As we also noted last week, Chapter 18 of Matthew’s Gospel presents us with Jesus’ teaching about how we are to view sin in our own lives and in the lives of one other: It begins with the observation that in order to inherit heaven’s kingdom, we must trust Jesus …
Our passage this morning makes absolutely no sense unless we understand and believe ourselves to be each other’s brothers and sisters, together sons and daughters of our loving and heavenly Father, called to live according to his will and ways through the giving of Christ’s Holy Spirit who indwells us …
Our passage this week immediately follows last week’s account in which Jesus explored with his disciples the matter of his own identity as God’s Messiah. So he first asked them who others said he, the Son of Man, was (v. 13). Having heard the offered suggestions, Jesus then turned to …
“Who do you say I am?” If we had to encapsulate the Gospel message to one key point, it would probably be the answer we provide to this question being posed by Jesus to his disciples: “Who do you say I am?” And by means of posing this question, we …
There are passages in Scripture that can be puzzling to us. They can be puzzling because the picture they present of God—the picture they present of Christ Jesus—goes counter to what we expect. When we think of Jesus, we think of someone who was always kind—always loving—always available to anyone …
This week’s passage is really a continuation of last week’s. In it we find Jesus telling a second parable to the religious leaders who have, as was their wont, yet again questioned his authority. As we saw last week, after Jesus entered the temple courts a second time—having cleared out …
Last week we saw how, Jesus “withdrew by boat privately to a solitary place”[1] upon hearing that Herod state that Jesus must be John the Baptist raised from the dead. [2] Then, from his deep compassion for the crowds, Jesus gave up his plan to be alone and instead healed …
I want to begin this morning by asking you to think about someone you love, a friend, family member, co-worker, what have you…. Now think about why you love that person. If someone were to ask you what was so special about this person, what would you say? What attributes …
I’ve gotten lucky these past few weeks since both parables we’ve covered have included Jesus’ interpretation of them. This week, however, we’re going to look at five short parables—some only a sentence or two long—and since Jesus only comments upon one of them, we’re going to have to work at …
Last week we considered various types of soil and saw how good soil, or believers respond to the Gospel message; bad soil, or those who reject the Gospel do not respond to this message for a variety of reasons. This week we’re going to consider a different metaphor for believers …
