MrsDrPoe: The Rich Young Ruler, Part 2

The week is almost out, which means another Theology Thursday is upon us!  Today we'll be continuing our discussion of the rich young ruler, so as always, I invite you to open your Bibles with me as we look at another portion of God's word.

If you remember, last week we looked at the story of the rich young ruler, how difficult Jesus said it is for the rich to enter into the kingdom of heaven, and that we too may need to get rid of our money and things if they are diminishing our trust in God.  Today we'll focus on the reminder of the passage, Luke 18:26-30.  

In verse 26, the disciples are taken aback by Jesus' teaching.  Then, like now, the rich were privileged, and if it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom, the disciples don't see how anyone can enter.  Jesus responds, "The things which are impossible with men are possible with God."  In this one statement, Jesus clarifies that while we cannot enter on our own accord, all men, no matter what their social status, can enter into the kingdom by the grace of God.

Another typical 'response' when studying this portion of the passage is simply to justify that we don't have to live in poverty to serve God and move on with our Bible study.  Again, this is true...but what should we be doing with our riches if they're not hindering our trust in God?  Here are some practical examples of how we can use our blessings to serve the kingdom.

- host a Bible study, prayer session, or gathering in your home (like Lydia!)
- use your projector/big screen to show music for a singing
- invite brethren in need to stay in your home
- offer to baby sit for free while a parent or other child is sick
- make a meal for a needy brother or sister
- go visit shut-in or hospitalized brethren
- loan a brother/sister in need your car or offer to drive him/her somewhere
- volunteer your time and/or tools to help someone complete a necessary project
- fund your own mission trip or support someone else's
- donate unused or slightly used clothing, food, furniture, etc.
- sell something and give the proceeds to needy brethren (like in Acts!)

As we conclude our look at the rich young ruler, let's remember the end of the passage (Luke 18:29-30) where Jesus tells us that whatever we give up for the kingdom (family, possessions, etc.), we will receive many times more in this life and eternal life when our physical bodies die.  So, if we find our riches drawing us closer to the world and farther from Christ, we needn't be anxious about getting rid of them...trusting in the Lord affords us innumerable blessings through His body!


I hope this study has been as helpful for you as it has been for me.  Let us always remember that all that we have we have been given and that we should use everything in a way that best glorifies God!

MrsDrPoe: The Rich Young Ruler, Part I

Welcome to Theology Thursday here on the blog!  As always, I invite you to open your Bibles with me as we look at a portion of God's Word.  For the next two weeks, we'll be looking at the story of the "rich young ruler" (Luke 18:18-30).

Many of us are familiar with this story (v 18-23); a young man comes to Jesus asking, "What must I do to inherit eternal life?"  Jesus answers with, "keeping the commands: 'Do not commit adultery,' 'Do not murder,' 'Do not steal,' 'Do not bear false witness,' 'Honor your father and your mother.'"  To which the ruler answers that he has done all of these things "from [his] youth."  

Then comes the challenge.  Jesus says, "You still lack one thing.  Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me."  The ruler goes away sad because he had many riches.  In verses 24 and 25 of the passage, Jesus tells us just how hard it is for people with riches to enter the kingdom of heaven- it's more difficult than fitting a camel through the eye of a sewing needle.

When we study this passage as Americans, we often look at it with relief, saying to ourselves, "I'm glad Jesus didn't ask me to sell everything I have!"  While it's true that the 'point' of Christianity isn't necessarily that Christians live in poverty, it's also true that we are to put our faith and trust in GOD and we are to purge our lives of anything that hindering us from fully serving Him.  In effect, Jesus has commanded the same of us if our riches are keeping us from the kingdom.

So how do we know if our riches are our personal stumbling block?  For starters, if you're extremely relieved thinking that the command to sell everything doesn't apply to you, your riches are probably a problem.  Ask yourself how you would feel if all your money and things were stolen, if all was lost, or if you gave all away.  Be honest with yourself- do you trust your savings account to help you through a rainy day or God?

MrsDrPoe: The Cost of Discipleship, Part I

Once again Theology Thursday is upon us here at the blog!  Today I'll begin a two-part series on the cost of discipleship looking at some passages from Mark and Luke.  As always, I invite you to open up your Bibles with me as we look at these portions of God's Word.

Luke 9:23-27 says:

Then He said to them all, "If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.  For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will save it.  For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and is himself destroyed or lost?  For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, of him the Son of Man will be ashamed when He comes in His own glory, and in His Father's, and of the holy angels.  But I tell you truly, there are some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the kingdom of God."

The first verse in this passage is pretty well-known and often taken out of context and misapplied.  People say that an illness, a financial burden, or even a mother-in-law is their 'cross to bear,' but that is not what the cross is in this passage.  The cross leads to death (picture a modern day electric chair), which is obvious from the next few verses: we must loose our lives to Christ to save them.

Colossians 3:1-11 talks about the need to put to death the "old man with his deeds" in order that we may live as a "new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him."  Thus our commitment to Jesus is denying our fleshly desires, daily taking up the cross to put to death our old self who was slave to sin, and following Jesus in His actions and teachings.  The fact that Luke includes the word "daily" in his account of this teaching of Jesus is significant because it tells us that we must be ever watchful of the old man and the old desires and temptations that will try to sneak back into our lives.  We must die daily to serve the Lord.


Next week we'll look at another passage that exemplifies death as the cost of discipleship.



 

MrsDrPoe: Causing Others to Stumble

Today is Theology Thursday, so as always, I'm inviting you to open up your Bibles as we look at some passages of God's word.

Last week I was in a ladies study where our friend Mr. Holley guided a us through Luke 17.  Since that study, I've been thinking a lot about the first four verses of the chapter:


Then He said to the disciples, "It is impossible that no offenses should come, but woe to him through whom they do come!  It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea, that that he should offend one of these little ones.  Take heed to yourselves.  If your brother sins against you, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him.  And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times in a day returns to you, saying, 'I repent,' you shall forgive him.


In this passage, Jesus acknowledges the fact that men are not perfect and that they will occasionally stumble; however, He also notes that if this offense or stumbling was caused by a person, it would've been better that person would be dead than that to cause this offense.  This may seem a bit odd and extreme, but it definitely shows us just how great our responsibility is to those around us.


We should always try to be aware of our brethren and their weaknesses so that we don't cause another to sin because of something we did.  This requires us to really get to know our brothers and sisters in Christ- on a much deeper level that we often do, but it also requires us to be willing to give up our 'rights.'  Paul shows us this in 1 Cor 8 where he declares in verse 13, "Therefore, if food makes my brother stumble, I will never again eat meat, lest I make my brother stumble."


If we continue in the Luke passage however, Jesus commands His disciples to rebuke those who stumble and forgive those who repent...essentially as many times as they come to us in repentance.  If we compare these commands to what Jesus said immediately before them, we can see that by not rebuking a brother and allowing him to continue in sin or by not forgiving a brother who has repented we are causing him to stumble!

We can see both sides of the coin by examining Paul's letters to the Corinthians.  In 1 Cor 5, Paul scolds the Christians there for allowing sin to continue in the church in regard to the man who was with his father's wife.  Many believe that in his second letter to the Corinthians, Paul is again scolding the church there for not forgiving this same man after they had rebuked him and he repented (2 Cor 2).  In both cases, the church at Corinth was causing the/a man to stumble instead of caring for his soul as they should have been; as do we when we fail to rebuke and forgive.

MrsDrPoe: The Lost Parables (Luke 15)

It's another Theology Thursday on the blog, so I invite you to open up your Bibles with me as we delve into God's word. Today we'll be looking at the "lost chapter" in Luke, Chapter 15. I studied this chapter earlier in the week with our friend Mr. Holley, and most of these ideas presented here came from that study.

The chapter opens with the Parisees and scribes complaining that Jesus was again receiving and eating with tax collectors and sinners. And Jesus responds to their complaints with three parables:

The Lost Sheep
Jesus points out than any man who lost one out of one hundred sheep would leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness in order to seek after the one that was lost. Upon finding it, any man would call together his friends and neighbors to celebrate its return to the fold. Jesus compares this scenario to the fact that there is "more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine just persons who have need no repentance."

The Lost Coin
Jesus says that any woman who loses one of ten silver coins would light lamps and sweep her house, carefully searching until she finds it. And when she does find it, she gathers her friends and neighbors together to rejoice with her. Jesus again compares this to the "joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents."

These stories show us that God cares about every individual, not percentages. Like the "any man" and "any woman" in these parables, we should realize that there's too much at stake to give up on those who are lost; we should continually be searching for opportunities to teach the gospel of Christ. One other thing we can see is the heavenly view of repentance- it is an occasion for massive amounts of rejoicing in the Lord.

The Lost Son
A certain man had two sons, the youngest of which demanded his inheritance early. When he had received it, this son took all his possessions with him to a far country and literally wasted everything that he had. After a famine in the country, the son winds up feeding pigs for a citizen of the country. Coming to the realization that he would gladly eat the pods he was feeding the pigs, the son decided that he would go home, repent of the sin he committed against God and his father, and ask to be one of his father's slaves.

When he was a long way off, his father saw him and ran to him, commanding his servants to bring his son clothes and to kill the fatted calf. While the celebration continued, the older son came back from the fields and refused to enter the party. The father pleaded with him, but the son refused saying that he was responsible and worked hard for his father all the time but never received even the smallest of festivities in his honor. The father responds that all he had belonged to the oldest son, but it was right to celebrate at the younger son's return for he "was dead and is alive again, and was lost and is found."

There are so many lessons that this parable by itself could teach us. First, it's important to note that when the younger son wanted to leave, the father didn't try to get him to stay by changing the rules. (Example: the son wanted to spend money on harlots; the dad didn't say, "if you stay, you can bring one over occasionally.") This has application to us as children of God, as well as to those of us who are parents.

Another thought this story brings to light is the fact that if we take one step toward God, He will run to us, just like the father ran to the son when he was still a long way off. When we make the decision to turn our lives toward Him and to repent of the sins we've committed, He rushes to us, and helps us take up our cross daily (Luke 9:23).

Finally, while we must be careful not to be the younger son, we must also strive not to be like the older son. When one repents and returns to the church, we should embrace him/her and rejoice that he/she has been made alive again. Often times it's too easy for us to have a cynical ("he/she will just go back to his/her old ways soon enough.") or proud ("he/she doesn't deserve this; I've been more faithful than him/her!") attitude toward one who repents. These are the same attitudes that the Pharisees and scribes had toward the sinners and tax collectors at the beginning of the chapter- attitudes that we as Christians, saved by the grace of God, should not possess!

The parable of the lost son is left open-ended. I think that this is in part due to the fact that the Pharisees and scribes were left to choose whether or not they would continue in their holier-than-thou attitudes. If we struggle with this idea that heaven rejoices more over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine who don't need repentance, then we too are left with a choice- love our returned brethren and rejoice with the heavenly host or harbor our resentment, allowing the devil a firm foothold in our lives.

MrsDrPoe: Filling the Void

Happy Theology Thursday all! I invite you to open your Bibles with me as we go through a few passages that have stuck in my mind through this week's studies and daily Bible reading.

Throughout the Bible, we can see examples of just and righteous men; these men are deemed thus by both action and inaction- by what they do and do not do. In Ezekiel 18:5-9, God defines a just man:

____Action________________

does what is lawful and right___ _______
restored his pledge to debtor__ _________
given his bread to the hungry__________
covered the naked with clothing___
withdrawn his hand from iniquity__________
executed true judgement between men be_ _________
walked in God's statutes______
kept God's judgements faithfully_ _

___Inaction_______
not eaten on the mountains
not lifted his eyes to idols
not defiled his neighbor's wife_
not approached woman during her impurity
not oppressed anyone
robbed no one by violence
not exacted usury (loan interest)
not taken any increase

Similarly, in the first verse of Psalm 15, David asks God, "Jehovah, who may abide in Your tabernacle? Who may dwell in Your holy hill?" Verses 2-5 answer:

"He who walks uprightly,
And works righteousness,
And speaks the truth in his heart;
He who does not backbite with his tongue,
Nor does evil to his neighbor,
Nor does he take up a reproach against his friend;
In whose eyes a vile person is despised,
But he honors those who fear the LORD;
He who swears to his own hurt and does not change;
He who does not put out his money at usury,
Nor does he take a bribe against the innocent.
He who does these things shall never be moved."

Sometimes as Christians, we think we're "good people" because we may have put a stop to things we were doing before we turned to the Lord: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, etc (Gal 5:19-21). While merely practicing the "don'ts" that are taught by the New Testament, we create a void in ourselves where these unholy desires/actions used to be.

Examine the parable of an unclean spirit's return in Luke 11:24-26. A demon leaves a person for a time but then decides to return. When he arrives, he finds his "home" in put in order, so he gathers seven other more wicked spirits to dwell with him in his host. Thus the last state of the man is worse that the first.

We can find ourselves in a similar situation if we just clean out our lives by eliminating unholy things in them. 2 Peter 2:20-21 tells us that "if, after [we] have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord...[we] are again entangled in them and overcome, the latter end is worse for [us] than the beginning." These are the "3rd soil" in the parable of the sower: "Now the ones that fell among the thorns are those who, when they have heard, go out and are choked with cares, riches, and pleasures of life, and bring no fruit to maturity." (Luke 8:14)

When we remove sinful things from our lives, we must replace them with righteous things- we must fill the void, "putting off...the old man...and putt[ing] on the new man" (Eph 4:17-24)- or we strongly risk falling back into the world. Consider Luke 11:33-36. This passage tells us that we should fill ourselves with light such that there is no part darkness. By filling ourselves with the Word of God and taking the actions described in the New Testament- visiting orphans and widows (Jas 1:27), loving the Lord will all our heart, soul, mind, and strength (Mark 12:30), loving our neighbor as ourselves (Mark 12:31), doing good to those who hate us (Luke 6:27), submiting to our husbands/loving our wives (Eph 5:22-33), etc. - we can become the righteous person described in Ezekiel and Psalm 15, and our lives will glorify the Lord. The key to being pleasing to God is striving to do the things He likes and to refrain from the things He does not.

One final note on the subject: just because the commands of God instruct us in works we should and should not be doing does not mean that we are in any way earning anything. "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:8-10)

MrsDrPoe: Seeking

In a couple of recent studies in Mark and Luke, the topic of seeking God has come up. I've found it very interesting how, though both writers present the concept, they each present it in a different way.

A running theme in Mark is "inside" vs "outside." As Jesus teaches outside by the sea, we see huge crowds gathered around Him listening; however, many of these individuals are not truly seeking Jesus. In Mark 4:3-9, we see Jesus presenting the parable of the sower. Christ brackets the parable by "Listen!" and "He who has ears to hear let him hear!" Obviously these people came to listen, right? Right...sort of. Jesus is telling His listeners to listen with a purpose...to listen with an ear for the spiritual, not the physical. He's not just telling a nice story about a farmer who only had some of his seed produce!

In verse 10, we see the scene shift, and Jesus is now among His disciples (including the apostles). And they're not just hanging out- the disciples are asking about the parable. Christ answers, "To you it has been given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but to those who are outside, all things come in parables." The disciples are disciples because they're asking...and because they're disciples, they're are on the inside and can know the mystery of the kingdom. They are seeking!

Luke is a little more forward with the topic, in that the theme of "seeking and finding" is prevalent in the book. In Luke 11:9-13 Jesus tells His disciples, "So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened." It is my understanding that in this case "ask," "seek," and "knock" activities we must be continually doing. We can see this by examining the parable Jesus tells in the previous verses (5-8). At the conclusion of the parable He says, "...because of his persistence he will rise and give him as many [loaves] as he needs."

From these passages, we can see that, as Christians, we should be seeking God and seeking Him continually. Seeking and asking for wisdom to better understand His word. Seeking and asking for strength in times of difficulty and temptation. Seeking and asking for guidance and growth so that we can become more and more like Christ everyday.

But if we're always seeking, what about everything else? Matt 6:33 says, "But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you." From the verses before, we know that "these things" refer to life's necessities like food, drink and clothing. Thus we can spend our efforts seeking after God and seeking to be like Him, knowing that He will take care of us.

MrsDrPoe: Bargaining with God

Good morning and happy Theology Thursday to all! I invite you all to open up your Bibles and to look at a couple of passages with me; today's thoughts stem from some recent study, as well as my daily Bible reading this week.

I've noticed recently in a lot of TV shows how much people (in general) attempt to bargain with God. This bargaining begins with these characters' knowledge that they aren't serving God to the fully capacity that they should be, and it goes a little something like this: "God, if you get this girl to like me, I'll be at services every Sunday," or "God, if you can get me this job, I'll pray every day."

Job 9:14-15 says, "How then can I answer Him and choose my words to reason with Him? For though I were righteous, I could not answer Him; I would beg mercy of my Judge." Job 10:15 says, "If I am wicked, woe to me; even if I am righteous, I cannot lift up my head. I am full of disgrace; see my misery!" Reading these verses made me think of the fact that we "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." (Rom 3:23) We all (even the most "righteous") deserve death and eternal punishment for sin, but God has shown us great mercy by sacrificing His Son so that we may have the opportunity to be forgiven of our sins. When we ask for things, we can't offer God lip-service for anything- we can only appeal to His merciful nature.

I was also reminded of Luke 9:57-62 where we see three "volunteer" followers of Christ, two of which try to put conditions on their discipleship. One says, "Lord, let me first go and bury my father;" another says, "Lord, I will follow You, but let me first go and bid them farewell who are at my house." These statements look similar to those in the TV shows, right? Jesus answers the last man, "No one having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God."

We can't come to God on our own terms...we can only prostrate ourselves humbly before His throne as undeserving servants. We must empty ourselves of our pride and the things of this world and fill ourselves with the Word, becoming like Christ and "lov[ing] the LORD [our] God with all [our] heart, with all [our] soul, with all [our] strength, and with all [our] mind, and [our] neighbor as [ourselves]." (Luke 10:27) And as Jesus said, "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word...He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine but the Father's who sent Me." (John 14:23-24)

When we love the Lord and are faithful Him, we are promised that He will answer our prayers (Matt 21:22...more on this later). Even then we can't bargain with God, we can only appeal to His mercy.