Effective communication requires attentive listening and confirmation a message is received, perhaps via a reply or acting on the information delivered. The passages in Luke 10:38–11:13 and Matthew 6 contain lessons in effectively listening to God and talking with Him.
Building on our first discussion of lessons in communicating with God, we will explore the second lesson: Get the will-ies when asking for God’s will to be done in forgiveness and ways God is re-establishing dominion on Earth.
Effective communication requires attentive listening and confirmation a message is received, perhaps via a reply or acting on the information delivered. The passages in Luke 10:38-11:13 and Matthew 6 contain lessons in effectively listening to God and talking with Him.
The first lesson is in the account of Yeshua’s visit to the home of Marta and Miriam in Bethany. This is not just a little biographical story. It’s a lesson, starting with the names of the women themselves.
“What shall I do to inherit eternal life?” “Who is my neighbor?” At first these questions seem contradictory. Some even accuse the questioners of attempting to entrap Yeshua. However, honest seekers of truth regularly challenged rabbis with tough questions, as did Abraham, Moses and others.
There are profound similarities in these texts and the texts of the wilderness wanderings of Israel when God would move them into a “desolate” place and God supernaturally intervened to feed them and give them water. God is appealing to the world to come to Him for the Bread of Life and wants to gather the nations into His people, Israel. He is going to take back the Earth from rebellion of haSatan.
Herod Antipas thought he had silenced Yochanan (John) upon killing him, but Yeshua and His disciples were spreading the message everywhere. A common teaching on remarriage — that doing so is a sin — overlooks the likely teaching, shown in Antipas’ fear: divorce and remarriage in the course of adultery is what’s sinful.
Yeshua (Jesus) sent the 12 and 70 other close followers to various cities as witnesses of His message about the coming of the Kingdom of God. Key to this commission was a quotation from the prophet Micah at a time when Israel was about to be taken apart because of rebellion against God. The same was about to happen to Israel in the first century.
The story of the woman who had suffered with a hemorrhage for 12 years is woven beautifully into the story of the suffering, death and resurrection of the 12 year old girl.