Reflective Bible Study

During one of Jesus’ famous prayers, He shares an interesting idea, and it is one that could confuse those reading Jesus’ words without knowing the context of the last months of Jesus’ time on earth. In His prayer, Jesus says to the Father, “I am on my way to you. But I say these things while I am still in the world, so that my followers will have the same complete joy that I do.” (v. 13)

Some people when reading this may get the impression that Jesus’ death was when He left to return to God. But this doesn’t add up when we look at other details of the crucifixion – including Jesus’ conversation with Mary in the garden following His resurrection.

Instead, the focus at this point of the prayer is not on Jesus leaving as much as it is on Him wanting to say what needs to be said while still in this part of His ministry. The clock was ticking on being able to share a message with His disciples before the crucifixion happened, and while Jesus briefly taught the disciples following the resurrection before returning to heaven, trying to prepare the disciples for what was about to happen did have a time limit. Jesus wanted to share God’s message with them before He was arrested. Jesus wanted them to realize before the cross what the cross signified.

Jesus continues His prayer-conversation with the Father by saying, “I have told them your message. But the people of this world hate them, because they don’t belong to this world, just as I don’t.” (v. 14)

“Not belonging to this world” is a characteristic of Jesus’ followers. What this doesn’t mean is standing on a street corner preaching an “us vs. them” message. Instead, this statement means that we should not focus on what the world focuses on, and we should not be swept up with the ever changing new and greatest thing.

But instead of focusing on what we shouldn’t be focusing on – which is something that never works well, we should intentionally keep our focus fixed on Jesus and on keeping our connection with Him strong. Other people might hate us because they don’t understand or agree, but don’t let their opinions shake our focus off of Jesus. When we intentionally keep our focus on Jesus, ignoring the craziness of culture becomes easier because we will have an anchor holding us steady in the storms of life.

Most times I read about Jesus blessing the children, a question enters my mind. Perhaps, when we reach heaven, I’ll ask Jesus the question personally, but until that point in time, I will be left to looking for clues from the gospels that include this event.

The question is not why Jesus would have prompted this event or why He allowed children to come close. Jesus loves everyone, and He chose to value the children/infants as much as women and adults.

However, in the few verses that make up this event, Jesus makes an interesting comparison. At the end of verse 16, Jesus says, “Children like these are part of God’s kingdom.”

This prompts my question: What is it about “these” children that give them the status of being a part of God’s kingdom?

Is it some characteristic that is present in each child, such as trust, hope, faith, love, curiosity, or something else? Is it that these children had self-control and were intently listening to and engaging Jesus in conversation? Or is it simply because these children were with Jesus?

If Luke’s gospel description is correct in its additional detail that the children were “infant” age, then they likely didn’t have much if any conversation. Perhaps there was crying involved, but likely not any self-control. An infant loves and trusts their parents, and they do grow into being curious.

However, as I read this event, I think that Jesus is not talking about the children themselves, as much as He is talking about “where” the children are – next to Him and being held by Him. Perhaps Jesus was telling stories to the children who were old enough to understand stories, or perhaps He was simply holding ones who were too young to realize what was going on. Either way, the children who were there were with Jesus.

The children who were there may have been there without emotional or spiritual baggage. We don’t read anything in any of the gospels about the children being skeptical or questioning Jesus on His mission of being a Messiah. If the children are united in their proximity to Jesus, they also seem to be united in their acceptance of Jesus as well.

As I dig into the details, what I learn most from this event is that each of us should focus on being close to Jesus personally and that we enjoy our time with Him. Accepting Jesus is one big key to being a part of the kingdom of God!

Many Christians today believe that Jesus taught peace and tolerance towards all people. In this belief, we find a movement of people who focus on ignoring and minimizing the differences between the different worldviews and many of these people do so without realizing that Jesus never really taught His followers to be this way. Jesus did teach that His followers should love others, but love is different from tolerance.

In His first big message focused towards the newly-formed core group of twelve followers, Jesus tells them, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the world. No, I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. I came to set sons against their fathers, daughters against their mothers, daughters-in-law against their mothers-in-law; your worst enemies will be the members of your own family.” (v. 34-36)

This sounds like the opposite of tolerance. Jesus came and He is the cause of division between families. He even warns that His followers’ worst enemies may be members of their own respective families. It is in this context that Jesus shares a challenging statement that has bothered many people out of context. Jesus continues by saying, “Those who love their father or mother more than me are not fit to be my disciples; those who love their son or daughter more than me are not fit to be my disciples. Those who do not take up their cross and follow in my steps are not fit to be my disciples. Those who try to gain their own life will lose it; but those who lose their life for my sake will gain it.” (v. 37-39)

Many people have wondered why Jesus would require His followers to love Him more than their parents or children. On the surface, this sounds selfish and opposite from a “loving”, “selfless” God. But in context, Jesus’ words make more sense. If a parent, sibling, or child does not agree with our decision to follow Jesus, then they place themselves in the group Jesus describes as our enemies. These family members may be passive in their dislike about our decision, or they may be openly hostile towards us because of our decision.

When this happens, Jesus says that we are called to love them, but to love Him more. We are called and encouraged to stay loyal to Jesus regardless of who stands against us. This is what Jesus means when we are to love Him more than our closest family members.

Jesus finishes off by encouraging us to not hold onto our lives too tightly. If we fear death, and we let this fear drive our decisions, then it too can pull us away from God. If we try to keep our life through rejecting Jesus because of the pressure of culture or oppression, then we may lengthen it briefly, but we will have lost it eternally. However, if we lose our lives because of our faith in Jesus, we really have only lost the sin-filled, temporary life in this age of God’s kingdom. By losing our lives because we have chosen to follow Jesus, we solidify our eternal lives in the next age of God’s kingdom – and the next age lasts forever!

Following Jesus’ discussion about the end times, the gospel of Luke nicely summarizes a key idea Jesus shares about where we should place our focus. While Matthew and Mark include interesting details that help bring out similar themes and ideas, Luke’s recollection sounds the most practical of the gospel writers in this instance.

Luke concludes by sharing Jesus’ key point with the disciples saying, “Don’t spend all of your time thinking about eating or drinking or worrying about life. If you do, the final day will suddenly catch you like a trap. That day will surprise everyone on earth. Watch out and keep praying that you can escape all that is going to happen and that the Son of Man will be pleased with you.” (v. 34-36)

This main idea Jesus shares is powerful. Basically Jesus is saying that when we allow life’s busyness to crowd into our life through worry, we will miss out on the most important things we should be doing. These important things center on keeping our connection with God strong.

Jesus tells everyone present that the day He returns “will surprise everyone on earth.” (v. 35)

But Jesus also tells us how we can keep our connection with God strong. In addition to pushing back worry and busyness, Jesus tells us to “Watch out and keep praying that you can escape all that is going to happen and that the Son of Man will be pleased with you.” (v. 36)

In Matthew and Mark, the key theme in place of watching out is being alert and paying attention. Jesus is giving us a warning we can count on, and the way we move forward with God is through prayer. Jesus instructs us here to “keep praying” because it is through prayer that we stay connected with God.

Life seems to always give us something we can worry about. Whether life’s worry comes through an uncertain or unstable job, whether it comes from needing a job, or whether it comes from friends and/or family drama, government instability, overseas tension, or increased violence in the world, the way we push back is through prayer – specifically bringing our worries and concerns to God. When we do, He can remind us of eternity, and how the challenges we face today are insignificant when compared with eternal life with Him.

God cares about the challenges we face and He wants to help us. But His number one goal is preparing us for heaven. Everything He does and has done for us fits within the context of this goal!