Reflective Bible Study

Throughout Jesus’ ministry, the Jewish leaders as a group actively opposed Him. However, I don’t think that these leaders believed they were opposing God’s Messiah. Instead, I suspect that these leaders had wrapped their beliefs up inside their tradition, and when God sent Jesus as His chosen Messiah, He didn’t fit the description their tradition had created or ultimately formed.

However, the Jewish leaders could not deny that Jesus was special, that He had the ability to work miracles, and that He focused on helping those who were hurting. But what they could not wrap their minds around was how Jesus fit into their mold – because if Jesus didn’t fit into their mold, they concluded that they could not trust that He was from God.

It is with this backdrop that we come to an event where two opposed religious groups team up and ask Jesus for something. We will be looking at this event from Matthew’s gospel, and it is found in chapter 16. Starting in verse 1 and reading from the New International Version, Matthew tells us that:

¹ The Pharisees and Sadducees came to Jesus and tested him by asking him to show them a sign from heaven.

² He replied, “When evening comes, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red,’ ³ and in the morning, ‘Today it will be stormy, for the sky is red and overcast.’ You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times. ⁴ A wicked and adulterous generation looks for a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of Jonah.” Jesus then left them and went away.

What I find amazing in this passage and event is that Jesus criticizes these leaders for wanting a sign, before telling them that they will actually get a sign, but that the sign will come in a way that they did not expect.

Likely up to this point, no one had thought of Jonah’s rebellious life and attempt at running away from God as a Messianic symbol, but after Jesus made this connection with these religious leaders, the connection is clear. Jonah himself probably wouldn’t believe it if someone had suggested to him that his attempts at running away from God would be used as a sign pointing out the Messiah.

However, the challenge Jesus shares with these leaders is one that should prompt us to pause. Jesus says in verse 4, “A wicked and adulterous generation looks for a sign, but none will be given it…” Part of me wonders if Jesus really meant to say that a wicked generation demands a sign. If this is the case, then these leaders, who were trying to test Jesus by challenging Him to give then a sign from heaven, would be implicated, but those living at various points in history who were diligently seeking God and looking for the ways God is moving around them would not be guilty. I can understand those who frame Jesus’ statement in this way.

But while the heading in my Bible titles this section as a demand for a sign, the wording of the verses themselves speak more on the looking and seeking a sign rather than demanding a sign.

When we look a little deeper at what Jesus is describing in these verses, specifically in the context of these leaders’ request, we find an interesting clue about what Jesus is speaking out against. The leaders who had come to Jesus came with the idea that if Jesus would perform a miraculous sign for them, then they would choose to believe in Him.

This is a key distinction between of the two angles we can understand Jesus’ response. In Jesus’ own words, evil and adulterous people desire to see signs and miracles before believing, whereas other people who are paying attention don’t have to demand signs or miracles because they have opened their eyes to see what God is already doing all around them. Those who are paying attention to God’s moving and working have all the evidence they need for their faith, while those who demand to see miraculous signs will never be truly satisfied with what they see.

But tucked within these leaders’ demand for a miraculous sign is another trap that is less visible on the surface. I don’t even believe the leaders themselves realized it was there. The demand to display a miraculous sign is very similar to one of the temptations Satan brought to Jesus in the wilderness. In this temptation, Satan takes Jesus, places Him at the highest point of the temple, and challenges Him to jump off, quoting a scripture about God promising to protect Him.

The subtle temptation in both of these situations is for Jesus to do something miraculous to draw attention to Himself. The trap present here is that Jesus did not come to draw attention to Himself, but instead to give glory to God the Father. Everything Jesus did was intended to point people to the Father and to give people an accurate view of the Father. The Father poured His Holy Spirit out onto Jesus to validate this mission, and even at a few key points in Jesus’ ministry, the Father speaks His approval of Jesus.

Those who are always looking for and seeking signs will ultimately be disappointed. While Jesus does point these leaders to a sign that they can look for, the sign Jesus gives them is nowhere near the one they wanted to receive or the one they expected.

The sign Jesus points them to look forward to is a sign that is outward focused. People cannot raise themselves from the grave, but God can do so if He chooses. Another way to say this idea would be that if God the Father did not want Jesus to return to life after the crucifixion, there would have been nothing Jesus could have done to raise Himself from the grave. Jesus returning to life after the crucifixion is one of the clearest ways God gave to validate Jesus’ ministry.

In our own lives, we should not look for or seek after miraculous signs in order to build a foundation for our faith and trust in God. Instead, we should build our trust in Him based upon what He has promised us, and then keep our eyes open to what God is doing around us. There are plenty of signs available for us to see, but we must be paying attention and willing to acknowledge God’s interest in being involved the world today. It is easy to discount coincidences as simply that, but what if every coincidence was instead providence that gives us additional evidence of God moving in the world today.

As we come to the end of another podcast episode, here are the challenges I will leave you with:

Continue seeking God first, and choose to place your foundation on His promises and on what Jesus has done for each of us. Don’t look for miracles or signs to build your faith on, but instead look for these things as a way to validate the commitment you have already made.

Also, continue praying and studying the Bible for yourself to personally grow closer to God each day. Through prayer and personal Bible study, we are able to invite Jesus into our lives and hearts and let Him transform us from the inside.

And as I end every set of challenges by saying in one way or another, never stop short of, back away from, chicken out of, or doubt yourself away from where God wants to lead you to in your life with Him!

As we have moved through the final week leading up to the cross, we have just one more stop to make before zooming in on the night Jesus was arrested. By this point in the week, the disciples likely knew and realized that Jesus was leaving them, but they didn’t fully grasp how or really why. However, they did ask some good questions that help us understand what the world would be like leading up to His return.

However, before the gospel writers shift onto the details of the last supper, both Matthew and Mark chose to include the supper we began our year and week with. This supper was when Mary anointed Jesus’ feet. While neither Matthew nor Mark tagged Judas as the disciple who was offended by Jesus’ actions, both of these gospels describe what Judas did right after this supper, and Luke summarizes both the introduction and response, and Luke rightly attributes Judas’ actions to their true source.

Let’s read about what happened from Luke’s gospel. Our passage can be found in Luke, chapter 22, and we’ll be reading from the New Century Version of the Bible. Starting in verse 1, Luke tells us that:

¹ It was almost time for the Feast of Unleavened Bread, called the Passover Feast. ² The leading priests and teachers of the law were trying to find a way to kill Jesus, because they were afraid of the people.

³ Satan entered Judas Iscariot, one of Jesus’ twelve apostles. ⁴ Judas went to the leading priests and some of the soldiers who guarded the Temple and talked to them about a way to hand Jesus over to them. ⁵ They were pleased and agreed to give Judas money. ⁶ He agreed and watched for the best time to hand Jesus over to them when he was away from the crowd.

About the only think Luke doesn’t tell us in this passage is why Judas Iscariot let Satan enter him. The other gospel writers fill in this detail and it was because Jesus pushed back at Judas’ condemnation of Mary for her expensive gift the night that we started this year by focusing on. John even tells us in his gospel that Judas’ remark wasn’t because Judas cared about the poor, but because he helped himself to the money and this gift could have helped his not-so-secret thievery.

Judas Iscariot appeared to resent not being included in the inner circle of disciples, and He wanted to make a name for himself. However, Judas runs into the challenge that most everyone faces when they want to be known: Will you be known for your good deeds or for your bad deeds?

When we look at the disciples and which ones we can recognize or name easily, we have the three closest disciples, who were Peter, James, and John. Most everyone who knows disciples knows these three first. But after these three, only four other disciples are easily recallable, at least to me.

First is Andrew, and his claim to fame is bringing people to Jesus. Andrew brought Peter to meet Jesus, and he also brought the boy with a lunch to Jesus when there was no other food. Andrew is known for bringing people to Jesus – and this makes him a fisher of men while also being a fisherman.

Next is Thomas, and his claim to fame is his doubt. While his story doesn’t end with doubt, his big statement about doubting the word of the other disciples after Jesus’ resurrection brings him his fame and this title. Even if Thomas was satisfied and believed after seeing Jesus personally, He represent all those who have a tendency to doubt if they haven’t seen something personally.

Aside from Judas Iscariot, the only other disciple that stands out is Phillip, and he is known for occasionally speaking up and asking the questions that others are probably thinking but to afraid to ask.

Lastly, we have Judas Iscariot, who is infamously known for his betrayal. While searching for a way to be known and to make a name for himself, Judas could have chosen any of these other three roles. Just because Andrew was known for bringing people to Jesus, Judas could have chosen this role as well. In the same way, Judas could have joined Phillip as being one who asked challenging questions.

However, Judas let his desire to be known lead him to be known as the betrayer. While being known as the betrayer fulfills his desire, it is probably the least desirable way to be known.

The temptation Judas faced is a temptation we all face in varying degrees. This temptation is the desire for fame and glory. This is the root of Lucifer’s transition into Satan in heaven, and while Lucifer had the status and the glory, he became bored with it and wanted more. In our star-crazed culture, we face a similar temptation.

Unfortunately, it’s easier to be known for bad than it is for good. But while this is the case, most of those who are known for bad are only known for a limited time. The bad they did will eventually fade into history.

However, those who choose to be known for good will be remembered forever. Even if our memory fades or if we didn’t know the good at the point it happened, those who have focused on loving others and helping where they can are remembered by God, and they actually model a part of His character.

When we look at God and how He acts in the world today, we don’t find Him stopping every evil thing. While this might cause some to doubt, it is only because they don’t understand why God might choose to do this. However, tucked within the bad that God allows are amazing opportunities for good. Whenever a disaster strikes, good people mobilize and jump in to help. One terrorist or natural disaster reveals dozens, if not hundreds, of people stepping up to help where they can.

Part of God’s character is the amazing ability of bringing good out of bad situations. While I don’t fully understand how He always is able to do this, I’m sure Satan hates this fact.

The details in our passage lay the foundation for this very truth. While it seems tragic from an earthly perspective that Jesus would let a betrayer into His group of disciples, or that someone who had been with Jesus for 3+ years would let Satan enter him so easily, the facts that this happened don’t speak negatively about God or about Jesus.

God and Jesus gave Judas Iscariot every opportunity to change his heart and his life, but he refused. When we look at our passage and the religious leaders, we discover that God’s timing supersedes our timing. The religious leaders didn’t think they would be able to arrest Jesus during the festival, and they planned to wait until afterwards. Without Judas’ betrayal, Jesus’ crucifixion wouldn’t have happened in the same way it did.

However, through the negative of Judas Iscariot’s betrayal, we have Jesus’ sacrifice for us, and we have the amazing news that His death gives us the opportunity for a new life with Him. God is able to turn negatives, even the betrayal of His own Son, into amazing good for His Story of redemption!

As we come to the end of another podcast episode, here are the challenges I will leave you with:

Always seek God first and trust that He knows what He is doing from an eternity perspective. While things might not always seem to make sense from our perspective here on earth, trust that when we reach heaven, He will be able to answer every question to our satisfaction.

Also, always pray and study the Bible for yourself to grow your personal relationship with God. While a pastor or podcaster can share ideas with you, always take what you hear or read and go back to the Bible to confirm or deny its validity.

And as I end every set of challenges by saying in one way or another, never stop short of, back away from, chicken out of, or fall away from where God wants to lead you to in your life with Him!

Throughout Jesus’ ministry, it seemed as though He always ran into conflicts with a religious group known as the Pharisees. The Pharisees had become the predominant religious group in Israel at that time, and they had used their position in culture to develop a set of rules that was supposed to keep the people from coming close to breaking God’s laws. However, by the time Jesus entered history as a man walking the earth, things had gotten a little out of hand, and what began as a good idea had spiraled out of control.

The gospel of Mark describes an event where Jesus’ disciples appear to offend the Pharisees, and how Jesus responds to their reaction. For our episode this week, we will be reading from the gospel of Mark, chapter 7, using the Contemporary English Version of the Bible. Beginning in verse 1, Mark tells us that:

¹ Some Pharisees and several teachers of the Law of Moses from Jerusalem came and gathered around Jesus. ² They noticed that some of his disciples ate without first washing their hands.

³ The Pharisees and many other Jewish people obey the teachings of their ancestors. They always wash their hands in the proper way before eating. ⁴ None of them will eat anything they buy in the market until it is washed. They also follow a lot of other teachings, such as washing cups, pitchers, and bowls.

⁵ The Pharisees and teachers asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples obey what our ancestors taught us to do? Why do they eat without washing their hands?”

⁶ Jesus replied:

You are nothing but show-offs! The prophet Isaiah was right when he wrote that God had said,

“All of you praise me
    with your words,
but you never really
    think about me.
⁷ It is useless for you
    to worship me,
when you teach rules
    made up by humans.”

⁸ You disobey God’s commands in order to obey what humans have taught. ⁹ You are good at rejecting God’s commands so that you can follow your own teachings! ¹⁰ Didn’t Moses command you to respect your father and mother? Didn’t he tell you to put to death all who curse their parents? ¹¹ But you let people get by without helping their parents when they should. You let them say that what they own has been offered to God. ¹² You won’t let those people help their parents. ¹³ And you ignore God’s commands in order to follow your own teaching. You do a lot of other things that are just as bad.

Pausing our reading here, I want to draw our attention onto the fact that Jesus did not initiate this conflict, nor did His disciples. Instead, this discussion was prompted by a challenge from a group of Pharisees who believed their own traditions were ordained by God. This is a disturbing place to be, because only if you are 100% correct, which is not possible, can you truly have a foundation in your traditions. It is not possible because God is bigger than a set of rules or a tablet of phrases on a stone.

Relationships cannot be dictated by rules, nor can rules push relationships towards growth. Rules do help relationships by giving all parties involved a unified frame of reference, but it is up to the people included in the relationship whether the relationship itself will grow or die.

At this point, Jesus senses a teaching moment. Let’s continue reading from verse 14 and learn what happens:

¹⁴ Jesus called the crowd together again and said, “Pay attention and try to understand what I mean. ^15-16 The food that you put into your mouth doesn’t make you unclean and unfit to worship God. The bad words that come out of your mouth are what make you unclean.”

¹⁷ After Jesus and his disciples had left the crowd and had gone into the house, they asked him what these sayings meant. ¹⁸ He answered, “Don’t you know what I am talking about by now? You surely know that the food you put into your mouth cannot make you unclean. ¹⁹ It doesn’t go into your heart, but into your stomach, and then out of your body.” By saying this, Jesus meant that all foods were fit to eat.

²⁰ Then Jesus said:

What comes from your heart is what makes you unclean. ²¹ Out of your heart come evil thoughts, vulgar deeds, stealing, murder, ²² unfaithfulness in marriage, greed, meanness, deceit, indecency, envy, insults, pride, and foolishness. ²³ All of these come from your heart, and they are what make you unfit to worship God.

The big, challenging thought we find in Jesus’ words in our passage is that our spiritual cleanliness is based on what we think, do, and say, because these things come from our heart. The state of our heart is what makes us unclean, because when our hearts are evil, evil actions, words, and thoughts will follow. The passage concludes by saying that these evil things make us unfit to worship God.

I suspect that some people living in the first century believed that the food that was eaten made one acceptable or not acceptable to God. While this is not the case, some people have taken Jesus’ words here to the opposite extreme with the idea that anything can be eaten freely. However, while all “foods” are fit to eat, it would be good for us to define what is intended to be a food for us and what is not. It would also be worth making the distinction that not all foods are equally healthy for us.

Nothing that goes into our mouths makes us less loved by God, but what comes out of our mouths can make us unfit for worship, because the source of what we say is what is inside our hearts.

I’m challenged by this because Jesus is essentially saying that regardless of how we look on a given weekend at church, if our hearts are unclean, then we are unfit to worship Him. This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t worship, or that we shouldn’t pray for God to create a new heart within us, but it does mean that we shouldn’t make our worship all about us.

Worshiping with the frame of mind that says we are unfit to come and worship is the beginning of the realization that nothing we do, say, or think can make us more acceptable to God. Instead, this prompts our prayers to be requests for help and acknowledging that our lives are filled with sin – even if that sin is not known by anyone else.

I don’t believe Jesus shared this challenge to put these Pharisees in their place. Instead, I believe this was Jesus’ way of challenging them on their own terms, by pointing out inconsistencies with how they say they believed when compared to how they acted. If it were possible, I believe Jesus would have done everything possible to bring these religious people into a better understanding of God, but because their hearts were so hard and stuck on their traditions, even God couldn’t break in.

Part of me wonders if Jesus’ hard words actually did break through some of the hard shells of the Pharisees’ hearts. While there is no way to know on this side of heaven, I am curious if Jesus’ words reached someone in this group, even though everyone else was offended. I also wonder if these words challenged the disciples who were present with how they chose to worship God.

Perhaps this is even a challenge for us today.

As we come to the end of another podcast episode, here are the challenges I will leave you with:

Humbly come to God and seek Him first in your life. Understand that without Him, our hearts are bent towards evil and selfishness, and only with His help can we hope to be clean and fit to worship Him. The challenge for us living today is to continually, intentionally move towards Him and ask Him to help clean our lives up.

After making this commitment, it is extra important for us to not only study the Bible for ourselves, but to do so with a prayerful, humble attitude. As we pray and read the Bible, God will impress on our hearts what we need to get rid of and what we should add into our lives.

And when we receive this inspiration, know that it is designed to help us move into where God wants to lead each of us. Because of this reason, I always end each set of challenges by challenging each of us – including me – to never stop short of, back away from, chicken out of, or deviate away from where God wants to lead you to in your life with Him!

After sharing some end-time parables with the disciples in the large discussion about the time of His return, Jesus shifts His focus out of speaking in parables, and He returns to teaching about His return. In this grand conclusion to His end-time message, Jesus shares one of the most practical truths in the entire Bible, and it is a truth that is easy to see while also being easy to miss.

Let’s read how Jesus concludes His message for these disciples, and how this message has challenged believers throughout the centuries stretching all the way to today. Our passage is found in Matthew’s gospel, chapter 25, and we will be reading from the Holman Christian Standard Bible. Starting in verse 31, Jesus continued by saying:

³¹ “When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on the throne of His glory. ³² All the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate them one from another, just as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. ³³ He will put the sheep on His right and the goats on the left. ³⁴ Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

³⁵ For I was hungry
and you gave Me something to eat;
I was thirsty
and you gave Me something to drink;
I was a stranger and you took Me in;
³⁶ I was naked and you clothed Me;
I was sick and you took care of Me;
I was in prison and you visited Me.’

³⁷ “Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You something to drink? ³⁸ When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or without clothes and clothe You? ³⁹ When did we see You sick, or in prison, and visit You?’

⁴⁰ “And the King will answer them, ‘I assure you: Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me.’ ⁴¹ Then He will also say to those on the left, ‘Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the Devil and his angels!

⁴² For I was hungry
and you gave Me nothing to eat;
I was thirsty
and you gave Me nothing to drink;
⁴³ I was a stranger
and you didn’t take Me in;
I was naked
and you didn’t clothe Me,
sick and in prison
and you didn’t take care of Me.’

⁴⁴ “Then they too will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or without clothes, or sick, or in prison, and not help You?’

⁴⁵ “Then He will answer them, ‘I assure you: Whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me either.’

⁴⁶ “And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

In this passage, we see one of the most startling challenges we have on the subject being saved. This passage seems to indicate that our salvation hinges on something we do rather than on the One we believe in. However, narrowing our salvation down to be exclusively based on the truth in this passage only shares half of the truth.

The full truth is that our salvation is based on faith, but our faith is only valuable when it is visibly helping others.

In this passage, I find it interesting that both groups of people are surprised to find out that Jesus was among the least of these people. While I don’t believe that Jesus was literally present in each of these situations, I believe that Jesus shares a powerful truth based on how God wants us to focus our love for Him. Within this passage, I see God, through Jesus, challenging us to love Him by loving and helping those in society who cannot help us in return or repay us for our help.

While the list of help that Jesus shares is probably not exhaustive, I believe it gives a tangible theme of the type of help God values. When someone is hungry or thirsty and we give them food or drink, they cannot repay us. If they had money, they could simply buy food or water, and if they had food or water, then they wouldn’t be hungry or thirsty. Helping others in this way is help that introduces us to the theme of helping in a way that cannot be repaid.

Next, we discover that helping a stranger by giving them a place to stay also follows along the same theme. If someone had money, they could rent a room in a hotel, and they would have a place to stay. Without money, when we take someone in and give them a place to stay, there is nothing they can really do to repay us. While they might help around our home, chances are good that their “repayment” is really a way of saying thank you more than trying to earn their right to stay.

After the stranger, we discover the same theme within being naked and being clothed, sick and being taken care of, and in prison and being visited. All of these examples represent help that is giving without expecting any type of repayment, and it is help in situations where payment cannot be returned.

So why does God value this type of help to base our salvation on? In my mind, I see this type of help being God’s type of help. This type of help is what God has done for each of us.

By sending Jesus into this world, God chose to step down and help the human race when we didn’t deserve help, and when we could not do anything or repay anything back to God. It is as though God gave us a million dollar gift and the best we could return is a penny.

But Jesus didn’t come to collect the pennies of humanity. He came because God is interested in sharing the millions and billions in gifts because of who He is and how much He loves us. The best way we can say thank you to God, continuing our metaphor, is to pass our pennies on to those who cannot repay us.

While it might be easy to jump to the conclusion that money is the best gift, money is also the most repayable gift. When we are called to help others, we are called to help in ways that are not repayable.

God values humanity so much that He gave Himself for us. While anyone could help another person out, only those who help others because they love God, they have placed their faith, hope, and trust in Jesus, and they have chosen to show their love for God through loving others will experience salvation. The motivation of the heart matters and the reason for our love is crucial.

People can love and help others with self-serving motives, and people can love and help others without having faith in Jesus. These people will have only carried out the visible half of salvation while missing the hidden part. Others can place their faith and trust in Jesus but be cruel and mean to everyone they meet. This second group will have only carried out the hidden half of salvation while missing the visible part.

In order to be welcomed into heaven, we must be saved internally, because of our faith is in Jesus, and we must display our faith and thanks to God for His gift by helping others in ways that are not easily repaid. This is living out God’s character in the world, and it’s His challenge to each of us!

As we come to the end of another podcast episode, here are the challenges I will leave you with:

Always seek God first and place Him first in your life. Be sure to have your faith, hope, trust, and belief in Jesus’ sacrifice to cover your sins. Believe that His sacrifice is enough and show your thanks to God for what He has done for you through helping others who cannot help you in return. Pay God’s love forward in the world around you!

Also, always pray and study the Bible for yourself to keep your connection with God strong. We need a strong private connection with God to truly know His level of love and sacrifice for us. We cannot out give God, and the closer we are to Him, the more we know this to be true.

And as I end every set of challenges by saying in one way or another, never stop short of, back away from, chicken out of, or fall away from where God wants to lead you to in your life with Him!