Jesus came to seek and save the lost, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor, to teach people of the Kingdom of God, and to present the truth that no one is good enough for God but that people could have a relationship with God through Jesus himself. It’s the last part of the message that many have difficulty with, and it’s that last part of the message that has the potential to divide families. The message that Jesus is the only way to God is divisive no matter how you look at it, and any divisive message has the potential to divide even families.

In fact, Jesus is saying these words as an encouragement to his followers. You see, in this section where Jesus is challenging his followers and speaking words of truth that alleviate fear, he has to address one of the major fears people have when coming to him. “What will my coming to Jesus do to my family?” There are some people who know that coming to Jesus will create a rift in their family, and they have to make the tough decision of whether their family is more important than Jesus or vice versa.

Jesus makes it clear that this kind of decision is par for the course when it comes to knowing him. Don’t be afraid to make this decision in Jesus’ favor. If you are sharing your faith with someone, don’t worry about being the person who might disrupt their family dynamic. If you are the person making the decision, don’t worry about being the person who disrupts your own family dynamic. We are each accountable to God as individuals not as families.

But of course, Jesus doesn’t throw these words out there for us to fret over them. He speaks some encouragement to us too by telling us that those who are willing to lose even their own life for Jesus will find true life. It’s almost as if he is saying, “Whatever you may lose for me will be returned to you in truer fashion.” Additionally, he makes the promise that doing even the smallest thing to honor Jesus and care for his followers will guarantee a heavenly reward. How much greater a reward will one receive who makes a great sacrifice like the loss of his own life!

BIG IDEA FOR THE DAY: Do not fear what you may lose or give up in knowing Jesus and making him known; he has the resources to replace it and reward you.

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What great encouraging words those must have been for the newly identified apostles! “I am sending you out like sheep among wolves.” That’s like a high school football coach sending in his offense against the Chicago Bears defense and saying, “I’m sending you in there to be killed and devoured. Go to it!”

What’s the deal with Jesus sending his followers out into dangerous water without years of training? After all, doesn’t he know that winning someone to faith often takes months of arguing the truth of the Bible and wearing the other person down with niceness etc.?

Sure, it’s frightening, but it is also one of the most encouraging sets of verses. Check out these promises Jesus gives to offset the effects of fear:

• The Father, through the presence of the Holy Spirit will tell you what to say during times of stress. (Don’t be afraid of being put to the verbal test by an examiner of the faith or your life.)
• There will be great stress over Jesus (they aren’t alone), but those who stand firm through the end will be saved.
• God can see anything that anyone does against you.
• God is the judge and the only one to fear, but he loves us enough to know the hairs on our head.
• If we acknowledge Christ before men, he will acknowledge us before the Father.

Are you afraid of talking to people about your faith? Jesus promises that words will be given to you in the moment you need them. Are you worried about failing in the faith? Jesus promises that simply standing firm to the end will result in salvation.

Other applications can be made, but here is your big idea for the day.

BIG IDEA FOR THE DAY: We have no one to fear but God himself, and he loves us intimately.

Not long after Jesus identifies his “Twelve” as unique among all his followers, he gives them the identity of “apostles” (sent out ones) and then sends them out to the nearby towns to do what? To heal the sick and cast out demons! Not only that, but he also expects them to simply live off the generosity of those who will hear their message!

On Sunday, we talked about how fear is a major hindrance in our spiritual growth and how faith is the key to alleviating it if not defeating it altogether, but as I look at this passage, I can’t help but think about all the fear this would create in me. Sure, it’s great to see Jesus do miracles, but we aren’t even halfway through the book of Matthew, in fact, just a couple chapters past the Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus is telling his followers to preach, heal, and cast out demons and to live as homeless moochers! I just can’t fully grasp that.

Even if Jesus looked me in the eye and said, “Jeff, this boy has a demon. Cast it out.” I would stammer over my words and think two or three times before even attempting it, but here, they will be doing it all ON THEIR OWN without Jesus by their side.

Of course there are potentially a dozen or more lessons to take from this, but one lesson is that Jesus will quite frequently call us to take on tasks beyond our ability to prove the all surpassing power he has to work through us. Paul calls it the “Jars of Clay” principle in that great things coming out of weak people point to an awesome God.

Is there something Jesus is calling you to do but you are a little afraid to jump into it? Is he calling you to finally make a commitment to him? To be baptized? To volunteer to help at the church? To join a small group study? To propose to the girl? To break up? To share your faith?

What is it? If Jesus is calling you to do something, it’s because he wants to stretch you and prove his power. Why not give it a shot and see what happens? Oh, and a word of warning. Perhaps you should consult with a few other believers to make sure it really is something Jesus is calling you to do!!

BIG IDEA FOR THE DAY: We have no reason to fear doing whatever Jesus asks of us because he has a purpose in it whether we can see it or not.

For years, this man had lived alone in the caves. No one related to him, and his family had basically disowned him, so when Jesus healed him, he had nowhere to go really and all the time in the world. So he asks to follow Jesus, but Jesus tells him instead to go home and share with others all that has been done for him.

Jesus has forgiven my sin and healed my soul, but he hasn’t taken me to heaven yet. Why? Because there are people here who need to hear my story. The same goes for you.

How much has the Lord done for you? How has he shown mercy to you? Who besides you knows the answer to those questions?

For your devotional time today, how about you count God’s blessings to you by making a couple lists?

List #1: Spend 5 minutes writing down all the things God has done for you and all the ways he has shown mercy to you.

List #2: Write down all the people you know who don’t know those things about you.

Finally: In prayer, commit to schedule a time with one person from List #2 to share with them at least one thing from list #1 or even to show them the whole list!

Three points to notice in this section:

• Jesus connects fear with a lack of faith. “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” It’s almost as if Jesus is saying, if you had faith you wouldn’t be so afraid.
• Jesus rebukes the weather before he rebukes his disciples. Apparently, he knew that the most loving thing for them was to deal with the immediate cause of their fear before attempting to actually deal with the deeper root. Then, when the rebuke of the weather comes, it’s a simple “Quiet! Be still.” No fanfare or coersion here. Jesus simply says it, and it comes to pass.
• Jesus had originally said, “Let us go to the other side.” He did not say, “Let us go into the middle of the lake and die in a seething torrent of waves before reaching the other side.”

Ultimately, the way to answer our fears is to claim the truth of God:

• What has God said about this situation or anything like it?
• Who is in charge and where is he?
• Does he care?

Each of these is a profoundly deep question, but the final question is the easiest to explain and the hardest to fully grasp.

Does God care for you? Yes, after all, he sent his son to die for you. He loves you a great deal, and he can be trusted to keep loving you.

BIG IDEA FOR THE DAY: With all his great authority, Jesus is aligning himself with us for our protection and our growth!

Jesus is responding to a question from the Sadducees, and in verse 32 He quotes Exodus 3:6 where God speaks to Moses in the burning bush. God identifies Himself to Moses by saying, “I am the God…of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.”

In Matthew Jesus hangs his response to the Sadducees on the tense of the phrase “I AM.” Since God tells Moses that He is the God of these men who are already dead, then there must be life after their bodily death. Otherwise these men would no longer have a God and the phrase would have been “I was the God…”

The key thing here is that Jesus is confident that Scripture is authoritative and that things truly occurred just as Scripture records them….even down to the very tense of a specific word. If Exodus records God as saying “I am,” then that is truly what He said.

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A couple of thoughts come to mind regarding this passage. First, since Jesus tells us to give that which bears Caesar’s image, the coin, to Caesar, it raises the question, “What do we give to God?” Obviously, the answer is that which bears God’s image, but what is that?

From Genesis 1: “Let us make man in our own image… in the image of God, male and female, he created them.” We bear God’s image, and thus it is our very selves that God expects of us.

Also, I find it particularly suitable that this passage, regarding our relationship to “Caesar”, falls this year on Independence Day in my church’s lectionary. We must always remember that our liberty is a gift from God, our Creator, not from our government. Caesar’s job is to protect and guard the liberty of his subjects; he is not its source. The same thing goes for morality. Caesar is not the ultimate arbiter of right and wrong—God is. When our government sets itself up as the determiner of morality, rather than its defender, whether through legislation, or courts, it is Caesar, back to his old tricks. Let us not give to Caesar that which belongs only to God.

BIG IDEA FOR THE DAY: What does giving to God what is God’s mean for you today?

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In this passage we are told that the kingdom of heaven is like a marriage feast, i.e., a big party. Many were invited, and all the likely candidates didn’t come. Some just made fun of the invite, others actually mistreated and abused the king’s messengers. So the king sent his messengers out to bring in whatever riff-raff they could find. This king was determined!

We may tend to think of the “kingdom of heaven”, as mentioned in this passage, as referring to some grand, cosmic, future reality, as in “I sure want to go to that feast in heaven when I die.” But Jesus, by his incarnation, death, resurrection, and sending of the Holy Spirit, came to bring the reality of the “kindgom of heaven” to the here and now.

The King is inviting us to his Son’s marriage feast each day. Today, when I get the invitation, what will I choose? Will I enter into his Presence, join his feast? Or will I scorn the invitation, and choose instead to feed sinful appetites? Or maybe I’ll just choose distractions–things that aren’t necessarily bad in themselves, but just fritter away my time and energy.

Lord, today I choose to come to the feast that you invite me to. Lord, I choose to receive from your hand, rather than the world, since I know that everything that comes from your hand is good.

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When I was a teen, my favorite job was babysitting for my piano teacher’s children. I’m not entirely sure letting me be responsible for her 3 little ones was necessarily the sanest choice, but the kids sure loved it. We had quite a few rowdy games that we played with great fervor, but none so much as “Rock-A-Bye-Baby.” Most people I know gently rock their children and then give them a little pretend-toss when they get to the line “down will come baby”, but that’s not how we played it. I would wrap one of them up snug in a blanket, rock them vigorously back and forth until they were giggling uncontrollably, and then, at the “down will come baby” climax, literally toss them 2 or 3 feet through the air onto their overstuffed couch. And they loved it. It never crossed their minds that I could very possibly lose my grip on them prematurely and drop them on the floor. And I’m sure they never thought I would ever miss the couch and send them flying into a less forgiving piece of furniture. Perhaps the craziest part of our game was the fact that they kept coming back for more. “Do it again! Do it again!”

So when Jesus says we should come to him like little children, I like to think of those 3. They trusted me completely – so much so that they literally put themselves into my hands. Do we trust Jesus that much? There will be times when my life is in so much chaos and motion that I have no control over it, but my response needs to be complete trust that He will not lose His grip on me. And in the moments when I feel as though I am hurtling through the air toward who-knows-what, He calls on me to rest in the assurance that He has, in His infinite love and wisdom, chosen the exact right place for me to land.

BIG IDEA FOR THE DAY: Would you let Jesus throw you on the couch? And then ask for more?

Sometimes, I think Jesus is just being rude to people. Here’s a nice man with great upbringing and a pretty solid spiritual background approaching Jesus with a very bold statement of commitment. If I had been there, this man’s statement of commitment would have put my own commitment to shame. There are some places where I really don’t want to go. This guy seems to have it all together!

That’s the problem with words of promise. They can convince us that something is true about a person when in fact it might not be. I look at Jesus and initially think he’s rude, but then I remember that Jesus came to earth on a mission of life and death that would label him as a workaholic for three straight years. He got up early in the morning to pray, and he went to bed late at night. He was constantly surrounded by crowds (and at times by some really annoying fishermen). But the mission wasn’t about celebrity. Ultimately, he was going to give up his life for the sake of others, and he was going to call his followers to do the same.

Perhaps it wasn’t rudeness but straightforward honesty that drove Jesus to challenge this man’s commitment to “go anywhere.” Perhaps Jesus knew the man wasn’t interested in a nomadic life but was rather interested in just walking with Jesus to his final destination assuming that Jesus had a home base from which he operated. Perhaps the man was simply asking, “Jesus, can I sleep over tonight?” Perhaps that’s what Jesus knew about the man, but at any rate, Jesus simply says, “I’ve got no place to sleep tonight or any night. There is no home base for what I’m doing. Are you aware of what you are signing on for?” And that’s the last we hear of this particular man.

The other man, of course, seems to be a little more honest and humble, but Jesus again responds with something that seems to be rude! This man just wants to bury his father, and Jesus says, “Forget about him! His body will turn to dust on its own eventually. Just leave it!” Or maybe that’s not what Jesus was saying at all. Perhaps Jesus knew something about this man too. Perhaps this man’s father wasn’t actually dead yet. Perhaps this man’s father wasn’t even sick. Perhaps this man was saying, “Well, Jesus, once my parents have passed, then I’ll look you up.” Perhaps Jesus was saying, “If that’s what you want to do with your life, wait for your parents to die, then you are already dead yourself. So go, let dead people bury dead people.”

Or perhaps Jesus was simply using these opportunities to teach something to those who would be reading these verses in 2008.

Jesus sacrificed a great deal to get on the road proclaiming good news and healing people, and he calls his followers to similar sacrifice. Are you waiting around for something to happen before you will give Jesus your full allegiance? Are you displaying a surface commitment to Christ while not actually addressing what it will cost you?

BIG IDEA FOR THE DAY: Take time now to reflect on your status with Christ. He calls his followers to sacrifice for the sake of the mission. “Follow me,” he says.

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