannot tell you what that number is, particularly if expanded to include the concept of a multiverse.  But even within the context of this universe alone, that number has more zeros in it, than the population of earth has ever had at any time, or in aggregate since our creation.  And sadly we know, not every person who has ever lived, has embraced the gift of salvation our God offers.  So there is a LONG way to go to come anywhere near that number.  And have you considered the idea that even with ALL the residents of heaven at the perfect age, even with all married which not all may choose to be, and even with all of those married couples churning out new children every 9 months, it would take an infinite amount of time to populate an infinite universe.  And time is something we have in abundance.  No need to rush anything.  We may alternatively choose to raise a family every 100 years, or every 1000, or every million.  Time again will be nothing to us.  At that rate, the multiplication would again take forever, and forever we have.

What is certain, is that Jesus is trying to restore us to the creation He intended.  In that marriage, procreation, and the Sabbath will endure forever and ever – and will no longer be marred by sin in any way shape or form.  “Limited time” will become a concept so foreign to us, it will lose all meaning and disappear from the lexicon of human experience entirely.  What God creates and establishes is meant to endure forever.

 

Emails to get You Fired ...

Privacy is a myth.  Electronic privacy a long expired dinosaur.  What you put out there in “the ether” of the internet, whether via text, or email, or social media platform remains “out there” forever.  You can’t take it back.  You can’t really delete anything.  Best you can do is apologize for it.  But a meager apology is sometimes not enough to undo damage that can affect your career, or your livelihood.  Your words, your thoughts, and the motives they sometimes clearly reveal, remain unhidden from the entirety of mankind – and frankly this is rarely a good thing.  Now most folks understand this, at least where it comes to stuff you put on social media platforms, but they take exception where it comes to emails or direct messaging.  And if you can keep from accidentally including the entire company in your addressing of an email note, you can seem to keep it limited to just “someone” to read, not everybody.  While you talk about “business” topics you might remain safe.  But just ask any “former” executive whose emails have been subpoenaed what private truly means.  Or ask some poor jilted lover whose correspondence has now been made public by the other party, what private really means.

And lest you think Uncle Sam is not an avid reader of every note you ever send … think again.  Whether they keep it or not is a question on how big, big data really is.  But whether they read it, and potentially flag it, is just not in question.  If you do nothing but write love notes to your mom, you can bet those notes were read and discarded.  But if you read or write notes between suspect financial organizations, drug dealers, or folks on the watch lists for whatever reason – your notes become flagged, your accounts become flagged and you will also join the watch lists forever.  And this is where having the crazy uncle does not do you any favors either.  Because when crazy uncle Bud decides to make posts that would make a rational person cringe, your familial relationship with that uncle earns you the unwanted attention of the government as well, even though through no fault of your own.

And beyond criminal threats, or threats of violence, any kind of threat to the economy is treated just as seriously.  In our banking industry we are required to take continuing education certifications every single year on our responsibilities to prevent financial crimes of many kinds.  Education is the first step to prevention.  But if some other crazy uncle gets caught up in a scheme to rob banks, or print fake currency, everybody in the family will get flagged on watch lists that last forever.  The simple logic is that whatever a family member may do or say, may not truly be an independent action, but might be an action that is shared among other family members.  Not so with me, probably the fact the my dad was a policemen for 3 decades, my family knows I would turn them in 😊.  Does not stop the love from me, but I tend to have a zero tolerance for crime, or for that matter for crazy.  But that does not change how your family thinks, or speaks.  And unfortunately, I do have a few crazy uncles, that I wish posted differently, or had lived differently while they had the chance.

The breadcrumbs of what you say then, can follow you forever.  For us, imagining that every word we ever said, in addition to what we may have written down, is an ever more terrifying prospect.  But not so for Jesus.  In contrast to you or I, every word Jesus ever said was truth, and love.  Every word, intended to find a spot of redemption in your soul, to lure you back to the throne of God.  Not so you could kiss the feet of God, but so that He could stand you up and kiss your cheek and hold you close to Him.  God does not need our worship, He needs to be able to share His love with you, up close and personal.  It is for His love’s sake, that He wants to save you, even though that means having to forgive your choices, and bare the pain of your rejection so often repeated.  Still He comes for you.  And so Jesus even while being plotted against by the leadership of His own church, still uttered every word in an attempt to save the very men bent on killing Him.

But to kill Jesus, those men had to discredit Him first.  So they kept track of every word Jesus ever said, looking for the chance to trip Him up.  Kind of like a stalker in our world, looking for the chance to pounce on you when they catch you in a lie, or indecent remark, or sin they can publicly exploit.  Except that with men, this kind of stalking works, because we fall and embrace sin.  With Jesus, He never did.  Imagine how utterly frustrating that must have been for those bent on killing Him.  To find, that even after time, and watching Him everywhere, that He says nothing to condemn Him over.  Imagine looking for hate and finding only love.  It was killing them.  It was frustrating them.  It was turning the lot of them into a group of crazy uncles.  So they had to escalate the situation.  They had to start setting verbal traps that there was no good answer out of, so they could by intention trip Him up.

Luke records one of these incidents starting in chapter 20 of his gospel letter to his friend about what we believe and why.  It picks up in verse 19 saying … “And the chief priests and the scribes the same hour sought to lay hands on him; and they feared the people: for they perceived that he had spoken this parable against them. [verse 20] And they watched him, and sent forth spies, which should feign themselves just men, that they might take hold of his words, that so they might deliver him unto the power and authority of the governor.”  These men were not only interested in discrediting Jesus in front of the people.  They were trying to find any reason at all to turn Him over to the governor of Roman authority.  It is irony that these same priests and leaders considered tax collectors to be the ultimate sinners because they took money from the Jewish people and turned it over to Rome.  Yet here they were ready to turn over innocent blood to Rome to have it murdered.  Beyond that, not only innocent blood, but the very blood of God.  How much worse than that is blood over money.  Yet they considered themselves pure, and the tax collector as untouchable.

Luke continues in verse 21 saying … “And they asked him, saying, Master, we know that thou sayest and teachest rightly, neither acceptest thou the person of any, but teachest the way of God truly: [verse 22] Is it lawful for us to give tribute unto Caesar, or no?”  First the flattery to loosen Him up.  It works on other priests, why not on Him.  Then the question that will either kill Him in the hearts of the people, or kill Him on a cross of Rome.  Do we give money to Caesar or not.  They were just certain this question was so clever it could not be answered without killing Him some way or another.  Luke continues in verse 23 saying … “But he perceived their craftiness, and said unto them, Why tempt ye me? [verse 24] Shew me a penny. Whose image and superscription hath it? They answered and said, Caesar's. [verse 25] And he said unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesar's, and unto God the things which be God's.”  Here is their irony on display.  They value money more than life.  They are trying to use the hatred of the people in paying taxes to kill Jesus if He stays true to the idea of obeying the government in charge.

But Jesus does more than that.  Jesus shows the true value of money, and of things that belong to God.  We are not to obey the government ahead of, or over God.  But it is God that should hold our hearts, our love, and our devotion.  And in so doing that, we still give the government what it asks for in taxes, even if that is all we have, or what we think is unfair.  And that answer beat them.  Luke picks up in verse 26 saying … “And they could not take hold of his words before the people: and they marvelled at his answer, and held their peace.”  They were beaten and could do nothing more than marvel at the beauty of His Truth.  But what is it that Luke wants His friend to know about this gospel passage?  Is it just that Jesus was more clever than the most clever conspiracy ever launched?  I doubt it.

I think the greater lesson was to teach us all, that our words should leave a bread crumb trail back to the throne of Grace.  If they do not, we speak in error, or our words require apology. Just like in social media platforms once you say something hateful it remains in the ether, and in the heart of one impacted by them.  You cannot pull those words back into your mouth and down your throat, having never uttered them.  You said them.  You may have even meant them.  And you caused pain by them.  But what you can do is to apologize for them.  Not just to say you are sorry, but to feel the pain you have caused and truly be sorry for them.  You can look to Jesus to learn how to keep from uttering more words just like them ever again.  To not only be sorry for what you might have done, but to avoid any kind of recurrence ever again.  To love differently, to love so much, than you could not even conceive of saying such things, because in truth you do not feel such horrible things again.  Temper is not an excuse.  And even when people are not looking to hold something against you, when you speak in anger and hate, you leave others hurt in the wake of those words.  And sometimes that wake cannot be undone.

Send a hasty email note to your boss, or perhaps his boss, and rant and rave about how stupid management is, and how doomed this program or project is, and see what happens next.  Your only “out” there is to claim you were off your meds.  But send that same note to a co-worker who you thought a friend, but in truth was always ever looking to get you in trouble, and they will forward your “private” sentiments on to management, and the off the meds excuse just does not work.  You get fired for what you said.  You get fired for what you shared.  The trick then is not to just say those things, the real trick is to find a way to think differently about those things.  To find peace, and solution ideas in Jesus.  So that when you speak, it is in kindness, patience, and love to make things better.  You can assume everything you say is public never private.  But don’t just be on guard against some enemy trying to use what you say, instead be inspirational in what you say as you ground even your sentiments in Jesus Christ.  After all only Jesus beats the impossible.  And there must certainly be a lot impossible in the situations you face.  Start by changing how you feel, how you think, and who you rely on for answers that might improve everything you encounter.  It is so much easier to live that way.

 

Letting It All Go ...

What is the chief priority of your life?  To answer that, you might consider what thing, activity, or even person it is, that you are most invested in.  Sometimes the answer might surprise you.  We get so involved in what we do, our routines, that we stop thinking about what is most important to us, and just go about life.  But take a step back from it, and think about it for a few minutes and the answer begins to emerge.  You would think that for Christians, the answer would always be Jesus.  But if you measured your answer against what you actually do with your time, it is hard to say Jesus and back it up with what you do.  Or if you measured your answer with love for others, it is hard to truly say, that outside of your immediate circle you truly love “all” others the way Jesus truly loves them.  Finally if you measured your answer against where you spend the bulk of your money – does Jesus truly emerge as your number one financial priority.  It is the routine that deceives us.  We love our spouse, sometimes with great passion, or our children and families, and think that our love for others is what Jesus intended – how could it not be.  We give our tithes and offerings faithfully to the church, and then think we have met the Lord’s requirements and so our financial “obligations” have been met.  Many other believers do not give at all, let alone systemically.  And as for time, we make time to go to church, or to watch it online, and once again consider ourselves “good” Christians as a result.  Again, many other believers don’t even go or watch at all.

But what if I told you that all those efforts, while a good start, are nowhere near enough?  It is not the beginning of being a Christian that is so condemning, it is that we let ourselves become fully satisfied with the beginning of Christianity and never take one step farther in it.  Once more, the devil knows all this.  The devil may not be able to prevent you from becoming a Christian, but the next best thing he can do, is get you to become fully complacent in your Christianity.  Cause you to focus on what you do for Jesus, not who you are inside.  Once you buy in to the argument that you are “good” enough, you shouldn’t need to try any more than that right?  I would offer, perhaps it is the “trying” that is the fundamental cause of the disconnect.  For as we “try” to be Christians, we begin to see the cost of being a Christian.  Our time spent on spiritual things is measured.  Our money given to ministry or the poor, is ever measured in order to satisfy what we think is “appropriate”.  And our love offered to spouses and children and families is thought to ever be enough.  But to “try” reveals one fundamental flaw, it is action of effort, not behavior that is natural to “who” you are.  Jesus is trying to change “who” you are, He is not focused on the actions, until the motives drive the behavior naturally.

There is a recipe for what it meant to follow Jesus, to be a true Christian.  It sounds harsh, but let us give it a second look and see if what we first read as harsh is not meant to be so.  Luke records the very words of Jesus Himself on this topic in his gospel letter to his friend on what we believe and why.  It begins in the fourteenth chapter picking up in verse 25 it reads … “And there went great multitudes with him: and he turned, and said unto them, [verse 26] If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.”  Yikes.  Hate your mom and dad?  Hate your wife and kids?  Hate those you call brothers and sisters?  All this sounds way more like Satan talking that Jesus.  But Jesus does not end his list there, it continues to the main point of this passage.  We are to “hate” our own lives.  What does that mean?  I ask again, what, or who, is the chief priority of your life?  Go back and take a quick look at the Law, and you find to love God comes first.  How you love mankind comes second.  Why?  Because you cannot do the second half of the Law if you have neglected the first half.  To truly follow Jesus requires we let it all go.  It means we allow Jesus to transform “who” we are.  That is a very personal transformation.  And nothing else can be more important to us than that.  Not friends, or even family, but beyond both of those things, - not even ourselves.

Clinging to “who” you are right now, will be the death of you.  We come to like ourselves.  All the self help books in the world teach us to do this very thing.  Love yourself.  Do this before you can love others, or have a good life.  But here is Jesus saying – come to hate yourself.  Stop clinging to this person you are and valuing, the current you, at the cost of who you could be post the transformation Jesus longs to bring to you.  What needs to change in your life, is not a deeper love of self, but the total absence of it.  A willingness on your part to let your whole life go.  Let go those priorities you maintain today, for whatever priority Jesus lead you to.  Let go those relationships today if they stand in your way.  Especially the one of fondness for who you are as you sit today.  In truth you are not “good enough” today.  You are nowhere near as “good” as you need to be.  But way beyond that, you are nowhere near as “good” as you will become if you let Jesus run the “who” you are, and “who” you are yet to be.  The “trying” just fades away and is replaced by actions you are unaware of, even if the world around you cannot believe them with their own eyes.

The goal is not to truly hate mom.  But the priority must ever be Jesus first.  If I allow my relationship with mom to get in the way of Jesus first, I do mom a disservice, I destroy myself, and I cripple the transformation of me, that Jesus so longs to create in me.  Ultimately, for what I think is love for mom, becomes my undoing and hers.  Case in point, our first forefather Adam.  Adam let his perfect love for Eve, become more important to him, than a perfect love for God.  In so doing, he was undone, Eve was undone, and his perfect love was immediately corrupted by a new “love” that was ever aware of self-interests.  When Jesus comes for his evening walk with Adam and Eve, they hid from Him.  They were aware of their nudity.  They were ashamed of what they had done.  And when Adam is questioned about this, he does not recite a noble love of sacrifice for his beloved.  Instead he blames Eve for “making” him eat, it was her fault, not his.  Where was all the love for Eve then?  Tossed right out the window, in an effort to keep God from killing him on the spot.  Even though that would never be the plan of Jesus.  It is no different with you or I today.  We allow ourselves to claim that family is more important than Jesus to us in a pinch when things are desperate, and in so doing, we undo ourselves, and family we claim to love.  Better to hate who we are, and keep Jesus first, to give Him the clay of our lives to start over with.

Jesus continues in verse 27 saying … “And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple.”  Yikes.  The analogy of serving Jesus compared to a torturous death that takes days to finally bring the end.  Not terribly appealing is it?  And here is where the rubber meets the road.  Who you are is not so willing to be transformed.  That love of self hangs on as if we would have to crucify it to get it out of here.  For days it struggles to find breath, maybe for years.  The carnal nature of 6000 years is deeply rooted in us, and is not inclined to go quietly.  Add to that the interest darker forces take in any person even glancing at Jesus to enact this kind of transformation and you get a perfect storm of self-love and self-interest trying desperately to avoid transformation and convince you that you just don’t need it.  And that is where most of Christianity just quits trying to let go, and settles in to a complacency about who they are, content to move this far and no farther.  But the cross is not an eternal torture device, it hurts more than anything, and then you die.  That is the hard part.  To truly be a disciple of Jesus, a follower of Jesus, the “who” we are today is destined to die.  No other way around it.  A hard truth, but a truth of hope beyond all imagining.

Jesus continues in verse 28 saying … “For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it? [verse 29] Lest haply, after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish it, all that behold it begin to mock him, [verse 30] Saying, This man began to build, and was not able to finish.”  Here is Jesus Himself looking through the ages of time to a church of today, that is so content with itself.  We laid a foundation, we began through the faith of our forefathers, we rest on their accomplishments, and we move no farther.  And the devil, and the world, and our neighbors mock us saying that we have no real faith, for our lives look just like their lives, it is impossible to tell us apart, for we have no more love than they do, and we love all the same things.  We blend in so well, there is no distinction between a Christian and a non-Christian.  Worse, very often Christians are known for their condemnations and judgments of others.  Imagine that, what Jesus wanted was for the world to know us by our love.  And now they know us only by our judgment.  The church may be the greatest place for hate-speech the world has ever seen – not hate of sin, but hate of the sinners themselves.  For we offer them no plan of escape from lives burdened with pain of sin, just look at us, we have found no plan ourselves, how could we offer them one?  So we hate them instead of hating ourselves and who we have become.  The foundation was laid, but we have moved no farther.

Jesus continues in verse 31 saying … “Or what king, going to make war against another king, sitteth not down first, and consulteth whether he be able with ten thousand to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thousand? [verse 32] Or else, while the other is yet a great way off, he sendeth an ambassage, and desireth conditions of peace.”  We are at war today.  Not war with a physical enemy, or even war with a virus we do not see.  We are at war with ourselves, with who we are, and who Jesus longs to re-create us into, with whether we will allow Him to change us that way, or not.  But here is where hope begins to emerge once again.  Jesus tells us we are outnumbered.  Jesus tells us, it is time to find peace, to surrender and suffer no more.  On the other side of peace is a life waiting for you like no other.  On the other side of death to who you are today, is a new creation that has no limits.  The best life you can imagine is not enough to describe what Jesus first will create in you.  The conditions of this world cannot touch it.  And the conditions of the world to come, will be once again beyond all imagining.

Jesus concludes this section beginning in verse 33 saying … “So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.  [verse 34] Salt is good: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be seasoned? [verse 35] It is neither fit for the land, nor yet for the dunghill; but men cast it out. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.”  Letting it all go.  Leaving it all behind.  To seek Jesus first, God first.  To turn yourself over to Jesus entirely no matter the outcome, no matter who you will become, who He will make you into.  This is what it means to be a disciple, to be a follower of Jesus.  It may someday mean you are poor, perhaps dirt poor.  Not because you did not have money, but because you gave it all away without so much as a second thought or single regret.  You long only for the opportunity to give more.  It may someday mean, you are divorced, or isolated from your entire family for the strength of your love for Jesus.  But in that passion, your family may bear witness to who you have become, and your ever-present love for them, grounded in Jesus.  It may be that your entire family seeks the same Lord to find that kind of love for themselves.  And in being willing to let them go for the sake of Christ, that they are all brought to the feet of Christ and saved for themselves.  If Adam had been willing to let Eve go, and trust her to the love of Jesus, humanity would have had a very different fate, and Eve would still not have been lost forever.

But lest you think what the church is today, is enough, examine the analogy of salt losing its savor.  You can’t fix that.  You can’t make it better.  It becomes useless.  It becomes a church made of people who carry the name of Christ, but cling to everything in their lives but Jesus.  And in so doing, the world is not led to Jesus, but instead led away from Him.  The image of a condemning God is maintained by a people more prepared and willing to condemn others than to love them unconditionally.  A Jesus-first-church, is willing to let their entire lives go, and find themselves made into something else, something better.  A Jesus-first-church begins to think of the salvation of others, not by pointing out yet more attention to their sins, but by loving them first while they are yet in their sins, and then pointing them to Jesus for relief from the pain of their sins by the quiet example of their own lives.  No condemnation ever need be spoken, the world is not searching for yet another condemnation of itself.  But the world is desperately looking for a love that does not fail, and gives it reason to seek change, to seek a better way.  If we offer no better way in the example of our own lives and love, then we are salt that is no longer a seasoning of flavor, but just empty granules of nothing.

To let it all go sounds like sacrifice from this point of view.  But across the transformation horizon it is the deal of the century.  It is the letting go of our pain, for His joy.  It is the letting go of our self-inflicted stress and worry for His peace that nothing can touch.  It is the letting go of what we call love, for a pure love that comes from the throne of heaven itself and is reflected through you, without self-interest, but with only genuine care for another, for any other, whether sinner or saint.  And the un-healed cancer patient facing death can see this transformation in their own mind and hearts, and wind up living every moment from now to the grave in a state the world cannot ever know.  Each moment of life being made precious by a ministry for others, even though the disease never leaves, even if it kills them.  This world is but an introduction to a far better one.  And finding Jesus here is all that matters, it is all that makes life worth living, it is the meaning of life itself.  Letting it all go, means putting what matters most to you, in that hands of a loving Savior.  It means trusting God with your wife, your kids, your family, your job, and your money.  For it will only be as Jesus transforms you, that you may ever be able to reach those you love, to truly minister unto them.  And that is all that matters.  It begins, as you let it all go, but it has no end, ever better, ever more.

 

The First Casualty is Pride ...

How does one minister to the rich and the powerful?  This seems a rare question discussed in the modern church of today.  Most all the emphasis today is upon the poor, the desperate, or perhaps the middle class if such a thing still exists.  A crashing economy, and an active pandemic, manufacture many more poor than anything else these days.  And it is certain that Jesus seems to have much more interaction with the poor throughout scripture than He does with the rich.  But that may well be because the poor recognized their need of Jesus, far more often than the rich did.  Still, the rich and powerful had need of Jesus, perhaps even more so because they did not often recognize that need.  And Jesus did not come to save just one type of person.  Jesus came to save everyone.  He loved everyone.  Jesus knew the difficulties of being poor, and He recognized the burden of carrying wealth.  Poverty exposes need.  Wealth covers it up.  Yet the same need exists.  So when the rich and powerful made attempts at including Jesus in their social circles, Jesus did not run away.  Nor did He scold them for an invitation.  Instead He gladly accepted it and went into their homes when invited.  You might think that out of character for Someone who ministers so often to the poor.  But that is whole point, His character was same towards both rich and poor, He loves them and us like only our Creator God could love us.

Jesus was the perfect picture of humility.  Such a stark contrast to hearts of mankind.  We think of ourselves as rich or powerful when we measure against those we know, or have heard about.  We like to “take pride” in our homes, or our careers, or our families.  We lift ourselves up.  But it is vanity.  It is false pride and arrogance.  Jesus, by contrast, is the God of Creation, the God of Life, the God of the Universe.  There is no position across time and space which would be more exalted.  Yet He carried Himself in our world, and in His ministry to us, as the chief servant of everyone.  He carried Himself this way, He did not push you away because you didn’t.  Jesus did not require the poor to confess their worthlessness before He would stoop down to minister to them.  No, Jesus saw the poor as the invaluable treasure they are, each person of infinite value to Himself.  And so He treated us as kings, when we should be nothing.  The same was true of the rich.  Jesus treated them with the same love.  He did not require the rich to abase themselves first, before He would minister to them.  Instead He showed us all, how we should live, love, and treat each other.  His sermon was His living example.  Are we willing to follow that approach?

Luke tells us of an incident around ministry to the rich and powerful in his gospel letter in chapter 14.  This incident begins with a Sabbath feast to which Jesus has been invited.  Picking up in verse 1 it begins … “And it came to pass, as he went into the house of one of the chief Pharisees to eat bread on the sabbath day, that they watched him. [verse 2] And, behold, there was a certain man before him which had the dropsy.”  Jesus had been invited to one of the chief Pharisees for a Sabbath feast.  And He went.  These men were far from fans of Jesus.  Rather this invitation may well have been to spy on Jesus, to watch Him up close and find some occasion to trip Jesus up with law.  Ironic that foolish men would even attempt to trip up the Lawgiver with His own laws, but such is what happens when vanity rules the heart, instead of love for others.  And whether by chance coincidence, or through a setup of conspiracy, along the way to the feast there is a poor man afflicted with dropsy.

Consider for a minute what you might do in the same circumstance?  You know these rulers are not fans.  You know they believe that healing on Sabbath is a big break in the rules Moses handed down.  If you heal the man, you will decidedly cause mayhem with the folks you are trying to minister to.  So do you delay the healing perhaps?  Maybe have the disciples find out this man’s home address and come back to him as soon as the sun goes down.  Or perhaps minister to the man orally right there and then, but have his healing take effect as soon as the sun goes down.  Either of those options is exactly what the rich and powerful would prefer.  In fact, they always state exactly that kind of approach.  You can heal all you want, just wait till after Sabbath.  And what is so wrong with that?  Only one thing.  It cares more for the “rules” of Sabbath observance than it does for the victim who needs healing.  In fact, it twists the ideas of Sabbath observance to be performed without deep love for each other.  And how can the Sabbath be observed, if we do not love?  Short answer, it can’t.  Jesus knows this.  And Jesus will not change “who” He is, or how He loves, because we do not hold the right view of doctrinal beliefs.

So Luke continues in verse 3 saying … “And Jesus answering spake unto the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, Is it lawful to heal on the sabbath day? [verse 4] And they held their peace. And he took him, and healed him, and let him go; [verse 5] And answered them, saying, Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the sabbath day? [verse 6] And they could not answer him again to these things.”  Jesus hits them (and us) where we live.  Whether for pity, or greed, or fear, these men would have helped their animals in distress upon the Sabbath.  They would not wish them to wait until sundown, and prolong their suffering, they would take action to end that suffering right there and right then.  Perhaps because more of us feel more sympathy for a wounded pet, than a wounded soul.  But the of our Lord cannot be contained.  He loves us too much, to see us wait until sundown, before He relieves that suffering.  Jesus heals, right then, and right there because this is where our need is.  Jesus is keen to meet our needs right as He encounters them, as we bring them to Him, as we let Him heal us.  The man was healed.  And the nature of love of Jesus was revealed to that man, to all those in attendance.  And if it were possible, an error in how we observe the law would have been corrected.  But vanity likely prolonged the error, despite the revelation of Truth given them (and perhaps us).

The invitation to the feast was not rescinded because of this incident, and they traveled on to arrive at the Pharisee’s home.  In those days, many homes had open courtyards in the center of the home, and rooms on the lower floor that surrounded them.  Of course, the rooms on the second floor, or upper floor, also surrounded those courtyards but because they were elevated, they had a much better view of center gardens and decorations below, as well as the city or countryside facing outwards.  So over time, the upper floors became the rooms of prominence and tended to be reserved for the most important invitees to a feast of any kind.  Vanity being what it is, being placed in one of the upper rooms would enforce the idea that “you” were an important guest, an important person generally.  This was especially true as the space in any home was always limited, so not everyone could be placed in the upper rooms, there were always folks who had to be placed on the first floor.  They were less important guests, less important people in general.  And as this procession with Jesus arrives at the home of the chief Pharisee, Jesus takes note of the people all heading up to the upper rooms before they fill up.  Each man believing, that he is important, regardless of what the owner of the home thinks, or what other thinks.

Jesus continues in verse 7 saying … “And he put forth a parable to those which were bidden, when he marked how they chose out the chief rooms; saying unto them, [verse 8] When thou art bidden of any man to a wedding, sit not down in the highest room; lest a more honourable man than thou be bidden of him; [verse 9] And he that bade thee and him come and say to thee, Give this man place; and thou begin with shame to take the lowest room. [verse 10] But when thou art bidden, go and sit down in the lowest room; that when he that bade thee cometh, he may say unto thee, Friend, go up higher: then shalt thou have worship in the presence of them that sit at meat with thee. [verse 11] For whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.”  Jesus offers practical advice to everyone.  Put yourself in the lowest rooms by choice, of free will, and with no expectations.  Be happy there, as you should be happy to attend any feast as a guest in another’s home.  If such is the occasion that the owner of the home did not intend you to be seated there, let them come to you, and bring you up to where they intended.  Putting yourself in the prominent place, could lead to you being forcibly placed in lower floors, with a good degree of shame in the process.  Our vanity will lead to our humiliation.  But our humility may well lead to our exaltation.  We should not fain humility in order to be exalted, we should be happy in the state of our humility.  For it is only in a state of humility, that we are truly able to minister to others.  And it is that ministry, which should be our goal.  For us to be effective ministers, pride must be the first casualty.

But the lessons Jesus wished to convey were not only for those invited to attend, but for those blessed enough to be able to host such a wonderful Sabbath feast.  Jesus continues in verse 12 saying … “Then said he also to him that bade him, When thou makest a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends, nor thy brethren, neither thy kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbours; lest they also bid thee again, and a recompence be made thee. [verse 13] But when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind: [verse 14] And thou shalt be blessed; for they cannot recompense thee: for thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just.”  So often, we give with silent expectation that our giving will be rewarded back to us again.  I send you a Christmas gift, I figure you will send me one in return.  Who wants to be “that guy” who never returns a gift or gesture like that?  Usually in fact, if you have someone who you send a card to every year, or a gift of some type, and that gift or card is never returned in kind.  You stop sending them.  Why?  Because you think the recipient did not appreciate it (you may not know that) – more likely because you never get anything back.  How often do you loan money to someone who never pays you back before you make it practice not to loan money anymore?  This kind of thinking pervades our social fabric until it is so woven into who we are, we do not even notice it is there.  This was true in the days of Jesus as well.

So Jesus asks us to break from our normal behavior and try something new.  Jesus asks us to give to people we absolutely know cannot ever pay us back.  People we know are too poor, or too sick, or to lonely to ever make a difference in our lives.  The “unimportant” people.  Look at that list of who to avoid for starters.  No friends, no family, no rich folks – people we would all tacitly expect to reward our giving in some way.  No, the new feast is not supposed to be for them.  But instead for the poor, the maimed or crippled or disabled, the blind – people who in those days would likely be beggars by profession as no other professions were left to them.  These “homeless” folks did not have means to repay you even if they wanted to.  They did not have upper rooms, or lower rooms, or food for feasts.  They struggled to live everyday.  Jesus asks us to give to them freely, and be happy in the giving, with zero expectation of reward.

And what is the recompense at the resurrection of the just (by the way, another subtle reminder to the Sadducees that they had this doctrine wrong)?  When your heart is fully and finally remade by Jesus at that resurrection.  You will finally love others, like Jesus loves other, and perfectly.  When your heart is filled with only that kind of love, what you have given here, freely and without expectation, will be the only truly happy memories you carry with you into the next world.  When you realize what effect you may have had on those in need, while they were yet in need, nothing else will mean as much to you.  Your reward will not come in gold, or diamonds, or recognition to feed a vanity that no longer exists.  But your reward will be more precious to you than all of those things, as it will live on in your heart forever.  One less thing to have to wipe tears away from, and one more thing akin to the love that lasts forever.

If we are to minister to the rich, let us begin by striving for the humility of Jesus in our hearts.  Let pride be our first casualty and not demand that of those we try to serve.  Let His love reflect through us.  We need not change “who” we are to be accepted by the rich.  We need only allow Jesus to change “who” we are that we might share in His ministry to everyone.  Let our transformation become sermon by example.  For rich and poor are drawn to the selfless love of Jesus, and if that love is reflected through you, you will become a beacon to point them to His great light of love.  Those will be memories you carry into the next world that will forever warm your heart.  His grace, through you.

 

War Is Here ...

We are at war with a virus.  It sounds rather one-sided, as we are complex creatures who think and feel, and our enemy is a rather simplistic, non-thinking, non-feeling enemy.  But what our enemy does well, is reproduce, spread, and kill us.  Covid-19 is still a mystery after months of battle with it.  And as much as we might wish that were our only war, it is not.  We are also at war with drug addiction.  Drug overdose is yet another killer, another enemy of our own making.  It is conceptual.  Drug addiction is an affliction, not a person, but like covid-19, it inhabits a person, overwhelms a person, and then defines a person.  You have it, or you don’t.  And for those who have it, it can be very fatal.  In both instances, we want to reclaim the person, and get rid of the affliction that inhabits them.  But in the case of drug addiction, it can drive an otherwise “good” person to commit horrible offenses against us.  To get that next fix, the addict will gladly steal, harm, or even kill on occasion.  Under “normal” circumstances these deeds would have been abhorrent to them, but under the influence of addiction, their desire for the next fix, overwhelms all sense of morality.

And in the church, we are at war with sin.  But much like covid-19 sin spreads far and wide until we all become afflicted with it in some form or fashion.  And much like drug addiction, sin drives us to do deeds that should be abhorrent to us, but for some reason we consider them normal.  It is a constant struggle between a war of love-of-self, vs a love-of-others.  And the side Jesus is on, the complete and absolute love-of-others, is hard to understand by the side afflicted with sin (the love-of-self).  So it becomes more than just a war within us, it becomes a war waged outside of us as well.  The wicked, that is, those who care little for how they sin, or why, or what damage it causes – pretty much hate those who look to Jesus to lose their own sin.  And behind their wicked forces stands Satan himself, always looking to inspire them to ever darker and darker deeds, and deeper and deeper levels of apathy and hate.  The war is here.  It will not end, until Jesus returns.  There can be no peace until then.  For the war is real.  It began in heaven and will not end until heaven returns to earth and fire rains down from the sky, until all that remains of evil is consumed, until even death itself is consumed forever.  Not eternal flames, but eternal consequences.  Not forever torture, but forever non-existence, forever separation from the source of Love, by the choice of evil.  For now though, the war is here.

Jesus was not unaware of this.  He shared some thoughts and ideas on it back in the gospel letter of Luke in the 12^th chapter.  Picking up in verse 41 He begins … “Then Peter said unto him, Lord, speakest thou this parable unto us, or even to all? [verse 42] And the Lord said, Who then is that faithful and wise steward, whom his lord shall make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of meat in due season? [verse 43] Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing. [verse 44] Of a truth I say unto you, that he will make him ruler over all that he hath.”  To set some context, Jesus has just been talking about selling all that you have, giving to the poor, and then becoming a servant by choice.  Peter is then asking, does this advice, and analogy of the servant or goodman-of-the-house apply to just the disciples, or to everyone?  Jesus continues that anyone who considers themselves a leader, is also a servant of all, and to be a ruler, is to be found a servant of the many.  This is the battlefield.  It is within us as the war rages between our selfishness and His commission.  It is present in both regular believers just as much as it is leaders.  But Jesus points out it is a blessing to be found in service.

Jesus continues in verse 44 saying … “But and if that servant say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming; and shall begin to beat the menservants and maidens, and to eat and drink, and to be drunken; [verse 46] The lord of that servant will come in a day when he looketh not for him, and at an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him in sunder, and will appoint him his portion with the unbelievers.”  This is not a war of good excuses.  This is not a war that can be delayed.  It is here and it is now.  And it is only winnable through personal complete submission to Jesus Christ.  Those of us who search for the loopholes in contracts, and determine we can delay our service and our gifts, until right before Jesus returns, do not just play a dangerous game, they play a losing one.  Because the heart remains unchanged, having never submitted it to Jesus Christ.  The vision remains blinded, because Jesus has never had the chance to open your eyes, and change how you think, or how you love.  And even in the church, where we know conceptually about Jesus Christ, we never meet Him personally, or learn what it means to truly obey, or to truly serve.  We play a game of words.  And when Jesus actually does return, these Christians in name only, find themselves cut off from the body, and apportioned with those who never believed at all.  For the difference is indistinguishable.

Jesus continues in verse 47 saying … “And that servant, which knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. [verse 48] But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more.”  Here is where Jesus describes the nature of sin itself.  Sin is the punishment.  Sin is the problem.  You do not need to wait for God to punish you for your sins, it is you who are already punishing yourself and others because of your sins.  Sin is the punishment.  Sin is the pain, it brings a desire for death to escape it.  But there is a different way of escape, it is Jesus who longs to free us from our sins so that we beat ourselves less.  So that we punish ourselves less.  When you “know” you should not be committing some sin, and you do it anyway, your guilt and foreknowledge adds to your punishment.  When you see those who you claim to love, suffer at the hand of your sin, your punishment is increased.  Not by God, but by your own knowledge that all this suffering could have been avoided, if you just submitted yourselves to Jesus and let Jesus bring you the victory.  This guilt is even worse when you are in a position of leadership, and those who look to you to help point them to Christ, find you pointing only to yourself, and your weakness.  For if you remain bound in sin, when you know the way out, how will they (the weaker) ever find true salvation from their own sins.  And so your failures are made worse by your fore-knowledge, and continued to refusal to submit, as you become the stumbling block to others.

For the non-believer, they suffer too, but they do not understand why they suffer.  They refuse to accept the responsibility that it is their own actions that bring the pain and suffering.  They are forever blaming someone else for their own pain and suffering.  In this they suffer less, but they still suffer.  And while they themselves may blame others (like Satan does), those they claim to love also suffer regardless of blame.  For the pain of sin causes suffering no matter what.  Sin is the punishment, never the “fun” as Satan would have us believe.  So Jesus points out to us here, how it really works.  When we know we should not have done the sin, we feel worse.  But worse than that, when we know that Jesus could have beaten the sin in the first place, literally handing us the benefits of His victory, but we chose not to humble ourselves, but instead make the claim we could beat the sin ourselves, we feel even worse than that.  For our continued failures in the war with sin, make us lifelong failures in this war.  Lifelong wounded soldiers.  Soldiers we were never intended to be, but followers, followers of Jesus who fights the war for us.

Jesus knew the war was here.  He continues picking back up in verse 49 saying … “I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled? [verse 50] But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished! [verse 51] Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:”  Jesus comes to send His fire throughout the earth.  He intends for His love to purge the sin from us, if we will but let it.  But how can His fire infect us, if we believe we already have another way to purge the sin from ourselves?  Instead of accepting His gift in our war, we refuse it, clinging to our own ideas about how we can win the war with sin, in our own strength of will.  And we do not win.  Nor do our motives that created the desire for sin change.  We remain drug addicts, bound in chains to the desire of our sin, because the fire of the Love of Jesus is strange to us.  We having made His fire strange to us.

Jesus brings a baptism of the Spirit with Him to win this war.  How can He pull back or stop those efforts until the war is won?  Until all are saved the war rages on, and baptism of the Spirit remains for any who would claim it, or seek it.  How can we believe peace would exist in this world, while Satan remains in this world?  That war started in heaven, and Jesus did not come here to surrender but to win it, once and for all.  To save you however, does not mean the war ends around you.  Instead it intensifies.  Plan on it.  It is what Jesus foretells.  He picks back up in verse 52 saying … “For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided, three against two, and two against three. [verse 53] The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother; the mother in law against her daughter in law, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.”  Where you would expect family to respect the bonds of family and let family love keep peace in a home.  But selfish love does not respect unselfish love, it abuses it, and tries to bring harm to it.  For it cannot reconcile with it.  So even the bonds of family disintegrate in this war of sin within us all.  Our weapon will be prayer, submission to Jesus, and love for those who would call themselves our enemies.  But make no mistake, they will be our enemies while Satan’s version of self-love remains within them.  For it is self-love that is the root of all sin, of all evil.

Jesus continues in verse 54 saying … “And he said also to the people, When ye see a cloud rise out of the west, straightway ye say, There cometh a shower; and so it is. [verse 55] And when ye see the south wind blow, ye say, There will be heat; and it cometh to pass. [verse 56] Ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky and of the earth; but how is it that ye do not discern this time?”  Jesus reminds His own followers and all those listening then or reading now, if we are able to discern the sky, or read the times and know what it about to occur – why are we so blind to the war with sin that rages all around us, and within us?  Have we become hypocrites, talking a good Jesus game, but still loving self, and telling everyone around us, that you have to love yourself before you can love others?  There is a whole mantra of books and philosophy based on self-first thinking.  And all of it at war with Jesus Christ in you.  Let us not be deceived, nor drawn to what our carnal nature craves, but instead to find submission to Jesus as our way out.  Jesus was right there in front of their faces, and yet many still denied the Son of God.  Has anything changed?  Jesus is right there in front of you and I, dare we deny Him, in favor of ourselves?

Jesus concludes beginning in verse 57 saying … “Yea, and why even of yourselves judge ye not what is right? [verse 58] When thou goest with thine adversary to the magistrate, as thou art in the way, give diligence that thou mayest be delivered from him; lest he hale thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and the officer cast thee into prison. [verse 59] I tell thee, thou shalt not depart thence, till thou hast paid the very last mite.”  If you wish to know where you are in the war, examine your heart and see if you have found true forgiveness for someone who has wronged you.  Our cries for justice have a boomerang effect, for as we demand justice against others, it always has a way to return back to ourselves.  Better to forgive, to learn to let go, to learn to trust in God for what we need.  The war over sin within us does not end because we declare it so.  It ends when we love like Jesus loves.  That kind of Love forgave us everything, every slight, every wrongdoing, everything we even knew we were doing wrong as we did it.  If His love is able to forgive us like that, should we not strive to find His love in us, and look for the forgiveness His love will bring.  While we look to get even, we remain entrenched in the pain we embrace.

Your war is here.  It will be raged within you.  It will be raged all around you.  The allies you hoped to have, you may find become the enemies you never expected.  The main enemy is beyond your abilities to defeat.  But that enemy has already been defeated by the Champion who wants to fight your war in your place.  If you can submit to different leadership in your life, you have a chance at following in His footsteps and finding the victories He earns on your behalf.  You need not fight this war.  You need only allow Jesus to fight it for you, within you, and all around you.  For only Jesus has the power to change the heart, and it is the heart that must be changed if ever you hope to see His victory.  You are not meant to carry the scars of this war.  You are not meant to have to declare yourself bound to sin forever.  When Jesus brings you a victory over sin, it is not meant to be only a temporary victory, but a victory that lasts forever.  When Jesus heals your motives, desires, and weaknesses, He does not aim only for today.  He aims for forever.  To cleanse you, to wash you white as snow, not so you can go back outside and fight again, and lose again.  But instead to remain behind Jesus, following His lead, looking to see His strength, not trying to demonstrate your own strength to Him.  He is strong.  You are not.  But if you become strong in dependence upon Jesus, He reveals just what a Warrior He will be on your behalf.  Let Him.  And watch Him win your war forever.  Always behind, and grateful to be there, to be part of the flock Jesus leads, looking not at men, but at the only Shepherd who knows you by name, and knows how you think and feel.