sit where?

While Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside by themselves, and said to them on the way, “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death; then they will hand him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified; and on the third day he will be raised.” Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee came to him with her sons, and kneeling before him, she asked a favor of him. And he said to her, “What do you want?” She said to him, “Declare that these two sons of mine will sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your kingdom.” But Jesus answered, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?” They said to him, “We are able.” He said to them, “You will indeed drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left, this is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.” When the ten heard it, they were angry with the two brothers. But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be your slave; just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:17-28, NRSV)

Do you think James and John really knew what they were asking for?

I mean for one to be at Jesus’ right hand and one at His left hand in His glory…

Were they asking to be the thieves?

Because we confess every day in worship that Jesus ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father… So if Jesus is at the right hand of the Father, who is sitting on Jesus’ left side?

Yes – God the Father… So which of James or John wants to take God the Father’s seat?

We must lose our lives and become a servant of all, seeking not our own glorification but the sharing of God’s grace with everyone!

lose it

“Everyone therefore who acknowledges me before others, I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven; but whoever denies me before others, I also will deny before my Father in heaven. “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. (Matthew 10:32-39, NRSV)

Have you ever felt like you lost it all?

Like everyone and everything was against you?

No matter what you did it wasn’t right and life seems to deal you a rotten hand every time….

Or the flip side, did you ever feel like you had it all together and were on top of the world?

Jesus said He did not come to bring peace, but a sword and that He would put father against son and mother against daughter and family would be against those who are supposed to be for us…

We are called to follow Jesus, have the proper placement of our position so we are seeing the back of His head as we go where He leads. And doing this the world will turn against us, even those we love and are supposed to support us…

We will be ridiculed and it will seem like we have lost it all, but that my friends is how we truly find it!

Jesus said when we lose according to the world we win in Him. If we lose our lives and give it up to Him, we will be winners!

Listen!

“The first service that one owes to others in the fellowship consists of listening to them. Just as love of God begins with listening to his word, so the beginning of love for our brothers and sisters is learning to listen to them”-Dietrich Bonhoeffer-Life together

How many of us listen to each other? Really listen. We might hear what someone else is saying to us, but do we hear them, or do we think we know what they said?

Most of us will hear 3 – 4 words of someone speaking to us and then start formulating what we are going to say. We will hear where a sentence starts and then begin working on our come back, what we will respond with. In doing this, you are no longer listening, but are paying attention to yourself. This is one of the first things I work on with couples that I am working through premarital counseling with. Communication is the basis for every relationship, and if you are not communicating there is no basis for a relationship. This is why we pray, to communicate with God. Part of this should be silence to listen for what God has to say to us. We need to listen not only to get to know the other person, but we need to listen, because that is what we have to do in order to communicate. In order to know what to really say we have to listen, and hear what is said to us. Then and only then can we respond with a response that is one that will build the relationship. It may not always be what the other person wants to hear, but it will build the relationship if it is spoken in love after listening and hearing what was said. If we listen and hear, then we will get to know more about the person and grow deeper in relation to them.

That is what Bonhoeffer tells us in the quote above. We owe it to others to listen to them. We need to hear them and to love them by being quiet and not formulating a response while they are talking. To hear them as we hear His word.

So the next time you are listening, listen and hear. Grow in relation to others.

proper place

From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.” But he turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life? “For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done. Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.” (Matthew 16:21-28, NRSV)

Our plans are not God’s plans!

This reading makes that clear. Peter  did not see the end of the plan and therefore did not understand what had to happen. he had in his mind what was going to happen, and when Jesus deviated from that, Peter asserted that Jesus was wrong and Peter knew how this was going to go…

When we look to our own hearts, wants and desires, we can not see what we need to see. We set our minds on our own desires and can not see the way God has set it out to be.

We need to know our proper place.

The words Jesus first speaks to Peter, He spoke to the other disciples as well. Earlier in the Gospel of Matthew in chapter 4:

“As he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea—for they were fishermen. And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.”” (Matthew 4:19-20, NRSV)

Follow me – or get behind me… in the Greek these are the same phrase. You see it is about proper place. It is true that Jesus walks with us, and is our friend, but He is God, and we need to follow Him or be behind Him. If we are looking into His face, we are in the wrong place.

We need to see the back of His head, as we walk behind Him to follow where He is leading.

So set your mind on Godly things, and get in the proper place and follow Jesus through the plan as God has set it to be.

chaos

For thus says the LORD, who created the heavens (he is God!), who formed the earth and made it (he established it; he did not create it a chaos, he formed it to be inhabited!): I am the LORD, and there is no other. I did not speak in secret, in a land of darkness; I did not say to the offspring of Jacob, “Seek me in chaos.” I the LORD speak the truth, I declare what is right. Assemble yourselves and come together, draw near, you survivors of the nations! They have no knowledge—those who carry about their wooden idols, and keep on praying to a god that cannot save. Declare and present your case; let them take counsel together! Who told this long ago? Who declared it of old? Was it not I, the LORD? There is no other god besides me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is no one besides me. Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other. By myself I have sworn, from my mouth has gone forth in righteousness a word that shall not return: “To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear.” Only in the LORD, it shall be said of me, are righteousness and strength; all who were incensed against him shall come to him and be ashamed. In the LORD all the offspring of Israel shall triumph and glory. (Isaiah 45:18-25, NRSV)

Have you ever stopped and thought about creation?

How everything was created?

Sometimes it seems like chaos. The world around us is so chaotic that it seems like it was created to be chaos. But is that creation or the way we see it and experience it?

You see, the world was created “good”! For when God saw everything He said it was good.

So it is not chaos or chaotic, but we experience like that because we are living in our flesh and in a sinful nature, which makes us see the world as chaos, yet in God’s eye and the hand that created everything it is good and perfect. If we turn to Him, and live in His peace and see the world through His eyes, the chaos will fade and our true life will be seen.

So live in His live, trusting in His peace, knowing His creation was and is good!

apostleship

Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures, the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for the sake of his name, including yourselves who are called to belong to Jesus Christ, (Romans 1:1-6, NRSV)

Paul was called to be a disciple. Just like Andrew, Nathaniel, James and John, and all the rest of the 12 apostles.

You also were called by god to be a disciple, a learner of the teachings of Jesus and a doer of His will, and an apostle. You are one that is sent by God into the world to show the world what He has done for all of us.

Because of who Jesus was, a descendant of David, and because of who He is, the Son of God who died on the cross and rose from the dead for us. We are all called and sent to show His love and to call people to listen to Him and to allow Him to change them and bring them into an obedience of faith!

So listen to the call and heed it, and go into the world, knowing He goes with you!

change…

and immediately he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues, saying, “He is the Son of God.” All who heard him were amazed and said, “Is not this the man who made havoc in Jerusalem among those who invoked this name? And has he not come here for the purpose of bringing them bound before the chief priests?” Saul became increasingly more powerful and confounded the Jews who lived in Damascus by proving that Jesus was the Messiah. After some time had passed, the Jews plotted to kill him, but their plot became known to Saul. They were watching the gates day and night so that they might kill him; but his disciples took him by night and let him down through an opening in the wall, lowering him in a basket. When he had come to Jerusalem, he attempted to join the disciples; and they were all afraid of him, for they did not believe that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him, brought him to the apostles, and described for them how on the road he had seen the Lord, who had spoken to him, and how in Damascus he had spoken boldly in the name of Jesus. So he went in and out among them in Jerusalem, speaking boldly in the name of the Lord. He spoke and argued with the Hellenists; but they were attempting to kill him. When the believers learned of it, they brought him down to Caesarea and sent him off to Tarsus. Meanwhile the church throughout Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace and was built up. Living in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it increased in numbers. (Acts 9:20-31, NRSV)

Can a person really change?

That is what the Jews were asking and the disciples… Saul is just trying to tellus he has changed. He is tricking us by claiming Jesus is the Messiah…

But when God changes a person, that person is changed. And there is the kicker, it is God who does the change, not the person.

But when God encountered Saul, he was so different, that He had to change his name. God changed Saul to Paul, and set him on a course to set the world on fire with the love of Christ.

What will God do through you if you will let Him change you?

can you imagine…

Then Jesus cried again with a loud voice and breathed his last. At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After his resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many. Now when the centurion and those with him, who were keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were terrified and said, “Truly this man was God’s Son!” (Matthew 27:50-54, NRSV)

Can you imagine being the one who stood by His cross, pierced His side, and watched Him die?

Can you imagine having no faith in Him, but then understanding everything to be true, and beleiving?

Actually that is what happened to all of us.

Even if we were raised in a home that taught us the faith, we still at some point heard the words spoken, and the promises that were given and we believed, and made a confession, “Truly this man is the Son of God!”

And we were the ones who pierced His side, and hung Him on the cross, yet He still made those promises for us!

So imagine Him loveing you, because He does, and now go and confess Him to the world.

if

When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away, and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.” (john 11:17-27, NRSV)

If you had been here…

I know he will rise again…

Yes Lord I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God…

All of the statements at the end are cancelled by the statement, “If you had been here…”

If we really believe in the resurrection, and if we truly believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the Living God, then there is no if you had been here. There is the here and now, and the fact that He is always with us, even when we do not feel Him, or see Him, or know He is there.

Jesus waited 4 days, because in 3 days Lazarus could have waken up, and for the sake of the disciples He wanted them to see the true power, and sometimes we need that as well, but knowing the stories we do, we shoudl wipe if away, and always go with since…

Since I know Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the Living God, I will trust and follow and know that He will always provide and care for me!

follow me…

The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Follow me.” Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth.” Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip said to him, “Come and see.” When Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him, he said of him, “Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!” Nathanael asked him, “Where did you get to know me?” Jesus answered, “I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you.” Nathanael replied, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!” (John 1:43-49, NRSV)

Can anything good come out of Nazareth?

Truly you are the Son of God!

When we encounter Jesus, the Son of God we will know it.

And when we are calm and follow Him our lives will be filled with wonders we won’t be able to imagine.

So know that He knows you and still loves you and asks for you to follow Him.