Matthew 17
The Transfiguration
1After six days Jesus took with him Peter, James and John the brother of James, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. 2There he was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light. 3Just then there appeared before them Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus.
4Peter said to Jesus, "Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, I will put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah."
5While he was still speaking, a bright cloud enveloped them, and a voice from the cloud said, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!"
6When the disciples heard this, they fell facedown to the ground, terrified. 7But Jesus came and touched them. "Get up," he said. "Don't be afraid." 8When they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus.
9As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus instructed them, "Don't tell anyone what you have seen, until the Son of Man has been raised from the dead."
10The disciples asked him, "Why then do the teachers of the law say that Elijah must come first?"
11Jesus replied, "To be sure, Elijah comes and will restore all things. 12But I tell you, Elijah has already come, and they did not recognize him, but have done to him everything they wished. In the same way the Son of Man is going to suffer at their hands." 13Then the disciples understood that he was talking to them about John the Baptist.
The Healing of a Boy With a Demon
14When they came to the crowd, a man approached Jesus and knelt before him. 15"Lord, have mercy on my son," he said. "He has seizures and is suffering greatly. He often falls into the fire or into the water. 16I brought him to your disciples, but they could not heal him."
17"O unbelieving and perverse generation," Jesus replied, "how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me." 18Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of the boy, and he was healed from that moment.
19Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, "Why couldn't we drive it out?"
20He replied, "Because you have so little faith. I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you."[a]
22When they came together in Galilee, he said to them, "The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men. 23They will kill him, and on the third day he will be raised to life." And the disciples were filled with grief.
The Temple Tax
24After Jesus and his disciples arrived in Capernaum, the collectors of the two-drachma tax came to Peter and asked, "Doesn't your teacher pay the temple tax[b]?"
25"Yes, he does," he replied.
When Peter came into the house, Jesus was the first to speak. "What do you think, Simon?" he asked. "From whom do the kings of the earth collect duty and taxes—from their own sons or from others?"
26"From others," Peter answered.
"Then the sons are exempt," Jesus said to him. 27"But so that we may not offend them, go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours."
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion:
Luke 19
Zacchaeus the Tax Collector
1Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. 2A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. 3He wanted to see who Jesus was, but being a short man he could not, because of the crowd. 4So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.
5When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today." 6So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly.
7All the people saw this and began to mutter, "He has gone to be the guest of a 'sinner.' "
8But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, "Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount."
9Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham.
February 26, 2008
Making Restitution
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READ: Luke 19:1-9
He shall make restitution for his trespass in full. —Numbers 5:7
During the compilation of the Oxford English Dictionary, managing editor James Murray received thousands of definitions from Dr. William Chester Minor. They were always sent in by mail and never brought in personally. Murray was curious about this brilliant man, so he went to visit him. He was shocked to find that Minor was incarcerated in an asylum for the criminally insane.
Years earlier, while in a delusional state, Minor had shot an innocent man whom he thought had been tormenting him. Later he was filled with remorse and began sending money to support the widow and her family. Minor was imprisoned for the rest of his life but he found practical ways of easing the pain of his victims and contributing to society through his work on the dictionary.
When the dishonest tax collector Zacchaeus heard Jesus’ message of grace, he chose to return more than what he had extorted from others. “Look, Lord, . . . if I have taken anything from anyone by false accusation, I restore fourfold” (Luke 19:8). The gospel of grace stirred Zacchaeus to help those he had harmed.
Have you wronged someone? What steps will you take to help make things right? — Dennis Fisher
Forgive me, Lord, for all my sins,
The many wrongs that I have done;
And show me how to make things right
Before the setting of the sun. —Bosch
Making restitution reveals genuine repentance.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
February 26, 2008
Our Misgivings About Jesus
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READ:
The woman said to Him, ’Sir, You have nothing to draw [water] with, and the well is deep’ —John 4:11
Have you ever said to yourself, "I am impressed with the wonderful truths of God’s Word, but He can’t really expect me to live up to that and work all those details into my life!" When it comes to confronting Jesus Christ on the basis of His qualities and abilities, our attitudes reflect religious superiority. We think His ideals are lofty and they impress us, but we believe He is not in touch with reality— that what He says cannot actually be done. Each of us thinks this about Jesus in one area of our life or another. These doubts or misgivings about Jesus begin as we consider questions that divert our focus away from God. While we talk of our dealings with Him, others ask us, "Where are you going to get enough money to live? How will you live and who will take care of you?" Or our misgivings begin within ourselves when we tell Jesus that our circumstances are just a little too difficult for Him. We say, "It’s easy to say, ’Trust in the Lord,’ but a person has to live; and besides, Jesus has nothing with which to draw water— no means to be able to give us these things." And beware of exhibiting religious deceit by saying, "Oh, I have no misgivings about Jesus, only misgivings about myself." If we are honest, we will admit that we never have misgivings or doubts about ourselves, because we know exactly what we are capable or incapable of doing. But we do have misgivings about Jesus. And our pride is hurt even at the thought that He can do what we can’t.
My misgivings arise from the fact that I search within to find how He will do what He says. My doubts spring from the depths of my own inferiority. If I detect these misgivings in myself, I should bring them into the light and confess them openly— "Lord, I have had misgivings about You. I have not believed in Your abilities, but only my own. And I have not believed in Your almighty power apart from my finite understanding of it."
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
How To Keep Order In Your Universe - #5512
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
People were confused about it for centuries. They looked at the sun rising and setting every day and they reached a seemingly obvious conclusion: the earth is the center of everything and the sun revolves around the earth, right? If you say "right," you need to go back to third grade science Actually, if you think the sun revolves around the earth, well, you agree with about one out of five Americans in a recent survey. You know, it's a good thing to get right—what's in the center and what revolves around it.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "How to Keep Order in Your Universe."
Now, it's easy to make the same mistake that ancient, and even some modern people have made, confusing what should be the planets of our life with the sun that those planets should all be revolving around.
In our word for today from the Word of God in Luke 4 beginning in verse 42, Jesus has to make sure that the "sun" is in the middle, and everything else is revolving around it in His own life. In this case, the "sun" is the life mission He is on. He's in Capernaum where He has spent much of the day miraculously healing people and casting out demons. Then it says, "at daybreak Jesus went out to a solitary place. The people were looking for Him and when they came to where He was, they tried to keep Him from leaving them. But He said, 'I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent.' And He kept on preaching in the synagogues of Judea."
Notice those words that decide Jesus' priorities: "I must." Jesus knows His musts, His non-negotiables, the "sun" around which all other demands in His life must revolve. And He is faced with a lot of people who need Him, asking Him to do a very good thing. But He says "No" based on His non-negotiable mission. He knows He must not allow anything, no matter how noble, to deter Him from what He came to do—to keep spreading His message to other towns.
And Jesus has left us a model for making the hard priority choices we all face. You may be struggling with some right now. And maybe, like Jesus, all your choices are good ones. When it's hard to sort all that out, it's time to do what Jesus did—get alone with God and let Him refocus you on what is most important from His perspective. Each new day, we need to be with the Father making sure we are making His non-negotiables our non-negotiables.
Certainly, our relationship with Him is the ultimate "sun" around which everything else is just a "planet." We can't make any choice that will adversely affect this anchor relationship. There are other non-negotiables God wants you to make the center of your choices: what's best for your marriage, your children, sticking to His calling, His life-mission for you, uncompromised integrity, your responsibility to show the people around you what Jesus is like, and your responsibility to spread the Jesus message to people who will die without it.
See, life's choices are a lot less confusing when you know your non-negotiables. Then you decide based on everything else having to revolve around those non-negotiables. Actually, you have to be sure you know God's non-negotiables as you re-clarify them with Him each new day. There are just too many noble detours that you just can't afford to take. Your personal universe is in order when the sun is in the center, and then everything else is where it's supposed to be - planets taking their place around a sun that never, never moves.
