Question of Interest
Luke 12:54-59 – Interpreting the Times
- “An Interesting Question”
- Jesus warns the crowds to recognize who He is during this time of the Messiah rather than waiting until the day of judgement – a common theme in hIs teaching.
- In His speech He asks an interesting question…
“Why don’t you judge for yourselves what is right?”
- At first that seems an odd thing to say because we know He is not suggesting that we make up our own rules but look to God to teach us His ways.
- So what is He really asking us?
- And why don’t we decide for ourselves what is right?
- Well let us remember that He was talking to the crowds and they on the whole deferred to the teachers of the Law and Pharisees to tell them what was right.
- Could it be that Jesus was highlighting this as a problem?
- Was He challenging the people that they could no longer hide behind the rules of their religion as an excuse not to do what deep down they know was true?
- I believe that Jesus believes that through His Word and His Holy Spirit we can know what is truth.
- I also believe that He thinks we may also use our leaders, and teachers but most of all, we use our Christian Culture as an excuse not to do these things.
- When Jesus came, people were not looking after the poor the way they should, they were not sacrificing with all their hearts, they were not practicing forgiveness and they thought they were ok because no-one else [including their leaders] were doing it either.
- The problem?…
- They were comparing their lives to other followers of God rather than God Himself.
- Yet they were in for a huge shock!
- Are we?
- Many Christians in Germany thought it was ok to vote for Hitler, many Brits and Americans thought it was ok to own slaves, why because most Christians did.
- But it did not make it right.
- And so Jesus asks us all the same question, you have My Word and My Spirit so …
- “Why don’t you judge for yourselves what is right?”
- We cannot hide behind a ‘Christian’ label that God does not recognize and we do not have to be limited by it either!
We can do the things that God puts on our hearts to do!
We can run after the vision to change the world that we feel challenged to do!
We can soar like eagles if we no longer make our Christian culture our limitation.
- Meditate on this:
Other peoples experiences don’t have to be our expectation.
- If Jesus came today and challenged us in the say way, I don’t think we would persecute Him to death, I think we would patronize Him to death.
- We would tell Him to calm down and be less intense.
- But there is a world to rescue and the power to do it if we will just decide for ourselves what is right and good!
If this has been helpful in any way then please share it on Facebook and Twitter by clicking below or on the links to the left.
Intense heat refines gold – releases the gold droplets from the dross in the clushed ore and lets it flow with the other droplets to form a mass of gold – there is no such thing as calm heat – there is only ‘hot or cold’ / ‘on or off’ / His way or no way – God’s desire is to bless and refine but the on/off switch or the door handle is on our side as we have been given free will to choose ‘The Way’!! Intially Christians were reffered to as followers of ‘The Way’.
He went all the way to the cross for us to be set free for all time and to understand time.