Reflective Bible Study

The dialog in this journal entry’s passage is one that has challenged many Bible students. While we are given a picture of an always kind and caring Jesus, it seems that in this case, Jesus was quite rude and insulting. First He ignores, then He dismisses, thirdly He insults, before finally granting the request.

Perhaps this was just as much of an object lesson for the disciples and teaching them about prejudice as it was about helping this woman with her request. After all, the disciples are the ones who prompt Jesus to stop ignoring the woman and move to dismissing her.

In His statement, Jesus states a piece of His mission, but it seems as though He chooses the most generic and popular way to describe it. In verse 24, Jesus responds to the woman, “I was sent only to the people of Israel. They are like lost sheep.”

Now while this statement was the common perspective of the Messiah at that time, I find it difficult to truly think Jesus felt His mission was exclusively to Israel – except that I also do not think that Jesus would lie to the woman. This means that Jesus really was “sent” to the people of Israel. When Jesus says, “They are like lost sheep”, I can completely understand what He is saying.

But this idea also makes me wonder a little. If “God’s people” living at that time were “like lost sheep”, does that tell us anything about our lives today? Could this same phrase be used to describe the Christian church today – with hundreds, if not thousands, of groups claiming different beliefs, traditions, doctrines, and methods?

I also wonder about Jesus’ initial statement: “I was sent only to the people of Israel.”

Does this mean that Jesus is only the Messiah for the Jews? On the surface, it might look like that, but take this phrase and apply it spiritually, and in the role of Messiah, only those who see their sin and need of a Savior will actively seek out Jesus.

The Greeks were not looking for a Savior or a Messiah, so they would not have understood the real reason Jesus came.

But Jesus helps this non-Jewish woman, which tells me that Jesus saw His mission as being broader than just the people of Israel. This woman needed help that only Jesus could supply, and He grants her request. If Jesus came to help “spiritual Israel”, who is everyone who seeks to follow the God of the Jews who know they need a Savior to bridge the gap sin has caused, then Jesus can fill that role. This also means Jesus is a stumbling block for those who think they can do it themselves.

Jesus was sent only to the people of Israel, but it seems He saw His mission as helping people of all nationalities who realized their need of a Savior.

On the night Jesus was arrested leading up to His trial and crucifixion less than 24 hours later, John’s gospel tells us about a profound conversation He has with His closest remaining disciples. In this conversation, Jesus promises His followers that while He is leaving and returning to heaven, He will come back to earth to bring them home with Him.

In this conversation, Jesus tells His followers, “If you had known me, you would have known the Father. But from now on, you do know him, and you have seen him.” (v. 7)

One of the disciples, Philip, speaks up and asks Jesus, “Lord, show us the Father. That is all we need.” (v. 8)

Jesus responds to this request by simply saying, “Philip, I have been with you for a long time. Don’t you know who I am? If you have seen me, you have seen the Father. How can you ask me to show you the Father? Don’t you believe that I am one with the Father and that the Father is one with me?” (v. 9-10a)

Jesus tells Philip and this whole group of disciples that by knowing Jesus, they now know the Father. Jesus tells them that He is one with the Father and the Father is one with Him. In some ways, if Jesus were to answer Philip’s request, all we might see is a mirror reflecting light back onto Jesus.

But Philip’s request is a request that many of us have. Philip wanted certainty to back up His belief and Philip wanted to know the Father like he knew Jesus. Many of us living today desire a face-to-face level of certainty that God exists and that He loves us like we believe Jesus loves us.

Plenty of people living today have a picture in their minds of a cruel God the Father and a friendly Jesus. They imagine the Father and Son of the Godhead are the good and bad cops when the judgment comes.

However, this is not at all how Jesus describes the Father to Philip and the rest of the disciples. Jesus answers Philip’s request by letting Philip know that the Father and Him are identical. This doesn’t mean that they are the same person, but that they have the exact same character, focus, love, and compassion towards humanity. While I don’t fully understand the roles of each of the members of the Godhead, Jesus’ role included becoming human so we could better understand who God is and what He is like.

Jesus came and gave us a picture of God the Father, and everything Jesus shares about the Father speaks to a King who is kind, loving, and merciful towards those He rules, and since God is the King of the universe, we are included among His subjects. This means that God the Father loves us just like Jesus loves us – and Jesus loves us enough that He gave His life to save us from sin!

Part way through Jesus’ ministry, as He was speaking to a crowd of Jews in the temple during a festival, Jesus shares a powerful statement about slavery and sin. John’s gospel includes this message Jesus shared, as well as some details the Jews might not have been ready to accept.

John tells us Jesus said, “Very truly I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” (v. 34-36)

The first statement Jesus makes in these verses is profound: “everyone who sins is a slave to sin.” While we would like to think slavery is something that we are erasing from the world, perhaps it is something that is not possible to do while sin is present in the world. Jesus’ statement doesn’t leave any flexibility when it comes to freedom for someone who is actively sinning.

The next statement Jesus makes is powerful as well: “a slave has no permanent place in the family.” While this sounds cruel to think about, someone who is a slave or who has been hired to help in a home may develop close friendships with those in the family, but they are not a part of the family simply because they are present. In this second statement, Jesus is drawing a parallel that someone who sins is a slave and as a slave, he/she is not part of the family.

The third statement switches our perspective because Jesus then tells us: “a son belongs to it [the family] forever.” While Jesus is hinting at Himself as a member of the family, He is really setting the stage for former slaves being freed and adopted into His family. In the third statement, Jesus begins to give us hope that we are not always destined to be slaves to sin.

The last statement in these verses tell us: “if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” Jesus draws our attention now onto Himself being the original Son (or first Son, or eldest Son) in God’s family. This last statement is a promise that Jesus can free us from sin, and that He is willing to adopt us into God’s family where we are truly free.

But the catch we don’t often realize is that the freedom we are invited into when God adopts us is a freedom from sinful desires and from choosing sin. Jesus can set us free, and when He does, if we choose to return to a life of sin with our freedom then we essentially are telling God we reject His offer and would rather be a slave.

With God through Jesus, a sinless life is possible. This does not mean we live a life without mistakes, but it does mean we live a life where our thoughts and desires are focused on God and living as He directs. Living an entire life without sinning at some point is not possible for us, but focusing on Jesus and on living for Him can make our future lives sinless even if our future lives are not “mistakeless”. Living with Jesus in this way tells God we accept the adoption He offers us into His family.

For this journal entry, we will look a little closer at one of the events in Jesus’ birth, and uncover a truth that I found especially interesting. This truth is hidden in plain sight, but it is easy to miss if you read this story without paying attention.

In verse 25 we read, “but [Joseph] kept her [Mary] a virgin until she gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus.”

While Joseph had planned to send Mary away silently to not publicly disgrace her, an angel in a dream convinced him otherwise. We don’t know if their wedding was the next day, or if it happened at a future date, or if Jesus was conceived weeks or months before. If Mary raced off to be with Elizabeth for three months prior to her wedding, then it would be very possible that Jesus would have clearly appeared to have been conceived outside of marriage. However, if all this happened before or right around the same time with Joseph and Mary traveling to see Elizabeth and Zechariah immediately following their marriage (a.k.a. honeymoon), then it would have looked to outsiders that Jesus was a honeymoon baby.

We know from reading Matthew that Joseph kept Mary as a virgin until after Jesus was born – but to everyone else looking at the scene, it probably would have looked as though Jesus was Joseph’s son.

This is significant because often times in our own lives, each family has secrets that they don’t want to share and/or they don’t feel are either believable or relevant for others to know. Perhaps it is simply a countercultural choice that the couple has made that they don’t want to share for fear it will cause division, or perhaps it is a dark secret that has brought the family shame in the past and they would rather it be erased from their history.

At any rate, Joseph and Mary had an incredible and unbelievable family secret, and Joseph accepted the reality that it meant, and chose to raise Jesus as his own Son. Joseph stepped into the unbelievable, and became the earthly father to the Savior of the world. For us, we cannot change the past, but we can choose to accept the place we are currently at (including all the craziness present) and see it as a step towards moving forward into a better future.