Midweek Devotion Healing

29 And immediately he left the synagogue and entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. 30 Now Simon's mother-in-law lay ill with a fever, and immediately they told him about her. 31 And he came and took her by the hand and lifted her up, and the fever left her, and she began to serve them. 32 That evening at sundown they brought to him all who were sick or oppressed by demons. 33 And the whole city was gathered together at the door. 34 And he healed many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons. And he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.

Jesus & the disciples had just left worship where demons were cast out. And instead of sending Jesus away, Peter invited him home with them. How many times have we been blessed in worship, but left God at church?

When we talk about Jesus touching people, it’s hard to relate that to today because Jesus isn’t physically present with us today. Although Jesus rose from the grave on Easter Sunday, according to the Bible his physical presence is in heaven at the Father’s right hand as our advocate. So how can people experience the touch of Jesus today if he’s not physically present? Well one way, perhaps the primary way, is through Jesus Christ’s Church. You see, the Bible calls the Christian Church "the body of Christ." That means that although Jesus’ physical body is in heaven, the Christian Church fills the void created by his physical absence. So one way Jesus touches people is through his community, his gathered people who seek to love and follow Jesus. So although his touch certainly isn’t limited to the Church, I believe the gathered Christian community is one of the primary ways people experience the touch of Jesus in their lives today.

Simon’s mother-in-law is home, sick in bed with a fever. Now technically, a fever isn’t an illness, but it’s a symptom. But for whatever reason-maybe she had the flu-she was so feverish that she couldn’t even get up out of bed. So Jesus heals her, but he heals her without saying a word. Most self-proclaimed faith healers in the ancient world would use incantations, elaborate rituals, or special potions to try to heal people. But what Jesus does is very different. He simply takes her hand, helps her up, and as he does, the fever breaks. Jesus doesn’t say a word. His touch is all she needs, and when his hands are on her, his healing she receives.

This woman’s immediate response to the touch of Jesus is to begin waiting on them. Now some have thought that this section to be teaching that a woman’s place is serving men, cooking food, cleaning house, and so forth. But the word for "wait on" here in v. 31 means "serve," and it’s the same word Jesus will use in chapter 10, when he says that he didn’t come to the earth to be served, but to serve. The point of this event isn’t that a woman’s place is serving men; the point is that a Christian’s place is serving others. When Jesus touches a person to heal them, the natural response is to serve God’s people, to use the opportunity of being restored to health as an opportunity to serve.

Now this miracle isn’t very spectacular. It’s in the privacy of a home, witnessed only by Simon, Andrew, James and John, and of course, Simon’s mother-in-law. Yet by that evening, the entire community gathers at the doorway to Simon’s home for healing and prayer. Imagine the scene, with people having every possible kind of sickness, limping, walking, being carried or dragged to this miracle worker named Jesus. Amputees who lost limbs in battles, epileptics, people with birth defects and abnormalities, people feverish with deadly viruses. There’s nothing that’s quite so humiliating as being seriously sick. When you’re really sick, you can’t control your bodily functions, you smell bad, people poke and prod you trying to figure out what’s wrong with you. Picture the scene as a multitude of sick and diseased people gather in front of the house for help. What a sight it must’ve been.

By touching others to heal them, Jesus shows us his AUTHORITY. Jesus’ healing miracles are another sign that God’s Kingdom has invaded human history. So the miracles point to something else, to God’s intervention in human history in a special way. The rule and reign of God has broken through our rule and reign on earth.

Now Jesus didn’t heal every sick person he came in contact with. And even those he did heal eventually got sick again and eventually died. So Jesus’ healings here are partial, a mere foretaste of future life in God’s Kingdom. Physical healing merely points us forward to our eventually resurrection and enjoyment of immortality in God’s presence.

And Jesus’ healing touch still comes to people, and it often comes through his Church. As we gather and worship together, as we pray for each other and follow Jesus together, the healing touch of Jesus comes to people.

Why does the healing touch of Jesus come to some people and not others? I don’t know. I think it’s just a mystery, a mystery we can’t explain and shouldn’t try to explain. I certainly don’t think it’s because we don’t have enough faith or that there’s hidden sin in the sick person’s life. I think it’s cruel to blame a sick person for their own lack of healing.

We need to constantly remember that physical healing in this life is only a foretaste of the real thing. When healing does come we should rejoice and thank God. But when it doesn’t come we shouldn’t beat ourselves up or try to figure out just the right formula. We simply keep walking, keep following Jesus. Full and final healing will come at the resurrection, and until them, the healing touch of Jesus is mysterious.

The End of the Day

You know they're tired when that don't even make it out of the kitchen with a snack.

Midweek Devotion

John 6:25-26 says, “When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, "Rabbi, when did you get here?" Jesus answered, "I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill.”

We often do things for the wrong reasons. As a young man I went to Junior College in Brevard, N.C. and I started attending a small Methodist church across the street from the school. I went every Sunday, dressed to kill, but I wasn’t doing so to be noticed by God, not even the preacher…but rather a nice young lady who was in school with me. I was hoping that she would notice me in church and not believe what she heard about my Friday and Saturday night antics. It didn’t work, but I went to church. We all have different reasons for attending church, don’t we? Some are here so that they could see other people. Perhaps for the fellowship or to catch up on the latest gossip.

Now, just as that crowd in this text followed Jesus primarily for a selfish reason; often people today follow Jesus for selfish reasons. There is a brand of theology out there called “prosperity theology” and if you’ve ever watched the religious channel you’ve seen it. It’s a theology that says if you come to Christ, He will take away all of your troubles. If you want to be healed, follow Jesus. If you want to take care of your financial difficulties, follow Jesus. If you want to meet the love of your life, follow Jesus.” Now all these are true in a sense. Jesus does heal, but not all the time. Jesus often does help you in your finances, but not always. The whole spouse thing I don’t know. Although I do believe that God had a hand in finding me a mate.

But if this is why you want to be a Christian, then you are being a Christian for the wrong reason. The focus of Christianity quickly becomes not how can I love and serve Christ, but what can I get from Him, and the focus of Christianity is not Christ, but rather the by-products of Christ.

Could you imagine if you built a marriage on the same principle? I love to eat my wife’s spaghetti sauce. In my opinion, there is none better. But you would say I was crazy if I told you that I married her for her spaghetti sauce, (unless of course you have tasted it). But how long do you think my marriage to Laurie would last if I was married to her not because I love who she is, but rather I love the way she cooks her spaghetti sauce? It wouldn’t last a year. The same thing happens when we follow Christ not because of who He is, but rather because of what He can give us.

You see we need to ask the question, “What happens when we follow Christ for the wrong reasons?” Often the response to that question is, we become disappointed and leave. A woman falls in love with a man because he has stomach you could iron a shirt on, but 5 years down the road when that six pack starts to look more like a barrel, she is disappointed and the marriage quickly falls apart. When I follow Christ because He will heal my cancer, or fix my marriage, or balance my check book, and when that doesn’t happen, I quickly fall away.”

And when you follow Christ for any reason other than who He is, you will be disappointed and you will say, “It didn’t work. Let me try something else.” Now, don’t get me wrong. God does heal, He does perform miracles, He does do all these things, but these are not why you become a Christian. You became a Christian because you were convinced that Jesus is the Christ, the promised Messiah. You follow because of who He is.

True faith is when you follow God not for the blessings that come with it, but from the blessing of who He is. Let me ask you a harsh question. If you were to lose your job, your family, and your health; would that change your relationship with God? Job is a good example of faith. Job was a wealthy man who had it all, but in one day he lost his children, his wealth, and what was his response. Did he curse God, “God, if this is how you treat your friends, I don’t want to be one!” No, listen to what Job said. In Job 1:20 when he hears this awful news, vs. 20 says, “At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship and said: "Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away; may the name of the LORD be praised."

You see, Job’s possessions, his family, even his health did not affect who God is. And here is another amazing thing to hear, even if God chose not to bless you in any way, He’d still be God and worthy of your worship. You see, we need to follow Christ today not because of what He can give us, but rather because of who He is. He is the Christ the Son of the living God. That would be enough, but instead He has done so much more. He has given us blessings upon blessings, He has met all of our needs, but most importantly, He has taken care of our greatest need. The bible says that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. When we were dead in our sins, Christ died for us. And when He rose from the grave and ascended into Heaven, He left the door open for us to come in.

Mignons First Hunting Trip

Today I took Mignon out to hunt for the first time. She told me Saturday that she wanted to shoot a deer. So today at 3:00 I picked her up from daycare and we went to our local feed store and bought her a gun, binoculars, and some ear protection just in case daddy shot.

We were hunting for Axis or Sika deer, not Whitetail. Axis meat is 99.8% fat free, making it the leanest meat of any mammal. The taste of the meat is very close to good beef. Among aficionados of venison, sika flesh is regarded as one of the very finest and most flavourful of all game meats at the dinner table.

Unfortunately whitetail was all that came to the feeder.

Mignon did really well. She sat in the deer blind with me for two and a half hours without a complaint.

We had a really good afternoon and spent some real quality time together sans television. She wants to go again.

I really hope that she becomes an outdoor enthusiast and enjoys fishing and hunting.

We topped the afternoon off with a Dairy Queen hamburger. It was an exceptionally good afternoon.

Midweek Devotion

Read Luke 16:1-13

A hen and a pig approached a church and read the advertised sermon topic: “What can we do to help the poor?” Immediately the hen suggested they feed them bacon and eggs. The pig thought for a moment and said, “There is only one thing wrong with feeding bacon and eggs to the poor. For you it requires only a contribution, but for me it requires total commitment.” That story also serves to illustrate a key point that we will be emphasizing from the Scripture today: Counting the Cost.

That is something that we don’t like to think about too often. But, everything comes at a cost. For an athlete, they must decide early in life just how serious he/she wants to become in their sport and train accordingly. I remember watching the Olympics this summer. Some of those people have been training for 6-10 years just to qualify to participate in the Olympic games. What dedication to sport. What a price to pay. They will train and condition themselves for years just for the chance to compete.

This morning’s Gospel reading is the Parable of the Unjust Steward: Luke 16:1-13. This is one of the most difficult parables to understand, because at first blush it looks as if Jesus is condoning deceitful practices. On careful reflection however, I don’t think he is. One of the interesting things about difficult parables is that Jesus explains the difficulties and this parable is no exception.

What Jesus is admiring is the shrewdness of unjust steward. We see this with Jesus’ comment in Luke 16:8. The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are shrewder in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light.

Jesus is not commenting on the morality of the man. The message of this parable however is not found in this difficulty. Rather the key verse to the parable is found in Luke 16:13 No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.

It seems to me that the message of this parable is simply this. That Jesus is looking for single-minded people, people totally dedicated to God, who have one purpose in life to serve God in all they do. If we are Christians, we are God’s stewards and the challenge is, what kind of steward are we. The Unjust Steward was single-minded but he wasn’t serving the right master.

Jesus is stressing discipleship, not necessarily salvation. I think it’s possible to be a believer and not follow Jesus and his teachings. I know because I’ve been there. My faith in Jesus as Savior is rock solid as it is for many people. But my dedication to His Lordship, that is, to what he taught and the lifestyle he advocated has flagged at times. Jesus talked earlier in Luke 14 about how everyone is invited to come to the banquet of salvation. It’s freely offered and freely received. We don’t have to count the cost for salvation because Jesus already did that. But discipleship is a different matter. It is costly. Discipleship is not an invitation to a Sunday school picnic. It is an invitation to a long term relationship.

Facebook

I started this blog mainly so that Laurie and I could report our experiences from General Assembly. Then it evolved into a way to share pictures and info with family and friends. I have avoided myspace and did not know much about facebook; but this past week at the Couples in Ministry retreat most everybody was on facebook and they were singing its praises.

So I joined facebook and it has helped me to reconnect with some friends that I haven't seen in years. Laurie will be on facebook later this week. Take a look it is a really neat idea.