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We’ve been studying the Parable of the Talents in my High School/young adult class and have learned, correctly, that God assesses our ability and based on that assessment expects some kind of productivity out of us.
I asked my class that if God revealed to us what he thought of our individual abilities... how would that make us feel?
For instance, if God revealed to the whole class that we were all just one talent people what would be our response? Would we just respond by thinking… God knows everything and I am what I am or would we be so indignant at our own correctly assessed ability that we decide… I’m not going to be a one talent man… I’ll prove that I can be better?
What if God told everyone in the class that they were all five talent men what would our reaction bethen? We might be pretty happy and smug and maybe rest on our laurels.
If God told me that I was a five talent man I think that might motivate me to be even better. I might think I’m going to do so well they are going to have to write a new Parable about the 10, 5, 2 and 1 talent men.
You see, in John 15 we find out that God prunes his most productive people so we can be even more productive… that’s how a low talent man can be a higher talent man… by letting God prune him. And as one of the students pointed out this morning… pruning hurts the plant a little but it’s a pain that is soon forgotten, especially in comparison to the great joy we feel at pleasing God.
Let's be the best children of God that we can be and trust his process.
I think an interesting study would be to compare the beginning and the end of Jesus’ ministry.
Of course it began with Jesus’ baptism and choosing to fast in the wilderness for 40 days and then to be unsuccessfully tempted by Satan.
Jesus’ choice to begin his ministry is interesting. My guess is he did it in this manner to foreshadow how his follower’s personal ministry must also begin by being cleansed by the waters of baptism and to receive the promised “gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:38).
At the beginning of his ministry Jesus voluntarily deprived himself of a necessity of life… food.
At the end of his ministry he was deprived of another necessity of life… all his friends, followers and family.
Jesus was all alone at the beginning and all alone at the end.
Satan tempted Jesus in the wilderness in an attempt to make Jesus his servant. Satan never tried that again but at the end successfully tempted Judas and Peter and manipulated the Jewish and Roman governments to kill Jesus. If Satan couldn’t make Jesus his servant he would kill him… or so he thought.
When Jesus was baptized a loud voice came from Heaven… this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.
When Jesus died on the cross God spoke again by tearing the veil in the temple, sending an earthquake and making the dead rise from their graves.
Surely Jesus baptism foreshadowed his death, burial and “rebirth”… buried in the waters of baptism and buried in the ground. Arising from the waters of baptism and arising from the tomb.
All of this was an example for us. Remember… Satan never gives up. Sometimes he changes his tactics but he doesn’t give up and if we don’t give up either then like Jesus we can live for eternity in God’s presence and among the “principalities and powers in Heavenly places”.
In Genesis 30 Jacob was having a disagreement with his father-in-law Laban as to the division of their flocks.
Jacob proposed that he take all the sheep that were spotted and Laban could have the more valuable pure white sheep. Laban readily agreed to that.
The trouble for Laban was that God blessed Jacob and the majority of the lamb crop each year was spotted and Jacob’s flock prospered while Laban’s flock diminished.
Jesus during his three year ministry consistently chose the spotted sheep to minister to… the prostitutes, the tax collectors, the hypocritical Pharisees, the sick and the dying.
Of course the Lord’s church has been compared to a flock of sheep complete with Shepherds (Elders) who care for the sheep. The Lord’s church does its best work with spotted sheep that need shepherding.
Sometimes in a congregation we might want to “pick” our sheep. Oh here’s a nice moral family in a denomination let’s clean up their misunderstandings about the Bible and add them to our number and we can go out and eat and be friends and laugh and have a good time.
But the best work is accomplished when we can find someone filthy with sin and show them a little light at the end of the tunnel and with great patience and great spiritual stamina stick with them through thick and through thin until they become strong enough to stand on their own two feet. That my friends is a great victory over Satan and causes the angels in Heaven to rejoice.
And if there is anything to be learned from the Lesson of the Spotted Sheep it’s that God will make that flock of sheep great and prosperous to the bewilderment of folks like Laban who considered spotted sheep to be inferior.
And we’re not talking about sheep and flocks but rather people and congregations.
1 Kings 3 reveals some things about King Solomon…
“Now Solomon loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of his father David, except that he was sacrificing and burning incense on the high places”
Worshipping in the “High places” was prohibited by God in Deuteronomy 12…
“You shall utterly destroy all the places where the nations whom you are going to dispossess serve their gods, on the high mountains… And you shall tear down their altars and smash their memorial stones to pieces… You shall not act this way toward the Lord your God. But you shall seek the Lord at the place which the Lord your God will choose from all your tribes, to establish His name there for His dwelling, and you shall come there”
1 Kings 3 continues with the story of how God blessed Solomon in a dream and gave him unsurpassed wisdom. And then we come to 3:15…
“Then Solomon awoke, and behold, it was a dream. And he came to Jerusalem and stood before the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and offered burnt offerings and made peace offerings, and held a feast for all his servants”
Did you see that? Solomon was worshipping in the “High Places” but after the dream he was already smarter and wiser and worshipped God where he should have in the first place… before the “Ark of the Covenant”
God no longer speaks to us in dreams but through his Son Jesus Christ and in his revealed Word.
Maybe we better re-examine where and how we worship and if we find out (like Solomon did) that our worship is improper, make the proper correction.
We don’t have to be as smart as Solomon to do that… we can borrow his wisdom and mimic it. After all wasn’t that what God intended when he preserved these words for us?
I read an obituary in the Corpus Christi Caller Times last week. The subject of this particular obituary was a retired Lt. Col from the army. He lived 92 years on this earth.
His children wrote the obituary for the old widower and mentioned that when they were cleaning out the garage they came across a box that contained some medals… the Distinguished Flying Cross, Purple Heart, Silver Star and Bronze Star.
They were astonished… they had no idea. He had never mentioned any of those great honors. I think if I was one those kids I would have just sat there and cried. They don’t just hand out those kind of medals to just anyone. He had risked his life at great peril and shed his own blood probably to save his own men.
That my friends is great humility… to achieve so much and not ever mention it to anyone.
There’s a great lesson to be learned by that in our spiritual warfare. Don’t dwell on what you have done… how many people you have baptized, how popular you are as a preacher, how you defeated someone in a debate, how much money you gave to the poor, etc. Just keep working for God and don’t even think about what you’ve done in the past and keep your good deeds a secret between you and God.
2 Corinthians 5:10 says we will give an accounting before the throne of Jesus Christ for both the good things and the bad things we have done.
I don’t know what that venue is going to be like… if its private or public, but if it were public and you were watching your mom or your dad kneeling before Jesus and Jesus just went on and on about the good things your parents had done… maybe things you never even knew about wouldn’t that make you proud? Wouldn’t you just tremble at each word spoken?
I wish I had known Lt. Col John W. Dean, retired. He must have been quite a man and if you ask me… deserved the Medal of Honor for humility.
Unexpected phone calls… we all get them. You’re at work and you get a call… Your dad has cancer and has only 12 months to live. You’re at work and you get a call… your wife has been in a bad car accident… come quick. You’re sitting on the couch watching TV and get a call from Ray Torno… Linda just collapsed and died.
We moved here in 1982 and Ray and Linda were already members here. We don’t miss services very often and neither do they. So for forty years we have seen them three times a week. When we moved here in 1982 and rented a house Linda took her kids and went over and cleaned the place up for us before we moved in. She didn’t even know us. So many little individual acts of kindnesses that when tallied together equal a heart bursting with love. We’ve attended all the funerals of dear and old friends with Ray and Linda. All the baby showers. All the wedding showers. All the picnics. All the social gatherings.
Linda taught our kids and grandkids. After class she would come up to us and brag on them and tell us how much she loved them and how special they were. She truly had a gift for teaching and rarely took a quarter off.
She and her work with the “kiddos” helped make Parkway special.
I was talking with Julie the other week and told her… you know… one of us is going to get sick and our health is going to fail and one of us is going to have take care and to bury the other. It almost seems to me that the easier part is on the one whose health fails compared to the one who has to watch the person he loves the most in the world decline and fade away.
I told her… I hope you don’t have to take care of me
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It’s a time to mourn and reflect and we need this time. Linda is in a far, far better place and my guess is that she’ll find all the kiddos up there and love them with all her heart. Rest in peace Linda… we miss and love you.
Thank God we won’t be getting any unexpected phone calls in Heaven.
Please pray and be there for my old friend Ray Torno
Most of us are familiar with the story that Nathan the Prophet spun to help David understand the severity of his sin.
In short, there was a rich man with many herds of sheep and a poor man with just one lamb. The rich man needed to prepare a meal for a visitor and took the poor man’s only ewe lamb and killed it and prepared a meal for his guest.
Nathan asks David what should be done. David replied that the rich man deserved to die but should be punished by giving the poor man four of his lambs.
Nathan said… you are the man.
Remember that David committed two grievous sins… he committed adultery with Bathsheba and had her husband Uriah (one of the thirty mighty men) killed.
But wait the story only points at one sin… adultery with Bathsheba not the murder of Uriah… or does it?
The rich man with many sheep is David (he did have several wives). The poor man with one ewe lamb is Uriah the Hittite and the ewe lamb is Bathsheba.
Let me suggest that the ewe lamb is a double figure. The ewe lamb not only represents Bathsheba and the addition of her to David’s flock of wives but also represents Uriah because in Nathan’s tale the ewe lamb is killed and eaten… and so was Uriah the Hittite so David could have his wife.
Why didn’t Nathan just confront David and say you killed Uriah and had sex with his wife? Because the illustration in a story helped David understand the enormous magnitude of his sin and God’s enormous grace in forgiving him and not punishing him with taking his life… which he roundly deserved.
David never forgot his sin and probably remembered it every time he looked into the eyes of his wife Bathsheba. We should remember it too.
