#17 - Eternal Life?
<<< BIBLE CHAPTER SECTIONS >>>
(Referred to in this weeks "Come Follow Me")
Mt 18 - Who is Greatest? - Temptations to sin - Parable of lost sheep - If your brother sins against you - Parable of unforgiving servant -
Lk 10 - sends out the seventy-two - woe to unrepentant cities - return of the seventy-two - rejoicing in Holy Spirit - parable of good Samaritan - Martha and Mary
COMMENTS and QUESTIONS
by J Neil Evans:
Jesus’ disciples came to Him asking a common human question: “Who is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven?” At least in our American culture we seem obsessed with greatness, popularity, power, influence, prestige and the like. Like nearly everything else, Jesus answer turned our ideas upside down. He said, and I paraphrase: “you can’t even get into the Kingdom of Heaven unless you become like children.” When we think of the Kingdom of Heaven, we often think like these disciples do about sitting in power and likeness with God Himself. But Jesus says we should want childlike qualities like dependence, trust and simplicity. Satan’s first temptation to us was that we could be “like God,” and we still fall for it.
Into the politically and religiously oppressed culture of Jewish Gallilee, Jesus marched with His message of the need for individuals to repent of their idolatrous independence from God. On one occasion He sent seventy-two (or as some texts say: seventy) men with a very unique mission. Unlike the familiar religious leaders of their day (or any other age for that matter) they were to: “carry no money, no knapsack, no shoes, not greet people on the road, stay in the houses of strangers who welcome them, eat and drink whatever is given them, not go house to house, heal the sick in towns that welcome them.”
Returning to Jesus, they joyfully reported that they had cast out demons, and by Jesus’ authority nothing harmed them. They, like most of us, had enjoyed the power and the prestige. But Jesus challenged them to realize, what children would realize, that the greatest thing is simply, and profoundly, to have our name written in Heaven. Jesus wasn’t reviving or instituting some new religious order of seventy for He nor His Apostles never mentioned them again. This was simply a lesson to seventy-two men, and any willing to see, that the greatest thing in life is belonging to God.
Representing the Jewish religious system, one of their legal experts asked Jesus a question designed to trap Him in some clear heresy. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” the lawyer asked. Jesus answered with a question to the lawyer, “what do you believe the Law says?” The lawyer answered with the simple general answer rather than the elaborate detailed answer of hundreds of requirement of the embellished Jewish law. He said: “Love God and love your neighbor.” When Jesus told him he was correct, the real lawyer in him came out. He asked for the details of what was required, “well, who is my neighbor?” In response Jesus told the now familiar story of the Good Samaritan.
In contrast to the callous and self-righteous responses of a Priest and a Levite, a man of Samaria (looked down upon as an illegitimate Jew) cared for an assault victim with sacrificial love. This kind of mercy represents one who is living the kind of Kingdom Life that God enables. As John the Baptist, Jesus and His disciples had been proclaiming all along, the way into the Kingdom of God was not by earning it with self-righteous religious acts, but by repentance and humble love for the God who enables His followers to genuinely love others. Eternal Life is not earned, it is a gift given to to those who know and admit they could never deserve it but desperately need it.
(Referred to in this weeks "Come Follow Me")
Mt 18 - Who is Greatest? - Temptations to sin - Parable of lost sheep - If your brother sins against you - Parable of unforgiving servant -
Lk 10 - sends out the seventy-two - woe to unrepentant cities - return of the seventy-two - rejoicing in Holy Spirit - parable of good Samaritan - Martha and Mary
COMMENTS and QUESTIONS
by J Neil Evans:
Jesus’ disciples came to Him asking a common human question: “Who is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven?” At least in our American culture we seem obsessed with greatness, popularity, power, influence, prestige and the like. Like nearly everything else, Jesus answer turned our ideas upside down. He said, and I paraphrase: “you can’t even get into the Kingdom of Heaven unless you become like children.” When we think of the Kingdom of Heaven, we often think like these disciples do about sitting in power and likeness with God Himself. But Jesus says we should want childlike qualities like dependence, trust and simplicity. Satan’s first temptation to us was that we could be “like God,” and we still fall for it.
Into the politically and religiously oppressed culture of Jewish Gallilee, Jesus marched with His message of the need for individuals to repent of their idolatrous independence from God. On one occasion He sent seventy-two (or as some texts say: seventy) men with a very unique mission. Unlike the familiar religious leaders of their day (or any other age for that matter) they were to: “carry no money, no knapsack, no shoes, not greet people on the road, stay in the houses of strangers who welcome them, eat and drink whatever is given them, not go house to house, heal the sick in towns that welcome them.”
Returning to Jesus, they joyfully reported that they had cast out demons, and by Jesus’ authority nothing harmed them. They, like most of us, had enjoyed the power and the prestige. But Jesus challenged them to realize, what children would realize, that the greatest thing is simply, and profoundly, to have our name written in Heaven. Jesus wasn’t reviving or instituting some new religious order of seventy for He nor His Apostles never mentioned them again. This was simply a lesson to seventy-two men, and any willing to see, that the greatest thing in life is belonging to God.
Representing the Jewish religious system, one of their legal experts asked Jesus a question designed to trap Him in some clear heresy. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” the lawyer asked. Jesus answered with a question to the lawyer, “what do you believe the Law says?” The lawyer answered with the simple general answer rather than the elaborate detailed answer of hundreds of requirement of the embellished Jewish law. He said: “Love God and love your neighbor.” When Jesus told him he was correct, the real lawyer in him came out. He asked for the details of what was required, “well, who is my neighbor?” In response Jesus told the now familiar story of the Good Samaritan.
In contrast to the callous and self-righteous responses of a Priest and a Levite, a man of Samaria (looked down upon as an illegitimate Jew) cared for an assault victim with sacrificial love. This kind of mercy represents one who is living the kind of Kingdom Life that God enables. As John the Baptist, Jesus and His disciples had been proclaiming all along, the way into the Kingdom of God was not by earning it with self-righteous religious acts, but by repentance and humble love for the God who enables His followers to genuinely love others. Eternal Life is not earned, it is a gift given to to those who know and admit they could never deserve it but desperately need it.
Check out these LINKS:
Watch Bible Project video about Matthew
Watch Bible Project video about Mark
Watch Bible Project video about Luke
Watch Bible Project video about John
Read "Bible Words to Ponder" related to this week study
Read "The Gospel"