Plymothian

Then Jesus went around teaching from village to village. ⁷ Calling the Twelve to him, he began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over impure spirits.

⁸ These were his instructions: “Take nothing for the journey except a staff—no bread, no bag, no money in your belts. ⁹ Wear sandals but not an extra shirt. ¹⁰ Whenever you enter a house, stay there until you leave that town. ¹¹ And if any place will not welcome you or listen to you, leave that place and shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.”

¹² They went out and preached that people should repent. ¹³ They drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them.

Authority To Change The World

This passage forms the kernel of what is explained more in depth in Matthew 10.  Jesus transfers his authority to the disciples and they are able to perform wondrous acts.  This shows the people in Judea and Galilee that the Kingdom of God is at hand.  Something with this level of authority must be rooted in a tremendous power.  However, the power is not one of military might, or physical prowess.  Jesus was no wimp, but his ministry was based in the power of truth and righteousness, not arrogance and self-interest.  This same power and authority has been part of the kingdom for centuries.  However, we rationalize it away and we become distracted by the toils and the cares of this world.  In Chicago people are too busy building petty kingdoms and dynasties that seem magnificent in their opulence.  However, the disciples would not be awed by our power structures.  Their heroes were not the heroes of our culture.  In fact, they would tell such people to repent.  Then when the inevitable scorn is revealed toward the meek, they shake the dust off their sandals and go and inherit the earth.  Our heroes are just buried in it.

We have been given the authority that Jesus had.  Surely that should change the world.

Prayer

When I think of the world, I often think, “Who am I?” It’s a good question.  My existence is contingent on the existence of Another.  My days are numbered by One who has authority to give length of life and shorten it.  I am prone to still walk in sinful paths and lose myself in the darkness.  Yet, in a mad move You have given me your authority.  I have the Truth of Your message.  I have the secret and the mystery of life living in me, which is Christ.  Is it arrogant to follow a bold calling to proclaim truth?  Or is it more arrogant to stand in opposition of the Truth, to dictate that there is no authority and to really try and generate truth to live by in a bankrupt soul.  save us from the counterfeit authority we drum up in ourselves whilst denying its very existence.  Let us trust in You and walk boldly without the defeat of self-obsession.

Questions

1. What is the most important thing Jesus gives his disciples before sending them out?
2. How is the world better for the disciples?
3. Why didn’t Jesus do all his work himself?
4. Does Jesus transfer his authority to us?
5. How are we meant to go out like the twelve in twos?

Jesus left there and went to his hometown, accompanied by his disciples. ² When the Sabbath came, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were amazed.

“Where did this man get these things?” they asked. “What’s this wisdom that has been given him? What are these remarkable miracles he is performing? ³ Isn’t this the carpenter? Isn’t this Mary’s son and the brother of James, Joseph,^[a] Judas and Simon? Aren’t his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him.

⁴ Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own town, among his relatives and in his own home.” ⁵ He could not do any miracles there, except lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them. ⁶ He was amazed at their lack of faith.

Jesus’ Home Town Rejects Him

Jesus’ home at this point is Capernaum, but he goes back to the town of his younger years.  The people there know him as a carpenter, more literally a woodworking handyman who would do a bit of masonry or smithying if the job required it.  Jesus was no wimp who swooned at the first sign of pain.  However, he was no scribe in the traditional sense.  He was not cut out to be a rabbi in the way that was expected.  Usually a priest or rabbi came from a family where they could dedicate themselves to study.  Jesus would have worked a full-time job and studied on the side.  The people in this passage know him in te same way as we know the fix-it guy who drives up in his old van to do odd jobs.  Suddenly, he takes the role of teacher in his home synagogue and he is stirring up trouble.  Many people rejected Jesus, but the people in his home town had a unique reason.  They could dismiss him because of their familiarity with him.  Rather than let him change his identity in their context, they would define him by the role that he had always had.

I felt this way growing up in my church in England.  Some people knew me as a love-sick boy who had a string of girlfriends.  Some people knew me as a questioning mind who sat and interrupted teaching at inopportune times.  Other people knew me as either cocky or insecure depending on the day.  Some of those people let me grow and become someone else by God’s grace.  Others thought they had me pegged and so they kept me there in their minds whenever I visited.  Actually, when I went to Pakistan and had my eyes opened to poverty and when I came back from my studies, some people were skeptical of the things I would say.  Some family members look on their own children as having grown and matured, but they sometimes treat me as the weak minded or emotional runt in the family.  However, in admitting my weaknesses and seeking help I may have found an uncommon strength.  Jesus is someone who understands this because he endured it on a much larger scale.  However, in his case the people rejecting him rejected the message that is the hope of life to all mankind.  In my case the relationship was affected and little more.

This passage explains how people reject Jesus for a variety of reasons because they can not accept his message.  Today people make up excuses and move on.  What is your excuse?

Prayer

Jesus, I am thankful for this passage because I feel like my family and home town are sometimes incredulous toward my calling as a Bible College professor.  Sometimes I fear that their opinion of me has some power.  However, you didn’t let much stronger opposition hold you back, so I will not let mild disdain hold me back.  I also see the relationship between skepticism and the outpouring of your work in a community.  Help me not to limit your work because I anticipate what you are capable of on too small a scale.

Questions

1. What two locations were Jesus’ home towns?
2. How did Jesus behave in the town of his birth?
3. How do you think a local handyman was regarded as a teacher of wisdom?
4. Do you limit those from whom you might receive advice?
5. How does Jesus’ rejection encourage you to persevere with someone who has a preconception of who you are?

³⁵ While Jesus was still speaking, some people came from the house of Jairus, the synagogue leader. “Your daughter is dead,” they said. “Why bother the teacher anymore?”

³⁶ Overhearing^[c] what they said, Jesus told him, “Don’t be afraid; just believe.”

³⁷ He did not let anyone follow him except Peter, James and John the brother of James. ³⁸ When they came to the home of the synagogue leader, Jesus saw a commotion, with people crying and wailing loudly. ³⁹ He went in and said to them, “Why all this commotion and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep.” ⁴⁰ But they laughed at him.

After he put them all out, he took the child’s father and mother and the disciples who were with him, and went in where the child was. ⁴¹ He took her by the hand and said to her, “Talitha koum!” (which means “Little girl, I say to you, get up!”). ⁴² Immediately the girl stood up and began to walk around (she was twelve years old). At this they were completely astonished. ⁴³ He gave strict orders not to let anyone know about this, and told them to give her something to eat.

Jesus Over Anger and Disappointment

Can you imagine Jairus’ feelings as Jesus delays to heal a sick woman?  Now he receives news that whilst they were dawdling on their way, his twelve-year-old daughter has died.  I can’t imagine the transition that occurs within him as he hears the news.  I know that I would have been furious at the delay.  The woman Jesus healed had been bleeding for twelve years.  She could have bled one more day without dying.  Jairus’ daughter had minutes not years to live.  Now with the passing of precious minutes she has died.  Then Jesus tells him, “Don’t be afraid; just believe.”  Professional mourners come to tell Jairus that the mourning is to get started, and now Jesus contradicts them.  Is this a sick joke?  However, Jairus must have had a shred of faith and they walk together to Jairus’ house.  Taking a step past broken dreams and a broken heart into a bright future is hard when the grief and anxiety seem so justified and powerful.

Now Jesus enters into the chaotic wailing and grieving of Jairus’ home.  Professional mourners with instruments would have started helping the grieving family to release their distress.  Does Jesus have a smirk when he knows how he is about to put the mourners out of a job.  What he says to them sounds like a sick joke, and they laugh.  However, it is not with Jesus but at Jesus that they laugh.

Jesus has compassion on Jairus’ household and raises their daughter.  It is a sign of who he is, but one that is to be kept quiet.  Being too well known as a revolutionary, ushering in a new kingdom, would draw the wrong kind of attention.  Also Jesus’ mission was not to come as an emergency vehicle (N.T. Wright).  He didn’t come as a first-responder but to evoke strong responses in the hearts of those whose lives he touched.   The question raised is whether we would choose to believe in Jesus in such circumstances.  Would we be enraged at his delay?  Would we be crushed at hearing such awful news?  Would we still turn to Jesus in a moment of despair and wait to see how he moves?

Prayer

I have stored up such a well of anxiety about whether I am safe and accepted.  I built up layers of protection, but they just kept my grief in, they didn’t prevent life from affecting me.  Now you lead me on to places that heal me, but it is not all at once and it is not forever – yet.  I look forward to the day when you will raise me from death and say, “Peter, get up.”  Then things will be as they were meant to be.  All the sinful patterns I have will cease.  The Father’s wisdom will be clear to me as I make decisions.  I will be accepted by my Creator, the one who knows me more intimately than I know myself.

Help us to see in these days exactly what we are meant to have faith in.  I have a childhood friend who is dying very young.  I don’t know what to do for him, but I bring his case to you.  I have friends who are anxious, grieved, even enraged.  I pray that they would come to you in an open way and that you would lift their burdens.

Questions

1. Why has Jesus delayed his visit to Jairus’ house?
2. What is Jesus’ response to news of death?
3. What does this story teach us about Jesus, faith, and fear?
4. Are there situations where all hope is lost for you?  What are they?
5. How does Jesus want to walk with us beyond ‘all hope is lost’?

³⁵ That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” ³⁶ Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. ³⁷ A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. ³⁸ Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”

³⁹ He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.

⁴⁰ He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”

⁴¹ They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”

The force of the rebuke to the storm was somewhat lost in translation for me.  Today as I read the passage I tried to imagine what it would be like on the boat.  The fresh water lake looks fairly meek when you see it.  I remember thinking that the ‘storm’ must be exaggerated.  I have seen storms on the Atlantic and the Pacific and they can look brutal.  When I saw little Sea of Galilee, I was kind of disappointed that Jesus probably just calmed a ripple or two and went back to sleep.  However, when I saw the small size of the ancient fishing boats and heard how the lake sits in a basin where winds sometimes suddenly converge, I changed my opinion.  To be on a small boat tossed by the waves and in very sudden danger of being swamped would be terrifying.

Jesus’ calming of the storm should also be seen in light of ancient near eastern cosmology.  The primal cosmos in ancient thought consisted of the waters above and the waters below.  They were conceived of as a sort of anti-creation.  The waters in the Bible often work against creation in the narrative.  There is a harmony or a design for the way the world is meant to be and the forces of Chaos work against that harmonious design.  Jesus does the same work as the Spirit of God in Genesis one.  He brings order to the chaotic ‘deeps’.  This is a powerful demonstration of why a person would pay attention to him and make him their teacher and absolute authority.  He calms chaos.  When creation seems like it is in rebellion, he reestablishes the order of God, showing in the process that he is God.

The disciples’ fear seems reasonable because it is hard to grasp that your teacher from Galilee is God.  If the person you walk with is God and you put your faith in him, even a little faith will reap huge results.  So, the disciples’ question is the one we should answer:  Who is this?

Prayer

Who are you, Jesus?  Help me to spend time enough with you to get who you are.

²⁶ He also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. ²⁷ Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. ²⁸ All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. ²⁹ As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.”

³⁰ Again he said, “What shall we say the kingdom of God is like, or what parable shall we use to describe it? ³¹ It is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest of all seeds on earth. ³² Yet when planted, it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants, with such big branches that the birds can perch in its shade.”

³³ With many similar parables Jesus spoke the word to them, as much as they could understand. ³⁴ He did not say anything to them without using a parable. But when he was alone with his own disciples, he explained everything.

Seeking Out Hidden Paths

It would seem that God grows the Kingdom of God regardless of the efforts of man.  However, the planting of the seed is key, so who plants it?  The answer could be Jesus or his disciples.  Jesus was planting seeds throughout northern Israel at this point in his ministry.  He didn’t have to get up and fret whether God was using what he was doing.  Jesus knew he had a role to play and his Father would orchestrate the rest behind the scenes.  The Kingdom of God goes through stages of growth as faithful disciples grow and give life to new ‘plants’.  The idea of ‘getting people saved’ seems inadequate to explain what ‘preaching the Kingdom’ may mean.  It starts with people accepting that the Kingdom has come and deciding to follow it, however, there must be growth and reproduction.  I see that less and less in a western culture that wants a latte with their McFaith.

Growth and results are key to both parables.  However, the results are unseen.  Many in the west may be watching church influence decline as Christians are understood to be more and more out of step with the culture.  I there are faithful disciples in the west who orient their lives around Jesus, then God will do miraculous things through them quietly.  Marriage might become less and less well defined,  sex may be a consumer option on a Saturday night, and language may become inexact, vulgar and rude,   but Jesus works to further something profound.  Perhaps the sheep are being separated from the goats and the chaff distinguished from the grain.  However, let’s not worry too much at what we see.  Let’s rest assured that God works in hidden ways and we must seek them out.

Prayer

I am grateful that whether I am on board or not, you are working for good in the world.  You are changing hearts and establishing your rule in the faithful.  Those who played at the faith are falling away, but those who want to bring your Kingdom will be empowered to change the lives around them.  It is easy to worry about the changes in society and the abandoning of churches.  However, if we are committed to you, there are strategies to walk in hidden paths as Christians have in darker times in history.

Questions

1. What two illustrations does Jesus give in the passages above?
2. What is the point that unites both passages?
3. How would Jesus’ disciples have acted differently after hearing these parables?
4. In what ways has God’s Kingdom grown around and through you in hidden ways?
5. How might hearts devoted to Jesus change people and the world for good in your sphere of influence?

Again Jesus began to teach by the lake. The crowd that gathered around him was so large that he got into a boat and sat in it out on the lake, while all the people were along the shore at the water’s edge. 2 He taught them many things by parables, and in his teaching said: 3 “Listen! A farmer went out to sow his seed. 4 As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. 5 Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6 But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. 7 Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants, so that they did not bear grain. 8 Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, some multiplying thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times.”

9 Then Jesus said, “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.”

10 When he was alone, the Twelve and the others around him asked him about the parables. 11 He told them, “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parables 12 so that,

“‘they may be ever seeing but never perceiving,
and ever hearing but never understanding;
otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!’[a]”

13 Then Jesus said to them, “Don’t you understand this parable? How then will you understand any parable? 14 The farmer sows the word. 15 Some people are like seed along the path, where the word is sown. As soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown in them. 16 Others, like seed sown on rocky places, hear the word and at once receive it with joy. 17 But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. 18 Still others, like seed sown among thorns, hear the word; 19 but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful. 20 Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop—some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown.”

Christians Who Don’t Grow

What do you want?  Really want?  Is it a relationship with someone who really ‘gets you’?  Romantic comedies and gossip columns sell this dream all the time.  What do you want?  Someone to make you happy?  Some miracle cure for aches pains, depression, anxiety, and a dysfunctional family?  Is your primary concern for some breathing room financially?  Do you obsess about whether your house sells?  What is your life about in practical terms?  I don’t mean, what is your life about in theoretical terms when you are sat in church and the pastor asks the question.  I mean what is your life about on Monday morning?  What grabs you each day?  Where does your mind go?

Wherever your mind goes Jesus is throwing seed at you.  He is recklessly proclaiming that there is a way of life to be lived that is completely and utterly abandoned to him.  He proclaims there is a life that multiplies itself thirty, sixty, or a hundred times.  This doesn’t mean multiplication of possessions or finances.  It doesn’t mean multiplication of friends.  It means multiplication of things that have eternal value.  Rather than pursuing all the things that feel significant but aren’t, we pursue God who doesn’t always feel significant but multiplies himself with eternal significance in our lives, communities, and environments.  When I look around myself in North America, I see dead people.  I see people killed by trying to do the same things that promise happiness and deliver nothing.  We work hard to create a nest egg; we immerse ourselves in the sporting world and receive its affirmations; we carry out our duties to family and wish for time alone to ourselves when we think we will recoup but never do; we are committed to being excellent in our work and so we commit our hearts and minds to a job; we live vicariously through our children, unaware that they are modeling themselves on the vapid shells that we have become; we create pretty little fools in our own image who lack substance but go ga-ga over dresses, make-up and music; we fight for our own rights so that we don’t get trampled and we end up victorious, isolated and angry; we even commit to serving God so that our own egos are stroked, but we miss God in the process entirely.  In the words of the parable, we cultivate crappy soils.  We spend our time nurturing weeds, hardening pathways and welcoming rocks.  Then when we have made ourselves completely unresponsive, we blame God that we can’t hear him.  We strut and pout and walk away from service and church – that is of course if we think about God in our over-filled lives and our over-caffeinated churches.

Jesus is a farmer who scatters seed with abandon.  He tells those sat on the soil of the shore of Galilee, listening to him, a parable.  It is like a dream sequence where the story itself is interesting but its meaning make no sense without explanation.  Jesus talks of hardened, rocky, and cluttered soils.  He also talks of clear soil.  the crazy farmer just scatters the seed everywhere and lets the soil produce its crop.  To the crowd it’s a nice story about a crazy farmer who gets varied results.  Disciples seek out Jesus to find out why his teaching is so obscure and what it means.  He describes people who hear Jesus’ message of a new life in the Kingdom of God with the same varied response as we do today.  Some are scornful, others are shallow, and others are just too overwhelmed by criticism or busyness.  There are those, however, who are true disciples who till their own hearts with the help of God so they persevere and seek out God and find what life is all about.  Look at attendance at church in contexts other than the Sunday service.  Look at what God means to you and those around you.  Can we make a guess at what kind of soil we have cultivated?  If all continues as it is going, the church in America will follow the pattern of the church in England.  It will become small, irrelevant, unconcerned and possibly damned.  The few occupants who are left may be the faithful, but more likely it will be social misfits who just don’t have anyone else who will hang out with them, or it may be a few gray-hairs who want a little comfort in their lives in the face of death.  Wake up, American church!  Wake up!  Pursue Jesus with everything and he may call you to a life that will surprise you with its radical significance.  Keep modeling yourself on your neighbours and you will suffocate and die like they do.

Prayer

Jesus, I long for you.  I long for you to be my constant focus.  My friend, I don’t know why those who own your name are so lost in putting out fires, climbing corporate ladders, and entertaining themselves to death.  Grant us a new life in you.  May I help cultivate soils.  May we tell each other stories of what God is doing in our lives that amaze us.  May we see your hand in our communities, homes, and workplaces.  May our schools know Jesus in the classroom.  May our churches see revival.

Questions

1. What is the audience that Jesus is talking to?
2. What is Jesus telling the audience about himself?
3. How does the fertile soil identify itself (show itself) by their actions in this passage?
4. What soil does your life show itself to be?
5. How do you see fruit in your spiritual life that reflects a healthy relationship with Jesus?