Plymothian

²⁸ “Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. ²⁹ Even so, when you see these things happening, you know that it^[d] is near, right at the door. ³⁰ Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. ³¹ Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.

³² “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. ³³ Be on guard! Be alert^[e]! You do not know when that time will come. ³⁴ It’s like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with their assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch.

³⁵ “Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back—whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. ³⁶ If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. ³⁷ What I say to you, I say to everyone: ‘Watch!’”

Stay Awake

Does Jesus command that we make charts and try and plot the exact portents of the end times?  What does Jesus tell us to do?  He tells us to be watchful and to stay awake.  In the many years since his death we have seen much persecution of the church.  Christians today suffer in various locations around the world.  Earthquakes and wars still happen.  All these things will happen and they are things that Jesus foretells, but he does not command that we tally them or order them in order to be wise to the exact moment that Jesus returns.  In keeping the time of Jesus’ return a mystery, God the Father gives us reason to live as though any day could be our last.  This parallels the Book of Ecclesiastes’ focus on death.  If we live with the constant awareness of our own mortality we are more likely to seize the day.  If we live with a constant awareness that Jesus could return, we will seize the day.  However, just like the superfit jogger running along the road never expects their life to be snuffed out by the speeding motorist, so a generation that thinks of 2,000 years as a long time will be caught unaware when Jesus comes on the clouds of heaven.

Our lives do not last forever and the world will not continue forever.  There are multiple reasons to live life awake.

Many of my students become sleepy in class around October and November is often a wash.  They do not seize their opportunities to study and focus on this moment in their lives.  Instead the semester seems long to them and for some of them do not grasp the import of their opportunity (others are dog tired from having to work 30 hours a week as well as study full-time) and the value of the education their parents are paying for.  I feel sympathy because I was such a student and I look at how I focused on my social life in college and missed the opportunities that were at my fingertips.  The question to ask is, “What is God’s vision for my life?”  not the life of the future, but the life of now.  Many Christians live a life of deferred giving.  They will give their all to Jesus at some future point.  However, they fall asleep and some of them die in their sleep.  Whatever God has placed before you to do now, do with all your heart as a love-gift to God.  Present each day to God with its priorities ordered and its time rightly assigned.  In such a way of living, we find our own constant renewal.  More importantly, the Kingdom of God is built through an ever-present awareness, not an ever-present drowsiness.

Prayer

God, keep me awake.  I feel sometimes like there is something wrong with my system that sends me to sleep.  However, I can never tell for sure because I get distracted and my life is always disordered to some degree.  You lavish your grace upon me as I rearrange my day around my children, but I take your grace for granted as I do not stay aware of your presence.  As I walk in your Spirit, he guides me in ways that I do not see when I sleepwalk. 

Questions

1. What commands does Jesus give in this passage?
2. What commands do people give themselves after reading this passage?
3. Why did a persecuted church need to hear this message in their suffering?
4. What sends Christians to sleep today?
5. How can Christians stay awake?  When are you most ‘awake’?

As Jesus was leaving the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!”

2 “Do you see all these great buildings?” replied Jesus. “Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.”

3 As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John and Andrew asked him privately, 4 “Tell us, when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are all about to be fulfilled?”

5 Jesus said to them: “Watch out that no one deceives you. 6 Many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and will deceive many. 7 When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 8 Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places, and famines. These are the beginning of birth pains.

9 “You must be on your guard. You will be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogues. On account of me you will stand before governors and kings as witnesses to them. 10 And the gospel must first be preached to all nations. 11 Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit.

12 “Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child. Children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. 13 Everyone will hate you because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved.

Resting in God When the World is Ending

When my son doesn’t know when something will happen he sometimes tries to hold my head, because he thinks I am ignoring him.  “When?”  he’ll ask repeatedly, like a broken record.  “I don’t know.”  I reply.  You’d think that I didn’t know on purpose.  He can’t contain his need to know.  Many Christians feel like this with the end times.  I sometimes think these are the same people who need to know exactly what will happen on their vacation before they can enjoy it.  Jesus’ disciples were told by him that the temple would be destroyed.  It had become irredeemably corrupted.  It no longer acted as a bridge between God and man.  People relied on its traditions and rituals without any heart change, so it had to go.  For the disciples this was huge.  It would be like a prophet in Chicago telling us that the Willis Tower (Sears Tower) would be destroyed in the same way the Twin Towers of New York went down.  Jesus’ response is curious, he does not give them a date – he gives them a stance or an attitude.

Jesus is often vague and uses apocalyptic technique to disguise his answers when asked about future events.  His disciples associate the destruction of the temple with the end of time, but Jesus tells them of tumults and persecutions that will last through the ages.  First century Rome was not as peaceful as we may assume.  There were wars on the borders and there were revolts.  It would be a Jewish revolt in 70 A.D. that would see the temple destroyed.  Jesus prepares his disciples for that event, but he also here prepares his disciples for the chaos that has ravaged our world through the ages.  He specifically prepares Christians for persecution.  The key to enduring all of this tumult is to cultivate a faithful dependence on God.  If one focuses on the storms and tries to predict the future, one will be swamped by fears and anxieties.  If one rests in the arms of God and trusts in the work of the Holy Spirit, one will have what one needs for each moment and each age of mankind.

In our world today we look for signs, we make elaborate charts and fall out over whether we are Dispensational or Covenantal, pretrib or posttrib.  These issues need to be talked about, but they are secondary to a calm assurance that God is in control.  They are secondary to a personal relationship where we trust and curl up in the arms of God our Father knowing that he holds all things and that he loves his children.

Prayer

I would like to know when the world would end.  However, I think if I knew I would waste my time worrying or try and do something to delay the appointed time.  It is your world and you can do with it as you like.  As your child, Father, I want to rest assured and be vigilant at the same time.  I want to be unpreturbed by events in the Middle East (Syria and Egypt), but prayerful and vigilant for Christians in the region.  I want to see your power bring peace to that region.  I want Muslims to know you and Jews to find you in a personal way.  However, let me be a light by cultivating a relationship that is based in peace and trust in a world of chaos and darkness.

Questions

1. What causes the disciples to ask about the end of time?
2. How does Jesus both answer them and avoid an answer?
3. What is the point of Jesus’ response?
4. What difficult times are there in our age?
5. How do you rely on God in the ways that Jesus advocates?

35 While Jesus was teaching in the temple courts, he asked, “Why do the teachers of the law say that the Messiah is the son of David? 36 David himself, speaking by the Holy Spirit, declared:

43 Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. 44 They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on.”

Why Does David Call the Messiah Lord?

Some people see the widow’s offering as something to be emulated. However, Jesus has just commented about how Pharisees devour widows’ houses. I believe this widow to be one such unfortunate. Jesus does contrast the amount she gives with the amount the Pharisees give. They give out of a bounty but she gives out of the little she has. She gives to a corrupt structure that should take care of her, but the ones who look after her will line their own pockets rather than fulfil their duty. It is a tragic scene.

In contrast with the story of the exploited widow, Jesus hints at something greater than the corrupt temple system. The Jewish people expected a king like David, they did not expect a king who would transcend David. Jesus openly claims to be more than a mere king, as the world defines kings. He claims that the Messiah is above David.

Jesus is still above our expectations. Our ideas about him are limited by the bounds of our own minds. Our systems are corrupt and exploit people for gain. However, Jesus established a Kingdom that even transcends the ideal kingdom of David. In that kingdom there is no room for corruption.

Prayer

Jesus our systems empty our pockets and exploit the poor. We give money to people who can work but don’t. We take money from people who are in need. Bamks have shown themselves to be run by corrupt, greedy people. The government of David was just and focused on you. Help us, as your people, to take care of the needy and be generous in giving. May we give you everything because there is no-one like you.

Questions

What does Jesus show to be true about the Messiah?
How did Pharisees run a corrupt system?
In your opinion was the widow to be emulated or pitied?
How does Jesus create a government that is superior to David’s?
How is the church doing in its care for widows and orphans? What about you?

¹³ Later they sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Jesus to catch him in his words. ¹⁴ They came to him and said, “Teacher, we know that you are a man of integrity. You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are; but you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. Is it right to pay the imperial tax^[b] to Caesar or not? ¹⁵ Should we pay or shouldn’t we?”

But Jesus knew their hypocrisy. “Why are you trying to trap me?” he asked. “Bring me a denarius and let me look at it.” ¹⁶ They brought the coin, and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?”

“Caesar’s,” they replied.

¹⁷ Then Jesus said to them, “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.”

And they were amazed at him.

Church and State/Sacred and Secular/God and Caesar

At a first read through, this passage could be seen as a reinforcing of the separation of church and state.  We have our ‘Caesar’ oriented tax-paying lives and we have our God oriented tithe-paying lives.  However, that approach reads back into the text a view that only really has been popular since the 18th century.  As we read this, we should see that there are not two worlds, secular and spiritual, but Jesus understood that there was one world but that Caesar was an administrator.  The Jewish understanding of how a public administrator should rule was reflected in their Jewish word for a king.  When Saul was appointed king of Israel in 1 Samuel, the word used for him is one for a princely administrator.  David was the better king because he reported to God and answered to God for what he did.

Caesar, at this time, had minted coins for the taxes which he demanded back as payment.  The coins had claims to deity on them, and they had an idol on the reverse side of them.  Jesus asks for one of these coins. Jesus exposes his questioners’ hypocrisy when he shows that they were carrying the coins.  When they produce the coins, Jesus tells them to give those coins back to Caesar.  In this way Jesus appears to say that the people should pay the tax.  He is also saying that corrupt coins should be returned to a corrupt leader whose government is needed, but whose way of administrating it is blasphemous.  In this way he can not be accused by the authorities or by the religiously devout.

So, how does this apply to us?  We operate in a corrupt world.  I live in Illinois, which is both corrupt and broke.  However, if you choose to live in Illinois you have to abide the taxes.  You live in a corrupt state, but the state is under God.  Whilst we rightly give the state our taxes, our greater allegiance is to God.  Images of past leaders of government are on the dollar bills, but we look beyond the government to ‘in God we trust’.  The image of the King of Kings is minted in our hearts and our souls and our strength.  We must pay back to God what is cast in his image.  That is our very selves – all of who we are.  Whilst the government mints more money to pay off its debts (and create more chaos), we can be calm at its mismanagement of God’s resources because we give to God what is God’s.  The state does not administer resources and educate children and provide health care that is its own, it has responsibility to govern resources that are God’s.  As far as we can submit to it, even with its corruption, we do.  There will be a day, though, when we will live in a divine dictatorship and Jesus will be the government.  Then the perceived separation of the secular and the sacred will disappear.

Prayer

Jesus, we pay to corrupted and mismanaged government what we must so that they will take out the trash and educate children.  We need to have systems to take care of the poor and the sick and so such systems are necessary.  Whilst we give our financial resources to the government and the church in order to take care of our neighbour,  help us to remember that the money the mint and the resources they manage are made from your bounty.  Help us to ultimately turn to you for justice, for provision, and for direction.

At this time I particularly lift up Egypt.  It looked to government to save it from its ills and the government has shown that it is not the source of salvation.  It reflects the corruption in people’s hearts.  I pray for the Islamic Brotherhood.  I do not trust them and I think they are creating martyrs to generate sympathy for a dangerous cause.  I also do not trust the army to manage people in ways that are just.  I pray that a movement for peace and reconciliation would come from your children in Egypt, even as their churches are marked by red paint and destroyed by the Brotherhood.  I have heard that the Christians’ homes too are being marked.  I pray that the red paint would be passed over on the doors of the faithful in Egypt and that justice would be seen in the lives of the perpetrators.  When they cease their violence, let there be unconditional love and reconciliation.  let mercy triumph over judgement.

Questions

1. How do the Jewish leaders flatter Jesus?
2. What is the motive for their question?
3. How does Jesus’ response satisfy revolutionaries and those loyal to Caesar?
4. How do people use this passage to justify two worlds:  the public/political/secular world and the private/religious/sacred world?
5. How does one give to caesar what is Caesar and God what is God’s today?

 Jesus then began to speak to them in parables: “A man planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a pit for the winepress and built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. ² At harvest time he sent a servant to the tenants to collect from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. ³ But they seized him, beat him and sent him away empty-handed. ⁴ Then he sent another servant to them; they struck this man on the head and treated him shamefully. ⁵ He sent still another, and that one they killed. He sent many others; some of them they beat, others they killed.

⁶ “He had one left to send, a son, whom he loved. He sent him last of all, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’

⁷ “But the tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ ⁸ So they took him and killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard.

⁹ “What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and kill those tenants and give the vineyard to others. ¹⁰ Haven’t you read this passage of Scripture:

¹² Then the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders looked for a way to arrest him because they knew he had spoken the parable against them. But they were afraid of the crowd; so they left him and went away.

Building The Right Life

The Pharisees were building.  They learned the biblical texts that were available at the time.  They didn’t just study them, but they memorized them.  Like Awana and other children’s Bible clubs, they devoted time to reciting scripture.  They worked hard on elaborate liturgy and mastered public prayer.  They gave regularly to the poor and fasted each week.  They debated for hours as to whether their particular interpretation of scripture was right.  They created hell.

The kind of spirituality that frets and worries over whether each detail is taken care of is hellish.  It does not build a sense of liberty and life.  The building that Jesus built required one stone around which every other stone would find its right place.  When one builds all the practices of religion first and then ADDS Jesus, we find that he doesn’t fit.  We have a choice to tear down our building and start with Jesus or we can go on cherishing a building that is dysfunctional and corrupt.

When Jesus told this parable, the audience probably thought he was talking about Israel being occupied by Rome to begin with.  However, as he progressed, it would be more evident that he was talking about the leaders of Israel.  He was not talking about the common people of Israel, but he was talking about those who laid out how the faith should be lived.  Like many in church history, the leaders of Israel were building a little empire for themselves.  They were seeking out power and influence.  When we build and shape the ‘vineyard’ for ourselves, we figuratively kill Jesus like the Israelite leaders did.  When we start with Jesus and walk with Jesus, the kind of faith we build is centered on a relationship.

In this busy and pragmatic age we are not good at relationships in general.  Facebook connects us with hundreds of people, but how many know us?  By how many am I known?  Relationship exposes the heart in ever deepening conversation and longs to see the depths within another person.  It encompasses the intellect, the emotions, and the physical.  As we reveal all these aspects of who we are to Jesus and have him reveal himself to us through fellowship, Bible reading, and spiritual disciplines so our lives are transformed in ways that slavish rule-following can not do.

Like many people who have built their lives and reputations on behaving rightly and performance in assigned tasks, the Pharisees are furious when their life’s investments are shown to be bankrupt.  The one who owns the land in which they live is about to judge them because they will kill his son rather than welcome him and relate to him.

Prayer

I spend so much time escaping from thinking and feeling.  I build into things that are not focused on you, Jesus.  I want to love you in such a way that I am conversing with you as I play with my children and walk down the street.  It happens to rarely.  I am not aware that I am living in your world.  I have a secular/sacred divide that comes from my education and my culture.  I pray that you would continue to make it all sacred.

Questions

1. What events in the temple does this parable follow?
2. Who are the tenants and the messengers in the parable?
3. How were the most religious people in Israel guilty of making the worst mistakes?
4. How do religious people completely miss the point today?
5. How is your life more centered on the cornerstone?

As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage and Bethany at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two of his disciples, ² saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and just as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. ³ If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ say, ‘The Lord needs it and will send it back here shortly.’”

⁴ They went and found a colt outside in the street, tied at a doorway. As they untied it, ⁵ some people standing there asked, “What are you doing, untying that colt?” ⁶ They answered as Jesus had told them to, and the people let them go. ⁷ When they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks over it, he sat on it. ⁸ Many people spread their cloaks on the road, while others spread branches they had cut in the fields. ⁹ Those who went ahead and those who followed shouted,

¹¹ Jesus entered Jerusalem and went into the temple courts. He looked around at everything, but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the Twelve.

The King of Kings

The account of Jesus in the Gospel of Mark strikes me as one which emphasizes Jesus’ authority as king in much the same way that Matthew did as we read it previously.  However, when reading Mark I was struck more how Jesus knew his rights to absolute authority, but kept his identity under wraps.  No more.  In this passage Jesus lets the crowd adore him and he rides into town on a colt.  Taking an unridden horse or donkey was a kingly act, but making sure it was a donkey and not a white stallion also communicates something.  Jesus will not retake Jerusalem from the Romans.  At the end of the passage he does not check out the temple in order to restore its worship.  He will tear down the temple system through his death and resurrection.  A lot of his actions and declarations in his final week before his crucifixion will proclaim the Jewish sacrificial system to be fulfilled in Jesus.  Holiness will be fulfilled by those set apart as disciples of Jesus, whilst the lack of holiness within the nation of Israel will be exposed.

For readers today we need to ask how we respond to the clear demonstration of Jesus’ authority and rights as king.  Do we surrender our whole life to him?  In America I see a church that pays lip service to Jesus, but as David Platt says, we lack the radical commitment.  As Francis Chan says, we lack a crazy love.  We wave our palm branches quickly and half-heartedly so that we can get home for the big game.  We pray to Jesus that he will help us with our agenda, and we forget him when we feel relief.  People in Jesus’ day were no different.  They think he is coming to Jerusalem to set up David’s throne.  The disciples think he will establish them as governors and leaders.  Within seven days these same crowds will turn on him as a great disappointment and they will support the Jewish political elite as they crucify him.  Mark more than the other gospels emphasizes the suffering in the days that follow.  Are you willing to follow the King of the Universe when he calls you to examine yourself and see your sin and change through sacrifice?  Do you just want relief from your present circumstances?  If you just want relief, your cries are as hollow as the cries of the masses on Palm Sunday.

Prayer

I know I want so many things that you do not want.  I know that I also do want the life you give.  I know your kingship leads to suffering in the same way a patient suffers under the scalpel of the surgeon.  However, do we want to be better when it hurts to admit our despair, guilt, shame, fears, lusts, anger, and pride.  I wish for a strong King at conversion who would just suck all that away.  But you call us to a free-will relationship where we are covered by grace and we volunteer the changes.  The more I bring the sin before you, the deeper you go.  The deeper you heal me, the deeper my love for you grows and you reveal yourself to me.  Help me not to sing shallow songs of triumph without surrender to your agenda.  In many ways I would choose relief over real change.  Change my desire and transform my heart.

Questions

1. What does Jesus choose to ride and why?
2. What did the people shout?
3. What did the people expect?
4. What area of your life do you need to examine today?
5. How authentic is your desire that Jesus do what he wants with your life?  How can you examine God’s will for you more?