6:7 - There are people that sit in churches looking for reason to complain...looking for flaws instead of worshipping God. They aren't in the best company. Here is a list of the people at our church that fall in that category...j/k...hope you didn't get scared!
6:12 - Jesus prepares for big decisions through intense prayer...why would we do anything different?
6:19 - "And all the crowd sought to touch him, for power came out from him and he healed them all." I would hope that the people of our community would long to come in touch with Northside because we pour out the healing power of Jesus into our city. That is my prayer for us.
6:22ff - Take a minute...read verses 20-23, and then read verses 24-26. Which one do you more resemble? A scary reminder to seek humility and live with an understanding of your insufficiency's, because in those insufficiency's Jesus is powerful and we are grateful.
6:40 - We have a never-ending quest to train to be more like Jesus ahead of us...sounds like a wild ride!
6:46 - Really good question!
7:9ff - We should sit up and take notice when Jesus marvels at someones' faith. The centurion has an understanding of who Jesus is that surpasses that of the Jews - he is observant and clued in to the Spirit of God that Jesus exudes. He has a respect for the power of Jesus and a faithful expectation that Jesus will move powerfully in his life. We can take some hints from that guy.
7:13 - Jesus compassion for the widow gives us a clue about where our compassion should be directed.
7:44ff - We wary of undeserved "righteous" complacency in your life. This woman lived a sin-filled life and had nothing to offer Jesus but broken-hearted remorse...she gave him everything...laid it at his feet. The "good" man who arrogantly saw himself as "greater than" or "equal to" Jesus offered the son of God nothing. Let's hope we never begin t think that merely letting Jesus "come into our presence" is enough.
3 comments:
I think average Americans need a dose of 6:20-26.
I think it would definitely ramp up our faith!
I'm really glad you got to go to the retreat this weekend.
Luke's account of the "Sermon on the Mount" brings up an interesting observation. Jesus taught this sermon to several people that were present that day. That many people were able to share what they heard with someone else who was not present. Enough of this happened, that when Luke was tracking down who said what and when and where they did it, he was able to extract the same truth from that time of teaching that Matthew did and Jesus intended. I feel like at times when we teach (whether in our classroom setting or in our lives) we worry so much about the content and if people will be able to track with all of it. We spend so much time focusing and stressing on the details, when in the end what matters is consistency. Don't get me wrong: we are called to excellence. We are called to do our very best and make sure we put our very best foot forward, but in doing so we are NOT called to worrying about details and focusing on how or if people are catching on to everything we are saying, whether in a classroom or with our lives. Truth is truth, and it will come out in consistency, whether you intend it to or not...
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