Tuesday, April 12, 2016

 When he came to his senses, he said,  ‘How many of my father’s hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death!  I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you.  I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.’ So he got up and went to his father.        

                                                          - Luke 15:17-20a

I must admit that I have sometimes wondered if this younger son’s decision to return home was truly the result of a broken and repentant heart, or if it was more of a desperate survival tactic motivated out of self-preservation.  After all, which of us hasn’t turned to God in a crisis, begging Him to help us out of whatever fix we were in, and promising to change our behavior if He will bail us out one last time?

However, if we dig a little deeper into the historical context of the story, it becomes clear that returning home is no “quick fix” for his money problems.  He would have had to endure extreme shame and the scorn of his family and entire village. In his book The Cross and the Prodigal, Dr. K.E. Bailey describes what this process might have been like.  “As the son comes closer to his home, he feels fear and shame. He wished his father dead, left family and community, and now he has lost everything. He expects to face his father’s and brother’s anger and rejection. Further, the community would reject and banish him, as was the custom.  Any Jew who lost his family’s money among foreigners would face the Kezazah ceremony (literally “the cutting off”). The Kezazah would be performed by breaking a large clay pot at the feet of the prodigal as visual symbol that the community rejected him forever.”  So this lost son would have understood that to return was not going to be easy. 

Another reason for believing that his motives were not entirely selfish is the content of his rehearsed speech. He is at least saying the right things, he acknowledges his sin against both his heavenly and his earthly father.  He also recognizes that he cannot presume to re-enter his old life on the same terms, as if the whole thing had never happened.

Still, I think we have to admit that this son, like all of us, is probably a mixed bag when it comes to the true motivations of his heart and his reasons for returning home.  Did he long for his former life as his father’s son? Quite likely.  Was he thinking with his growling stomach?  Also very likely.  Was he completely genuine and repentant in his confession speech?  Are you?  Am I?  The truth is that none of us are 100% in anything we do.  However, as we will soon find out, the restoration of the son does not depend on the quality and sincerity of the son’s speech, but on the grace and compassion of the Father!

Biblical scholars agree that this is the turning point of the story (at least for the younger brother). This is the moment when his life begins to change.  The phrase “When he came to his senses” actually means when he came to himself--when he remembered who he was.  All of the things that he had sought his identity in were gone: money, women, freedom, friends, etc., and all he has left is the faint memory of the son he used to be.  As far as he was able, he turned his heart toward home. 

This is the beginning of repentance.  We do not have to have our act together.  We do not have to know all of the right words to say and we may not even understand all of the words we do know.  All our Father asks of us is that we “come to our senses” and return to Him.

Pastor Jeff Frazier

Monday, April 11, 2016

Now the tax collectors and “sinners” were all gathering around to hear him.  But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered,  “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”    - Luke 15:1-2

This week, our online devotionals will be centered on Luke 15 and the Parable of the Prodigal Son.  In order for us to get beyond our general familiarity with the basic story and grasp the depth of Jesus’ meaning in it, we must understand something about the culture in which it was told and the people to whom it was first addressed.

In just a few verses here, Luke gives us quite a bit of information about the setting in which Jesus told this parable.  There was a growing controversy surrounding Jesus wherever He went.  Jesus was becoming an irritation and a threat to the religious establishment of His day.  His teaching was a challenge to their understanding of God’s law and His miracles were a challenge to their moral authority in that society.  This would not really be such a big deal if it were not for the fact that Jesus was drawing a crowd wherever He went; people were listening to Him and gathering around Him.  Worse still was the kind of people that were gathering around Jesus.  Luke writes that they were “tax collectors and sinners”.  This was one of the major objections that the religious establishment had against Jesus.

While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and “sinners” came and ate with him and his disciples.  When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples,  “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?”  - Matthew 9:10-11

But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples,  “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?”  - Luke 5:30

Who were the tax Collectors and sinners?  Many of us Sunday School types think of the “wee little man” Zacchaeus when we hear the term tax Collector.   However, tax Collectors were really a hated lot by the Jews.  At this point in history, the world is ruled by Rome, from India to England.  Rome was not all the togas and marble that you see in the movies. They were a ruthless empire. In fact, there are historical accounts of Rome conquering a city and then taking thousands of men, women and children, stripping them naked and crucifying them on the road leading up to that city for miles. Anyone going into the city would get the horrific message, “Don’t mess with Rome!” They were a brutal regime.  Now if you rule from India to England and you don’t have an air force or you don’t have the ability to press a button and launch weapons, the only way you can govern a landmass that size is with a massive army.  How do you fund, supply, feed and train a massive army? Taxes. Heavy taxes on the conquered people to pay for the army that was killing so many of their own people!

The second group that Luke mentions are the “sinners”.  For us to understand “sinners,” we have to get out of the Western mindset.  Because we tend to think, you’re a sinner, I’m a sinner, everyone is a sinner. That’s not the understanding of the Jews of Jesus’ day (though it should have been). To the Jews, “sinner” applied only to a specific class of people in society: people who are deformed, diseased, or whose profession is one that the Jews would have considered wicked.  This included prostitutes, strippers, slave traders, thieves, or those with some kind of physical ailment that the Jews viewed as being a curse from God.

These people would have had the very clear understanding that they were not welcome in the religious circles.  They were not allowed to go to the temple. They were not allowed to hear the Torah read aloud in the synagogue. They were totally cut off from the religious life of the community.

I met with a man several years ago that had been in and out of prison and had led a very troubled life.  Over a cup of coffee, he said to me, “I am just not the kind of guy that God is interested in, and I have accepted that.”  This statement closely resembles the basic view of many of those who were gathered around Jesus.

Now stop and think about this for a moment…

In Jesus day, the moral and religious outsiders were attracted to Him and gathered around to hear His message, while the moral and religious insiders were irritated, annoyed, and confused by Him.

I fear that for too many Christians, and too many churches the dynamic is exactly the opposite.  We attract the insiders to our religious club, and those on the outside continue to stay away.

The question is this: Is the church (our church) a place where outsiders and outcasts are made to feel welcome?  Are you the kind of Christ-follower that attracts those who might feel as though they are beyond the reach of God’s love?  If we claim to be followers of Christ, then we should examine our lives by His standard.

On hearing this, Jesus said to them,  “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”  - Mark 2:17 

Pastor Jeff Frazier

Friday, April 8, 2016

But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him.  He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and took care of him.  The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper.  ‘Look after him,’ he said,  ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’  “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”  The expert in the law replied,  “The one who had mercy on him.”  Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”  - Luke 10:33-37

The first three words of this passage are the most shocking and surprising of the whole story.  “But a Samaritan…” this was the last thing that this expert lawyer would have expected Jesus to say. 

A little historical background…
This expert in the law was a most likely a scribe and a possibly a Pharisee.  A scribe was a specially trained expert in the Torah, or Jewish Old Testament Law.  A scribe’s job was to read, study, copy and protect the law.  scribes were highly respected in Jewish culture.  Not all Pharisees were scribes, but most scribes were Pharisees (think about that for a minute).  A scribe’s place was in the Synagogue, while a priest and a Levite operated within the Temple.  There was a kind of religious rivalry between the priestly class and the class of the scribes and teachers of the law.  Each group thought their role was more important and looked down their nose at the other group.  

Keep in mind that the first two men to pass by this poor half-dead traveler without helping him in Jesus’ story were a priest and a Levite.  It is quite probable that this expert in the law expected Jesus to say that a scribe or a Teacher of the Law came by next and stopped to help this man.  He might have been thinking to himself, “It is just like a priest to be too high and mighty to help someone in need. But not me! I would have stopped to care for such a man!”

But Jesus turns this expert’s world upside down when He says that it was a Samaritan who stopped to help. He must have thought, “A Samaritan?  Did he just say a Samaritan?  Nah!  He couldn’t possibly be saying anything good about a Samaritan.”  

A little more history…
Samaritans were from the northern region of Israel and the Jews in the surrounding area hated them.  Samaritans in Jesus day were descended from the Jews who intermarried with the conquering Assyrians and faithful Jews considered them half-breeds and traitors.  There were actually prayers in the Mishna from Jesus day asking God to withhold His grace from the Samaritans!  The hatred was a two-way street; the Samaritans hated the Jews right back.  Do you get the picture?  It was even worse than Bears and Packers fans!

Did you notice the question Jesus asked this expert at the end of His parable?  He asks, "Which of these three was a neighbor to the man who was left for dead?"  It is a simple question, with a fairly obvious answer.  But did you notice the way that this man answers Jesus’ question? He says that it was “the one who had mercy on him”.  He (the expert in the law) cannot even bring himself to say that it was the Samaritan; he calls him “the one who had mercy”!

It must have felt like a punch in the gut when Jesus told him to go and do likewise.  Go and live your live like this Samaritan. Ouch!

So Jesus says to you and to me, “go and do likewise”: go and love your God and extend compassion to your neighbor.  That’s it. You heard him. Get going!  Go out into the world and live your life in love for God and in service to others…go on!  Your neighbors are in need and your God is calling. Are you still reading this?  Get going!

Pastor Jeff Frazier

Thursday, April 7, 2016

But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus,  “And who is my neighbor?”  In reply Jesus said:  “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead.  A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side.  So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side.  But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him.  He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and took care of him.  The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper.  ‘Look after him,’ he said,  ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’  “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”  The expert in the law replied,  “The one who had mercy on him.”  Jesus told him,  “Go and do likewise.” - Luke 10:29-37

This parable of the Good Samaritan may be one of the best known and best loved (along with the parable of the Prodigal Son) in all of the Bible.  However, while it is one of the best known, it may also be one of the least lived parables by those who claim to be Christians.  

Keep in mind that this entire parable is told in response to a question that was asked of Jesus.  An expert in the law was questioning Jesus about who really qualified as his neighbor. This story is Jesus’ brilliant and powerful answer.

When Jesus begins His story by saying, “a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho”, he is referring to an actual road between the two cities; it was about 17 miles long and it really did go “down”.  The road from Jerusalem to Jericho dropped nearly 2,500 ft over those 17 miles!  It was also a notoriously dangerous road where robberies and ambushes of travelers was not uncommon.

We aren’t told anything about this poor fellow who gets attacked and left for dead.  We don’t know anything about his ethnicity, his religion, his occupation, or his family.  He is just a person in desperate need of help, which is kind of the point Jesus is making.  But we do know something about the other three characters in the story: a priest, a Levite, and a Samaritan.  Everybody knows the story from here right?  The priest and the Levite ignore the guy, but the Samaritan has compassion on this fellow and helps him.  

It is easy to be harsh and judgmental about the actions of the priest.  But the truth is that it would not have been easy for the priest to help this guy.  First of all, it could have been a trick or a trap.  Perhaps those robbers who attacked this guy were still nearby.  Perhaps they were waiting in ambush to attack him.  Secondly, he doesn’t know if this man is dead or alive.  If the guy turns out to be dead, or if he dies while he is trying to help him, then the priest would be defiled (ceremonially unclean) from touching a dead body (Lev. 21) and would not be able to carry out his priestly duties.  He would have had to go back to Jerusalem and carry out the complicated cleansing rituals in the temple in order to have another priest pronounce him clean again.  This would have taken at least a week and would have involved considerable expense for the priest and for his family.  In other words, it would not have been an easy thing for this priest to decide to stop and help; he would have been taking a pretty big risk.  To help this guy was probably going to cost him a good deal of time and money.

I think it is a bitter irony that it was the priest’s own religion that kept him from stopping to help this man.  Remember that Jesus had just said that the two most important commands in all of Scripture are to love God and to love others; He does not say that the most important commands are the OT laws about staying “clean”!

Who is your neighbor?  Anyone in need of compassion (this means everyone).
What holds you back from extending compassion to others?
Does your “religion” ever get in the way of your compassion? 

Pastor Jeff Frazier

Wednesday, April 6, 2016

On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus.  “Teacher,” he asked,  “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”  “What is written in the Law?” he replied.  “How do you read it?”  He answered: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and,  ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”  “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied.  “Do this and you will live.”  But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus,  “And who is my neighbor?”   - Luke 10:25-29

This expert in the law has asked Jesus a very profound question and Jesus has given him a very clear and straightforward answer. Well, okay. Technically Jesus answered his question with a question. But either way, He brought this “expert” to the heart of the matter.

I want you to focus on the final sentence in the above passage.  He (the expert in the law) wanted to justify himself.  Don’t we all?!?  What is it about us human beings that we are prone to look for loopholes or the exception to the rule?  Why couldn’t this expert lawyer simply take Jesus’ reply that he is to love God and to love others at face value?  Why did he (why do we) feel that he needed some justification?

Perhaps he was trying to put Jesus to the test.  He might have been trying to catch Jesus on some technical matter of interpretation of the law (after all he was an expert in it).

Perhaps it was because he expected Jesus to say that his neighbors are his family, his friends and his fellow faithful Jews.  Perhaps he really thought that he was keeping the law and fulfilling his obligation to love God and others, and he wanted to hear Jesus tell him “good job!”

Maybe he was just trying to put on a show for those in the crowd.  He might have been more concerned with his reputation--more worried about what others were thinking of him than what Jesus thought of him.

But maybe there was a part of him, somewhere deep down inside, that knew he was not living up to this law of love (after all he was an expert in it).  Maybe he was trying to find some way that he could wriggle out from under the weight of its conviction.  Maybe, just maybe, he (like all of us) knew in his heart that he could not keep the law the way that God commanded.

If we are honest with ourselves, we all must admit that we fall far short of the standards God sets for us in His word.  The truth is that we fall short not only of God’s holy standards, but also of our own concept of basic human decency as well.  I know I do. I say that I believe in forgiveness, but I often withhold forgiveness from those who need it.  I say that I believe in humility, but I harbor pride and arrogance in my heart.  I say that I believe in honesty, but I am too often prone to spin or color the truth in my favor.  I say that I believe in the high ideal of love, but I do and say unloving things nearly everyday. 

Who am I, and who are you--who are any of us--to try and justify ourselves before Jesus?  The whole point of the gospel message is that we cannot justify ourselves!  Only Jesus can justify us before God!  The only proper response is to fall on our knees before Him, confess our failures, and beg for his mercy.

Take a few moments to reflect on your own heart. Consider what areas you feel the need to justify yourself before God. Where do you tend to make excuses for yourself?

Oh Lord we know that we cannot hope to justify ourselves before your holy standard.  We can only cast ourselves upon the mercy of the only one that can justify us – Jesus Christ. It is in His mighty name that we pray, Amen.

Pastor Jeff Frazier

Tuesday, April 5, 2016

Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together.  One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”  Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it:  ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’   - Matthew 22:34-39

Yesterday we read a similar passage in Luke 10:25-28.  In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus is the one who quotes the OT law (Deut. 6:5).  Matthew tells us that Jesus was being tested with a tough question.  He was asked to boil down the commands of God to a single statement.  In other words, “Tell us what it is all about Jesus.  What does faith in God really mean?”  Wouldn’t you like to hear from the ultimate authority on what life and faith are really all about?  

Jesus’ answer to this question is amazing!  His answer is so simple, and yet it is also deeply profound.  I had a theology professor who used to say, “Any idiot can make simple things sound complex, but it takes real genius to make complex things sound simple.”  This is precisely what Jesus does here!  He takes the great complex mysteries of life, the Bible, God, and faith, and distills them down to two beautifully simple and clear commands: love God and love people!

There it is. You want to know what the Christian life is all about?  It is right there in those two commands.  Jesus says that everything else “hangs on these two commands”.  

You might think of these two commands as describing the vertical relationship and the horizontal relationships that make up the Christian life.  The vertical relationship is to love God with all of your heart, soul, mind and strength.  The horizontal relationship is to love your neighbor as yourself.  For those of you who are visual learners, think of these two areas as the two beams that make up a cross.

It is important for us to realize that you have to have both.  You cannot have a cross without the two beams.  If you take away the horizontal beam, you are left with a stake in the ground.  If you take away the vertical beam, the horizontal beam falls to the ground.  You cannot love God if you ignore your neighbor and when you love your neighbor you also love God.  This may sound obvious or simplistic, but too many Christians overemphasize one to the neglect of the other.  The wisdom of Jesus shows us that you simply cannot separate the two because they are really not two different commands, but one.

If anyone says,  “I love God,” yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.  – 1 John 4:20

All of your studying, all of your giving, all of your serving, all of your attending, all of your worshipping, all of your teaching, all of your meeting, all of your praying, all of your fasting, all of your reading, all of your sharing, all of your witnessing, all of your writing, all of your calling, all of your walking, talking, eating, breathing, living, and dying should be done in love for God and in love for others!

Take a few moments to do a little self-assessment in these two areas; love for God and love for others.

• Are you harboring any bitterness or resentment toward God or another person?
• Are you spending time with God in His Word and in prayer?
• Are you taking time to listen and extend kindness to others in your life?

Oh Lord, teach us to love you with all of our heart, soul, mind and strength, and grant us your grace to love others as ourselves.  Keep us from distractions and divisions.  Keep our hearts focused on these two simple commands.  – Amen.

Pastor Jeff Frazier

Monday, April 4, 2016

On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus.  “Teacher,” he asked,  “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”  “What is written in the Law?” he replied.  “How do you read it?”  He answered: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and,  ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”  “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied.  “Do this and you will live.”   - Luke 10:25-28

Let’s begin with a question…what is the most important question you could possibly ask?

The question, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” is easily the most important question any person can ask. It is more important than the question, “Where should I live?”  It is more important than the question, “Whom shall I marry?” It is more important than the question, “What career shall I pursue?”  The reality is that life is so uncertain that a person could be in his grave before he marries or enters a career.  So the matter of where one spends eternity is the crucial issue to settle before all others.

A man well versed in the study of the Jewish Law (a lawyer) asked this very question of Jesus Christ.  But it is possible to ask the right question with the wrong motives, and that is just what this Jewish lawyer did. He knew the answer to the question in his head, but his heart was not right before God.  He was not open to the fact that he needed eternal life for himself.  He knew the Law far better than the average Jew. He kept the Law...or so he thought.  After all, he was no "pagan" or Samaritan!  He was asking the question about eternal life to test Jesus.  Perhaps he wanted to trip up Jesus or to demonstrate his own superior knowledge in front of the crowd.

But Jesus turned the question back on the lawyer.

Jesus did not say to the lawyer, “What do the scribes and Pharisees say?” He didn’t ask, “What is the tradition of our Jewish religion?” He didn’t say, “That’s an interesting question. What is your opinion?” He didn’t inquire about any mystical spiritual experiences had by the man. Rather, Jesus directed the man back to the written Word of God: “What is written in the Law?  How do you read it?”

The Bible and the Bible alone is our sole authority in matters of faith and practice. This may sound basic to you, and in some ways it is; but it is under constant attack and so we must hold firmly to it. It was one of the central issues of the Reformation (Sola Scriptura).  It is a crucial dividing line between evangelical Protestant churches and the Roman Catholic Church.  If we move away from Scripture as our only authority, we are adrift on a sea of subjectivity where we can end up saying many things that contradict the Bible. So, what does Scripture say on the crucial question, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?”  This is essentially the question that Jesus puts to the lawyer.

The lawyer answers Jesus by quoting the two great commandments--that we must love the Lord our God with our total being and love our neighbor as ourselves.  Jesus praises this answer: “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live” (10:28).  Notice that Jesus did not say, “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.” Neither did Jesus say,  “Just pray this little prayer after me.”  Why did Jesus answer as He did?  Maybe He needed some training on how to share His faith! Or, maybe we need some instruction from Him on how to share our faith!

When it comes to loving God with our total being, we cannot begin to love a God whom we do not know. And, as Jesus has just said, “No one knows who the Father is except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him” (Luke 10:22).  If this lawyer had evaluated his life correctly by the standard of God’s Law, he would have seen immediately that he fell far short. He would have fallen down before Jesus and cried, “How can I know God and love God as I ought?” Jesus would have replied, “Repent of your self-righteousness and believe in Me. I alone give eternal life to those who believe and follow Me.”

Have you asked this all-important question about eternal life?

Have you found the answer in Jesus Christ?

Have you shared this answer with anyone else who may be asking the question?

Pastor Jeff Frazier