Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions

Luke 17:20-37: The Scandalous Verses, part 2: Israel must purge its pride and put it upon the Messiah

Many look to the apocalyptic Matthew 24, also touched on in Luke 17:20-37, for signs of the “end times.” But the context in both books suggests the real message is a call for Israel to purge itself of pride in anything other than God and offload that rebellion upon the Messiah.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions

Luke 17:1-19: The Scandalous Verses, part 1: Forgivers and the grateful leper

Continuing the themes of hope for the “lost” from God (Luke 15) and hope in God being more wealth-creating than material goods (Luke 16), the parables of Luke 17 give us positive role models of hope and trust in God.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions

Luke 16:19-31: God vs. stuff, round 2: Rich man vs. Lazar vs. Moshe and Prophets vs. wealth

The overall theme of Luke 16 is how we are to use material wealth. Is Luke 16:19–31, known as “the rich man and Lazarus,” a travelogue of hell or a parable related to wealth?

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions

Luke 16:1-18: God vs. Stuff, part 1

This passage has three seemingly distinct teachings — parable of the shrewd manager, whether the Law and Prophets stopped with Yokhanan the Baptizer and a “one-liner” on divorce — but all of them as well as the parable that follows of the rich man and Lazar deal with one topic: God as Master or wealth as Master.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Appointments With God Discussions Passover Prophets and Writings

Luke 15: Loving the Lost, part 2: A Tale of Three Lambs

This chapter covers a central theme via the interrelated parables of the lost sheep, lost coin and lost son: The Son of God was sent to “find” and “bring back” the “lost sheep” of Israel. With the soon approach of the annual Lamb Selection Day for Passover — 10th day of the first month of God’s calendar — it’s fitting to note God’s “tale of three lambs” in Luke 15 and throughout Scripture

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions

Luke 15:1-2: Loving the Lost, part 1: Yeshua shows how God makes sinners righteous

At the beginning of a chapter with three parables about God’s seeking to bring back to the Kingdom of God those who are “lost,” Yeshua demonstrated how God makes the “unholy” “holy.”

We are in danger of making God’s name common and of no repute — i.e., “taking it in vain” — if we reject those who He is calling to Himself just because they don’t have the same understanding we have.

Categories
Apostolic Writings Discussions

Luke 14: Whose honor do we seek?

Yeshua’s schooling of a Pharisee member of Israel’s ruling council on allowable actions on Shabbat seems disconnected from the parables that follow in Luke 14. Yet they all are threaded together with learning God’s view on justice, compassion and mercy then honoring God through lifelong commitment to those principles of the kingdom of Heaven.

Not honoring God by seeking that change of “glasses” for seeing the world — and seeing the One through Whom the change would come — doomed much of Israel to be scattered and regathered repeatedly.