2 Corinthians 11 -- Proving His Love

Paul loved a church that wasn’t loving him.  They’d fallen – hook, line, and sinker – for the arguments of the false teachers and had accepted a substitute gospel, and now he was trying to get them to see exactly what they’d done.

 

These false teachers had given every reason in the world why the church should disavow Paul, trying to make him look weak and make themselves look like super-apostles.  My commentary said that the Holy Spirit inspired Paul to compare the two ministries to show the church how they’d been fooled.  The main point was that Paul was a giver while the false teachers were takers.  The false teachers boasted about their speaking skill and Paul’s lack of it.  Paul boasted only in what he’s suffered for being an apostle.  After all, why would anyone put up with everything he’d experienced unless he’d been give a holy commission?

 

Father, yesterday and this morning I’ve felt a little like Paul must have felt.  I believe that I have trusted and obeyed, and difficulties have still arisen.  I know that they amount to trust-builders.  Help me to remember that and to never doubt that You are 100% in control of everything in this world.  My job is to trust and know that Your will cannot be overridden.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

2 Corinthians 10 -- 3 Questions

Okay, I’ve gotta admit that I didn’t like this chapter very much when I first started reading it, and my commentary seemed to know what to say:

 

“At first it sounds like Paul was bragging about himself.  But Paul was actually defending his ministry and his apostolic authority.”

 

What I discovered was a section about the true measurement of spiritual ministry:  “Paul suggests three questions we may ask ourselves as we seek to measure our ministries by the will of God:

 

1.       Am I where God wants me to be?

2.       Is God glorified by my ministry?

3.       Can the Lord commend my work?

 

The important thing is that we are where God wants us to be, doing what He wants us to do so that He might be glorified.  Motive is as much a part of God’s measurement of our work as is growth.  If we are seeking to glorify and please God alone, and if we are not afraid of His evaluation of our hearts and lives, then we need not fear the estimates of men or their criticisms.”

 

Father, I pray that all of my answers will always be “yes”.  I want to be at the center of Your will for my life.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

2 Corinthians 9 -- More On Grace Giving

Loved these additional thoughts from my commentary today:

 

·         Your giving will provoke others to give.

·         In grace giving, our motive is not to get something, but receiving God’s blessing is one of the fringe benefits.

·         If we cannot give joyfully, then we must open our hearts to the Lord and ask Him to grant us grace.

·         Certainly God can bless a gift that is given out of a sense of duty, but God cannot bless the giver unless his heart is right.

·         The Christian who practices grace giving will always have what he needs when he needs it.

·         Everything we have – not just our income – belongs to God, is given to God, and is used by God to accomplish His work.

·         Grace never looks for a reason [to give]; it only looks for an opportunity.

·         No amount of evangelistic zeal or worship activity can compensate for lost opportunities in serving others and meeting their practical needs.  There must be a balance of sharing the gospel and meeting practical needs.

·         It is sad when our giving becomes a substitute for our living.  When a Christian practices grace giving, his money is not a substitute for either his concern or his service.  He first gives himself to the Lord and then he gives what he has.  His gift is a symbol, as it were, of the surrender of his heart.

 

Father, our desire to hang on to material blessings and not trust You to provide is something that every Christian struggles to overcome, I think.  Help me not to struggle, but to trust.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

2 Corinthians 7 & 8 -- Grace Giving

WOW!  My commentary did an incredible job discussing chapter 8, calling it all about grace giving.  Some of the highlights:

 

·         When a church is not spiritual, it is not generous.

·         The motivation for giving must be from the grace of God in the heart.

·         When you have experienced the grace of God in your life, you will not use difficult circumstances as an excuse for not giving.

·         Grace giving means giving in spite of circumstances.

·         It is possible to give generously but not give enthusiastically.

·         Their giving was voluntary and spontaneous.  It was of grace, not pressure.

·         Grace not only frees us from our sins, but it frees us from ourselves.  The grace of God will open your heart and your hand.

·         God sees the “heart gift” and not the “hand gift”.  If the heart wanted to give more, but was unable to do so, God sees it and records it accordingly.  But if the hand gives more than the heart wants to give, God records what is in the heart, no matter how big the offering in the hand might be.

·         God sees, not the portion, but the proportion.  If we could have given more, and did not, God notes it.  If we wanted to give more, and could not, God also notes that.

 

Father, help me to remember how freely Jesus gave His blood for me on the cross, and help me to use the remembrance of that grace when You give me opportunities to give to others.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

2 Corinthians 6 -- Contact Without Contamination

Paul had a warning about separation from unbelievers in this chapter.  It’s almost a two-edged sword.  We as Christians are to be “in the world, but not of the world.”  Paul’s way of putting it was, “Do not join yourselves to them.”  My commentary said, “Like a skillful physician, we must practice contact without contamination.  Otherwise, we will isolate ourselves from the people who need our ministry the most.”

 

We’re to be out in the world, being the hands and feet of Christ to a lost world, but we’ve shaken off the world and surely don’t want to take back upon ourselves what we worked so hard to rid from our lives.

 

And about that risk of recontamination, my commentary noted:  “Too often Christians deal with symptoms and not causes.  We keep confessing the same sins because we have not gotten to the root of the trouble and cleansed ourselves.  Perhaps there is filthiness of the flesh, some pet sin that feeds the old nature.  Or it may be filthiness of the spirit, an attitude that is sinful … But cleansing ourselves is only half of the responsibility; we must also be perfecting holiness in the fear of God.  This is a constant process as we grow in grace and knowledge … But it is foolish to try to perfect holiness if there is known sin in our lives.”

 

Father, I want to be where I’m needed – where You can use me to bring others to You.  But also I do not want to take up the sin that I used to struggle with so much.  So please guard my mind and my heart as I minister in the world.  Also help me to always be mindful that I deal with causes of sin in my life, not just symptoms, as I continue to work toward holiness.  Help me to do nothing that misrepresents You in this world.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

2 Corinthians 5 -- Declaring PEACE, Not War

“All this is from God.  Through Christ, God made peace between us and Himself … God won in Christ, making peace between the world and Himself.  In Christ, God did not hold the world guilty of its sins… Christ had no sin, but God made Him become sin so that in Christ we could become right with God.”

 

God created all that we know, and selfishly we chose to sin and messed it all up.  But here’s the remarkable thing:  “God has not declared WAR on the world!  At the cross He declared peace,” my commentary said.  And He did that how?  By the very death of His Son!  He gave instead of taking.  That’s something the world cannot understand.  You don’t win by giving in!  He declared peace by giving His Son, yet most of the world has not laid down their arms against Him and accepted that peace.  Therefore, “one day He will declare war; and then it will be too late for those who have rejected the Savior.”

 

We as Christians are ambassadors going out to get people to accept those terms of peace.  We aren’t declaring war against them.  We therefore should not go out in an attitude of feeling as though we’re intruding and unwelcome.  We’re talking about a benefit, not a burden for them.  I sure need to see it more that way!

 

Father, who but You would declare peace by sacrificing Your own Son for Your enemies!  It’s amazing how Satan has blinded the world to that supreme act of love!  Open eyes and help them to see that, Father, and expose Satan for the liar he is.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

2 Corinthians 4 -- Being The Pot

We are like jars of clay – worth nothing by themselves.  “But it is the treasure within the vessel that gives the vessel its value,” my commentary said.  “No Christian should ever complain to God because of his lack of gifts or abilities … Psalm 139:13-16 indicates that our very genetic structure is in the hands of God.  Each of us must accept himself and be himself.  The important thing about a vessel is that it be clean, empty, and available for service … We are vessels so that God might use us.  We are earthen vessels so that we might depend on God’s power and not our own … Paul was not afraid of suffering or trial, because he knew that God would guard the vessel so long as Paul was guarding the treasure.”

 

As weak vessels, we must be careful not to think that we can live any way we please, and that God will guard us even in sin.  “God can and does turn suffering into glory, but he cannot turn sin into glory.  Sin must be judged, because there is no glory in sin.

 

Father, I’ve got an old clay pot that should remind me of myself.  It’s fragile and easily damaged.  But I love the thought that what makes the clay vessel valuable is not itself but the treasure inside.  Thank you for filling me with that treasure and giving me worth as a result – not of myself but of Christ.  Where I was unworthy, You have giving value and meaning to my life.  Help me to help others to discover that as well!

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

2 Corinthians 3 -- WHY Do You Obey?

My commentary reminded me that “Paul wrote at a period in history when the ages were overlapping.  The new covenant of grace had come in, but the temple services were still being carried on.”  The Corinthians and others found themselves caught between these two factions.  Those teachers of the Law were trying desperately to hold onto the old, and they wanted to impose it on those who’d never known it.

 

The use of the law, Paul had found, was to make people understand that it left them hopelessly condemned.  Living under it left one feeling more and more guilty, producing those feelings of hopelessness and rejection.

 

“The Law brought us to Christ, but only grace can make us like Christ.”  It finally comes down to why we obey – is it “legal obedience, born of fear” or “filial obedience born of love”?  That obedience is not something we can accomplish on our own.  “It is God who makes us able to do all that we do,” Paul wrote.

 

Father, I’m glad that You made me tired of the guilt.  I’m glad that You got me to a point where I saw that my own hope of obedience was impossible, and that my only hope was to throw myself on Your mercy and grace and give up, allowing the Holy Spirit to enable me to obey You out of love and not out of fear.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

2 Corinthians 2 -- Discipline

“I didn’t write to make you sad, but to let you know how much I love you … [there had been trouble in Corinth, and Paul had needed to be tough in what he told them] … The punishment you gave him … is enough for him.  But now you should forgive him and comfort him to keep him from having too much sadness and giving up completely … show that you love him.  I wrote you to test you and to see if you obey in everything [they’d needed to discipline a church member and Paul had told them to do it.  Now, they needed to forgive and forget] … so that Satan won’t gain a foothold.”

 

My commentary talked about how reluctant churches are to discipline and the damage that is done when they don’t.  Biblically, it’s necessary and important:  “Faithful are the wounds of a friend”, the Bible says.  “There is a big difference between hurting someone and harming him.  Sometimes those who love us must hurt us in order to keep us from harming ourselves...  True discipline is an evidence of love … Problems that are swept under the rug have a way of multiplying and creating even worse problems later on.”

 

Paul urged forgiveness for the sinner’s sake (“It’s the medicine needed to heal broken hearts.”) for the Lord’s sake (“The problem was not simply between a sinning brother and a grieving apostle; it was also between a sinning brother and a grieving Savior… most of all he had sinned against the Lord.), and for the church’s sake(“an unforgiving spirit in a congregation because sin has not been dealt with in a Biblical manner gives Satan a beachhead.”)

 

Father, that’s good advice not just for a church, but for a family as well.  Help me as a father to understand when discipline is most needed.  Help me in my anger not to sin.  And help me most of all to forgive and forget so that my sons’ hearts are not broken and unmended.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

2 Corinthians 1 -- Tough Times, God Times

Paul was describing how he managed to hang on through some very tough times with God’s help.  My commentary boiled it down to this:

 

1)       Remember what God is to you

a)      Praise Him because He is God

b)      Praise Him because He is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ

c)       Praise Him because He is the Father of mercies

d)      Praise Him because He is the God of all comfort

2)       Remember what God does for you

a)      He permits the trials to come

b)      He is in control of trials

c)       He enables us to bear our trials

d)      He delivers us from our trials

e)      He is glorified through our trials

3)      Remember what God does through you

a)      We learn to be channels of blessing to others

b)      He perfects our character and helps us to share the character of God

c)       Through our sufferings He prepares us for something He is going to do

 

“How we handle the difficulties of life will depend largely on what kind of character we have, for what life does to us depends on what life finds in us.”

 

To Paul, having a clear conscience despite everything was very important.  In other words, not disappointing God during our trials.  “When you have a clear conscience, you will live in the light of the return of Jesus Christ, you will be serious about the will of God, you will glorify Jesus Christ, and you will be on good terms with the Spirit of God.”

 

If instead our conscience is clouded by sin, we can find ourselves experiencing the opposite of these things during our trials.

 

Father, there sure have been a lot of trials over the last three years.  But I can look back and see that You’ve been using them to grow my faith and my character, and You’ve taught me better to trust You.  Through it all, I’ve learned how to help others to do the same.  Thank You for the growth that has come from the trials.  Give me opportunities to share with others how they too can find rainbows in the storm clouds.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Mark 14 -- Would I have?

Would I have poured out something worth a year's wages to anoint Jesus?

Would I have gotten angry at the one who did?

Would I have allowed strangers into my house to have their Passover meal?

Would I have missed Jesus' reminder that He WOULD rise from the dead?

Would I have claimed that I wouldn't fail Him?

Would I have slept while He prayed for what was to come?

Would I have betrayed Him with a kiss?

Would I have obeyed Him and scattered, or disobeyed Him, following behind and into temptation?

Father, it's so easy to look with 20/20 hindsight and think that I would have done better, but the truth is I am just a man and a sinner.  I probably would have done just as these men did.  But having that 20/20 hindsight, I should be NOT sinning and SURELY doing all the things You command.  Yet LIKE THEM, I fail as well.  Thank You for Your loving forgiveness and grace.  Help me to limit the times of failure as I go closer to You.

Sent from my iPad

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Mark 15 -- What People Did!

What people did!

 

Pilate couldn’t find anything wrong that Jesus had done, yet he gave in to please his constituents.

The religious leaders lied and weren’t out for justice, but vengeance.

The crowds allowed themselves to be whipped up into a fervor to get a murderer released and Jesus crucified.

The soldiers in the Praetorium despised Him for being weak and passive in their view and took out on Him what they most likely despised about themselves.

Passersby wagged their heads in disgust at Him.

The crowd around Golgotha taunted and verbally abused Him.

A guard offered Him vinegar, not water, when he cried out that He was thirsty.

 

It seems that humanity brought out its worst to the best offer we’d ever received – our sins covered, removed, forgiven …

 

But then there was:

 

Simon, carrying the cross.

The Roman soldier, saying, “Truly this was the Son of God.”

The thief on the cross beside Him who believed.

Joseph and Nicodemus, who risked their careers to ask for and bury His body.

 

On which side do we find ourselves?  Does it depend on the day or the situation?

 

Father, yesterday was a tough day.  So was the day before that.  Please remind me in the middle of them that I’ve never had a day as bad as Jesus’ last 24 hours before He died.  Forgive me for even presuming to complain.  Help me to cherish what Jesus did for me on the toughest day of His life.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Mark 13 -- Whether To Worry Or Watch

There was so much end-of-Jerusalem-back-then stuff mixed in with the yet-to-come Tribulation and Great Tribulation stuff.  I tend not to worry about that for myself, believing that Christ will take all believers out of the world before it starts.

 

Yet what I do think about are those who need to become believers before all of this happens.  Who would want any friend or family member to have to endure such a terrible time?  Jesus has given us the task of telling unbelievers about Him so that they will come to believe in Him and as a result be raptured.  I think Jesus’ continual commands to “watch!” may have to do with finding those who need to come to know Him before that time.

 

Father, give me courage in telling others about You and Your Son.  Don’t let me miss a single opportunity!

 

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford

Mark 12 -- More In There Than We'll Ever Know

The Jewish leaders kept coming up with questions for Jesus.  But they weren’t trying to learn from Him.  They only sought to trap Him with His own words.  “They were not asking ‘What is true?’ or ‘What is right?’ but ‘What is safe?’  This is always the approach of the hypocrite and the crowd-pleaser,” my commentary said.  In the same way, it’s often tempting to water down the gospel so as not to offend.  But Christ never did this.  Because His time on earth was short, the urgency of His task propelled Him forward and led Him to ask the hard questions that would cause people to decide for or against Him.

 

The Sadducees did not believe in resurrection, yet they asked a hypothetical question about resurrection designed to discredit Jesus.  They only accepted the law of Moses as their scriptural authority, and they’d not found any evidence of resurrection there.  But Jesus showed them otherwise.  When Moses was meeting God at the burning bush, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had been dead for around 400 years, but God said, “I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”  If they were truly dead, God should have said, “I was…”  So that meant they were alive even though they’d died.  The Sadducees thought they knew God’s word, but they’d never considered this.

 

Our pastor was telling about a man who was asking about the length of time needed to earn a seminary degree.  He couldn’t believe that someone could actually take 4 to 6 years to study one Book!  Yet the Sadducees had studied the first five books by Moses for hundreds of years and they’d failed to see the truth that God revealed through Christ!

 

Father, Your Word speaks to us on multiple levels and even in different ways at different times as You bring us to it and direct our lives.  Help me to keep my heart open to what You have not yet shown me, and keep me from turning off my mind when I think I’ve already heard it all on any subject.  For if I did that, I’d be just like the Sadducees.  I want to keep hearing from You every day.  Keep it fresh, Father!

 

Your Brother In Christ,

 

Gary Ford

Mark 11 -- A Good Lesson In Killing A Tree

“It was unusual for Jesus to act in judgment, yet there comes a time when this is the only thing God can do,” my commentary said.  It was speaking about Jesus condemning a fig tree and cleansing the temple.  Here’s why He did it:  The tree was “a lesson in failure:  Israel had failed to be fruitful for God.  In the Old Testament, the fig tree is associated with the nation of Israel.  Like the fig tree our Lord cursed, Israel had nothing but leaves … Christ is still seeking fruit from His people, and for us to be fruitless is sin.”  (John 15:16 says, “I gave you this work:  to go and produce fruit.”)

 

The cleansing of the temple occurred in the court of the Gentiles, “the one place where the Jews should have been busy doing serious missionary work.  If a Gentile visited the temple and saw what the Jews were doing in the name of the true God, he would never want to believe what they taught … The court of the Gentiles should have been a place for praying, but it was instead a place for preying and paying,” my commentary noted.  “The chief priests and scribes were using the temple and its religious services to cover up their sin and hypocrisy.  Both Isaiah and Jeremiah had warned the people of their day that the presence of the physical temple was no guarantee of blessings from God.  It was what the people did in the temple from their hearts that was really important.”

 

I was appalled thinking about how the religious leaders of that time were in the temple plotting the murder of someone they saw simply as their competition.  That’s unbelievable!  That it also happened to be against the Son of God was unthinkable!

 

Father, please give me the ability to look at what I do from the outside to make certain that I’m not so caught up in a wrong-headed vision that I become spiritually blinded as they were.  Reveal any wrong motives to me and point me in the right direction.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

 

Gary Ford

Mark 10 -- We Believers Do WHAT???

The world tries to inject its own logic oftentimes rather than encouraging us to obey God.  The Pharisees asked Jesus a question about divorce that was designed to anger some faction no matter HOW He answered it.  But rather than entering the current debates, He directed them back to the creation account, my commentary said.  "God Himself had established marriage and He has the right to make the rules ... Mark 10:9 warns us that man cannot separate those who have been united in marriage, but GOD can ... A divorce may be legal according to our laws and yet NOT be right in the eyes of God.

He expects married people to practice COMMITMENT to each other and to remain true to each other."

 

Another crazy episode followed.  The disciples told parents to STOP bringing their kids to Jesus!  What were they THINKING??  It's much the same as parents today grounding their kids from coming to YOUTH!

 

Jesus then told His disciples that He would die in Jerusalem, where they were headed.  What do His disciples do?  James and John ask for a FAVOR -- they wanted THRONES on each side of Him!

 

Again it happened -- They were walking towards Jerusalem and the crowd warned a blind man to be quiet and not bother Jesus!  Instead, He called for Bartimaeus and healed him.  What had they been THINKING??

 

Followers of Jesus doing the unthinkable, firmly believing that they were SINCERE in their duties, but they were SINCERELY WRONG!

 

Father, I pray that You will intervene if I am ever in such a position.

Don't allow me to find myself doing what these people were doing -- hindering Your work.  Open my eyes and my heart and change my thinking.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

 

Gary Ford

Mark 9 -- All Together In One Boat

One of the greatest revelations of the New Testament occurred here, when Moses & Elijah appeared with Jesus and Jesus' glory was unveiled to Peter, James, and John.  They heard God say, "This is My Son, whom I love.  Listen to Him!"  Yet right after that, several unfortunate things happened.

 

When they returned to the other disciples, they found a great crowd gathered and the teachers of the law picking a verbal fight with the other disciples because they hadn't been able to cast out a demon from a boy.  Jesus stepped in and ordered the demon out.  When the disciples asked why they had been unable to do so, Jesus replied that this type of spirit can only be forced out by prayer.  Since Jesus hadn't prayed before forcing out the spirit, my commentary indicated that they had been careless in their own personal spiritual walk and had neglected prayer and fasting.  That certainly makes me want to improve my prayer life!

 

As they walked to another place, Jesus noticed the disciples were arguing about something, and He later asked what was going on, but they DIDN'T answer Him!  (They had to have known that He knew!  Why hide it?)  They were arguing about who among them was the greatest.  So Jesus told them that whoever wants to be the most important must be last of all and servant of all.

 

Wanting to be the most important sounds like pride is an issue, and if so, it needs to be dealt with.  So perhaps the best way Jesus knew to do so was to tell them to become like a servant, putting yourself last.

 

Finally, I noticed the disciples telling someone "not in their group" to stop casting out demons in Jesus' name.  Jesus' answer was, "Don't stop him ... whoever is not against us is with us."  "He went on to explain the danger of causing others to stumble and therefore STOP serving The Lord.... The disciples did not get along with each other, nor did they get along with other believers!" my commentary said.

 

Jesus knew their hearts.  He knows OUR hearts, too.  It is vitally important in His kingdom today to make sure, first, that we know our own hearts the way He does.  We also need to make certain that we operate on a servant basis as He taught them.  And we also need to remember that their IS danger in causing others to STOP serving The Lord because of our own actions.

 

Father, help all of us to examine these things in our hearts and lives.  Remind us that we all are part of one kingdom, and there is only one King.

 

Your Brother in Christ,

 

Gary Ford

Mark 8 -- Losing Your Soul

Jesus asked the disciples who people thought He was.  It’s apparent from the answers He received that “they had opinions instead of convictions,” my commentary said.  Peter rightly said Jesus was the Christ – Messiah.  But because Jewish tradition focused on the reign of Messiah, Peter then told Jesus to stop talking about His death on the cross!  My commentary said, “They were following Satan’s philosophy (glory without suffering) instead of God’s philosophy (suffering transformed into glory).”

 

When Jesus talked about giving up their lives to have true life, He was talking to His disciples, “men who had already confessed Him as the Son of God.  He was not telling them how to be saved and go to heaven, but how to save their lives and make the most of their opportunities on earth.  Losing your soul is the equivalent of wasting your life, missing the great opportunities God gives you to make your life count,” my commentary added.

 

Father, thank You for showing me that, and for giving me incredible opportunities to show You to others!  Don’t let me waste a single opportunity!

 

Your Brother In Christ,

 

Gary Ford

Mark 7 -- The Complainers And The Hopeful

The interactions Jesus had with the Pharisees remind me all too much of the nagging complaints I often hear from older church members about traditions not being maintained at church.  What I read in my commentary just about covered them:  “True worship must come from the heart and it must be directed by God’s truth, not man’s personal ideas.”  It also contrasted man’s traditions with God’s truth:

 

Man’s Traditions                                                              God’s Truth

Outward forms – bondage                                          Inward faith – liberty

Trifling rules                                                                       Foundational principles

Outward piety                                                                   True inward holiness

Neglect and replace the Word                                   Exalts the Word of God

 

I really liked what my commentary had to say about the Syrophoenician woman.  Jesus had mentioned that He was to be spiritually feeding the children (Israel) first and not throwing their food to the little pet puppies.  She replied that puppies do on occasion get to eat crumbs.  “It must have rejoiced His heart when she took His very words and used them as the basis for her plea!  She accepted her place, she believed His Word, and she persisted in her plea, and Jesus not only met her need but commended her for her faith … Great faith is faith that takes God at His Word and will not let go until God meets the need.  Great faith can lay hold of even the slightest encouragement and turn it into a fulfilled promise.”

 

Father, help me to remember that Your promises are Your enablements, and help me to lay hold of them and not let go.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

 

 

Gary Ford

Mark 6 -- A Little Too Familiar

Jesus had returned to His hometown of Nazareth, where He’d spoken once before.  Again He entered the synagogue and began to teach.  About His words they said, “Where did this man get these teachings?  What is this wisdom that has been given to Him?”  What He said stirred their hearts, but what they saw didn’t:  “He is just a carpenter, the son of Mary and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas, and Simon.  And His sisters are here with us.”  Mark adds,  “So the people were upset with Jesus.”

 

They’d watched Him grow up.  They knew His family (and we often forget that He had quite a large one).  They felt that He was being “uppity” with them, knowing that He’d never had formal religious training.  So they scorned Him, not for His words, but because they felt He was too much like them.  That meant that they were in actuality scorning themselves, feeling themselves unworthy of a visit from God Himself.

 

Mark then says, “So Jesus was not able to work any miracles there except to heal a few sick people by putting His hands on them.  He was amazed at how many people had no faith.”

 

What caused this failure?  Certainly Jesus’ power from God had not diminished.  It was the lack of faith exhibited by people who knew Him well.  So faith must play a huge part in the miracle business.  If we do not expect, then it’s not likely to happen.

 

I think we also must be careful not to let familiarity cause us to get too cozy in our relationship with him.  Yes, He is our dearest friend, but He is also the Holy Son of God – our Savior.  And we must always keep that at the forefront of our thinking.

 

Father, I thank You for giving me a Savior who is closer than a brother.  But keep reminding me that He is also the One who created all things.  Let me never presume upon His friendship or His grace.

 

Your Brother In Christ,

 

Gary Ford