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Is It legal?

Posted on by korgrocker

““Is there a single one of us rulers or Pharisees who believes in him? This foolish crowd follows him, but they are ignorant of the law. God’s curse is on them!” Then Nicodemus, the leader who had met with Jesus earlier, spoke up. “Is it legal to convict a man before he is given a hearing?” he asked. They replied, “Are you from Galilee, too? Search the Scriptures and see for yourself—no prophet ever comes from Galilee!” Then the meeting broke up, and everybody went home.”
John 7:48-53 NLT

There appeared to be a meeting of the Pharisees and the other religious leaders, possibly convened to follow the attempt to arrest Jesus and bring Him before them to face charges of blasphemy. The dynamic of the meeting is interesting, in that there appears to be one person speaking for all those present. But there was dissent from a man called Nicodemus. We remember him as the man who went to Jesus by night for a meeting. We read in John 3:1-2, “There was a man named Nicodemus, a Jewish religious leader who was a Pharisee. After dark one evening, he came to speak with Jesus. “Rabbi,” he said, “we all know that God has sent you to teach us. Your miraculous signs are evidence that God is with you””. But from what Nicodemus said, it appears that the Jewish leaders were going to kill Jesus without a trial. John 5:18, “So the Jewish leaders tried all the harder to find a way to kill him. For he not only broke the Sabbath, he called God his Father, thereby making himself equal with God”. How they were going to kill Him in the Roman-governed province was unclear.

To the religious leaders, the Law of Moses, as they interpreted it, was of paramount importance. It must have been a nightmare for the Romans, because there was effectively two legal systems in operation. But the Jews walked a tightrope between the demands of the Law and restrictions placed upon them by the Roman occupiers. They knew that if they stepped too far out of line then the Romans would brutally deal with them. But as we can see from Jesus’ trial, the Romans were quite happy to allow the Jews to judge religious matters, though with restrictions when it came to capital issues. John 18:31, ““Then take him away and judge him by your own law,” Pilate told them. “Only the Romans are permitted to execute someone,” the Jewish leaders replied”. 

It is interesting that so much of our legal system here in the UK is based upon the Law of Moses, and it is only in the recent past that more radical changes have been made. For example, the mandatory death sentence for crimes such as murder was only repealed in living memory. But sadly, the UK is becoming increasingly secular with the Christian witness and influence slowly dwindling away. The gap between the state and the church is ever widening, with our politicians introducing laws that would have been unheard of in the mid twentieth century, and with negative consequences resulting. Abandoning God’s laws and replacing them with modern Godless ideologies is a dangerous strategy that will increase the devil’s influence on our societies bringing chaos and strife.

Nicodemus asked, “Is it legal to convict a man before he is given a hearing?” Having to ask that question is a long way from the intent of the Law. Jesus was later asked about what was the greatest commandment, and His reply was to love God with all your heart, and to love your neighbours as yourself. Such a message seemed a long way from the venom and anger of the Pharisees, intent on upholding their interpretation of the Law regardless of God’s plan for human decency. But before we pilgrims make any comment we have to ask ourselves the question about our own responses to others, particularly when we start using Bible verses in judgement of another. God has a higher law based on love, and when that becomes the starting point, a journey can be commenced that will eventually bring resolution in times of conflict. Jesus is recorded as saying in John 3:17, ”God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him“. Instead of bringing judgement and punishment Jesus said, ”For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost“.

Jesus’ teaching and message was a long way from that dispensed by the Jewish leaders, which was probably why they hated Him so much. God has a law much higher than that followed by the Pharisees and it is based on love and grace. He is not a stern figure with a policeman’s hat and a truncheon leaning over the banisters of Heaven reaching down to beat us at every sinful opportunity. He is a loving Father, who corrects us when we stray and who affirms us when we do well. The question “Is it legal” doesn’t apply in the courts of Heaven.

Dear Heavenly Father. We thank You for Your love, grace and mercy. Where would we be without You? We worship You today. Amen.

Ignorant of the Law

Posted on by korgrocker

“When the Temple guards returned without having arrested Jesus, the leading priests and Pharisees demanded, “Why didn’t you bring him in?” “We have never heard anyone speak like this!” the guards responded. “Have you been led astray, too?” the Pharisees mocked. “Is there a single one of us rulers or Pharisees who believes in him? This foolish crowd follows him, but they are ignorant of the law. God’s curse is on them!””
John 7:45-49 NLT

The arrogance of the Pharisees, and the others who made up the religious leadership, is breath-taking. With their words they sealed their own fate and accused those in the “foolish crowd” of being ignorant of the Law even when it pointed, through prophecies, to the coming Messiah. Worse, they then cursed the people in the name of God. A very sad situation that ultimately led to Jesus’ execution at Calvary.

There are men and women today, in positions of church leadership, who claim to know better than ordinary “foolish” people. In fact, every generation since Jesus walked on this planet has had more than its fair share of people who preach a message based on their own construction rather than God’s intent. They may even use Scriptures, like the Pharisees, to justify their position. But in 1 Corinthians 1, Paul contrasted the “wise” of this world with the “foolishness” of the message of the cross and the people who are being saved by it. He wrote, “The message of the cross is foolish to those who are headed for destruction! But we who are being saved know it is the very power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18). Paul went on to quote a verse from Isaiah 29, “As the Scriptures say, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and discard the intelligence of the intelligent””. And Paul, a lapsed and repentant Pharisee, then wrote, “This foolish plan of God is wiser than the wisest of human plans, and God’s weakness is stronger than the greatest of human strength. Remember, dear brothers and sisters, that few of you were wise in the world’s eyes or powerful or wealthy when God called you. Instead, God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful” (1 Corinthians 1:25-27). 

The wisdom and knowledge of the Pharisees and the other religious leaders was ultimately exposed for what it was by the ordinary people in the crowd who came to believe in Jesus. The “wise” religious leaders journeyed on to their ultimate fate. I can just imagine one of these arrogant leaders standing before God trying to explain why they refused to believe in His Son, Jesus. Perhaps they even angrily shook their fists in God’s face, accusing Him of letting them down. A quote from C S Lewis (the Great Divorce), “But, beyond all these, I saw other grotesque phantoms in which hardly a trace of the human form remained; monsters who had faced the journey to the bus stop—perhaps for them it was thousands of miles—and come up to the country of the Shadow of Life and limped far into it over the torturing grass, only to spit and gibber out in one ecstasy of hatred their envy and (what is harder to understand) their contempt, of joy”. But perhaps God will lovingly say to them that by sending His Son He was fulfilling the intention of the Law. Jesus said in Matthew 5:17, “Don’t misunderstand why I have come. I did not come to abolish the law of Moses or the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose”. And then, before God, the light suddenly dawned on those arrogant men as they, too late of course, realised their error. 

Paul was a very learned man, and considered a Pharisee above all others, but he wrote in Philippians 3:7-9, “I once thought these things were valuable, but now I consider them worthless because of what Christ has done. Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ and become one with him. I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ. For God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith”. 

We pilgrims believe in Jesus. We have faith in Him and His words of eternal life. The message of the cross has led us astray, away from the “wisdom” of the world into the Kingdom of God. There is no better place to be.

Dear Father God. The message of the Cross is fundamental to our faith in Jesus, and we are eternally grateful for Your plan for the salvation of mankind. Amen.

No Arrest

Posted on by korgrocker

“Some even wanted him arrested, but no one laid a hand on him. When the Temple guards returned without having arrested Jesus, the leading priests and Pharisees demanded, “Why didn’t you bring him in?” “We have never heard anyone speak like this!” the guards responded.”
John 7:44-46 NLT

The Temple guards had a dilemma. They had been sent to arrest Jesus, but they had no legal mandate to do so, other than the instructions of the religious leaders. But in Jesus’ presence they were overcome by His gracious and life-giving words, in some way touched by God. I picture a group of the senior clerics, the leading priests and the Pharisees, meeting together, and deciding to send the guards to arrest Jesus. So, the guards were called in and given their instructions. Off they went and found Jesus in the Temple teaching the people. He wouldn’t have been hard to find, because of the crowd who were probably standing there silently and listening to what Jesus had to say. In other places in the Gospels we read about how Jesus spoke with an authority they had never experienced from their own teachers. But the guards paused for a few moments, taking in the scene and starting to listen to Jesus as well. Mesmerised, they forgot their mission, and when the session came to a natural end, they returned to the meeting of clerics without Jesus. I wonder why they returned, but I suppose they had to report back to their employers. I also wonder what story they started to form in their minds to excuse their lack of action? But in reply to the question, “Why didn’t you bring him in?” they replied,  “We have never heard anyone speak like this!”.

In the Temple, Jesus was communicating God’s message to His people. This was a brave thing to do because the religious leaders claimed that right for themselves, but early on in His mission, Jesus came up against the traditional religious environment of His day. His message was forgiveness and life, much more attractive than the Pharisaical message of laws and rules. He performed miracles and signs, and gave the glory to God, who subsequently touched those Temple guards with a message of hope and a future with Him. More than anyone else, those guards would have been well aware of the hypocrisy in the religious lives of their leaders, so it is no wonder that they were refreshed by an encounter with Jesus.

We pilgrims can have such an encounter with our Lord and Saviour at any time, through the power of the Holy Spirit within us. But we too must beware of becoming fixed and hypocritical in our faith. We worship the living God, who has made available to us the “living water” Jesus offered to the temple crowd that day at the end of the Feast of Tabernacles. We drink at every opportunity, so that the water of life will flow around us and touch all the sceptics in the “crowd”, with God’s gracious words of forgiveness and life.

Dear Heavenly Father. We thank You for the water of life that perpetually pours from Your throne in rivers of blessing. We praise You today. Amen.

Prophet or Messiah

Posted on by korgrocker

“When the crowds heard him say this, some of them declared, “Surely this man is the Prophet we’ve been expecting.” Others said, “He is the Messiah.” Still others said, “But he can’t be! Will the Messiah come from Galilee? For the Scriptures clearly state that the Messiah will be born of the royal line of David, in Bethlehem, the village where King David was born.” So the crowd was divided about him. Some even wanted him arrested, but no one laid a hand on him.”
John 7:40-44 NLT

There were obviously some people in the crowd who knew their Bibles. The reference to the “Prophet” came from verses in Deuteronomy 18, “Moses continued, “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him. … I will raise up a prophet like you from among their fellow Israelites. I will put my words in his mouth, and he will tell the people everything I command him” (Deuteronomy 18:15,18). And the prophecy about the “Messiah” came from Micah 5:2, “But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, are only a small village among all the people of Judah. Yet a ruler of Israel, whose origins are in the distant past, will come from you on my behalf”. Still others didn’t rate Jesus at all, presumably considering Him to be a fraud, so they wanted to arrest Him. It was not a time in history when you would want to make claims of divinity, it seems.

But the three-way schism in the crowd that had gathered in the Temple came to nothing, because “no one laid a hand on Him”. Jesus’ presence, and His teaching and miracles, started many people off on a spiritual journey by confronting their beliefs and behaviours. If Jesus was in fact the Prophet or Messiah, then what should they do? But their religious leaders had publicly rejected Jesus because He didn’t pander to their religiosity and because He didn’t behave in the way they, the religious leaders, expected. They were perhaps expecting a Jesus such as we read about in Revelation, coming on a white horse at the head of an army, ready to do battle with the forces of evil. So the people were indeed left, as Jesus said later, like sheep without a shepherd. 

Perhaps the question for today is what do we think about Jesus? At His first coming was He the Prophet or the Messiah, foretold by the ancient prophets? We pilgrims have the benefit of hindsight, and know the truth. Jesus came as the Son of God, fulfilling the Old Testament prophecies, and offering Himself as the Saviour of everyone who believes in Him. Most people in our Western societies today will have very different views, even if they have any views about Jesus at all. But there has never been anyone born in this world who has impacted history as much as Jesus did. 

In the Temple that day, the people were not aware of the importance of the occasion. They knew Someone significant was before them but that was probably as far as it went for most of them. But there would have been a few people that God had called who listened to Jesus and then went away changed by an encounter with Him. People who desired more than anything else the “living water” that Jesus was offering. These were people who became the bedrock of the early church, and to whom we should be grateful. In the generations since, there have been a significant minority of people who have heard God’s call and who have followed Him, often in difficult and life-threatening circumstances. One day we will all meet up, and be with our Saviour for ever, rewarded for our faith and belief in Him.

Dear God. Thank You for Your Holy Spirit, so available to all who ask. We thank You for refilling us every day, and for keeping us close to You. Amen.

Living Water

Posted on by korgrocker

“On the last day, the climax of the festival, Jesus stood and shouted to the crowds, “Anyone who is thirsty may come to me! Anyone who believes in me may come and drink! For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart.’” (When he said “living water,” he was speaking of the Spirit, who would be given to everyone believing in him. But the Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus had not yet entered into his glory.)”
John 7:37-39 NLT

It was the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles. For the previous seven days, water had been poured out at the base of the altar in the Temple, but on this day it wasn’t. So perhaps symbolically, Jesus stood up and offered to the people “living water”, with one proviso – the people had to believe in Him. Once again Jesus was talking about spiritual water, not the physical water so sought after in that dry and dusty land. Helpfully, John explained this for the benefit of the people reading his Gospel; the spiritual “living water” was the Holy Spirit, the giving of whom was a gift from God following a person’s salvation. In Acts 2:38, in the middle of Peter’s sermon on the Day of Pentecost, he said, “ … Each of you must repent of your sins and turn to God, and be baptised in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. Then you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit”. There is no other way of receiving the Holy Spirit, although we read about someone called Simon who tried. Acts 8:18-19, “When Simon saw that the Spirit was given when the apostles laid their hands on people, he offered them money to buy this power. “Let me have this power, too,” he exclaimed, “so that when I lay my hands on people, they will receive the Holy Spirit!”” As we read on in Acts 8 we see how he received correction for his erroneous demands.

There are many references to “water” in a spiritual sense in the Bible. For example, Isaiah wrote, “With joy you will drink deeply from the fountain of salvation!” (Isaiah 12:3). And there is Isaiah 58:11, “The Lord will guide you continually, giving you water when you are dry and restoring your strength. You will be like a well-watered garden, like an ever-flowing spring”. Once before, Jesus mentioned living water. To the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well He said, “ … If you only knew the gift God has for you and who you are speaking to, you would ask me, and I would give you living water” (John 4:10).

The Holy Spirit is a gift from God, and He brings to our spirits all the benefits that physical water brings to our bodies. So just as our bodies need water to survive, so does our spirits. But the “living water” for our spirits is alive and active, not stagnant and dead. It refreshes us and satisfies our thirst and leads us to eternal life. The “living water” within us refreshes those around us as well, as we make available God’s gift in our families and communities. And every day we can request a fresh infilling of the “living water”, the Holy Spirit, to help us face into the day and its challenges. 

Father God, we pray for a fresh supply of this living water, for the refreshment of our spirits in this dry and dusty land. Thank You. Amen.

“Search for Me”

Posted on by korgrocker

“But Jesus told them, “I will be with you only a little longer. Then I will return to the one who sent me. You will search for me but not find me. And you cannot go where I am going.” The Jewish leaders were puzzled by this statement. “Where is he planning to go?” they asked. “Is he thinking of leaving the country and going to the Jews in other lands? Maybe he will even teach the Greeks! What does he mean when he says, ‘You will search for me but not find me,’ and ‘You cannot go where I am going’?””
John 7:33-36 NLT

The Jewish leaders were perplexed because of the two statements made by Jesus. In their attempt to arrest Him, they were stopped in their tracks. “You will search for me but not find me” had just been said by a man who claimed to be the Son of God. If His claim about Himself was correct, they reasoned, why will He disappear and go somewhere they can’t? They rationalised their dilemma by suggesting that Jesus might be planning to leave Jerusalem and going to another land where the Jews or even a people they despised, such as the Greeks, lived. But then perhaps a niggly thought started to build in their minds. The prophet Jeremiah had written, “And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:13). If Jesus was in fact divine, as He claimed, then they would be able to search for Him and find Him. But if they refuted His claim then they were in danger of missing out on the promise penned by the prophet. 

Once again, Jesus was speaking about spiritual matters. Those who rejected Him and His teaching about the Kingdom of God had chosen a path that would fail to lead to eternal life with God. They would instead experience God’s judgement and an uncertain future beyond the grave. It took the Jewish people of His time much courage to be able to believe in Jesus, because His radical teaching, though building on much of the Jewish traditional theology, took a different course and re-established the importance of gaining a relationship with God. Such a message had always been there in the Hebrew Bible but had become eclipsed by a form of religion that majored on following rules and regulations rather than the One who brought them in the first place. In the same way it took much arrogance from the Jewish leaders to reject Jesus and His teaching, instead stating that Jesus was a fraud and should be killed to avoid Him polluting the people with a teaching that they did not approve of. 

So, Jesus quite rightly told the Jewish leaders that He was going somewhere – in fact, as we know, returning to His Heavenly home – a place that would not be available to the Jewish leaders because they had rejected the Messenger, the Son of God, sent by the very God they claimed to worship. There is no place in Heaven for anyone who has rejected Jesus. But we fast forward to 21st Century Planet Earth and find the same attitudes still prevalent today. Of course, Jesus does not stand before us in the flesh, but His message is still alive and well. His counter-cultural teachings about the Kingdom of God and the importance of repentance of sins and receiving God’s forgiveness still stand. And the words of Jesus still divide humanity into two camps – those who believe in Him and those who don’t. We pilgrims are assured of our salvation because we have embraced Jesus with all of our hearts, and we try our best to persuade others to make the right choice.

Dear Lord Jesus. Only You have the words of eternal life. Please help us to hear them clearly so that we can share them with others. In Your precious Name we pray. Amen. 

Just a Little Longer

Posted on by korgrocker

“Many among the crowds at the Temple believed in him. “After all,” they said, “would you expect the Messiah to do more miraculous signs than this man has done?” When the Pharisees heard that the crowds were whispering such things, they and the leading priests sent Temple guards to arrest Jesus. But Jesus told them, “I will be with you only a little longer. Then I will return to the one who sent me. You will search for me but not find me. And you cannot go where I am going.””
John 7:31-34 NLT

Because of His miraculous signs, the crowds at the Feast of Tabernacles started to realise that Jesus was in fact the Messiah. John recorded that many believed in Him, triggering alarm amongst the Pharisees and the priestly hierarchy. So, the Temple guards, the heavies who kept order in the Temple, were sent off with an arrest warrant to take Jesus into custody. A brave act, because those in the crowd who believed in Him, might have had other ideas. But the Temple guards, and the leaders, were stopped in their tracks when Jesus told them that His time was short, and He implied that He would soon be returning to the “One who sent [Him]”. Jesus prophesised what was going to happen on an Easter Sunday a year or two later. We of course, with the benefit of hindsight, know why Jesus’ persecutors wouldn’t be able to find Him, and unless they believed in Him, they wouldn’t have been able to follow Him either.  

We pilgrims can be a bit impatient at times. We want God to do something quickly and find it hard to accept delays. It  is said that there are three possible answers to prayer. God will say, “Yes”, or “No” or “Maybe”, but often the answers don’t come as quickly as we would like. Perhaps God sometimes says “Yes … but just a little longer”. At other times, we may find ourselves in a dry season and long for it to come to an end. Sometimes, God is saying to us, “Just a little longer”, helping our persistence and faith. He may be building up our characters for something more challenging coming towards us. Hebrews 10:36, “Patient endurance is what you need now, so that you will continue to do God’s will. Then you will receive all that he has promised”. 

There is also the thought that the season of grace we currently enjoy may only be with us for “just a little longer”. One day God will decide that it is time to draw a line under the current kingdom and instead usher in the New Kingdom, with Jesus as its head. This could happen at any time soon, if world events are anything to go by. But when that happens, how would Jesus find us? Hopefully, doing His will and living by faith in our wonderful God. Hebrews 10:37-38, “For in just a little while, the Coming One will come and not delay. And my righteous ones will live by faith. But I will take no pleasure in anyone who turns away.” In Romans 11:11-12, Paul wrote, “This is all the more urgent, for you know how late it is; time is running out. Wake up, for our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. The night is almost gone; the day of salvation will soon be here. So remove your dark deeds like dirty clothes, and put on the shining armour of right living“. 

We pilgrims live as though Jesus will soon return. The last recorded words of Jesus in the Bible are found in Revelation 22:20, “He who is the faithful witness to all these things says, “Yes, I am coming soon!” Amen! Come, Lord Jesus!” Jesus said it, so we believe it.

Dear Lord Jesus. We echo those words recorded by Your servant, John, “Come Lord Jesus” and we believe it is to be soon. Amen.

Jesus, the Sent One

Posted on by korgrocker

“While Jesus was teaching in the Temple, he called out, “Yes, you know me, and you know where I come from. But I’m not here on my own. The one who sent me is true, and you don’t know him. But I know him because I come from him, and he sent me to you.” Then the leaders tried to arrest him; but no one laid a hand on him, because his time had not yet come.”
John 7:28-30 NLT

Jesus didn’t just appear in this world as part of the normal reproduction of human beings. He was born in humble circumstances as a male baby, the first-born of a Jewish peasant girl. He went through all the stages of growing up as a boy did in those days. However, when He reached the age of twelve, He knew His mission in life. He stayed behind in the Temple one Passover and His parents found Him there. We read in Luke 2:49, ““But why did you need to search?” he asked. “Didn’t you know that I must be in my Father’s house?”” A reminder perhaps to His parents of that fateful day when Mary had a visit from an angel. We read in Luke 1:35, “The angel replied, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the baby to be born will be holy, and he will be called the Son of God”. Jesus was born as a baby with Mary’s and God’s DNA. He was both human and divine. 

So, Jesus informed the crowd around Him at the Temple that, although they knew most of His humble origins, He had in fact been sent by His Father in Heaven. This statement of truth, however, was lost on the religious leaders who instead wanted to eliminate Him. After all, they couldn’t have someone claiming to be God’s Son around them, because if they believed Him, the consequence would be that there would be a tremendous upheaval to the political and religious life in Israel. We then have the intriguing statement that the leaders “tried to arrest Him”, but failed. The problem to them was that they were afraid of the crowd around Jesus – any attempt to arrest Him might cause unrest and threaten their authority. They needed to get Him on His own somewhere so that they could carry out their dark deeds. But there is perhaps a hint that Jesus’ Father in Heaven might have sent a few angels to protect Him, because John wrote, “His time had not yet come”. There would come a day when Jesus would be arrested but this wasn’t that time.

Jesus had been sent from God. It wasn’t a sudden appearance – that would happen at His Second Coming – but the first time round, Jesus had to come as a human being because in that way He would act as the bridge between God and mankind. We have a sinless, human and divine Saviour, who in spite of all the opposition, left us with a timeless message of love and hope, a message finally coming to fruition on a cross at Calvary. 

Dear Lord Jesus. Thank You for coming to this world in the way You did. Through Your sacrifice at Calvary we now have a way back to God, forgiven of our sins. Amen.

When the Messiah Comes

Posted on by korgrocker

“Some of the people who lived in Jerusalem started to ask each other, “Isn’t this the man they are trying to kill? But here he is, speaking in public, and they say nothing to him. Could our leaders possibly believe that he is the Messiah? But how could he be? For we know where this man comes from. When the Messiah comes, he will simply appear; no one will know where he comes from.””
John 7:25-27 NLT

So the animosity between the Jewish leaders and Jesus was obviously public knowledge. Everyone seemed to know about Jesus, and He split public opinion into two people factions – those that supported Him and those that didn’t. Jesus’ message and His claim to be the Son of God was clear, so clear in fact, that people started to ask the question if He really was the Messiah they had been expecting. But they had a problem with Jesus’ pedigree. If they had bothered to do some research they would have found that the prophecies about the coming of the Messiah fitted exactly with Jesus’ origins. As we know, Jesus was born in a stable in Bethlehem, fulfilling the prophecy in Micah 5:2, “But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, are only a small village among all the people of Judah. Yet a ruler of Israel, whose origins are in the distant past, will come from you on my behalf”. The Jewish leaders at the time of Jesus’ birth knew that, and Herod was convinced enough by the prophecy to murder many innocent male babies in and around Bethlehem. The people assumed that He was born and bred in Nazareth, a village located in Galilee, because that was where He grew up and worked.

Another misconception the people held was that the Messiah would just “simply appear”. It is sometimes strange how ideas and rumours quickly grow into becoming facts, even though there is no basis for them. Jesus made it clear that He was and is the Messiah. John 4:25-26, “The woman said, “I know the Messiah is coming—the one who is called Christ. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” Then Jesus told her, “I Am the Messiah!”” But the problem for the people was that Jesus didn’t fit their preconceived notions of the Messiah they were expecting. They were expecting a King and the wise men from the east came looking for Him – Matthew 2:1-2, “Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the reign of King Herod. About that time some wise men from eastern lands arrived in Jerusalem, asking, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star as it rose, and we have come to worship him.”“ The Jewish people expected the Messiah to usher in an immediate kingdom that would re-establish the Jewish state, independent once again. Luke 19:11, “The crowd was listening to everything Jesus said. And because he was nearing Jerusalem, he told them a story to correct the impression that the Kingdom of God would begin right away“. But it was sad that the Jewish leaders and people selected the prophecies that they agreed with, and discarded those, such as the Suffering Servant in Isaiah, that didn’t fit their expectations.

I wonder how many of the Jewish people expected Jesus to establish a spiritual, not physical, Kingdom? His Kingdom was not of this world, Jesus said in John 18:36, and it was so sad that the Jews continued to search for their Messiah when He was walking amongst them. But we pilgrims have the benefit of hindsight, and we know that the Messiah, Jesus the Christ, indeed came to “seek and save the lost”. After all, we are amongst those for whom He came, and we look forward when His Kingdom is finally established, for all eternity. We have rewritten the phrase “When the Messiah comes” into “We know the Messiah has come”, and through the power of the Holy Spirit, He is still with us today.

Dear Lord Jesus. You are the Messiah, the Christ who came to save us from our sins. We worship You today. Amen.

The Law of Moses

Posted on by korgrocker

““Moses gave you the law, but none of you obeys it! In fact, you are trying to kill me.” The crowd replied, “You’re demon possessed! Who’s trying to kill you?” Jesus replied, “I did one miracle on the Sabbath, and you were amazed. But you work on the Sabbath, too, when you obey Moses’ law of circumcision. (Actually, this tradition of circumcision began with the patriarchs, long before the law of Moses.) For if the correct time for circumcising your son falls on the Sabbath, you go ahead and do it so as not to break the law of Moses. So why should you be angry with me for healing a man on the Sabbath? Look beneath the surface so you can judge correctly.””
John 7:19-24 NLT

In Exodus 20:8-11 is recorded the words God said to Moses about working on the Sabbath. We read, “Remember to observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. You have six days each week for your ordinary work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath day of rest dedicated to the Lord your God. On that day no one in your household may do any work. This includes you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, your livestock, and any foreigners living among you. For in six days the Lord made the heavens, the earth, the sea, and everything in them; but on the seventh day he rested. That is why the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and set it apart as holy”. But the Rabbis developed from this Law a raft of rules, regulations and exclusions watering down the intent of God, which was to supply His creation with a holy day of rest. The Jewish leaders had harassed Jesus for doing what they defined as work on the Sabbath day – He healed a man of an ailment that had kept him paralysed for thirty eight years. Worse, He had then told that man to lift up his bed and carry it away. But Jesus easily exposed their hypocrisy by pointing out the Rabbi’s rules on circumcision, an act that they carried out on the eighth day after the birth of a male child, even if it had to take place on the Sabbath. Jesus wasn’t saying that this was wrong. He said, “Look beneath the surface so you can judge correctly”. In Mark 2:27-28 we read what Jesus said about another apparent contravention of the Sabbath rules, “Then Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made to meet the needs of people, and not people to meet the requirements of the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord, even over the Sabbath!””

Human beings love to put in place laws, rules and regulations to govern behaviour. So we have recently seen in Scotland the introduction of a hate crime law, which tries to define what people should and shouldn’t do when it comes to their attitudes and actions towards their fellow members of society. In the church there is a similar approach with the introduction and application of liturgies, which define what members of that particular denomination should believe and how they apply it. But Jesus said in response to a question from a Jewish lawyer something that is the key to Godly human behaviour. Jesus was asked what the most important commandment was and He replied, “ … ‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments” (Matthew 22:37-40). 

Jesus on many occasions pointed out the hypocrisy and flaws in a religious system that replaced a relationship with God and each other with a set of rules that then became the responsibility of the Jewish leaders to police. In the process the leaders replaced freedom with legalism.

I love what the psalmist David wrote about the law in Psalm 19:7-11, “The instructions of the Lord are perfect, reviving the soul. The decrees of the Lord are trustworthy, making wise the simple. The commandments of the Lord are right, bringing joy to the heart. The commands of the Lord are clear, giving insight for living. Reverence for the Lord is pure, lasting forever. The laws of the Lord are true; each one is fair. They are more desirable than gold, even the finest gold. They are sweeter than honey, even honey dripping from the comb. They are a warning to your servant, a great reward for those who obey them“. Unfortunately, by the time the Jewish leaders of Jesus’ day got involved, the “joy to the heart” was replaced by a legalistic drudgery with little in the way of a relationship with God. The people followed the Law because the religious leaders said so, and because to do anything else was to invite punishment of one sort or another.

Jesus told the Jewish leaders that their hypocrisy and legalistic contradictions need to be sorted before they pointed a finger at Him.

Father God. You provided the Law so that Your people would know the right and true way. Please help us to listen carefully to all Your gracious and loving words so that we too can follow You faithfully and enjoy a relationship with You that lasts for all eternity. Amen.