Tag Archives: Matthew

His Disciple—They Went

“These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Do not go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans. Go rather to the lost sheep of Israel.  As you go, proclaim this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely give.” – Matthew 10:5-8

They were to go without His physical presence with them, but with His authority and power on them. He told them where to go and where not to go. What to say, what to do. In other words, He sent them with His purpose and strategy not theirs.

And once again He reminds me that I do not call the shots for my life. I am not the decision maker in this relationship.

“Do not get any gold or silver or copper to take with you in your belts— no bag for the journey or extra shirt or sandals or a staff, for the worker is worth his keep.” (vs. 9-10) 

He allowed them no means to provide for themselves and it would be their first lesson in trusting the One who sent them out.

“If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet.” (v. 14) 

Don’t spend breath and time trying to make someone listen to you. Just go. Move on. I wonder if that was as hard for them as it is for us. To just walk away from someone who isn’t ready to repent, instead of trying to convince them to accept something they don’t want.

We are a people called to carry a message to the world. But we are not a people called to try to convince the world to believe and receive our message. Neither are we called to dress the gospel up or dress it down, to cover it in soft sounding language and prime it with the best songs and lights and coffee in the lobby. I’m not saying having coffee for people is wrong. I’m not a monster. I’m just saying that, in so many ways, what we are doing today looks very different than it looked then and I don’t know if that’s such a good thing.

“I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves. Be on your guard; you will be handed over to the local councils and be flogged in the synagogues. On My account you will be brought before governors and kings as witnesses to them and to the Gentiles.” (vs. 16-18)

He didn’t sugarcoat it for them. Didn’t frame it as a great adventure. He told them the truth—this was going to be hard. Dangerous. They were being sent out on mission with the authority and power of Jesus on them, and a mandate to preach the gospel, heal the sick, and cast out demons. And, with a promise of suffering.

So they went. Perhaps that is the most surprising thing of all. They chose to trust and obey and they just went. The simplicity of it is stark in comparison to our months and months of trainings and preparations and fund raising and our “let me pray about it” mentality. (Yes, yes, in our world today all of that feels so necessary, and practically speaking it is, I get that. But don’t you just long for the early days? The days when trust was literally all they had?)

They were His disciples, and He said go, so they just went.

Father, break us free from ourselves and our propensity to run with our own plans and to complicate the mess out of what You’ve called us to do. May it be said of us, in this time, that we just went, because You said go and we had learned to trust You.

His Disciple: Return

From that time Jesus began to preach and to say, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” (Matthew 4:17)

The concept of returning to God is called “repentance” (teshuvah). It is one of the most important messages of the Bible. Repentance is a central thrust of Yeshua’s teaching and the Gospel imperative. Yeshua’s message was “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17). What is true repentance? Return to the LORD your God, you and your children, and obey his voice in all that I command you today, with all your heart and with all your soul. (Deuteronomy 30:2) – Nitzavim-Vayelech: The Greatness of Repentance

Return to the Lord your God… was God’s call of repentance to His people, because sin (primarily idolotry) had turned them away from Him. With Jesus, God had come near to the “lost sheep of Israel”, and was calling them to repent. To turn from their sin and their idols and turn back to Him.

And here we are today and I wonder if we still hear the call of repentance, to return to Him. In my western church world, we repent when we commit a sin, which isn’t wrong theology, just incomplete, I think. Because I find that when our heart wanders, the solution given is to spend more time with Jesus, more time praying, more time reading His Word. Again, not bad things, but going through the motions of worship with an idolotrous heart is not repentance. We must return, not with our activities, but with a heart that grieves the sin that created the distance between us and Him.

It means leaving every idol behind. The things we have turned to for comfort, for help in our time of need, including ourselves. Our self-help Christianity is a lie, we are not the masters of our own fate. We cannot get better by trying harder. We cannot manifest the life we want. A better job, bigger house, or another diploma isn’t going to fill the void that is left when we turn from God.

God isn’t just a means to make our life better, He is our life. To think otherwise calls for repentance. To believe that we can make our way in this world, calling the shots and living our best life all while claiming to follow Jesus, calls for repentance.

Choosing to believe man-made theology that makes sense to us and makes us feel good about Christianity, but is contrary to what the Word of God has spoken, needs repentance. When we form our faith around what we think God should be like, we have made a god in our own image and it calls for repentance.

If we try to love everyone around us without first loving God (the one true God), then we need to repent. The greatest commandment is to love God with our whole selves, and THEN, we love our neighbor as ourself. To think we can love others without loving God first turns our ability to love into an idol.

“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.“

It is not harsh, it is loving. It is God saying to us, come back. The problem might be that we are unaware of our own wandering. For that, I pray.

Father, open our eyes that we might see if we have moved our hearts away from You, and from truth. I pray that true repentance will come to mark us, Your people. I pray You will pursue every sheep that has wandered away, and that as our good Shepherd, You will protect us from the wolf that seeks to destroy us.

May all who have wandered, return.

Thanks for reading! See you next time.

Random Thoughts

They come in the middle of the night when I’m awakened by either God or my bladder. Hard to tell which it is sometimes. The thoughts trickle in while I drive, while I work, when I’m knee deep in the gospels, and while I’m cooking dinner (admittedly, a rare event). Thoughts, whole and unfinished they come. Like a dripping faucet of Holy Spirit whispers that I hold close, not quite sure what to do with them. Some are the questions of my own ever searching heart. All of it feels like the hands of the Potter, shaping and re-shaping, molding, and smoothing my rough edges.

make your life a sacrifice. the whole life, not just the parts you don’t mind giving up. in order for it to be a sacrifice, you have to give what you’d rather keep. the best, the most, the prized, the coveted. all belongs on the altar.

big picture – make disciples. the church, working as one to reach the lost. global purpose, global pursuit. but it’s the smaller picture that pushes me back and pulls me in close at the same time. the picture of letting Christ be formed in me, not through performance but through bending my knee again and again. and again. big picture, little picture. He is saving the world and He is saving me. glory.

This earth offers two things: light and momentery afflictions, and light and momentary pleasures. we chase the pleasures and hope to avoid the afflictions but the pleasures do us no good. no room for growth, no reason to change, no faith required. it’s the afflictions that matter the most, because they form Jesus in us. push us to seek Him out, lean into Him, fall at His feet.

we should rather have momentary afflictions and eternal pleasure, than momentary pleasure and eternal affliction.

if you understood the grace that is yours, you would live differently. you just would.

matthew 14:17. “we only have…”. the cry of us all. i only have a little. i only have this much, that much, not much. when will i understand that it doesn’t matter how much i have, it matters what God will make of what i have? who might He feed with my little lunch?

you can’t give someone what they are meant to get from Jesus.

Jesus is heaven’s response to sin. every time.

what the church has built for herself, will come down. I will find My remnant.

Jesus, You fascinate me.

how am I living as though God is not in control?

God does not have dreams. He has unchanging plans and purposes, and they are good.

we need to stop telling people to chase their dreams and start telling them to chase the heart of Jesus.

no one comes to the Father except through Jesus. our destination is a person, not a place.

discipleship isn’t making people look like us. it’s helping people look like Jesus.

Mark 1:23. demons knew who Jesus was, and what He could do. what do demons know and believe that i don’t?

the devil lied, but Eve engaged the lie. how have i been engaging the lies the enemy is telling?

Matthew 14:14. He had compassion on them and healed their sick. not because they asked the right way, or because they had enough faith, or because they did all the right things. they were healed because He had compassion. no other reason.

Jesus, offend the religious spirit in the church. and in me.

i am as in need of Jesus today as i was the first day i met Him.

what has following Jesus cost me?

every need i have is met in Jesus.

marriage is a good thing, but it is not the better thing (Luke 10:42). glory days are good, but they are not the better thing. success is a good thing, but it is not the better thing. i fear we are making idols out of good things because we forget there is a better thing. or is it that, honestly, we value the good thing more than the better thing?

Jesus never changed course or softened His message because people were being offended.

can we just talk more about what God is doing than what we’re doing? goodness, let’s talk about Jesus more, in and out of the church.

Random thoughts that push at the edges of my mind until i write them down. Thoughts that turn into conversations with the Holy Spirit and then into something in me moving out of His way, making room for more of Him and less of me.

Don’t ignore the random thoughts.

40 days of truth: day 25—He Came for the Broken Me

“It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick… For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” 

Matthew 9:12-13

For the Sick. For the Unclean. For the Lost.

I wasn’t ready. Before He came to rescue me, people did their best to get me to come to Him, but I was never quite ready. For some reason I thought I needed to clean up my life first. Ha. As though.

I could have scrubbed for a decade and still would not have been clean enough to stand in the presence of God.

Only blood can make us clean and only one blood at that. The blood of Jesus has more power to cleanse us than 10,000 years of doing good things ever could.

He came for me because I was not righteous. Because I was sin-stained through and through, sick as a dog from my guilt and shame. He came for me because I had no way out on my own.

He saw me. Had compassion on me. Loved my whole broken self.

He didn’t come for the good girl I thought I needed to be. He didn’t come for the girl that dressed right and talked right and knew how to behave herself.

He came for the broken me.

And He still comes for me and this is the truth I need with every sunrise. He has cleansed me and He is cleansing me. He has forgiven me and He is still forgiving me. He has freed me and He is still freeing me.

Because He still loves me. He still chooses me. He still has compassion for me.

And for you.

Marriage Matters—Criticism

One of the most difficult things for me to do in my own marriage is to not try to change my husband. I used to fool myself into thinking I was pointing out flaws, or correcting him for his sake, but that just isn’t true. I’m doing it to make me more comfortable with who he is. The truth is, my correction (criticism) rarely has the desired outcome. It makes him defensive, not compliant, because he, just like me, is human and humans balk at being changed by someone through critical words.

Only God can truly change us, change our hearts so that our behavior and our thinking changes. I remember the day I learned this lesson (a lesson I am still struggling to learn well!). It was the day God spoke something to me that cleared up any misconception I had that I was doing something good by pointing out my husband’s flaws and mistakes.

“I have a Holy Spirit, and you are not Him.”

It is not easy to just let someone, especially someone we share life with, to just be who they are. But we must be honest enough with ourselves to realize that we need to change just as much as they do, and then we have to turn our attention back to God, the One who changes a person without criticism. I promise you, life with your spouse will get much easier, more peaceful, and more fun if you will stop trying to do what only God can do.

“Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.” (Matthew 7:3-5)

Then there’s that.

Marriage Matters—It’s Subtraction

I was thinking about marriage the other day, as I was getting ready for work. It took a hot minute for me to realize God was present, directing the entire conversation I was having with myself. 

I pondered my young, selfish view of marriage so many years ago, and then how many people I see today who have that same view. Oh, it’s not a conscious attitude. If it were we would surely correct ourselves. It shows up in our words and actions, without ever making an appearance in our brain (so it would seem). 

It’s the idea that when we get married, we are adding a spouse to our life. 

And then we’ll just go on with all our dreams, with all our habits and ways – we’ll just have someone else joining us. 

We don’t really think that deep about things like how we’ll spend our money now, how we’ll spend our time. We go into marriage enamored with the idea of sharing our life with this other person. Our life. Not their life. 

{And let’s be honest, many of us don’t think past the relief that now, we won’t be alone. That’s really as far as we got in considering this marriage gig.}

We don’t count the cost of marriage. We don’t think about all the ways our lives will no longer be our own, or about the fact that we are going from independence to dependence. We don’t consider that our plans and our dreams and our passions will not be center stage anymore – there is someone else’s plans, dreams, and passions in the picture now. 

We don’t let it sink in that we aren’t adding someone to our life, we are dying to our old life to begin this new life. We’re giving up our right to do anything our own way anymore, our right to live independent, to spend ourselves on what we want. To chase our own dreams, pursue our own plans. Marriage is about two becoming one, moving as one, living as one.

“So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”  (Matthew 19:6)

Marriage is not addition, its subtraction.

When we get that and choose accordingly, our marriage will flourish. When we don’t, it will break.

And when I bent over to spit the toothpaste out, God bent down with me and whispered… 

That same view of marriage is permeating the Gospel today. 

God forgive us for allowing people to believe that they are adding You to their life. 

“Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.” – Revelation 19:9

the things of God

He was in our midst. Listening. Watching. Whispering. None of us saw him there, except Jesus. Jesus heard. Jesus knew. 

“From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that He must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.  Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to You!”  Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”

 Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. ” Matthew 16:21-24

We like to wonder. We wonder if Satan knew from the beginning that Jesus’ death would bring about his defeat. I’ve sat in on numerous discussions of wonderings. “No, he couldn’t have known. He is not omniscient.” “He knew. That’s why he was trying to kill Jesus ahead of time, to stop Him from going to the cross.” “He probably knew some things, but he didn’t know the whole plan.” We wonder, and then we move on.

But today I couldn’t move on. I stood there listening to Jesus address the unseen one speaking through Peter. Whether Satan knew the whole plan or not, Jesus had just announced part of it. Satan knew that it was the will and the plan of the Most High God for Jesus to go to Jerusalem, be killed and then be raised to life.

And surely Satan knows that any plan of God’s will not end well for him.

And so I wonder. What has Satan tried to stop in my life? What part of my destiny has he overheard, and whispered “No!”, because he knows that my destiny fulfilled will not be good for him?

How has he tried to convince me that sacrificing myself on behalf of someone else isn’t in my best interest?

How many times have I been persuaded that doing the hard work of dying to my own needs and wants isn’t what God requires?

Dying to self. Loving the the one undeserving of love. Showing mercy instead of judgment. Praying for the one who hurt me. Doing what is right instead of what is easy. Fighting for a relationship I would rather walk away from. Turning the other cheek. Giving when I have little to give. Pushing through when I’d rather give up.  Being open and vulnerable when I would rather hide and self-protect. Believing for the impossible instead of settling for the possible. Choosing brokenness and humility over my pride.

Picking up my cross. Losing my life for Christ.

The things of God and the things of men.

And in the midst of God’s people, there is one who is whispering “No! Never!”.

May I, may we, the Church, learn to discern. And may our voice be heard echoing through the realms of darkness…

“Get behind Me, Satan!”