Good morning. Jesus sends off the 12 to preach the word. As a note – Judas is with them. It does not say whether or not he participated in the preaching of the word. John the Baptist is in prison. He hears about the works of Christ. He knows that he himself is the forerunner for the Messiah, and that there are certain signs that the Christ will perform when He comes. Just to be sure, he sends his disciples to determine if Jesus is the Messiah. They are to ask Jesus, “Are You the Expected One, or do we look for someone else?” We do not know how long John's mother lived after he was born. You know that she would have told John about when Mary came to visit while he was still in her womb. Jesus tells John's disciples to go tell him what they heard and saw. Not only were there miracles, but also the poor had the gospel preached to them. This is what would accompany the Messiah. Jesus also said “Blessed is he who keeps from stumbling over Me.” After John's disciples leave, Jesus tells the multitudes just how great a man John was. He was the messenger preparing the way for Jesus. As great as John was, he was still not born again. He who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. That is counter-intuitive. One would expect John to be one of the greatest; but he was not born again. Jesus tells them that John was Elijah who was to come. John did not come eating and drinking, and they said he had a demon. Jesus did, and they said He was a gluttonous man and a drunkard. That sounds like today – you can't win for losing. It does not matter what you do or do not do as a Christian, you will be criticized. Father thank You that You give strength and encouragement to the reader. You help him/her to look forward to each day’s blessing.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

When considerable time had passed and the voyage was now dangerous, since even the fast was already over, Paul began to admonish them to not continue, because he perceived that not only would there be a loss of the cargo but also of their lives.

  Good morning. When it was decided that we would sail for Italy, they proceeded to deliver Paul and some other prisoners to a centurion. Notice that “we“ returns. Luke has not been mentioned during the entire two years that Paul was at Caesarea. I guess it is safe to assume that he was in the area during this time. We will leave out the names of a bunch of places where they passed. They had sailed for a good many days and began to have trouble with the wind. This was a warning of what was about to happen. When considerable time had passed and the voyage was now dangerous, since even the fast (Day of Atonement) was already over, Paul began to admonish them to not continue, because he perceived that not only would there be a loss of the cargo but also of their lives. The centurion was more persuaded by the pilot and the captain of the ship than by what was being said by Paul. They did not want to get stuck for the winter in the port where they were located. They actually were only g...
Read more

And they blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pain and their sores; and they did not repent of their deeds

  Good morning. And men repented, right? And they blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pain and their sores; and they did not repent of their deeds. The sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river, the Euphrates; and the water was dried up, so that the way would be prepared for the kings from the east. Previously, the 6th angel blew his trumpet and told them to release the four angels at the river Euphrates so that the army of 200 million could cross over. Back to the bowl: and I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs; for they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them together for the war of the great Day of God, the Almighty. Father continue to bring blessings upon the reader and his/her family every day  of their lives.
Read more
Good morning. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. That makes sense. Moreover we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise if in fact the dead are not raised. Is your head beginning to swim? For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised, and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. From what he says later, they must have had great concern about their friends or relatives who were Christians and had died earlier. But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits (The first sheaf of the harvest given to the Lord as a token that all of the harvest belonged to the Lord and would be dedicated to Him) of those who are asleep. Jesus was just the first to be raised from the dead, not the only one. We will see next time that Pa...
Read more