Archive #11-20
All materials copyright (c) 1998, Ken Wade
"A Fresh Look at Jesus" is a weekly devotional based on the life of Jesus Christ that was sent out by e-mail from 1998-2001.
Devotionals #11-20 are on this page. Use the following links to go to pages with other devotionals: #1-10 #21-30 #31-40
Baptism With Fire
"I indeed baptized you with water, but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit" (Mark 1:8 NKJV).
Several months ago I set out to study my way through the gospel of Mark. If you’ve ever compared the four gospels, you’ve probably noticed that Mark is the CNN Headline News version of the story. By comparison, I suppose Matthew would be the main CNN view, Luke would be a PBS in-depth look, and John would be a docudrama for Network TV. These analogies just popped into my head, and I sure wouldn’t want to stake my life on them, but I’d be interested to hear if anyone else sees it that way, or would like to suggest a better set of analogies.
Anyhow, getting back to the main point, I decided to study through Mark for a couple of reasons. One, I’d never done an in-depth study of that gospel, and two, I wanted to go through the life of Jesus in the quick overview mode.
So, why, I ask myself, am I still stuck in chapter 1 after months of study? Plain and simple, I found too much interesting stuff to study in Mark’s opening scenes to move on. This week’s "Fresh Look" and next week’s also will focus on just one word that is missing from verse 8: "fire".
If you read the same story in Matthew and Luke, you’ll notice that both of these gospels say that John the Baptist predicted that Jesus would baptize "with the Holy Spirit and fire" and that He would burn up the chaff of the world with unquenchable fire. Only Mark leaves out any mention of fire.
As I went looking for reasons why Mark might have omitted mention of fire from his gospel, one suggested itself immediately. The Church Fathers declare that Mark wrote his gospel based on the preaching of Peter. It is generally accepted that he wrote in Rome, for a Roman audience.
We know that Peter was martyred in Rome during the reign of Nero, the emperor who is best remembered for "fiddling while Rome burned" and for fixing the blame for the conflagration on the Christians. Rome burned in AD 64, and Peter was crucified about the same time. Assuming Mark decided to write down what he had heard from his spiritual father (1 Peter 5:13) soon after Peter’s death, is it at all surprising that Mark would leave out any mention of predictions that Jesus would bring fire upon the Christians, and that He would burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire?
What does this tell me about Jesus? After His ascension, He wanted the story of His life to be told, and through the Holy Spirit He inspired four men to tell it in four different ways. And as Mark told the story for a Roman audience, he told it in a way that specifically avoided giving offense or creating unnecessary problems.
That was Jesus’ way when He was on earth as well. Usually, He mingled in among the people, ministering, showing compassion, living their lives with them, not putting them off with a holier-than-thou attitude. There were times when He specifically chose to give offense, when the people needed to be shaken loose and have their eyes opened to new truth. But that was the exception rather than the rule.
Yes, Jesus baptized with fire. But the fire came after, and was subordinate to, the baptism with His Spirit of holiness, service, and love.
"‘I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.’
"When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him. And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.’
"Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil."
(Matthew 3:11, 16-4:1 NKJV).
In last week’s meditation I focused on the fact that Mark’s gospel doesn’t mention John’s prediction that Jesus would baptize with fire. In his quick telling of the gospel, Mark also skips rather quickly over Jesus’ experience in the wilderness, being tempted by the devil. Matthew and Luke deal with this scene in more detail--describing what I have come to think of as Jesus’ own baptism with fire.
The story is graphic. Jesus is baptized with water, then baptized with the Spirit, affirmed by His heavenly Father, and what happens next? He is driven by the Spirit out into the wilderness to face deprivation, starvation, and temptation--a fiery trial that lasted much longer than the crucifixion--no doubt it served as a preparation for that great trial.
While we might expect the Spirit to bring peace and prosperity to our lives, for Jesus it was just the opposite. The wilderness of Judea is far from a comfortable place. It is generally assumed that Jesus was baptized in the fall of the year, which would be at the end of the hot season, when there has been little or no rain for many months. It would be hot, dry, dusty, an oven by day, a freezer by night.
But Jesus knew that He could not baptize with fire if He had not first walked through the fire. How could one baptize with something with which he or she has not been baptized? How could Jesus expect us to go out into the wilderness to seek our own reckoning with the Spirit and with the demons, if He had not first experienced it and triumphed?
We cannot invite someone to a place we are unwilling to go ourselves. This is perhaps one of the heaviest challenges of the Christian life, but only those who are willing to undergo the baptism with fire will have the courage and faith to invite others in.
The later testimony of Jesus is that : "they were astonished at His teaching, for He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes" (Mark 1:22). He could teach with authority because He knew who He was, where He came from, and what His mission was.
The scribes, on the other hand, looked outside themselves for authority. Their method of teaching was to hide behind the well-known rabbis in the manner of "Rabbi A says..., but Rabbi B says..." They wanted to stay detached and noncommitted, always subject to revision by the next great rabbi. Their message essentially was that one can't really know for sure what truth is.
The scribes were not committed enough to truth to stake their whole existence on standing against error and the devil under all circumstances. But Jesus had gone through the harsh, trying, horrible starvation of the wilderness, and had met the devil on his own ground, and had not fallen for his lies. Now He knew for sure what truth was, on His own authority.
What a contrast for a Man to come, preaching on His own authority, because He had been committed enough to truth to put it to the test--to endure whatever was needed in order to strong. Not a professional, paid faith-peddler, He LIVED and DIED by His faith.
And that was why He taught with authority and power. And that is why what He taught has changed the world.
And why it has such power to change individual lives.
Like yours and mine.
If we’re willing to follow.
If we’re willing to receive His baptism.
"But Jesus said to them, ‘You do not know what you ask. Can you drink the cup that I drink, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?’
They said to Him, ‘We are able.’
So Jesus said to them, ‘You will indeed drink the cup that I drink, and with the baptism I am baptized with you will be baptized;’ ( Mark 10:38-39, NKJV).
"People bow down, and each man humbles himself; therefore do not forgive them."
"Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do’". (Isaiah 2:9; Luke 23:34, NKJV)
Recently I’ve been working with Pastor Dwight K. Nelson of Pioneer Memorial Church at Andrews University in developing a new book called _Outrageous Grace_. (For those of you who don’t know me, my "real job" is being a book editor.) There are many compelling thoughts in the book, but the one that has impacted my life most significantly is based on Luke 23:34.
As a little boy, whenever someone told me the story of the crucifixion of Jesus, I had a kind of odd reaction. I didn’t think much about the pain, or what it meant for forgiveness of my sins. I was always trying to think of ways to keep it from happening. I’d see myself hiding in the window of a nearby building with a bow and arrow, and shooting the soldiers before they could pound the nails in.
In other words, I’d save Jesus!
WOW! No one ever accused me of not having an ego, but as I think back now, that takes the cake! Doesn’t it?
Where do you picture yourself at the cross?
Are you there beside Mary and John, weeping, wringing your hands, wondering what you can do to help Jesus--to at least make His final moments of pain more bearable?
Or are you there with the pharisees: your affronted pride and ritualized righteousness spewing forth in venomous hatred at the One who saw the real you and told people their righteousness had to exceed yours?
Or are you, perhaps, one of the Roman soldiers, living a miserable life, taking orders from cruel commanders on high, and taking out your frustration in every hammer blow you can inflict on this helpless Fool on the cross?
Whichever group you find yourself in, take a moment to stop and listen to the words of Luke 23:34: "‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.’" These words float out in quiet firmness--covering, enveloping the whole massive, noisy, clamoring throng. And there is not a soul there for whom they are not a lifeline. A lifeline thrown down from on high, to lift them out of the tempestuous seas of human scheming, human activity, human doing, human accomplishing, human acting out.
When I started to write this devotional, I went to my computer concordance and typed in the words "forgive them" to get me to the verse I wanted. I was shocked when Isaiah 2:9 came up also--a message so strongly in contrast to the one I was looking for: "People bow down, and each man humbles himself; therefore do not forgive them."
It hardly seemed both of these messages could come from the same God. How could a God who could spread a blanket of forgiveness over those who are doing everything in their power to destroy Him, also utter orders not to forgive? The context of Isaiah 2:9 reveals that it is those who are bowing down to the works of their own hands that will not be forgiven.
Self righteousness. It’s never enough. Cursing, swearing, driving nails into divine/human flesh, scheming, plotting murders. These are all horrid things. But they aren’t as bad as self righteousness. They are forgivable sins, but self righteousness isn’t, because it doesn’t see its need.
What a God! To forgive even those who were purposely causing Him anguish. He’ll forgive whatever you’ve done too--if you’ll give Him the chance.
"And many women who followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering to Him, were there looking on from afar, among whom were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joses, and the mother of Zebedee's sons" (Matt. 27:55-56 NKJV).
As we continue to consider the crucifixion of Jesus, in the days leading up to Easter, we’ll take a look this time and next time at who was there to witness and participate in the events at Golgotha.
The people who were there were divided into two groups--those watching in horror and those watching with glee. Today let’s take a look at the friends of Jesus who were there.
Far off, on the fringes, watching from a distance, we find a faithful group of women who had followed Jesus all the way from Galilee. You can almost hear the wailing, see them wringing their hands, pulling at their hair, moaning and holding each other, looking to each other for strength.
Close to the cross we find "His mother, and His mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene" and also "the disciple whom He loved" (John 19:25, 26 NKJV).
The natural question that occurs is, where were the rest of the disciples? Were they already in hiding back at the upper room? Were the women and John the only ones with the courage to stay by in support of the Man they had looked to as their leader?
Perhaps this reveals a fundamental difference in people’s motivations for following Jesus. We know there had been stormy times among the disciple troupe. James, John, and Peter all vying for high positions in the kingdom; Judas trying to insinuate himself into the inner circle. No doubt all the men realized that they were on to a good thing--God had finally blessed them with good fortune, for they had been called to be close to the future king.
Visions of white stallions, chariots, and troop escorts no doubt danced in their heads as they thought of themselves as co-rulers with the soon-to-be Caesar of the whole world.
Yes, it’s possible to follow Jesus for the wrong reasons. It’s possible to be a Christian for the wrong reasons. I met a young stock broker not long ago who made it a point to go to church at least twice a week (to two different churches)--it seemed like the best place to look for new clients.
The women who had followed Jesus had no such hopes of glory--sure they might get a comfortable place to live out of it when their Friend took over the Herodian palaces, but could it be that their motives were purer--less subject to being side tracked than the men’s.
Of course there may be other reasons why we don’t find the disciples in the list of the witnesses. (In fact the rest of the disciples may have been there among Jesus’ "acquaintances" watching from a distance, according to Luke 23:49, but they are never singled out by name as being there.) The women probably stood less risk of being arrested as conspirators. Calvary would have been a more dangerous place for the men than the women in that male-dominated society.
But what about John? Was it just because he seemed to have good connections with the high priest (John 18:16) that he had the courage to be right at the foot of the cross? Or could it be that because he was "the disciple whom [Jesus] loved" he had been converted and had come to follow Jesus out of love rather than for selfish reasons?
The power of love was revealed over and over again in the life of Jesus, but never more clearly than at the cross.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.
Now when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.
"And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself."
Genesis 1:1-3; John 1:1-5; Mark 15:33; John 12:32 NKJV
The Black Hole of Sin
In the absence of God, the world was darkness and confusion, and then He spoke light into existence, and with light brought life.
But it didn’t take man long to descend back into darkness. Wandering away from the Father of Light, Adam and Eve and all their children became trapped in a dark morass of sin. The world seemed to collapse inward upon itself until there was hardly a glimmer of true life or hope to be seen.
There is a phenomenon in the physical world which physicists call a black hole. They claim that anything, compacted to small enough size--a size called a singularity--can become a black hole. And what is it that makes a black hole so black? It is so dense, so compact, that its mass creates a gravitational field so powerful that even light can’t escape.
Everything that approaches the "event horizon" that surrounds a black hole is pulled in, never to escape. Light, sound, stars, even high-powered cosmic rays, are vacuumed in and torn apart. Astronomers believe that they can detect the existence of black holes in the universe because as mass and energy are sucked into these cosmic vacuum cleaners, immense amounts of energy are given off in the form of X-rays--a kind of final scream emitted by atoms as they are torn asunder by the massive force that is dragging them kicking and screaming into oblivion.
You might think that our world is a black hole of sin--that the darkness has abode here so long that it has developed the power to draw anything that approaches our planet into its fiendish clutches.
But I think of something very different when I think of the black hole of sin. I think of one particular time and place on this planet where all the sin of history was caught in a vortex and drawn into the Cross hairs of a single point. A singularity that became such a powerful force that it could vacuum up even the most powerful and heinous of sins, and pull them to a place where they would be torn apart, shredded, destroyed, never to be seen or heard of again.
Only the mind of man and woman is powerful enough to overcome the power of that black hole. For we can, by the force of our wills, demand that we have our sins back. We can refuse to confess them. We can refuse to let the Man at the center of the black hole of sin draw our sin away from us. We can cherish them. We can hold onto them.
But who would want to?
Whatever your sin. However horrible you may think yourself to be. Whatever anger, whatever lust, whatever fear or distrust your heart harbors. Whatever you hold against your neighbor, your father, your mother, or your heavenly Father. Whatever enrages you against the One who made you the way you are. All these, and anything else that could separate you from your Creator. Anything that is called sin can be brought to the event horizon called Golgotha. Even today you can take that thing and you can hurl it at Jesus. You can scream at Him, and cast all the anger and hatred of your life at Him, and it will all be sucked into the black hole of sin and you will never have to look at it again. And then you can hear Him say: Father, forgive--he didn’t know--she didn’t know back then. But now he knows me. Now she is free of all of that, and now I can claim them as my forgiven children.
That’s what Calvary, Good Friday, and Easter are all about.
Road of Death, Road of Life
Then the one whose name was Cleopas answered and said to Him, "Are You the only stranger in Jerusalem, and have You not known the things which happened there in these days?" And He said to them, "What things?" So they said to Him, "The things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a Prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, "and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. (Luke 24:18-20, NKJV)
In the Bible we never hear about the village of Emmaus before or after the story of Cleopas and his friend’s miraculous encounter with the Saviour there on resurrection day. But it was an important, well-known city in its day. At one point, nearly 200 years earlier, during the Maccabean war of independence from the Seleucid Empire, the city was highly fortified as a defense post by the Seleucid commander of the region.
But the event connected with Emmaus that would have sprung most easily to mind for Cleopas and his companion would have been a tragic story of slaughter. It had occurred less than 70 years earlier, during the time when the Parthians (from the area of Persia) had taken over Palestine from the Romans, who had taken control of the area in 63 BC. In 40 BC the Parthians invaded Palestine and installed a man named Antigonus as ruler in Jerusalem. The Romans mounted a counterattack under the leadership of Herod and a general named Macheras, and managed to reclaim all of the countryside, but couldn’t dislodge Antigonus from Jerusalem.
It was during this time that Herod the Great was getting his start toward greatness by helping the Romans to drive out the Parthians. Herod set up court at Emmaus and Macheras, the Roman general, went up to Jerusalem to try to drive out Antigonus and the Parthians, but Antigonus simply refused him entry to the strongly fortified city. According to the historian Josephus, this humiliation made Macheras so angry that he marched back to Emmaus in such a pique that he had his soldiers kill every Jew he met along the road, no matter whether they were on Herod’s side or Antigonus’ side.
So the road to Emmaus carried the stigma of a place of horrid defeat and death for the Jewish people.
Now, it seemed, another horrid death and defeat had come. The One whom the Jews had hoped would deliver Jerusalem had been slain by the Romans. Perhaps Cleopas and his friend on that road of death brooded over those earlier events that seemed to parallel what had just happened to Jesus. Would the Jews always be the victims of the Romans? Even the greatest miracle worker of all time seemed unable to withstand their power.
Utter defeat, discouragement, loss of faith must have seemed the only thing left to them.
But then another Man joined them in their journey down the road of death.
And when they reached the end of their journey, He opened their eyes, and they saw the whole plan of God as it had been laid out in the Scriptures. And defeat and death were turned to victory and life.
Cleopas and his friend turned around and hurried back up that road of death. Only now it was a road of life! Their conversation no longer about death, defeat, and loss, they hastened to Jerusalem to proclaim life, not only Jesus’ life, but life for all the world.
Jesus has a way of doing that--of turning things around. He can do it in your life too, if you’ll walk with Him and listen to what He says.
Silent Saviour
The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, "Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! . . . And John bore witness, saying, "I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and He remained upon Him (John 1:29, 32 NKJV).
The gospel of John doesn’t directly tell the story of the baptism of Jesus, we hear about it only indirectly. In fact if we didn’t have the other gospels to tell us that it was at His baptism that the Spirit descended on Him, we wouldn’t even know that Jesus had been baptized.
The story of John pointing out Jesus as the Lamb of God apparently takes place at least 41 days after the baptism, for Jesus went immediately into the wilderness to be tempted after that first encounter. In the event depicted in John, Jesus comes back again, and seems to just mysteriously move through the background--passing on and off the stage without comment. He comes again the next day, and John repeats the enigmatic challenge: "Behold the Lamb of God!" (verse 36). Once again Jesus seems to just flow through the scenery, hardly interacting with the crowds to whom He has been introduced.
He doesn’t push Himself into the center of the action. He’s just there, waiting. Inviting a response only by His silence.
What must He have looked like, after those 40 days of fasting in the hot, barren hills? Haggard? Emaciated? Weak?
Maybe the first two. But how could one who had just stared down the devil himself and triumphed look weak?
There must have been a look of power in His eyes. A sense of purity. A clean slate, but certainly not a blank slate.
John’s disciples, accepting their master’s challenge, must have looked into those eyes. But it doesn’t seem that Jesus held their gaze. He just passed by, and the men were left staring at the back of His head--His retreating form.
But He had sparked a curiosity. A desire to know more. Perhaps a sense that there was something they couldn’t allow to elude them, something beyond even what they had found in following John. Spontaneously they followed--wills knit by common purpose.
Jesus sensed it. Probably He had anticipated it. He didn’t have eyes in the back of His head though, so finally He stopped and turned to see who they were.
He didn’t exactly welcome them. "‘What do you seek?’" He asked.
He wasn’t after run-of-the-mill curiosity seekers. He questioned their intentions right from the start. It didn’t take Him long to discover that they were in earnest. "Rabbi, where are you staying?" they asked.
The question expressed a commitment to follow. And the answer expressed a commitment to lead "Come and see," He responded.
In that simple, almost silent interchange, two men’s lives, and eventually the world, were changed for eternity.
Is Jesus passing silently through the scenery of your life today? Do you notice? Are you curious? Do you follow? Are you changed?
A Fresh Look at Jesus, #18
Speaking Saviour
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. . . .
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:1, 14 NKJV).
Last week’s devotional was called "Silent Saviour." I’m calling this week’s "Speaking Saviour. It grew out of news reports I heard this week about a new scientific study, purported to prove that "animals" of the genus homo (as in homo sapiens and homo neanderthalensis) learned to speak much earlier in evolutionary history than was previously thought. National Public Radio here in the U. S. reports that a scientific journal has just published an article about the openings that allow passage of nerves from the brain to the tongue. It seems that in the skulls of humans these holes are larger than similar openings in the skulls of apes.
That part of the study wasn’t news. What got the reporters’ attention was the fact that scientists have now studied the skulls of Neanderthal skeletons and found that Neanderthals (which are regarded by evolutionists as primitive forms of humans that lived hundreds of thousands of years ago and finally died out) also had the large openings for the passage of nerves from the brain to the tongue.
The implications of this new study--viewed from an evolutionist’s perspective--are that humans have been able to talk for a lot longer than scientists used to think.
Personally I happen to believe that God created humans with the ability to speak, and that Neanderthal skeletons will one day come to be recognized as just a different form of human being descended from God’s original creation. But that’s not the point I’d like to focus on.
The gift of speech--the ability to communicate ideas from the past and present, and to speculate about the future--seems to be uniquely human characteristic. Is it any wonder then, that the Bible describes Jesus at the Word of God--God’s ultimate communication to humans.
It was the Word of God that first spoke the universe, and our world, into existence. It was the breath of God that gave life to the clay that became Adam. But as God continued to try to communicate with His world, the signals often got confused. Men and women learned to be afraid of God. They began to blame God for the troubles in the world (did you watch the Learning Channel series on TV this week called "The Wrath of God"? It was all about disasters!) People began trying to "buy off" God through sacrifice, religious behavior, and self-denial, rather than entering into a loving, trusting relationship with Him. They came to see God as an ogre who had to be appeased.
How could God communicate with people who had such deep misconceptions of Him? Have you ever tried to defuse the anger of someone who has totally misjudged your intentions? It’s difficult--even for God. Mere words couldn’t do it. Words had to become flesh. Words had to live. Words had to demonstrate their truth in day-to-day difficult circumstances.
That’s what the life of Jesus was all about.
God created us with the ability to speak, and to understand speech. But He knew that we learn even more when we can see speech fleshed out. And that’s why He was willing to give His Son to come down to our earth, and to speak to us, but more than that, to live to us. To live the truth about God.
It is as we continue to study the life of Christ that we learn what God wants so badly for us to know. Then our tongues should be loosed to tell others. AND we can begin to live the life of Christ--honestly and truly--before the world.
It’s a gift He has given us from the very beginning.
A Fresh Look at Jesus, #19
Visions of the Risen Christ
And as he journeyed he came near Damascus, and suddenly a light shone around him from heaven. Then he fell to the ground, and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?" And he said, "Who are You, Lord?" And the Lord said, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. It is hard for you to kick against the goads" (Acts 9:3-5 NKJV).
Would you recognize Jesus if you saw Him? In an earlier Fresh Look (#10) I posed the question of what Jesus looks like to you, and we considered whether we impose a self-shaped mask on Jesus, or whether we allow Him to place a Jesus-shaped form on our lives. I also asked whether artists’ images may have so colored our thoughts that we would not recognize the real Man if He appeared.
Today I’d like to consider: What does the risen Christ really look like?
What did Saul see there on the road to Damascus before he was blinded? Was it just a bright light? What did Stephen see as he "gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God" (Acts 7:55)?
The story of Saul’s encounter makes it clear that he had to be told who was speaking, and who had shined the great light that stopped him in his tracks. In Stephen’s case, he was somehow able to recognize Jesus standing beside the throne of God.
But it was not always so easy--even for Jesus’ closest friends. Mary Magdalene, looking through tear-dimmed eyes, didn’t recognize Him when she saw Him near the tomb. The men on the road to Emmaus walked and talked with Him for what must have been hours before their eyes were suddenly opened and they realized who He was. The stories recorded in John 20, of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances in the upper room, imply that it was not only Thomas who had a hard time believing his eyes. It almost seems as though Jesus had to show His identifying wounds to persuade any of the disciples that He was who He said He was. Later, when He appeared on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, none of His disciples recognized Him--not even when He spoke to them--until He had worked a reprise of an earlier miracle by filling their empty nets at daybreak with more fish than they could handle (John 21:3-7 cf. Luke 5:4-6).
Why would this be?
What about the risen Christ makes Him so hard to recognize? Had He changed so much? Is His resurrected body totally different from the form He had before death? Was His form so damaged in the crucifixion process that those who had seen Him at the end couldn’t recognize His risen and restored form? Or did He perhaps purposefully choose to reveal Himself in ways that people would recognize Him not by sight, but by what He said and did?
It’s not absolutely clear what caused the confusion and lack of recognition. But it is clear that in each case, people finally recognized Him by His message, His actions, and by His scars.
Today there are many impostors who would claim to be messengers of Christ. And there are many messages that would claim our attention, even our allegiance. How can we know if they are truly Christian (from Christ)?
Two clues seem obvious from the passages we’ve considered. The message and action of the risen and glorified Christ must harmonize with what He said and did before His death. That’s why it’s so essential for us to be acquainted first-hand with Jesus’ teachings and activities as recorded in the Gospels. How important it is that we be reading the Gospels for ourselves, imbibing of His message and of His Spirit, so that we can recognize His Word when it comes to us today.
The second clue has to do with the scars. The scars were not gained through self-serving. They were gained through ultimate self-sacrifice, through refusing to call upon the power that rightly belonged to Him as the Creator of the world, through giving up of Himself for the sake of others.
These two tests seem equally applicable to any venture I may want to enter upon as a servant of Christ. Does it harmonize His Word? Does it serve me first, or others?
A Fresh Look at Jesus, #20
Expectations
Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him.
(Matthew 3:13 NKJV).
In Isaiah 9:1 Galilee is called "Galilee of the Gentiles". And with good reason. Much of Isaiah was written after the Assyrians had destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel in 722 BC, breaking down the walls of the fortified cities in Galilee, leaving the land desolate, and replacing its inhabitants with "people from Babylon, Cuthah, Ava, Hamath, and from Sepharvaim" (2 Kings 17:24).
An article titled "Israel in Exile" in the May/June 1998 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review (BAR) reports on excavations that have been conducted in Galilee. There is clear evidence of this destruction. And when the Assyrians imported new inhabitants, they must have settled mainly around Samaria in the southern part of the former kingdom of Israel, leaving Galilee largely uninhabited for nearly 200 years. (These imports became the hated Samaritans of Jesus’ day.)
Isaiah spoke his prophecies to the people of Judah, who also had suffered under the Assyrians, but had come through it with Jerusalem still standing. But he made it know that if they did not repent, the same fate would befall them: "The land shall be entirely emptied and utterly plundered, for the LORD has spoken this word" (24:3). This must have called up familiar pictures to any from Jerusalem who ever had occasion to travel north on business. The once-prospering region of Galilee, with its fertile fields and abundant lake, now lay unused, given over to weeds, brambles, and wild beasts.
After lying desolate for nearly two centuries, Galilee finally began to be resettled during the time when the Persians controlled the area, beginning in about 538 BC. But Zvi Gal, the author of the BAR article, points out that "Perhaps some of the new settlers were returning [Jewish] deportees [from Babylon]. But the most significant element of the population appears to have come from the west. Pottery from Lower Galilee exhibits a direct connection to pottery from the Phoenician coastal plain." These were the people of Tyre and Sidon--widely known as "dogs" to the Jews (see Matt. 15:26).
In other words, the people of Galilee were generally regarded as being, at best, of mixed heritage--not "real" Jews. When the apostle Paul listed the reasons why he could boast of his heritage, he pointed out that he was "of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews." Benjamin, with Judah, was situated in the southern part of Palestine, and was not deported by the Assyrians.
Thus, in the hierarchy of holiness, the people of Benjamin and Judah considered themselves purer sons of Abraham than people from other regions.
It’s plain that Jesus came from questionable circumstances. Yes, He was of the lineage of David, but He didn’t make a point of it. Even the circumstances of His conception were not doubt the subject of gossip. He didn’t use His heritage to gain points with the people. He came from Galilee and submitted to baptism at the hands of a humble prophet dressed in rough garments. He set Himself up for the insults of the pharisees who were quick to point out that no prophet had ever (or ever would, as far as they were concerned) come out of Galilee (John 7:52).
He didn’t do the sorts of things that were to be expected of a ruler-to-be.
In fact, Jesus seldom lived up to people’s expectations.
Instead He exceeded their expectations.
We’ll take a look at a few examples in coming devotionals. In the meantime, let’s consider how this part of Jesus’ example could flesh itself out in our lives.
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