Rebellion

 “Am I leading a rebellion, that you have come out with swords and clubs to capture me?’”              Mark 14:48 (NLT)

At times all Scripture needs to be wrestled with. The passage for this week needed a lot of wrestling. Let me outline the lead up to Jesus’ arrest. He had entered Jerusalem like a rock star. Then HE cleared the temple courts. He had a final meal with His crew (cause HE knew the time was coming). At dinner He identified Judas as His betrayer and told him to get on with it. He asked His best friends to watch and pray as he begged His Father to take the cup from Him, only to find them sleeping. He told Peter, who swore he would go to his death with Jesus, that he would that night deny even knowing Him. Then Judas shows up and kisses “his friend” Jesus to signal this is the one that should be arrested. Jesus makes the soldier fall down when He responds “I AM He” in response to who they were looking for. Just like that Jesus went from rock star to criminal and He had only ever done things that were good. Even as He’s being arrested, Jesus called for calm and healed a man after Peter cut his ear off. And Jesus asked this week’s question.

Basically, I feel like Jesus was saying, isn't this a bit much? Have you ever seen Me with a deadly weapon? Did you really expect me to put up a fight? But is there more going on here? Jesus was definitely not leading a political rebellion, but does that mean there wasn’t a kind of rebellion happening? Jesus’ mother often is portrayed and this really serene woman – yet Her song (see Luke 1:46-55) used the language of revolution, so much so that a number of countries would later ban it for fear it would lead to rebellion. So was rebellion part of His human DNA?

Jesus peacefully pushed back against the hypocrisy of the religious leaders of His time. I don’t know that he cared too much about the Roman occupation of Israel, but He did care about those who were meant to be bringing people to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and failing to do so. He also cared about the plan to restore creation to a right relationship with the Creator.

Jesus was innocent, in our modern view his arrest and death would be considered unjust. As He hung on that Roman cross, His Father placed the full weight of a sin broken world on Him and turned away for just a moment. In that moment the veil that separated humanity from God was torn apart, opening a path for us straight to the heart of God. A rebellion was waged against the power of sin and darkness and a few days’ later death was defeated and the darkness was pushed back. The transformation of the human heart and the world had begun. Every time someone decides to follow Jesus and to care for those around them, the darkness gets shoved a little further back and His light fills the void. In the face of a world filled with injustice – choose Jesus and follow after Him with your whole heart.

Let me know your thoughts. Know someone who might be encouraged by this – please share. I will be praying for you. Until next week – join the rebellion of heart transforming surrender to the Lord of Lords.

Answer My Question

“Did John’s authority to baptize come from heaven, or was it merely human?’”
Mark 11:30 (NLT)

It’s the day after Jesus had cleared the Temple of sacrifice retailers and money changers. It’s also after He cursed a fig tree for not having fruit, even though it wasn’t the right time of year for there to be figs. Jesus was walking through the temple area when… the priests, teachers of the law and the Jewish elders arrived demanding to know by what or whose authority had Jesus done what He did the day before.

Now I suspect that since Jesus knew the hour was near when he would be the sacrifice that would clear the way for all people to seek and find God, to be restored to a right relationship with Him – that He was pretty much done with the Jewish leaders. In response to their demands for who said you could chase everyone out of the temple like that – Jesus sticks it to them again. Jesus tells them if you answer one question for me, then I will tell you Who gave me the authority to clean house. Jesus asks this week’s question about where did John’s authority to baptize come from God or man?

Those demanding answers from Jesus step away to discuss their answer. Clearly they know the right answer, that John’s authority had come from God. But they knew if they said that, it would make them look even worse than they already did for not heeding the words of a prophet. The other option wasn't really an option because these guys were afraid of the people who did believe John. So what do they do – they tell Jesus, we don’t know who gave John that authority. Jesus doesn’t answer their demands because He knows they know where John’s authority came from and they chose not to believe him. So why would they believe Jesus.

When it comes right down to it we have the same choice those Jewish religious leaders had. Do we believe that Jesus was carrying the full authority of His Father in all that He did including going to the cross and rising from the dead or not? Will we surrender to His Lordship or not? When we pray “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven” do we mean it? How we answer these questions determines whether we will live abundantly free forever or hopelessly bound to a fallen world.

Let me know your thoughts. Know someone who might be encouraged by this – please share. I will be praying for you. Until next week – choose this day and every day who you will follow.

Whose Image?

“Why are you trying to trap me… Whose portrait is this? And whose inscription?’”
Mark 12:15b-16 (NIV)

In Mark’s Gospel, the scene where Jesus asks this week’s questions takes place after Jesus’ Parable of the Tenants or as some translations say the Parable of the Evil Farmers. By the end of that parable the religious leaders who had heard the story recognized their own images looked like the evil farmers. In Mark 12:12 it says: “Then they looked for a way to arrest him because they knew he had spoken the parable against them…” Imagine being convicted of your sinfulness and rather than repent and follow Jesus, you decide it would just be better to get rid of Him. So, it became all about trapping Jesus, so they could get Him out of the way.

That brings us to this particular attempt to trap Him. Some Pharisees and Herodians turn up to try and catch him saying something against the current Roman government. The Pharisee were Jewish teachers who didn’t like how Jesus was always giving them a hard time and the Herodians where Jewish political leaders who supported the Roman government. Generally speaking, the Pharisees (they bore the image of the law and all the extra rules they imposed on the people) and the Herodians (they bore the image of the Greco-Roman empire) didn’t get along but they formed an alliance around getting rid of Jesus. I like how they try to smooth talk him with compliments – oh Jesus we know you are a man of integrity and that you teach the truth and on and on. So, tell us “Is it right to pay taxes to Caesar or not? Should we pay or shouldn’t we” (Mark 12:14-15a)?

Jesus, let’s them know up front that He knows what they are up to – “Why are you trying to trap me?” If I were those guys I probably would have just left in order to avoid further humiliation. Jesus asks them to bring Him a denarius – that was a coin used to pay taxes. They give him a coin and Jesus brilliantly answers their questions with a couple of questions of His own and a charge of what to do. Jesus, after looking at the coin asks: “Whose portrait is this? And whose inscription?” In other words, whose picture and name are on this coin? The only right answer is Caesar’s, so Jesus tells them, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s” (Mark 12:17). Cue, the blank stares and mouths hanging open. The coin belonged to Caesar because it bore his image.

As humans, we bear the image of the creator of everything. Jesus made a way for that image to be properly restored as we accept His gift and follow him by faith, doing the things He taught. Do you look like Jesus, or do you look like some aspect of the world?

Let me know your thoughts. Know someone who might be encouraged by this – please share. I will be praying for you. Until next week – think about what image or images you are trying bear.

Jesus Holds It All Together

“Haven’t you read this scripture: ‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes?’”
Mark 12:10-11 (NIV)

Buildings are celebrated when the foundation is laid and when the last nail is driven in. This week’s question is a great reminder of a couple of things – first, the church is not ours it is Jesus’ and second the church is not an actual building, it is a unified group of people under HIS Lordship.

Jesus quotes Psalm 118:22 as He concludes His parable of the evil farmers (see Mark 12:1-9) as he sends some shade toward the religious leaders (see Mark 12:12). The religious leaders understood what he was saying and it added to their grievances against him. But for us, it is an encouraging word. We stand on Christ the solid rock and be secure in our faith.

The Hebrew word that is translated as cornerstone in Psalm 118:22 can also be translated as capstone, making Jesus the first stone of the foundation and essentially the last nail. Jesus holds us and His church together. In the Book of Revelation – the capstone of Scripture so to speak, the Lord says: “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End” (Revelation 22:13). The writer of the Book of Hebrews encourages the people to keep their eyes fixed on Jesus because he initiates and perfects our faith (Hebrews 12:2 NLT). Colossians 1:15-20 outlines Christ’s supremacy, and reminds us that He hold all of creation together and that He is the head of the church

So what does that mean for us? I think that first and foremost it means we can trust HIM above all else because He is our foundation and He holds us together so we are stable and strong. It means we don’t have to be afraid, we need to stay focused on what’s really Real. Jesus doesn’t promise us a life without trials and tribulation, in fact it makes it clear that we will face tough times. He does, however, promise a stable and secure place for us to stand during those times. He expects that his church (the people, not a building) will stand in unity against the powers that seek to destroy it, to destroy us. I will leave you with the chorus of Cody Carnes’ song Firm Foundation: Christ is my firm foundation, the rock on which I stand. When everything around me is shaking, I’ve never been more glad that I put my faith in Jesus cause He’s never let me down. He’s faithful through generations, so why would He fail now? He won’t.

Let me know your thoughts. Know someone who might be encouraged by this  – please share. I will be praying for you. Until next week – stand firm on the foundation of Jesus Christ, knowing that you are secure because He holds everything together.