Partakers Church Podcasts

Study 28-Luke 22: 47 – 23: 25 The arrest and trials of Jesus. The story now moves steadily towards the death of Jesus. It is told with remarkable economy and simplicity in all four gospels. Not even the failure of the leading apostle and founder of the early church is left out. Read Luke 22: 47 – 53. Question 1: Would you be thinking more or less of the eleven now if they had NOT tried to defend Jesus with their two swords (22: 38, 49 ) probably against an overwhelming force? Why? Their reaction to the approach of the crowd, which Mark describes as ‘armed with swords and clubs’, is an entirely natural one. It shows that they were not cowards. It also shows that they had not taken all of Jesus’ message really into their hearts and minds. Few of us have. Presumably the clash of one or two swords could easily have led to a more general skirmish in which Jesus could have been killed. But in the purposes of God his Son had to be tried, falsely accused, condemned and judicially killed. Without the legal decision of “guilty” Jesus would not have been dying for our sins. The universal responsibility of everybody for his death, symbolised by those directly involved, would not have been incurred. A great many prophecies, such as hanging on a tree (Deut 21: 23), would not have been fulfilled. Read Luke 22:54–62. Question 2: Peter lied - and lived to do much good work for his Lord. Was he justified in doing so? Should we do the same under certain circumstances? What circumstances? Is a life more important than the truth? When, and when not? In a way it is impossible to answer this question. We do not know, and neither did Peter, what would have happened if he had not lied. A life is more important in many ways than telling the truth yet the truth or the lie will define the life for ever. In the history of the church many, many people have refused to deny Christ and died. Let’s hope we never have to answer this question for real. Hebrews 6: 4 – 6 could be taken as a comment on what Judas did. Question 3: In the light of those verses what was the essential difference between the actions of Judas and Peter? What warning should we take from this? And what encouragement? The action of Judas was taken completely deliberately; Peter stumbled unwillingly into his denials. So many of our sins occur when we too stumble unwillingly into error. It is a great relief for us that Peter was not cast away from his position but lived to do so much good and die for his Lord in due course, about 30 years later, in Rome. Read Luke 22:63–23:25. There seem to have been many meetings that night in the effort to find grounds to condemn Jesus. Luke only records a ‘trial’ at daybreak (22: 66); Mark records one in the early part of the night; Matthew and John add further details. Luke was writing to Theophilus, a senior Roman citizen, and that probably affected which episodes he was most interested in. Question 4: In that case what things in the trials is he most likely to have wanted to concentrate on? It was important to him to try and show the Romans in as good a light as possible. Pilate had a very bad reputation in the Roman world anyway so he was not concerned with putting him in a good light. But he did want to show that there was a fair trial and that Jesus was condemned partly as a result of Jewish agitation and partly for Roman political reasons. His main concern was to establish who Jesus really was. So we have 3 titles in these verses: Messiah (or Christ, or Expected and Anointed One) (22: 67; 23: 2), Son of Man (22: 68) and Son of God (22: 70) Question 5: When Peter looked back at these events he was convinced that Jesus was the Messiah (Acts 2: 22 – 36). What made him so sure? If the council had accepted that Jesus was the Messiah what would that have meant for them? What actions would it have committed them to take? Peter remembered the resurrection above all. That was the ultimate proof that Jesus was who he said he was. If the council had recognised Jesus as the sort of Messiah they expected they would have been in immediate revolt against Rome. They thought they would have had to take up arms and tackle the Roman army, which no one could do successfully. Read Daniel 7:7, 13, 14, 17 – 28 again. How would the council have understood what Jesus said in 22: 69? How would the Roman authorities have understood his claim if they had known the background? A previous Caesar, Augustus, was the (adopted) son of Julius Caesar. After Julius was killed he was venerated as a god, which made Augustus a “son of god”! What would the idea that Jesus was the Son of God have meant to the council? What implications would it have had for the Roman authorities? The crowd of 23: 13 must, in part at least, have been the same one we read about in 19: 37, 39. How can you account for such a major turn around? What should this caution us against? Who was most responsible for the condemnation of Jesus: the crowd, the Jewish leaders, the Roman authorities, or Jesus (Jn 10: 17, 18!)? Were we also responsible as those needing redemption? Another obvious question we can ask ourselves, but never really answer until it happens, is: the trial exposed the forces, commitments and loyalties of all those involved: the council members, Pilate, the crowd and Jesus. Faced with similarly difficult choices how will we react? Will we cling to our securities and dreams and avoid moving out of our comfort zones, or will we ‘take up our cross’ and follow him? It would have mattered a great deal as without the legal decision of “guilty” Jesus would not have been dying for our sins. The universal responsibility of everybody for his death, symbolised by those directly involved, would not have been incurred. A great many prophecies, such as hanging on a tree (Deut 21: 23), would not have been fulfilled. Of course, it could never have happened that way anyway (Jn 7: 30). 5) The action of Judas was taken completely deliberately; Peter stumbled unwillingly into his denials. 7) The Resurrection. 9) Angels, Israel as a people, and the king of Israel (Ps 89: 26, 27) are called sons of God in the OT. The last of these is the meaning implied here. The council would have understood him to be saying that he was the King of Israel (see 23: 2). The Romans would have thought him to be claiming to be one of the many gods of those days and probably would not have been too concerned by that. 10) As Messiah he was the representative Israelite and is now the representative Christian (Rom 5: 15 – 17). We are in Christ (the Messiah). As Son of Man he is a human being standing in our place (Heb 2: 17 – 18). As Son of God he is the Saviour who, being God, is able to die for us all (Heb 1: 3; 2: 9). 12) This has been much argued about through the centuries. The best answer is probably all of them, and us. 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Study 27-Luke 22:1-46 Joys and Sorrows In this chapter Jesus is a source of great strength and joy to his disciples as they gather to eat the Passover together. At the same time betrayal, misunderstanding and desertion surround him. Read Luke 22:1–6. Question 1: If ‘Satan entered Judas’ how responsible was Judas for what he did? When is it permissible for us to say ‘Satan entered somebody? To answer the second part of the question first:it is very doubtful whether we should ever say this. Judas was fully responsible as he eventually recognised; Matt 27:3, 4 says ‘When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. I have sinned, he said, for I have betrayed innocent blood. What is that to us? They replied. That's your responsibility. There is an interesting and important parallel in Isaiah 10 where we read:“Woe to the Assyrian, the rod of my (the Lord’s) anger, in whose hand is the club of my wrath! I send him against a godless nation (that is Israel), I dispatch him against a people who anger me, to seize loot and snatch plunder, and to trample them down like mud in the streets.” But this is not what he (Assyria) intends, this is not what he has in mind; his purpose is to destroy, to put an end to many nations. When the Lord has finished all his work against Mount Zion and Jerusalem, he will say, I will punish the king of Assyria for the wilful pride of his heart and the haughty look in his eyes. For he says:'By the strength of my hand I have done this, and by my wisdom, because I have understanding.’ So we see in that passage it is true both that the Lord in his sovereign power used Assyria to punish Israel and the Assyrians were completely responsible for what they did. Here Judas was completely responsible for what he did even if in so doing he fulfilled the greater purposes of the Lord. That may not agree with our logic but that kind of both God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility at the same time is the common teaching of the word of God. As with the arrangements for the triumphal entry it seems likely that Jesus had pre-arranged the hire or loan of the room. We read Luke 22:7–23. Question 2: Luke is not interested in the detailed arrangements for the meal, which must have included things like the sacrifice of a lamb in the temple. What is he interested in? Can you think of any reason for that? He is only interested in the human aspects of the story, the depth of fellowship it showed and the inauguration of the Lord’s Supper. He draws attention to the way this celebration was repeated in the very early church in his account in Acts. He expected the church to follow the main points of what Jesus did down through the centuries. Question 3: What is the intended symbolism of the bread and the cup? What are the intended symbolisms in the way the elements must have been handled? How many of these symbolisms are lost the way your fellowship do it? Bread was the common essential of life in those days. It was nothing special that Jesus used. The loaf had to be forcibly broken, as was the body of Jesus to be. The cup was poured out but none was spilt as the blood of Jesus was. It represented blood and therefore (life-giving) death. In addition this was a Passover meal so it also carried the symbolisms of Exodus 12, particularly perhaps the redemption under the covering blood and the sense of a meal to be eaten in haste, prepared to go on a great journey of faith. It is up to you to think through how that relates to what your fellowship do when they celebrate this meal. Question 4: Sadly the communion service/breaking of bread/eucharist/ mass has become the chief symbol of division in Christendom when it should have been the great symbol of unity. Why do you think this has happened? Unfortunately men have sort power by claiming they, by reason of some office they hold, and they alone, have the right to dispense the elements and control the procedure. Very sad. There is surely no justification for any church or group of churches preventing Christians who are not of their fellowship from participating at the Lord’s Table. Jesus called it the feast of the ‘new covenant’. Gen 17:3–8 is the original covenant with Abraham. Deut 5:1–4 records the covenant with Moses and the Israelites at Siana. Jer 31:31–34 promises a new covenant which this is. Many churches never really talk about covenants, new or old. They lose by not doing so. Read Luke 22:24–38. The dispute of v24 must have filled Jesus with dismay as it contradicted all that he had tried so hard to teach his disciples. Question 5: In what ways are we most likely to contradict all that the communion service is meant to achieve in us even before we leave it? What should we learn from the words of Jesus responding to that dispute (v25–30)? The tendency of men and women to want to feel superior to other people is always present where people gather together. Jesus reiterates his teaching that we are not to seek that superiority for ourselves remembering that such things will be reversed in the Kingdom anyway. Question 6: The instruction to buy a sword (v 36) is very strange. There is no evidence that the early church ever did this. Should they have? How can we understand these verses? Read Luke 22:39–46. Luke’s account of Jesus praying on the Mount of Olives (v 39–46) is considerably shorter than Matthew’s (26:36–46) and Mark’s (14:32–42) accounts. What does Doctor Luke tell us to emphasise the importance of the event? What can we learn about prayer from this account? And so the scene is set for the final hours of Jesus and the beginning of new possibilities in human life. That will be in our next study. Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Thursday with Tabitha 3. Amos Amos was a prophet during the time of King Uzziah of Judah and King Jeroboam of Israel. His prophecy came somewhere roundabout the year 760 BC, give or take a few decades! At this time Israel and Judah were enjoying an unusual spell of prosperity and political stability. This was especially the case in Israel, where the land was very fertile and abundant crops were growing. The threat from the kingdom of Assyria seemed to have lessened, at least for the time being, so life was pretty good. Unfortunately the people of Israel and Judah had wandered far from the standards of holiness that God had intended for them. Idolatry was rampant, the rich were getting richer and more corrupt by the day and the wealthy were exploiting the poor. The Israelites falsely concluded that their prosperity was a sign of God's obvious blessing. They were looking forward to “the Day of the Lord” when God would finally crush their enemies. It is into this environment that Amos was called to prophesy. We're told that Amos came from Tekoa, a small village in Judah, south-east of Bethlehem. He is identified as a shepherd or maybe a sheep breeder. A rather unlikely choice for a prophet on the face of things! Amos begins his message in chapter 1 with a series of proclamations of God's judgement on the neighbours of the Israelites. He has words of judgement for Damascus, Gaza, Tyre, Edom, the Ammonites and the people of Moab. These people groups were enemies of the Israelites. The charges against them relate to their violence, cruelty and abuse of other human beings, particularly during times of war and conquest. The Israelites would probably have been nodding along happily until the beginning of chapter 2. At this point Amos suddenly turns his attention to Judah and then to Israel. The judgements leveled against God's people are of a different order altogether. God accuses them of violating the terms of his covenant with them - they are called to a higher standard of moral and spiritual living than the pagan nations around them. Amos doesn't hold back! The sins of the Israelites include oppression and exploitation of the poor, sexual sins, idolatry, misuse of God's temple, abuse and silencing of the prophets, and empty, ritualistic worship. God had patiently tried to warn his people, by sending them prophets and providing examples of holiness in the form of people like the Nazirites, who took vows of holiness and of abstinence from wine. But God's people had not listened and now God would judge them. The main message in the book of Amos is this: God's judgement is universal; Israel and Judah are not immune. Chapters 3 to 6 expand on the initial judgements outlined in the first two chapters. Even the women of Israel are exposed as people who oppress the poor - God likens them to the fat cows that graze in the fields of Bashan! God is appalled at the nature of the people's idolatrous worship. The people had started to offer sacrifices in places other than the temple in Jerusalem and they had appointed priests who were not Levites. These things were deviations from the instructions that God had provided for worship. They had even turned to worshipping golden calves and other idols. The Israelites thought that they were offering worship that was pleasing to God but it was actually detestable to him. In chapter 4 God summarises a series of warning shots that he gave to the people, which were intended to bring them back to him, but the tragic refrain is repeated over and over again: “yet you did not return to me”. In chapter 5 Amos entreats the people to turn back to God, telling them that it's perhaps not too late. God laments over Israel like a father whose virgin daughter has been raped or become a prostitute. In chapter 5 God declares the following: “I hate, I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the peace offerings of your fattened animals, I will not look upon them. Take away from me the noise of your songs; to the melody of your harps I will not listen. But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. (Amos 5:21-24 ESV) God calls the people to repent and come back to him and seek justice. In chapter 6 further sins are described which include the complacency of the people in the self-indulgence of the rich at the expense of the poor. Chapter 7 to 9 contain a series of visions which Amos has. These visions declare that God's judgement is unavoidable if God is to be just, which he must. The judgement is imminent. The final vision pictures God standing by the altar of the temple shaking it to its foundations. This is a prophecy about the final downfall of Israel. The prophecy was fulfilled very soon after this. Assyria gained power again and conquered Israel in 722 BC. After all the serious judgements and the terrifying reality of the impending downfall of Israel, the book of Amos ends on a tantalizing note of hope. Despite the people's willful disobedience and the depth of their depravity and sin, God is a God of mercy and deliverance. There is a promise of future restoration of the Israelites. God promises to repair the dwellings of David and preserve a remnant of his people for the future. So what can we learn from the book of Amos? Firstly, we learn that God is always just. God is a God of love and he is mercifully patient but he has to judge sin, otherwise he is not really loving at all. Despite appearances to the contrary, nobody is getting away with anything. Every human being who has ever lived or who will ever live must stand before God to be judged. And the truth is that none of us can stand before him with a perfect account, with an unblemished record of our own. However, the message of hope at the end of Amos hints at the salvation that would eventually come through Jesus. God never meant his judgements on Israel and Judah to be the last word. In mercy he preserved a remnant through the line of David through which the Messiah would come. Through Jesus, God has provided the means of our deliverance and restoration. Those who've trusted in Jesus' perfect, sinless record and accepted his payment for their sin (the sacrifice of his own life) will be able to stand before God without fear. Amos's message also shows us that the knowledge of God comes with responsibility. Those who know more of God and his standards of holiness will be held more accountable than those who have never heard about him. God chose the people of Israel out of all the peoples of the earth, but not because they were better or more numerous or more powerful. Quite the opposite in fact! They were chosen by grace alone. God made his covenant with the people of Israel and gave them clear boundaries of ethical and moral conduct and instructions for their spiritual worship. These were for their own protection and their own benefit. Today, as the new covenant people of God we are no longer required to keep all the requirements of the original old Testament law that God gave to Moses. However, Jesus did not come abolish the law but to fulfill it (Matt 5:17). Just because we have been freed from the demands of the law we are not simply free to do whatever we want. In fact as Jesus pointed out we are called to go above and beyond the requirements that the old law demanded. Rather than restraining ourselves to proportional revenge on our enemies we are called to love them. Instead of simply giving the bare minimum required we are called to give extravagantly. Jesus teaches us that the standard of holiness we are called to is so much higher than we would think. We should view sin with such seriousness that hating somebody should feel as bad as murder and lusting after another person should be regarded as adultery in the heart. Amos' words need to speak to us today, reminding us that God's standard of holiness is so much higher than we realize. Instead of passing our own judgement on the sinful Israelites we need to look honestly at our own lives and realize just how similar to them we can be. God calls his people to do justly, love mercy and walk humbly with him (Micah 6:8). Are we doing that? Do we actively look for opportunities to defend the rights of the poor in our society and our world? Do we think carefully about how we worship God? God is so merciful and patient with us – he calls us to come back to him, to abide in his love, to learn from him and to be his hands and feet in the world we live in.   Right Mouse click or tap here to download this episode as an audio mp3 file

Study 26 - Luke 21:5-38 The fall of Jerusalem and the End of the Age First: some introduction. A quick google shows 9 occasions in which there was a major siege and capture of Jerusalem, from that by the Babylonians in 586 BC to one by the British in AD 1917. This chapter is very similar to Mark 13 and Matthew 24 (many think Mark’ gospel was a major source of Luke’s information). Matt 24, in particular, is worth reading to note the additional information it contains. These chapters are concerned with Jesus’ prophecies of the important siege and sack of Jerusalem in AD 70. This was carried out by the Romans in reaction to a rebellion of the Jews within the Roman Empire about 40 years after the death of Jesus (probably about the time Luke wrote his gospel). But these are notoriously difficult chapters to understand, mainly because the prophecies of the fall of Jerusalem act in part as a foreshadowing and illustration of what is still to happen at the end of the age. The fall of Jerusalem was immediately catastrophic for the Jews but even more important for the Christians who understood it to be the final act of the OT approach to God, completely clearing the way for the Kingdom Age introduced by Jesus. Even the phrase ‘end of the age’ is difficult. Some argue that from the perspective of a Jew in AD 60 that would mean no more than the end of their life, society and culture, which did indeed occur in AD 70, landing them into a totally different age. However it seems to have at least some reference to the Day of the Lord, which is still in front of us nearly 2000 years later. Question 1: Which of the following verses is about the Fall of Jerusalem, which is about the end of the age, and which cannot be clearly assigned solely to either of these? v6–9; v24b; v25 & 27; v34b-35 The fall of Jerusalem was horrendous by any standards. According to Josephus, a Jewish historian working for the Romans, about 1.1 million people (he is known to exaggerate!) were killed, many because different factions of the Jews fought each other within the walls while the Romans watched in amazement from outside. The temple was then totally destroyed by the Romans but the city did continue for a further 65 years until AD 135 when a further revolt so infuriated Hadrian, the Emperor at that time, that he had it completely razed to the ground and rebuilt as a Roman city called Aelia Capitolina. Question 2: Is there any reason to think that the problems of v 9, 10, 25 and 26 were any worse in the 1st century than previously? Or are any worse in the 21st century? A matter of opinion – but I don’t think there is much difference. With the vast improvement in communication technology we know far more about what is happening on the other side of the world than they used to do. Read Daniel 7:1–3, 7–14, 19–22, 27. The hearers of Jesus will have known this prophecy of Daniel well. Question 3: What then will they have understood him to mean by the reference to the Son of Man in Luke 21: 27? In particular what encouragement will they have got from what he said? They will have been encouraged not only by the promise that Jesus will return in great power and glory but that the figure in Daniel is representative of the people of God. They will have taken this to mean that their position would improve greatly in the age to come. Question 4: What encouragement should persecuted Christians in one of the difficult countries of the world get from what Jesus said? Question 5: If, on the other hand, we are in one of the easier countries in the world to be a Christian what encouragement should we get from this chapter? It is strange that Luke does not use what Mark records in Mk 13:32–36. Question 6: What are the motives of those who ignore those verses and make confident but erroneous predictions? How should we react to such things? Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 25 - Luke 20:1-21: 4 Jesus challenges his hearers 7 times. The first 4 of these challenges are quite substantial with definite contexts; the others less so. Challenge 1 – Luke 20: 1 – 8 The question of authority is of great importance. There is no answer here so we need to go to John 5: 31 – 45 to find one. Question 1: Where does Jesus say his authority comes from or is testified to in these verses, which I am just about to read. Listen carefully and count the different sources you can hear. You should get six different ones. Where does the authority of what we say or do come from? You should have got as sources of authority: John the Baptist, his works, his Father, the Scriptures, Moses, his own words. Our main authority should be the Word of the Scriptures. All other authorities are secondary to them. Challenge 2 – Luke 20: 9 – 19 It is based on Isaiah 5: 1 – 7. This story of the Tenants, or rather of the Vineyard Owner, is one of the most significant of all the parables with the clearest foreshadowing of the future of Jesus. Question 2: What is the expected answer to Vineyard owner’s question “What shall I do?” after the first 3 servants have been beaten and sent back empty handed? What, therefore, is the significance of the given answer ‘I will send my son’? The expected answer is that he will declare war on the tenants and have them beaten or killed to restore his honour which has been so shamed. Instead the Owner (God) makes himself vulnerable to the behaviour of the tenants (the Temple leadership). Thus a new way of humility, love and grace is displayed before the watching world. That vulnerability is displayed in the Owner sending his son. The son is killed and only then is it said that the Owner ‘will kill those tenants and give the vineyard to others.’ Question 3: What is the significance of that for the original hearers? And for us? This suggests that the Incarnation of Jesus constituted a last chance for the leadership of Israel. They failed the test. Jesus is the first and last chance for us. Jesus comment on the parable is a quotation from the Psalms (118: 22) ‘The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone’ and one from Isaiah (8: 13 – 15) ‘The LORD Almighty will be a stone that causes men to stumble and a rock that makes them fall; they will fall and be broken, they will be snared and captured.’ “Son” in Hebrew is “ben”; “stone” is “eben”. This is probably a deliberate word play. Question 4: What should we, the second tenants, learn from this story? God is infinitely gracious in what he has done for us; but we must not presume on his loving kindness if we despise his Son and his graciousness. Challenge 3 – Luke 20: 20 – 26. This is about the relationship between church and state. Should we: a) resist - have nothing to do with politics? b) accept - have a modest involvement only? c) challenge - be politically active for the betterment of society? Since hearers and readers of this will come from so many different countries with so many different situations I will have to leave you without an answer so it will be best if I do not ask the question! There is a deeper meaning, often missed. Question 5: If we compare v 24b ‘Whose portrait and inscription are on it?’ with Gen 1: 26. ‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness,’ What does this imply? If the denarius belongs to Caesar we, not just our coins, belong to God. Challenge 4 – Luke 20: 27 – 40 People often assume that we shall be united with our loved ones in heaven although this is not clearly stated in Scripture. Jesus’ answer to the 7 husbands teaser probably has no implications for that assumption, since it is an impossible situation anyway. The following 3 much smaller challenges all have very little given context. Challenge 5 – Luke 20: 41 – 44 It is not easy to see what Jesus meant when he said this. Luke probably records it because it was very meaningful for the early church about 40 years later when they must have been quite puzzled to know who exactly Jesus was. They were worshipping him. Did that make him God? We know now that it did, and he was, but they must have been unsure about that for many years. These verses are a part answer to their questions. What Jesus said equates the Messiah with the Son of David. That is not literally true. It is a useful reminder that ‘son of God’ is not to be taken as grossly literal either as some people try to do. Challenge 6 – Luke 20: 45 – 47. Question 6: Jesus did not actually condemn the privileges given to the scribes. What did he condemn? What are the present day equivalents of these? In particular, in what ways can we err in the way we participate in a prayer meeting? What Jesus condemned were wrong attitudes to those privileges. They were to be things treasured and used for the benefit of other people not for private vanity. A minister should not dress differently from other people unless it is for a purpose such as recognition as he visits a hospital. We need to be careful when we take part in a prayer meeting that we are not taking part because we like other people to hear our voice. Challenge 7 – Luke 21: 1 – 4. Question 7: Is this realistic advice? Is ‘all she had to live on’ wise giving? If we do that we will end up in court for non-payment of utility bills or have to rely on other members of our family to give us food! So what can we take from this passage? Yet again this is all about motives and attitudes. A very few Christians can imitate this situation. But they have to be a very few or we would all starve! Perhaps this is another of Jesus’ overstatements for effect. Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 24 - Luke 19:28–48 The Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem Jesus cannot complete his mission without entering Jerusalem and confronting the authorities there. This he does, first with actions and then with words Please read Luke 19: 28-38. It seems likely that Jesus had made some arrangements the twelve knew nothing about. Perhaps he had 2 sets of supporters: the apostles in spiritual matters and a group of organisers or deacons.) Question 1: What makes that a reasonable thing to say? Are there any alternative explanations? There is something a bit mysterious about the account of Jesus sending two disciples to get the colt. It is hard to be sure but there does seem to have been a prior arrangement made by Jesus that the two disciples did not know the details of. To think that Jesus knew through his divine powers that the colt would be there is probably to over-emphasize the divine in Jesus and forget that he was also human. The account of the way Jesus entered Jerusalem is full of hints of OT passages. Three of the most important are: 1 Kings 1:33-35 which reads: "Take your lord's servants with you and have Solomon my son mount my own mule and take him down to Gihon. There have Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet anoint him king over Israel. Blow the trumpet and shout, 'Long live King Solomon!' Then you are to go up with him, and he is to come and sit on my throne and reign in my place. I have appointed him ruler over Israel and Judah." Psalm 118:26-27 Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD. From the house of the LORD we bless you. The LORD is God, With boughs in hand, join in the festal procession. Zechariah 9:9 Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion! Shout, Daughter Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. Each of these is important in that Jesus did things that ensured that he fulfilled these prophecies. Jesus often fulfilled prophecies without having any apparent control on what happened but this is totally deliberate. Question 2: Why did Jesus make sure these prophecies were fulfilled? Why did he make his entry into Jerusalem into such a public spectacle? He did not always do this. In John 7: 10 we read that after his brothers had left for the Feast, he went also, not publicly, but in secret. Jesus knew he would die in Jerusalem. He did not want to die quietly. This was the most important event in the history of mankind. It had to be witnessed by many people. Those people needed to have all the necessary and sufficient evidence that he was indeed the Messiah, the Anointed One, even if they did not believe the evidence. Question 3: What will each of the following have been expecting: an ordinary member of the crowd? one of the disciples? one of the priests, lawyers or leaders of the people? a watching centurion of the Roman guard in charge of keeping the peace? This is something interesting to use our imaginations on. I reckon a member of the crowd would have been caught up in the excitement, possibly not knowing much about Jesus but sensing that something important was happening. One of the disciples would have realised the significance of what was happening, have been exceedingly excited and wanting to be ready for anything including fighting. One of the leaders of the people would have been annoyed and worried, concerned that there might be a full blown riot before long. A centurion would have been making sure his sword slid easily out of its scabbard, that his men were all lined up and waiting, and relishing the prospect of a fight against a largely unarmed crowd. Luke's account continues with Jesus prophesying the total destruction of the city and the destruction of the temple. All of which actually happened in AD 70, just about the time Luke was writing, and involved the slaughter of most of the inhabitants of the city and the surrounding countryside. We read Luke 19:19-48. What Jesus said in Luke 19:46 is a combination of Isaiah 56:7 and Jeremiah 7: 11. I will read rather more verses than these because in both cases the context adds important ideas to those in the exact words Jesus used. Listen out carefully for those extra ideas, which form the next question. Question 4a: Read Isaiah 56:3-8. What extra ideas are there in those verses that would have been of interest to the more knowledgeable people in the crowd. Isaiah includes both foreigners and eunuchs, those who were excluded from the temple worship that governed all of life at Jerusalem feast days. Question 4b: Read Jeremiah 7: 3-11. What extra ideas are there in those verses that would have been of interest to the more knowledgeable people in the crowd. Jeremiah places conditions of good behaviour on temple worshippers. He is saying it is not enough just to be a Jew or an Israelite. Jesus was saying it was not who you were but what you were that mattered. If your worship at the temple was to be of any significance at all before God it was your life of faith that mattered, not whether you were a Jew, or not, or any particular sort of Jew. Perhaps Jesus and his disciples were just entering the court of the Gentiles, the great outer court of the temple from which the disabled (eunuchs) and foreigners were excluded, as he spoke. No race, or language, is any more important than any other to the Christian. The Bible Jesus used was a translation from the Hebrew to the Greek. We rejoice in the translation of the Bible into more and more languages. The way Jesus clears the temple in Luke 19:45 is a symbolic picture of the destruction of the temple. So that destruction was not accidental or due to the will of the Roman general. Question 5: What then is the significance of the temple ruins in Jerusalem now, for Jews, for Muslims, for Christians? The temple ruins are of absolutely no real significance for anybody any longer except as interesting relics of something which is now meaningless. Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 23- Luke 18:31–19:27 Seeing and trusting There are 4 sections in this study all of which have something to do with seeing and not seeing, understanding and not understanding or just plain hidden. The first section, Luke 18: 31–34 serves as a summary of what is to follow. Do read Luke 18:31-34. The disciples had a reasonable excuse for not understanding. What Jesus was saying was so strange and unexpected they could be forgiven for not understanding. But we, in all probability, have some knowledge of how things turned out so we do not have that excuse. v 34 provides a challenge to us, the readers or hearers: will we be blind or deaf, will we see or hear and understand? Blindness and sight are metaphors for no faith and faith. Have you moved from blindness to sight? Remind yourself what the effect of your blindness was and how you first knew that you were seeing or, if you are in a group, share together your journey from blindness to sight, darkness to light. Question 1: What is the significance of the rising sequence of names given to Jesus by the blind man (named as Bartimaeus, literally ‘son of filth’, in Mk 10: 46). Those names are Jesus of Nazareth; Jesus, son of David; Lord. Jesus of Nazareth probably meant to him the prophet with power to heal and who would have compassion on him; Jesus, son of David, meant Jesus was the Messiah; Lord that Jesus was worth following. The question and answer in 18: 41 may appear strange but begging was a profession in those days as it still is in some countries, dependant on a visible handicap and providing a good income. If the man was cured of his blindness he would have to find a job with no skills or experience to call on. Question 2: The emphasis is not on Bartimaeus’ restored sight but his faith (18: 42, 43). What exactly did his faith consist of? What is this miracle saying to us? The important phrase is ‘he followed Jesus’. He must have known something about Jesus or he would not have made so much noise trying to attract his attention. We, too, are not expected to start from detailed knowledge about what following Jesus means. We, too, are expected to get up (metaphorically speaking) and follow him. Do read Luke 19: 1–10. Zacchaeus was not only short of stature; he was a collaborator with the hated Romans. He would not dare to push his way to the front of the crowd for fear of a knife in his back. So he ran ahead! Not what an important man should do. But the crowd saw him go and mocked him so that Jesus learned his name. Jesus was intending to go straight through Jericho so that he would not have to spend time (possibly days?) being entertained with full ceremony. But he is prepared to go to Zacchaeus’ house. Question 3: Note the significance of seeing in this account. Who does the seeing? Everybody. Zacchaeus had to take action to see Jesus, Jesus sees him; the crowd sees what is going on and starts to mutter. The servant figure of Is 53 takes hostility meant for others on himself. Statements there like: “he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.” reflect the costly love that Jesus gives to Zacchaeus? Question 4: We read earlier in this chapter that the rich man/camel had to go through the eye of the needle! What happened to prove that Zaccheus didn’t dodge round? The promises of repayment Zacchaeus made are far reaching. If you do the Maths on what he said you will see that if he had cheated just on one eighth of his debtors he would end up with nothing. Perhaps he is saying that he has been a good man and that he has not been cheating in the past? Do read Luke 19: 11–27. Luke does not use the parable of the minas to teach successful stewardship as Matthew uses it in Matt 25: 14–30 but to explain the apparent non-appearance of the Kingdom (the people thought the kingdom of God was going to appear at once 19: 11). The parable uses a well-known and well-understood situation. 73 years earlier Herod the Great, second son of the just assassinated king, made a successful journey to Rome to petition Caesar to appoint him the next king of Judea. Later, about 37 years before Luke wrote, Herod’s son Archelaus had made a similar, but unsuccessful, journey seeking the same thing. (A ‘mina’ was about 100 days wages for a working man.) Queston 5: What would be the likely outcome for a servant of the would-be king if (a) the petitioner who would be king was successful, (b) he was unsuccessful? By their actions the servants would demonstrate their allegiance or otherwise to the man seeking to be king. Their future livelihoods, or possibly their lives, would be dependant on having chosen the right option. The last phrase of v 15 should perhaps read ‘how much trading have you done’ effectively asking how conspicuous have you been while I was away when it was known that you supported me. If I win, you win. If I lose, you lose. Question 6: How was this relevant to the developing situation as Jesus travelled to Jerusalem? How is it relevant to us? If he was indeed the Messiah he claimed to be and they showed their loyalty by open declaration of their support of him they would gain. If he wasn’t, they would be in a very dangerous situation. At least that was the way it looked. Things did not quite work out in that straightforward way. He was indeed the Messiah but they were still in a dangerous situation, humanly speaking. But in the vast story of human history they became very important. The comment of the third servant in 19: 21 must have been meant as a complement! He must have been suggesting that his master was something like a warlord in a country with much internal fighting going on! Question 7: How can this and the master’s reply (v 21, 22) be related to Jesus, or to God? Ps 18: 25, 26 relates to this sort of situation. It says of God ‘To the faithful you show yourself faithful, to the blameless you show yourself blameless, to the pure you show yourself pure, but to the devious you show yourself shrewd.’ It suggest that, at least in part, our understanding of God will depend on our general attitudes. Question 8: The final comment in 19: 27 ‘But those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them — bring them here and kill them in front of me. is realistic in the Judaean kingship, or warlord, scenario. How can it possibly be related to Jesus, or God? This is another unfinished story. We are told what the enemies deserved, not what actually happened to them. Compare what we deserve and what we actually get from the Lord. After Jesus had said this, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem. So says 19: 28, finally bringing to an end the long account of the journey of Jesus to Jerusalem and introducing the last phase of Luke’s account of Jesus’ life, death and victory. Tap or click here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 22 - Luke 18:9–30 The Way of the Kingdom We now come to two very significant parables either side of a short and rather surprising paragraph. I think we should start off with some explanations. The first parable is not about ways to pray but about righteousness (Luke 18:9). Righteousness is a very important, but very tricky, word in the Bible. Our English word has been used to translate a word in the Greek, which does not quite mean what our word means! In fact the Biblical word carries with it a whole set of meanings that no single word in English can possibly include. Our word has as its primary meaning ‘being right’, in the sense of being morally and ethically right in the scale of good and bad. But the Greek word in the NT is used to translate an OT word, which is primarily about being accepted, about being in relationship with someone. Our word is an accountant’s word; the OT word is a social word. Of course, in the OT one can only be accepted by a Holy God if one is right in the moral sense too, but that idea is secondary. And then a third implication of the word is that if you are accepted by God then you are within the covenant that God struck with Abraham. So the word means being accepted by God, being good and being within the covenant. Also, a big family of related Greek words about righteousness have to be translated by English words with two very different roots, righteous and justify, which don’t sound as though they have anything to do with each other. If there was an English word ‘righteous-ify’ things would be much easier but, unfortunately, there isn’t. So ‘justify’ in Lk 18:14, and through all the rest of the NT, would be righteous-ify, if there was such a word. So our reading from Luke 18 is going to start off with ‘to some who were confident of their own righteousness …’ which could be translated ‘to some who thought they, being better than everyone else would be accepted by God and were within the covenant.’ Please read Luke 18:9 – 14. The whole focus of this parable is about how one can come to be accepted by God, to be in a saving relationship with God. How? The answer is in the meaning of the word translated ‘mercy’ in v 13, which is exactly the same word translated ‘sacrifice of atonement’ in Rom 3:25 and 1 John 2:2. The time for prayer in the worship centred on the temple, which is when these 2 guys would have been praying, was the time of the sacrifice for atonement, as mentioned in the first few verses of this gospel when Zechariah went into the temple. The tax collector was effectively asking ‘Lord, make this sacrifice, going on right now, an atonement for me, a sinner’. Question 1: What is the only way we can be righteous, that is be accepted by God? As the write to the Hebrews says ‘Jesus was like us in every way in order that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. (Heb 2:17)? Or, as Paul says ‘and all are justified-righteousified-freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. Question 2: What other words are used in the Bible about the way God deals with us, which particularly emphasize our relationship to God? There are all the words about adoption, being children, and having an inheritance. For instance Paul says:‘those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. If we are children then we are heirs …’ There we have adoption, sonship, recognizing God as our Father and being heirs all in Rom 8:14 – 16; all of those are words about relationship. Paul piles up the same sort of relationship words in his letter to the Galatians too. Question 3: What is the important difference between the Pharisee’s prayer and the tax-collector’s? The Pharisee was relying on his own goodness to make him acceptable to God. But, like all of us, he could not be good enough to be acceptable to God who is pure holiness. The tax collector knew that he was not good enough to be acceptable so he asked for the mercy of God, the atonement from sacrifice. He did not realise that all sacrifice at that time was only of value because it was a foretaste of the perfect sacrifice that Jesus would make on the Cross. Question 4:Aren’t we glad we are not like the Pharisee …. Oops! There is something wrong with that question. I think I had better do another question 4. Please read Luke 18:15 – 17. Question 4: Children were not then the little gods they are in many cultures today. So what is Jesus emphasising by his statement in 15 – 17? Children accept what comes to them rather than attempting to organise the world around them to their advantage. Jesus is saying that we too can only progress by a accepting what is given to us from the Lord. Please read Luke 18:18-30 Question 5: What is the rich man suggesting by his use of the word ‘inherit’ (v 18)? How do we inherit? He would seem to have understood that eternal life is not something we can demand but depends on the gift of someone else. So the important thing is being in right relation to the person who gives, in this case, God. We can only inherit through the gift of God. Paul says in Gal 4:4 – 7 ‘God sent his Son, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. Because you are his sons, you are no longer slaves, but God’s children; and since you are his children, he has made you also heirs.’ Question 6: Compared to most of the people who have ever lived most of us are relatively rich! After all you must be sitting in front of a screen of some sort to be hearing or reading this. What then do we do with verse 22 where Jesus said ‘You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.? Are we thereby failing in our obedience? We are very fortunate people. but we cannot live in most of our societies without being able to pay our taxes, pay for the electricity and everything else we necessarily have – well, nearly necessarily have, anyway. The real punch line in what Jesus said is the last phrase ‘come, follow me’. If we do that all else will fall into place. We can enter the Kingdom. So that we will remember his warning Jesus gave one of his most memorable over-statements. Various attempts to explain camels as ropes or needle’s eyes as narrow gates are wrong. Just remember what Jesus said. That is the point of what he said. Question 7: We have just had 3 lovely stories:the Pharisee and the tax-collector, the children coming to Jesus and the rich man asking Jesus about eternal life. What are the similarities between these three stories? They are all focused on how we should approach God. In the first story we are told that being religious and pious are not sufficient ; in the second that it is all too easy to allow maturity and being worldly wise become a barrier; and finally that riches and good deeds are likely to be a hindrance to us. As one hymn writer said long ago “nothing in my hand I bring; simply to thy cross I cling”. I do hope all our hearers are doing just that. Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 21 - Luke 17:1-18:8 Faith and its consequences. This next section of the Gospel contains a collection of small episodes mainly about faith and its consequences. We read about having to be careful not to hurt anyone else, being prepared to serve in any capacity, giving thanks and praising the Lord, looking forward and behaving in the light of the coming kingdom and being persistent in prayer. Please do read 17:1 – 10 The 'little ones' (v2) are not defined but we probably will not be far wrong if we take them to be any Christians young in faith. 'to sin' (NIV) is more literally 'to stumble'. Question 1: Is the advice of 17:4 realistic? Can we sensibly forgive someone seven times if they keep on repeating the same thing for which we need to forgive them? Compare 1 Cor 5:1, 3b-5. What is the significant difference between these two situations? Perhaps we should not forgive anyone 7 times if, by so doing, we encourage the persistence of the problem. There has to be a difference in our reactions when we are acting as private individuals and when we are acting on behalf of the church. In the situation in 1 Corinthians Paul is acting on behalf of that fellowship. Question 2: Jesus cannot be saying to the disciples in 17:5, 6 that they have no faith because they cannot throw a tree in the sea! However he must be saying something about faith. What? Perhaps this is just another example of Jesus' dramatic over statements to make a memorable saying. But even so Jesus was challenging the apostles to think bigger about prayer than they had been accustomed to doing. Probably we all need to think bigger about prayer - I certainly do. Question 3: What is the Christian service (17:10) you do, or have done, which you have found hardest to do - only doing it out of a sense of duty? Does asking that question imply a wrong attitude towards duty? You will have to answer the first part of that question yourself. Luke put the comment about duty immediately after the sayings about prayer. Perhaps what we think of as duty he is suggesting we should think of as prayer. Please do read 17: 11 - 19. The story of the 10 lepers is all about seeing and not seeing - a recurrent theme in this gospel. (see also Lk 8: 10; 10: 23, 24). It reminds us of the story of Balaam and his donkey. The seer who could not see and his donkey who could see. Does that mean we need to be donkeys and not seers, I wonder? Question 4: Who saw what here and with what effect? Who failed to see? What do we find the hardest things to see (in this sense)? What do you do when you see? The first person we are told 'saw' was Jesus. Then just one of the lepers 'saw' he was healed, although presumably all 10 of them had been. That one leper saw more deeply than the others what Jesus had done for him. And so he had faith. Probably the other 9 did not have faith, but went on their way as spiritually stupid as they came. He got far more out of his meeting with Jesus than the rest did. A clear warning to us. Please do read 17: 20 - 37. This section is about the Kingdom of God and is not easy to understand as Jesus seems to have made 2 sets of prophetic statements. The first is about what would happen to Jerusalem - and did happen to Jerusalem some 40 years later when, in response to a revolt by the Jews, the Romans attacked it, besieged and largely destroyed it with huge loss of life. The second set of statements is about what will happen at the end of the world. The fall of Jerusalem was the end of the world as they knew it; the end of the world will be the end of the world as we know it. It is not at all easy to know exactly which some of the statements refer to. The destruction of Jerusalem is a sort of prophetic foretaste of that still future end. The very important phrase that is used to summarize the teaching of passages like this is 'Now, but not yet' meaning that the Kingdom was there in the presence of Jesus and is here now in the presence of the Holy Spirit but is not yet evident in its full and final glory. Question 5: What does Jesus say here concerning the 'Now'? But the question of the Pharisees was about the future. What did Jesus say here about this 'not yet' aspect of the Kingdom? What do his words suggest our attitudes to these two aspects should be? The now of those days was as difficult as anybody's now of today, full of wars and rumours of wars. Mankind has not changed much in these last 2000 years. Although Jesus clearly knew there was to be a last day he offered no suggestions at all about when it would be. The 'not yet' has already stretched out for those 2000 years. That fact inevitably affects our thinking, making us careless when we should be preparing for it. Jesus is warning against such carelessness. Be warned. Please do read 18: 1 - 8. The parable of the unjust judge is difficult. It probably belongs more to what goes before, the sayings of Jesus we have just been thinking about, than what comes after. Its primary meaning is not about persistent prayer in general but of our attitude to the expectation of the final day for at least 4 reasons: It is about a judge - and the final day is one of judgment; There is a general Biblical expectation that the apparent inequities of this present life will be compensated in the future life as Luke 6:21 and Luke 6:25 teach us and that is evident here. 18: 7 is similar to Revelation 6: 9 - 11 which is very clearly about the future in heaven. 18: 8 is about the coming of the Son of Man and that reflects Dan 7: 13, 14, 26, 27 Question 6: What compensating justice in the future life would most please you? Is that wish one that will encourage the Lord to think that he has found faith in you, or were you just being rather selfish? It is a good job that only you know what your answers to those 2 linked questions are! It is too easy to read this story as teaching that the Lord measures prayer by its quantity. That seems inherently unlikely. What about its quality? Paul only prayed about his thorn in the flesh 3 times and then decided he was stuck with it. We might have been tempted to go on pleading with the Lord like the widow in this story. Somewhere between the two stories is the right balance. Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 20 - Luke 16:1-31 The Problem of Riches This chapter, which is difficult all the way through, gives us one of the most puzzling of all the parables, as, if it is misread, Jesus appears to commend dishonesty. The story is about a landlord’s estate-manager or steward who was sacked for inefficiency in an unusual way: there is no lengthy argument or plea for reinstatement as you would have expected in that culture; the steward ceases immediately to be the approved agent but the rent books are not taken from him. Please read Luke 16:1-8 The estate-manager was able to reduce the rents and get the tenants to note the changes (v 6b, 7b), probably with the promise to share the reductions with him quietly afterwards. Because of the tenants writing on the documents the landlord cannot reinstate the changes without losing face and honour. Clever! Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file Of course the chapter division was not in the original documents so this story follows closely behind the one of the Prodigal Son (or whatever you decided to call it) and this story supports that one in some ways. Question 1: What are the parallels between this parable and that one? 2 noble fathers or masters; 2 ignoble dependents; 2 moments of truth regarding losses; 2 pleas for mercy; 2 problems of broken trust and its consequences. Question 2: What knowledge of the nature of the landowner did the estate-manager display by what he did? Think particularly of why the landlord dismissed him; why he didn’t imprison him; why did the landowner agreed to pay the price for the deception? What does this parable teach us about the nature of God? In that sort of culture there would very likely be a relationship several generations long between the families of master and steward. Honour has to be maintained on both sides so grace is necessary. Our God is a God of relationships not accounting practices. Our God is a forgiving God who, because of the sacrifice of Jesus is prepared to forgive the many things we have done which we should not have done, just as the master forgave the manager things he should not have done. We were careful to end the story at verse 8. Most Bibles paragraph this chapter in a way that suggests the next few verses are also part of that story. But that is unlikely because it would make verse 9 suggest we should be as dishonest as the manager and v11 and 12 sit very uncomfortably with the parable when they do make good sense in isolation. The next parable clearly starts at v19. In between is a collection of sayings, probably from some other occasions, linked by key words and ideas. Please read Luke 16: 9 – 18. Question 3: What does v9 mean if it is to be read separately, not relating it to the story before it. It teaches us that worldly wealth is not to be used solely for our own benefit. We are to use it for other people as well. It also reminds us that the day will come when our worldly wealth will be gone and we shall have to give account of ourselves before judge Jesus. One commentary labels most of these verses ‘Condemnations of the Corrupt at Heart’, which fits well. Verse 18 is the most terse and hard of all the NT statements about divorce and should not be read in isolation from the others in Matthew 5: 31, 32; 1 Corinthians 7: 10, 11. Question 4: What are the barriers against which people are forcing their way into the Kingdom in your world (v 16)? Obviously you have to answer this one yourself. Please read Luke 16:19-31 The difficulties continue! Lazarus is the only person in all the parables who is named (although one papyrus calls the rich man Neues). Purple clothing was strictly reserved for the elite of Roman society. Abraham’s side (literally bosom, that is Lazarus was reclining at the table beside Abraham) was thought to be the best place to be after death. The whole story, like the rest of the parables, is probably not meant to be understood as a real life episode. We should not draw any conclusions about the geography of heaven and hell from it. Question 5: What does the attitude of the dogs, (savage, guard?) dogs to Lazarus tell us about him? The dogs were expressing what the rich man should have done. Lazarus is clearly depicted as a nice guy, a likeable fellow. Question 6: What does the rich man’s attitude in the after life to Lazarus tell us about him? He thought of himself as a big man so Lazarus ought to act as his slave. He failed to realise that we are all equal in death, and indeed ought to consider others equal to ourselves in this life. Again the parable lacks an ending. The last statement has an element of wry humour about it. Jesus clearly realises that his death will not be the last event of his life. Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Thursday with Tabitha 1. Jonah  by Tabitha Smith Hello, and welcome to the first episode in our series about the Minor Prophets. We're starting our series in the book of Jonah. Of all the books of the Minor Prophets Jonah is perhaps the one that people are most familiar with, or at least they think they are familiar with the story line. Many people will have heard about Jonah and the giant fish. But there is a lot more to the book of Jonah than this! We going to look at some historical background to the book, the type of writing it is, the details of the plot, the major themes of the book and how we might apply these to our own lives today. Jonah prophesied during the reign of King Jeroboam II, who ruled between 782 and 753 BC. Jonah is unusual amongst the Old Testament prophets in that his primary audience was a pagan nation, not the people of Israel or Judah. People have debated about whether the story of Jonah is actually a historical tale or whether it might be a kind of parable or allegory. Some would argue that the episode involving the giant fish is too far-fetched to be historical. Others have argued that it is entirely possible for this to have happened, even without any miraculous intervention. However, the book of Jonah certainly bears all the features of a historical prophetic account and Jesus refers to the account of Jonah in Matthew chapter 12, treating the story as a genuine historical account of real events. The book of Jonah is full of fascinating literary features. It contains humour, satire and irony. The basic plot is quite simple to follow but there are several complex interwoven themes that are developed in the course of four short chapters. The book starts with God giving Jonah a prophetic assignment. God tells Jonah to get up and go to Nineveh, a very large, important city in the heart of the nation of Assyria. He is to go there in order to tell the inhabitants that God is greatly displeased by their evil behaviour and that he intends to judge them for this. The people of Nineveh were really wicked! They would sometimes cut off the noses and ears of their prisoners of war to mark them out for life; they worshiped at pagan temples and sacrificed their children. They certainly did not worship God. Jonah's task was no easy one. Nineveh was over 500 miles from Jonah's homeland and the Assyrians were the enemies of Israel. Jonah finds the proposal from God abhorrent – he finds it unbelievable that God would offer the chance of repentance to this evil pagan nation! So instead of heading to Nineveh, Jonah runs as fast as he can in the opposite direction, ending up in the seaside town of Joppa. He plans to get on a ship and sail to Tarshish, in a naive attempt to escape from God. God called him to “get up!” but Jonah does exactly the opposite and “goes down” to Joppa! Jonah hands over his cash and secures a place on board a ship heading for Tarshish. However, God has other plans and sends a great storm that batters the ship so hard that the sailors are afraid they will all die. They desperately throw cargo overboard as Jonah sleeps below deck, seemingly oblivious to their plight. Each sailor calls out to his own pagan god for help. Finally, in desperation, the captain goes down to Jonah to ask him to call out to his God for help. The other sailors cast lots to try to establish who on board has brought this trouble upon them. And the lot falls on Jonah. Realising that he's been discovered, Jonah confesses all and tells the men that he is trying to run away from God, the Lord God of heaven. The sailors are absolutely terrified and ask Jonah what they should do. Jonah asks them to throw him overboard because he now realizes his foolishness and he sees the hand of God in the storm. The sailors, however, are reluctant to do this, perhaps having compassion on Jonah, or perhaps fearing what God might do to them if they take his life in this way. They try as hard as they can to avoid having to throw him overboard. Finally, when the storm has reached its peak they cry out to God for forgiveness before throwing him into the sea. The sea becomes immediately calm and these hardened pagan sailors worship God in fear and trembling. Meanwhile, Jonah is sinking further down, deep into the sea, where he is swallowed by a giant fish, sent by God for this very purpose. Chapter 2 contains a poetic prayer that Jonah prays from inside the giant fish. Jonah thanks God for saving his life although, interestingly, he does not spare any thought for the safety of the sailors. Little does he know that God has extended compassion and grace to them, rescuing them from their futile idolatry. God arranges for the fish to vomit Jonah up onto dry land and he is unceremoniously spat out onto the beach. In chapter 3 God repeats the same prophetic call to Jonah and he commands him to get up and go to Nineveh. This time Jonah obeys! The city of Nineveh was huge and Jonah walks a full day into the city before preaching his short message: “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned”. Much to Jonah's disgust and horror, the inhabitants of Nineveh, from the smallest to the greatest, respond to the message from God. They believe in God, fasting, and repenting of their evil deeds. Even the King dresses himself in sackcloth and sits in ashes! A city-wide decree is issued that everyone should repent and humble themselves and ask God for forgiveness. Even the animals are included! God sees this incredible response of repentance and shows his compassion and steadfast love to the people of Nineveh, turning away from his plans to destroy them. All of this makes Jonah incredibly angry. He finds it absolutely unacceptable that God would forgive the people of this pagan nation. He cannot comprehend that God's mercy and love would extend to nations beyond Israel. In fact he is so outraged that he declares to God that he would rather die than see this city forgiven. God simply asks him: “have you any right to be angry?”  Jonah goes out of the city, still outraged, and waits to see what will happen. He still hopes that Nineveh might be destroyed after all. God provides a plant that grows quickly over Jonah's head, giving him much-needed shelter from the heat of the sun. Jonah thinks this is wonderful, but by dawn the next day the plant withers away, attacked by a divinely appointed worm. When the sun beats down harshly and the east wind blows on Jonah, he gets very angry again and declares that he would rather be dead than put up with the injustice of the plant having been taken from him. The book closes with God pointing out to Jonah that he has no right to complain about the destruction of the plant because he did not make it or care for it, or even deserve it. In contrast, God has every right to care deeply about the 120,000 people living in Nineveh and all the animals, whom he created and cares for. The overriding theme in the book of Jonah is the compassion of God and his steadfast love for all people. God goes to incredible lengths to get his message out to the nations, including those who do not know him. Jonah's disregard for the people of Nineveh stands in stark contrast to God's compassion on the pagan sailors, the people of Nineveh and Jonah himself. Throughout the book, Jonah demonstrates a distinct tendency towards self-centredness and hypocrisy. This was intended to be a lesson to the original readers of the book. God never wanted his chosen people, Israel, to become self-centred, self-serving and inward-looking. Israel was indeed chosen by God, but not because of any worth of their own, but only because of grace. They were chosen to be God's instrument through which salvation would come to all the nations. Throughout the book we also see God's sovereign purposes being carried out. God chooses Jonah, a very fallible human being, to take his message where it needs to go. When Jonah does not obey God, and even when he runs away from God, God does not give up on him or reject him. He patiently teaches Jonah and continues to use him, despite his faults, in order to accomplish his purposes. This perhaps can give us hope too. God can and will use us to accomplish his purposes, even when we make mistakes. We may have some learning to do first and God is patient and compassionate! We would do well to pay attention to Jonah's experience, and learn that it is better to obey the first time that God asks you to do something, even when it seems like a very challenging thing to do! We can also learn from the dramatic response of the people of Nineveh to God's message. Jonah did not preach a long, eloquent, all-singing-all-dancing message when he reached Nineveh. His message was very simple but it produced huge results. We should remember that the Word of God is living and active and very powerful. God promises that his words will not return to him empty but will accomplish everything he has intended them to do (Isaiah 55:11). This should give us confidence that we can declare God's message simply, not needing to soften, embellish or alter it in any way to make it more palatable to those who need to hear it. We also learn from Jonah that God always responds to genuine repentance. He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love! There is a symbolic foreshadowing of Jesus in the life of Jonah. Jesus is the greater Jonah who also descended to the depths of the earth (in the grave) for three days, only to rise again in order to bring salvation to all people, both Jews and Gentiles. Jesus himself draws attention to this point in Matthew chapter 12. The people of Nineveh foreshadow the great number of Gentiles who will repent and be saved when they hear God's message. We might need to ask ourselves whether there is any person or people whom we have foolishly considered to be beyond the reach of God. Is there any way in which we are being like Jonah, gladly accepting God's compassion and grace but wanting to keep it for ourselves? Have we placed limits on what we think God can do? Or have we become too comfortable in our own secure position, forgetting God's heart of compassion for those who are lost without him? Right Mouse click or tap here to download this episode as an audio mp3 file

Study 19 - Luke 15:1-32 The Joy of Recovery This chapter contains two marvellous double parables. The first is that of the lost sheep and the lost coin; the second that of the prodigal son, the loving father and the unhappy elder brother. Please do read Luke 15: 1 - 10. There is one obvious problem with the story of the lost sheep: would a shepherd really leave 99 sheep in wild country? Probably not. But a flock of that many sheep would need more than one shepherd so he would not be leaving them alone. It is important to note that the one who went searching was the owner and therefore comparatively rich. Question 1: Sheep are smelly animals. What is suggested by the carrying on the shoulders? And by taking it home and not back to the flock? As so often Jesus is emphasising that he is interested not just in the smug posh people who thought they alone mattered but the ordinary people, the country people, the working people. He is taking the sheep home to show that everybody is welcome in his Kingdom. Question 2: What are the similarities and deliberate contrasts that make it reasonable to call this (v 1-10) a double parable rather than two separate parables? Most of the verbal contrasts are obvious. But don't miss the careful balancing of a story about a man with one about a woman. This is typical Luke. All too many parts of the church world-wide have not come to terms with the way Jesus treated women on equality with men. The two parables are set in a strictly male world and a strictly female world yet they carry the same message. They go together hence I call them a double parable. Question 3: How does the double parable answer the 'mutterings' of v 2? What was the main contrast between the world in which Jesus lived and the one he is describing? What does this contrast say to our present day situation? It answers the mutterings by contradicting the ideas on which they were based. The posh people were not interested in the other people. They did not see everybody as their neighbour. We need to look at our own attitudes and those of our church very carefully and very honestly to make sure we are not like those people. The second double parable is perhaps the greatest short story ever told. Please read 15: 11 - 32. This is where the idea of a reflection that I mentioned earlier becomes really important to understand what Jesus was saying - or rather the importance of what he did not say. Both parts of the double parable are reflections. The first goes like this: a. son lost b. sin - everything lost c. rejection d. change of mind - inadequately e. acceptance f. repentance - everything gained g. son found Question 4: Is what I have just said correct? I said it started with the son being lost and ended with the son being found. Should it rather be "the father's loss" and "the father's gain"? And I might add, if so, might that change the title of the story - a question we will leave until we have looked at all the story. One commentator makes the following frequently overlooked points about that society and culture: A man was expected to give an oral will only when dying, as Jacob did in Gen 48 so the boy was effectively asking his father to die! To break with convention like that would have merited a beating. It was undignified for an elderly man to run. He wouldn't! But this one did. The father's kiss of welcome and greeting outside the local village stopped the villagers mocking the despised son as they would naturally have done otherwise. A calf was killed. A sheep would have done. The elder son would have been expected to act as the reconciler in the family dispute. Question 5: Was the father properly even-handed to his sons? That is as hard a question to answer as any. I think it will depend on who we are how we answer that one. I would say - doubtful. But it is only a parable. The second part is nearly a reflection: a. elder brother comes b. he is told his brother has arrived c. his father attempts reconciliation d. he complains - how you treat me e. He complains - how you treat him f. his father attempts reconciliation g. he is again told brother has arrived h. ???? The second part of the parable is incomplete - we do not know how the elder son responded. That is made very clear by looking at the structure, the reflection. And that leaves us with some major questions to answer. Question 6: Who is the story addressed to? Why is it left open like this? How would they have responded? How would we have responded? At the beginning of the chapter we are told that the Pharisees and the teachers of the law were muttering about Jesus and he told them these parables. It was clearly left open to make them think how they would have finished the story off and what the implications of their ending might be. How would we have responded? I think the only possible answer to that is 'with difficulty'. Question 7: This double parable is almost always called the parable of the prodigal or lost son. But is that the right title? After all only the first half is about him. What should it be called? The first part should surely be called something like the parable of the Forgiving Father. The second part might be the parable of the Unforgiving Brother. But then you may have other, equally good ideas. One final question remains which I will try to answer myself. It is this: do we always hear most about the prodigal son because the message of the second part of the parable is a lot harder for established Christians to take? I think that is a distinct possibility. It is nice and comfortable for all the Christians listening to hear someone preach about the prodigal son because it does not affect them. But thinking about the elder brother, the person who is already religious but fails to show his faith in his attitude to his younger brother, is not so comfortable for them. Oh, yes, younger brother had been a bad lot and had squandered the inheritance so there were plenty of good excuses elder brother could give for his attitude. But Jesus left his story deliberately unfinished to make his listeners, including you and me, wonder about themselves. Right mouse click to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 18 - Luke 13: 10 – 14:35 The Great Reversals We read Luke 13:10–17. Question 1: In these verses how do the Lord, and Luke, heighten the contrast between the woman before and after? By emphasising the ‘bent’ and the ‘straight’, we may well be meant to see these as metaphors for sin and righteousness. We read Luke 13:18–21. Question 2: The two small parables about the mustard seed and the yeast) say something obvious about size. What else do they say? Growth is a major factor in both little parables. And the fact that birds could perch in the tree suggests there will be unclean – non-Jewish people - in the Kingdom. What sort of tree Jesus had in mind is not clear; mustard seeds do not normally grow into a tree. Was Jesus, with his great sense of humour, deliberately suggesting that the impossible would happen? Yeast too is unclean, with the same suggestion. We read Luke 13:22–35. Isaiah 25 & 60 provide the background for the first story here. There we read: On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine— the best of meats and the finest of wines. On this mountain he will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations; Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn. Your gates will always stand open, they will never be shut, day or night, so that men may bring you the wealth of the nations— their kings led in triumphal procession. Then will all your people be righteous and they will possess the land for ever. They are the shoot I have planted, the work of my hands, for the display of my splendour. The least of you will become a thousand, the smallest a mighty nation. I am the LORD; in its time I will do this swiftly. The Jews of Jesus’ day were inclined to forget the bit about ‘all nations’ and think they were the only privileged people who would see the Kingdom. Jesus is saying that the situation will be much reversed if they are not careful – as they weren’t. We read Luke 14:1–14. Question 3: Why does Jesus not say something like ‘If you come back tomorrow I can give you proper attention and not offend anybody.’ Instead of (Luke 14:3–5)? Jesus is using the situation as a teaching opportunity. He is saying that the human situation, demanding the healing of the man, is more important than the religious duty of keeping the Sabbath. At first glance Luke 14:7–14 reads more like advice than a parable. There are two hints that it is a parable: the word translated ‘honoured’ near the end of v 10 is the same one usually used for ‘grace’, so it is literally ‘get grace’; and the saying in v11 is obviously like Luke 13:30, which refers to the kingdom. Question 4: Necessarily, some are Chief Executive Officers, bishops or head teachers. How does the teaching (Luke 14: 8 – 11) apply to them? They must be careful not to exalt themselves. If others exalt them that is alright. Once again Jesus is emphasising the importance of motive in all that we do. Other people can not see our motives but we know what they are, if we think about them, and the Lord knows anyway. Jesus breaks the accepted social conventions of good behaviour (Luke 14:4,7 & 12). Question 5: Why does Jesus do and say things that so offend people? Does this give us as ambassadors of the gospel a licence to offend people? Jesus places the rules of his Kingdom above the social conventions of his day. He wants people to understand that. We should only offend people for the same reason and then not if we can avoid doing so. We read Luke 14:15–24. The background to the implied question in 14:15, who will be at the great feast in heaven, is interesting. Isaiah clearly thought Gentiles would be present in his prophecy of that event that we have already looked at. Jews of the time of Jesus could not accept that and suggested things such as - that the angel of death would be present to destroy the Gentiles, forcing the believers to wade through the blood to reach the banquet! Jesus is being asked for his opinion. Question 6: People don’t buy fields or houses without seeing them, oxen or motorcars without trying them out (Luke v14:18-19). What is Jesus suggesting by his imagery? People make excuses for not doing what they know they ought to do. That is true here in our world. It is true even when the decision taken here in this world has implications in the age to come. Curiously, the third excuse (Luke 14: 20) is much better than the others! (Deut 24: 5) We read Luke 14:25–35. Question 7: There are 3 conditions here (Luke 14:26, 27, 33 and in 18, 20) for discipleship: renouncing family ties, being prepared for suffering and forsaking possessions. Which is the hardest, which the easiest of these? The answer to that question is up to you. Even allowing for the fact that the ‘hate’ of Luke 14:26 is another example of exaggeration for effect few are prepared to renounce family ties as completely as this suggests. To do so seems to run counter to all other NT teaching. Question 8: When I was at university, a long time ago, the Gospel sermons on a Sunday evening were expected to include a section on ‘counting the cost’. It did not appear to lessen the number of converts. How does that compare with what you hear as the preaching of the good news? That was a tremendously good thing to do and fully in agreement with what Jesus taught in these verses. That has been the second successive long passage with many small episodes, stories and parables. Since you have got this far – well done. The next study includes the parable of the prodigal son so it is rather easier to understand what it is all about. Look forward to it! Tap or click here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 16 - Luke 12:13 – 13:9 Priorities in life There are at least 12 different parables or sayings in this section. The theme is how we should set our goals and live our lives in view of the uncertainty of this life and the promise of the life to come. We read 12: 13 - 21. Question 1: Why exactly was the rich man such a fool? (You should get at least 4 different ways in which he was stupid.) Here is the story again. The 4 things I can see in this passage are: He assumed he would still be alive to enjoy the produce from his crops. He ignored the concerns of other people. He assumed that "eat, drink ... " would lead to joyful merriment. He ignored the claims of God on his life. Question 2: Isn't having big enough barns for your crops common sense? Isn't it what this world runs on? Yes! It is what this world runs on. It is all a question of motives - good or bad. The teaching of the parable is summarized in the final phrase: he worked for himself and was not rich towards God. It is not easy to be consistently rich towards God but that must be our life-long ambition. Next we read 12: 22 - 34. These verses are all about worry. A great deal of Western culture is driven by worry; if yours is not Western I have to leave it to you to work out how closely this conforms to your situation. We, in the West, are trained from an early age to think we must have the right toys, the right clothes, the right boy's toys, cars, etc. and to worry if we do not! We cannot completely opt out of our world. In the words of Jesus we need to be 'in the world' but not 'of the world' (Jn 17: 11, 14). Question 3: Some of the Lord's servants rely on 12: 31 but if we all did that who would be the givers through whom the Lord would supply us? How then should we understand this? We need to balance this saying with what Paul said to the Thessalonian Christians in 2 Thess 3: 10 - 'if a man will not work he shall not eat'. Somewhere between the two sayings is the right course for each one of us. We read 12: 35 - 48. This section includes no less than 4 different sayings about masters returning home or thieves breaking in. Most likely Luke has brought together things that Jesus said at different times simply linked by key words or ideas. The first homecoming is in v 35 - 38. The old Syriac and Arabic translations (culturally closer to those days) have the servants expecting the master who withdraws from the banquet (both equally possible translations) thus suggesting a pre-arranged plan for the master to bring food home from the banquet for his servants whom he then serves. Question 4: Assuming that is correct, what does this parable teach about the final great banquet (Is 25: 6; Lk 13: 29, 14: 15)? This is an astonishing picture of Jesus receiving us, his servants, and serving us the good things of the great feast. Question 5: In the third and fourth episodes of masters returning (12: 42 - 46 and 47, 48) the emphasis is quite different. What is it? These two parables, or sayings, with their emphasis on senior servants abusing their position over lesser servants, were probably chosen for inclusion by Luke to make some pointed comments to the church leaders of his day, some 40 years after Jesus said these things. They may well be strong rebukes to some church leaders in our day. Question 6: How do you understand the brutal bits (12: 42b, 46b, 47b) in these 2 episodes? Compare 1 Cor 3: 12 - 15. Is it better to shun responsibility in the work of the Kingdom and make sure we are not entrusted with too much? Why, or why not? These sayings are a warning to all those who work in the church: from preaching, to Sunday School teaching and looking after the crèche, to work hard at our tasks, not to take them lightly and not to forget that we need the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit in all that we do for the Lord. Paul said: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.
 if we do that we shall not go far wrong. Read 12: 39 - 45. The sort of family division mentioned in 12: 49 - 53 is rather alarming. We must never be responsible for the destruction of the peace, except for the fact that we follow Jesus. We must do all we can, apart from denying him, to avoid division. We read 13: 1 - 5. One writer commenting on these verses says: Jesus' question and answer react to the popular notion that sin is the cause of calamity. If God is responsible for everything and God is a just God, the calamities must be the result of human sinfulness. The fallacy in that argument is the notion that God is the immediate cause of all events, which leaves no room for human freedom or freedom in the created order, and therefore for events that God does not control ...'. Question 7: Do you agree with that statement? This is a very doubtful argument, theologically. It leaves God as less than sovereign. The problem that led to the question to Jesus is basically the same as that faced by Job and, in the book bearing his name, the only answer given is that God is an unchanging rock for those who love him in spite of all apparent evidence to the contrary. Perhaps the phrase 'the ordinary chaos of life', accepting that God is sovereign but we can have no idea what he has determined, no window into his sovereignty, is a good and acceptable summary of these verses. Finally we read 13: 6 - 8. This little parable of the fig tree is based on Is 5: 1 - 7. Question 8: What does Jesus add to what that passage teaches? Here is the passage in Isaiah: He includes a time marker, a year; probably to be understood as a period of grace before Israel would be "cut down". (Which turned out to be nearly 40 years before the siege and destruction of Jerusalem in AD 69, 70.) Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 16 - Luke 11:14 – 12:12 Controversies As they moved towards Jerusalem antagonism to all that Jesus represented grew. There is no clear pattern in this passage. Problem piled on problem; attack followed attack. Question 1: According to the experts those of us who live in the Western world live in a Christianised, but now post-Christian society and therefore in a situation much less clearly defined than it was in New Testament days. Then they knew who the enemy was. We can be much less sure. Apathy, rather than antagonism is our main enemy. Do you agree? If so, give examples of where this can be seen. Our world is clearly Christianized by its historical background. But there is a steady movement to a more secularized society in most of the Western world, showing in slightly different ways in different countries. In the UK this shows in strong arguments in the media that ‘religion’ is to have no role at all in politics or civic life. The adviser to one former Prime Minister announced that ‘we do not do God’. What is called ‘multiculturalism’ is appealed to to prevent any idea that Christianity has a special role in society in spite of it having been dominant for more than 1000 years. It is important for you, as it is for us, to think through how the culture of the society in which we live interacts with our Christian faith. Read Luke 11: 14 – 28. Jesus clearly divides the world he lived in into two warring parts: the Kingdom of Satan and the Kingdom of God (11: 18, 20). (By using a word about war I do not mean that there is any place for physically aggressive fighting in our faith. Defence may be another matter.) Question 2: Can we divide our world the same way? What are the implications of doing so? We need to be very careful here. It is all too easy to think where we are is the Kingdom of God and what opposes us is the kingdom of Satan. It may be but it may be just our arrogantly self-centred view of the world. Yet Satan is an all too real force in the world; indeed it is easy to argue that he has been more active than usual in the last 100 years in all the wars, massacres and famines that have plagued the human race.. We ignore him at our peril. Question 3: When Jesus talks in terms of warfare (Luke 11: 21 – 23) he distinguishes between those who are with him and those who are against him. Where is the front line today between those he describes as ‘with me’ and those ‘against me’? The answer to this one will vary according to where you live. As a general statement perhaps it is best to say that those, and only those, who are prepared to say “Jesus is Lord” are those who are with us. Question 4: Luke 11:24–26 suggests that turning over a new leaf is counter- productive. Can you illustrate this from your own experience by citing the case of someone who tried to turn over a new leaf without a spiritual dimension to it and slipped back into their old ways, or worse? Question 5: In what way does 11: 28 take 10: 39 forward another stage? Mary was commended for listening. This verse says we must not only hear the word of God – we must do it. And, remember, Jesus means by ‘doing’ action in the world, in loving other people and acting in their support, not just sitting in church and attending worship or praying regularly. There are plenty of other religions in the world which are all about doing the right religious things; none others which are so focussed on our behaviour towards other people. We read Luke 11:29–36. The emphasis in Luke 11:16 and Luke 11:29–32 is on the absence of any sign except the presence of Jesus. But at least they looked for a sign. If our generation does not do so, the likely judgement on them (or should that be ‘us’) sounds as though it will be grim. We read Luke 11:37–54. If you belong to an ordinary small Protestant church, as we do, our religiosity may appear to an outsider very vague and unfocussed compared with that of most overtly religious people (high Church of England, RC, Muslim, Mormons, Hindu etc.). We have no liturgy, no splendid ceremonies and ceremonial wear, no prescribed level of contribution, no required standards of behaviour. So we escape the accusations of Jesus in 11: 39 – 52. Yet we are not blameless! Question 6: For each of the 7 Woes (counting 39 – 41 as the first) think of how they might be reworded to attack our weaknesses (mostly the exact opposite of theirs). Would the Lord say ‘woe’ to us? I don’t need to tell you what I think the answer to that question would be! Finally we read Luke 12: 1 – 12. These verses are about is about a demand for a total commitment that is quite frightening. We can (do?) often slide sideways from these statements in a smoke screen of words. Question 7: Which statement in these verses, Luke 12: 1 – 12, do you find most difficult? do you most encouraging? Of course the answer to that one is up to you. For me the most difficult is the idea that those who do not follow Jesus will be thrown into hell; and the most encouraging is the fact that God knows all about all the sparrows that squabble in our back garden thinking they are singing when they are making the most awful noise. There is great hope for you and me in that statement. Tap or click here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 15 - Luke 11:1-13 Praying to the Father A disciple asks a question about prayer and although he gets a model prayer he also gets much more. First the prayer. We read 11: 1 – 4. This is a shorter version of the prayer than Matthew’s. Matthew starts off with ‘our Father in heaven’ instead of just ‘Father’. Matthew introduces the prayer after warning his disciples against showing off in praying, long words and many words. I doubt whether he would want us to keep on repeating this particular set of words either. He wants honest heart prayers in our ordinary every day language. One good idea is to pray along the pattern he has given us but rewording it as we go. So we might start off: ‘Dear Lord and Father I am so amazed that you have asked me to address you like this’ or ‘may I call you Father this morning even if you seem rather far away just at the moment’ or ‘ you are in heaven and I am stuck here on earth but please hear what I have to say’. Question 1: Think up 2 other ways you might start your prayer. Something like:’ I want to honour your name and who you are this evening as I pray – help me to do it by your spirit, please’ and an infinite number of other possibilities. ‘each day’ (11: 3 NIV) is a rare word in the Greek which may mean ‘today’ ‘tomorrow’ or ‘enough for the day’. Question 2: To which OT incident is it likely to refer? A cynic might ask whether this prayer is necessary in the day of the supermarket (at least in the world’s better off countries). The giving of manna and quail in Exodus 16 is being referred to. The owners of the supermarket probably think they filled the shelves but a greater than them, the Lord, organised the natural world for them to plunder! Question 3: Praying for the coming of the Kingdom could be dangerous. Why? What effect should praying like that have on us? What might it look like if it came and was openly apparent, as it is not now? It might come and where would we be then? If we have placed our trust in Jesus we shall enjoy the fruits of his faithfulness, but if not, not. If we ask for the coming of the kingdom we must live in kingdom style now, or else we are hypocrites. No one knows what it will look like with any certainty; all we do know is that it will surpass our wildest dreams. Question 4: Is it necessary to forgive every one who sins against us before we receive forgiveness from the Father? No. To say that would contradict every other place where forgiveness is mentioned in the Bible. What it means is that if we expect to be forgiven we need to live in the world of forgiveness. In the same way if we want to be loved by God we need to live in the world of love, which is what John meant when he said: Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. We read 11: 5 – 13. There is a problem in 11: 8. The NIV has ‘the man’s boldness’ but that is probably not as good as the TNIV ‘your (the person knocking’s) shameless audacity’ and even that is probably not right. The root meaning of the word being translated is ‘ avoidance of shame’ but in the original it is not ‘the man’s’ or ‘your’ but ‘by him’, which can refer to the person knocking or the one in the house being woken up. So it may mean that the person getting up has to do so in order not to lose honour and be shamed. It is amazing that Jesus used a parable in which the Lord God is shamed but that is the most likely meaning of this passage. Our experience of answers to prayer is probably not the same as is expressed in this passage. For something slightly different I will read out 10 statements we might make, or hear other people make, about prayer. I will pause very briefly after each and you can say ‘yes’, ‘no’ or ‘maybe’ after each. Then my comment will follow. Keep in mind what we have just read that Jesus said. 1) If we nag the Lord we will get whatever we want. Paul didn’t think so when he only prayed 3 times for his thorn in the flesh to be taken away. No, then. (2 Cor 12: 8!) 2) If we don’t get what we want it is because of our lack of faith. No it isn’t according to Jesus (Lk 13: 1 – 5). 3) All night prayer meetings are always more effective than one hour ones. Not according to Jesus in Matthew 6, but yes according to him in this passage. So it must depend on circumstances and attitudes. 4) Jesus was only making a point to antagonists in these verses – note that he calls his hearers evil in v 13. There may be some truth in this but it is a series of promises even if we find it difficult to see how they actually work out in our every day lives. Maybe, then. 5) Prayer is about learning to align ourselves with the will of God. If we do so successfully we shall ask and receive. This is the gift of discernment. Yes. Definitely true. 6) Prayer is always answered but God in his wise providence often gives us the opposite of what we ask for. Possibly true but it can be the way some people try to get past the fact that they feel they don’t always get answers to prayer at all. So, maybe. 7) Saying ‘if it is your will’ is a simplistic cop-out. Well, yes, it often is. 8) The struggle of prayer is not a struggle with God (like Jacob at the brook Jabbok, as often asserted) but with ourselves (as even Jesus experienced in the garden of Gethsemane) bending our wills to obedience. Yes. Very, yes. 9) Some people with wonderful tales of answered prayer may be adept at only seeing what they want to see. Unfortunately that does often seem to be the case. 10) We may expect our prayers to be answered only if we have a deeper sense of the Fatherhood of God than of our own need. No! In his abundant grace and goodness the Lord will often answer prayers from even his frailest servants, like you and me. I think passages like this are very difficult, particularly for those of us who live in the cynical, Western world. My questions probably reflect the fact that this is where I live. Those of you who live in a more spiritually open society may wonder why I appear to be so negative. If so, just treasure what you have got and pray for those of us who are not so well off spiritually. Right mouse click to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 14 - Luke 10:25-42 Loving God and Neighbour The parable of the Good Samaritan is usually considered by itself. It should not be! It is part of a pair with the story of Mary and Martha. The two go together because in the original Greek the stories are about 'a certain lawyer' (v 25) and 'a certain woman' (v 38). The two sayings of Jesus that conclude the stories are: in 37b 'Go and do likewise' and in 42b 'Mary has chosen what is better'. Question 1. Which saying is the more important in popular thinking and preaching? Which does the words Jesus used suggest is the more important? There is a great deal more interest in the story of the good Samaritan because of its simple brilliance as a story and the way it can be taken as an example by anybody, Christian or not. Everybody recognizes that they should help other people; not everybody is prepared to listen to Jesus as Mary did. Yet the words that Jesus used strongly suggest that the latter is the more important. Before we read the verses let's think about the structure a bit. The famous parable is set within two short dialogues, the first in 25 - 28 and the second in 29, 36 and 37. Both dialogues have the same, quite natural, formats: 1) a question from the lawyer; 2) a challenging question in reply from Jesus; 2') an answer to Jesus from the lawyer; 1') an answer to the lawyer from Jesus. The well-known parable is inserted before the question of Jesus in the second dialogue. We read the first dialogue: Luke 10:25 - 28. Did you get the pattern? And the second dialogue: Luke 10:29, the story, 36, 37. What a wonderful teacher Jesus was! Wouldn't it be good if all teachers were as good as he was at getting people to answer their own questions! Question 2. In the first dialogue the answer of Jesus in v 28 does not exactly answer the lawyer's question in v 25. What significance can you see in the discrepancy? What does this tell us about the nature of eternal life? The lawyer asked about eternal life. Jesus answered about life, a good life maybe but still only about life. What the Gospel's call 'eternal life' Jesus says starts in the here and now with a good life lived in this present world. That good life is a life of following him. It is time to read the famous parable. Luke 10:30 - 35 and the conclusions Jesus draws in 36, 37. Some things usually missed: a) The lawyer's question in the first dialogue (v 25) is deeply flawed: one can do nothing to inherit. b) The parable does not answer the lawyer's question in the second dialogue (v 29) but a slightly different one: 'Which of these three became a neighbour'. c) The priest would have been rich, therefore on horseback contrasting the Samaritan's donkey. d) The Samaritan would have risked his life taking a wounded Jew into a Jewish town, where the inn would necessarily have been. The men in the street might well have thought he was responsible for wounding the man and started to attack him before finding out what really happened. Question 3. Who is the Samaritan portraying? How does this relate to the point about the danger to the Samaritan going into a Jewish town? Jesus is the Good Samaritan. All others aiming to copy the story are simply following his example. This is another point about the story often missed. In coming into this world Jesus fully accepted all the danger that was to him. He died on the Cross to rescue those who are wounded: physically, spiritually, morally. Moving on to the second story: to put this story of Mary and Martha in context: the Jewish Rabbis said 'let thy house be a meeting place for the Sages and sit amidst the dust of their feet and drink in their words with thirst ... but talk not much with womankind.' We read Luke 10:38 - 42. In that culture a teacher sat to teach and a student, necessarily male, stood to recite and sat to learn. Question 4. How does Luke indicate that things were not as they would have expected them to be? Mary was sitting and listening. We can only imagine what the reaction of the men who wanted to be around Jesus might have been. Horror, shock, disgust, amusement - perhaps just a few of them would praise her for what she did. We are dominantly either doers or hearers: the Samaritan or Mary. By putting these two stories together Luke, and Jesus, are presumably saying that we ought to be both. Question 5. How can the doers learn to listen better? How can the hearers learn to be more practically active? These things are a matter of intent and will. Doers can always say 'I'm too busy' and hearers can say 'Ill do it tomorrow when I have finished listening'. Only if we are prepared to listen to what the Word of God is saying to us will we be all that we should be. Question 6. How does verse 42a provide a complete answer to the lawyer's original question in verse 25? If we truly follow Jesus all the rest will fall into place. We are never told whether the lawyer did set out to follow Jesus. We know that Jesus told him what he needed to do. Some of us need the same advice: 'go and do likewise'. Some of us need to copy the example of Mary more closely. Which category do you fall into: more action or more meditation? Tap or click here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 13 - Luke 9:51 – 10:24 Mission! From Luke 9:51–19:27, Luke has Jesus on the road to Jerusalem. Luke has put together many incidents within this journey story because after 8 chapters, at 17: 11, they are only just leaving Galilee! There is no clearly discernable structure to this part of the gospel. It contains some 8 major parables and many minor ones, most of them only found in this gospel. Please read 9:51–55. James and John got it badly wrong in this first story from Samaria. People are always tempted to use strong-arm methods. They may be violent, use their superior status, use financial pressures, try psychology, and so on. James and John reckon Jesus has power. The people in the village are not friendly so they think he should zap them. Question 1: Which strong arm method are we most likely to be tempted to use when the gospel is rejected? Jesus totally repudiates using any such. How can we counter the tendency in ourselves? Your answer will depend very much on where you live. In some countries of the world it is very dangerous to try and force other people to do what is wanted. We have to be wise as serpents, and harmless as doves as Jesus said. Only by making a determined effort to grow more like Jesus in the power of the Holy Spirit can we have any hope of overcoming our natural tendencies in things like this. Please read 9:57–62. Here Luke brings together 3 statements about the conditions for following Jesus. The first concerns comfort; the other two are about how we are to live in family relationships. All three appear rather harsh. But except for a few naturally nomadic souls most of us operate better from a secure base of stable home, family and friends. Question 2. How much do such things mean to you? How do you square the ‘no holes, no nest’ challenge with how you actually live? This is a tough one. Few in ministry or on the mission field put the kingdom totally before family. To do so is probably to experience destructive hostility. Perhaps what Jesus said is one of the overstatements, called Semitic hyperbole, like when he said ‘If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.’ Or ‘it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.’ These saying may sound strange to us but they are the ones we find easy to remember! In the last four episodes Luke has told us about welcoming little children, who was for or against Jesus, James and John’s attitude and the conditions for following Jesus. In all of these the disciples have misunderstood Jesus in one way or another. Question 3. What do they tell us about Jesus? There are many answers to this question, among them: the essential humility of Jesus, his conviction that, in spite of that humility, he was the Messiah, outranking all previous prophets, he had unique insight into what the people around him were thinking, he organised things ahead of time very carefully, he exercised complete authority over the disciples, he sometimes struggled with the task that he had (when he said he had nowhere to lay his head), and, he had total conviction about what he was doing (when he talked about looking back–you cannot plough straight if you look back). Please read 10:1–23. This is a difficult passage in many ways- but none the less interesting! We will ignore what nearly duplicates what happened when he sent the 12 out–in the previous chapter. Some of these verses copy statements in Matthew 11 into a different context. One verse sounds as though it has escaped from John’s gospel! Question 4. The 70, or 72 (equally likely) of 10:1 is probably a symbolic number reflecting the 70, or 72 (equally likely!) nations listed in Genesis 10. If so, what does this suggest? The way they used numbers in those days this is probably a deliberate repetition of the number to indicate that the mission was to be to all the world. One writer identifies 10 principles for mission in 10:1–11. Identify what they are and give them titles from the following clues. This is easy to do if you have a Bible in front of you; much more difficult without. plentiful harvest ask go wolves do not greet eat near kingdom not welcome wipe dust the kingdom. Question 5. Jesus relates his vision of the fall of Satan (10:18) to the success of the disciples work and describes their triumph over evil forces in metaphorical terms. What does that mean for us? What popular misconceptions does it not mean? It is exciting to realize that we can gain victories over Satan as we surely can. But we need to be very careful who we listen to. Some people will make great claims of triumphing over Satan here, there, and everywhere, and performing all sorts of different miracles whenever they like. A very few people can do these things, but they are usually not the ones that make the great claims. Question 6. If we take what Jesus says in v 19 as applying to us nothing will harm those on mission. What we experience in these days seems rather different. How do we cope with the discrepancy, if it is one? From which of the verses between 18 and 23 do you take most comfort? There is no evidence that the Lord protects even his best servants from the troubles of life. Even those working hardest for the Kingdom can get cancers or die in car crashes. Remember, he did not protect his Son, and that fact should be sufficient to protect us from falling victim of wrong attitudes to the disasters of life (as we see them to be). We finish this study by echoing Luke 10:2 - Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. Right mouse click to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Thursday with Tabitha Introduction by Tabitha Smith   I met Jesus when I was 11-years-old. God had blessed me with a believing family and I sung in church choirs from the time I could read. But I didn't have a personal relationship with Jesus until a certain day in 1990. I'd gone to a violin exam, which was being held in a local church. Waiting nervously for my turn to perform for the examiners, I picked up some leaflets that were sitting on a table in the church foyer. I read one of these leaflets on my own later that day. The message of Jesus dying and rising again for the sins of all people was not brand new to me, as I'd heard it many times before, but at that moment, it was like I heard it and understood it for the first time. I cried my 11-year-old eyes out and then asked my mum if I could get my own Bible. Of course, she agreed! I've always identified very strongly with the words in Amazing Grace, “I once was lost but now I'm found, was blind but now I see”, because that's exactly what it felt like. I made the decision to follow Jesus from that day onwards. Over the last couple of decades God has been teaching me from the Bible with the help of the Holy Spirit and many great human teachers. It's gradually become clear to me that my primary spiritual gift is teaching. I feel very privileged to be able to share in the ministry of Partakers. Over the next few months I'm going to be taking a tour through the books of the minor prophets. I reckon that if you lined up the Bibles of a sample of believers (myself included!) and looked at the pages that looked least worn and thumbed you would find that the minor prophets account for a substantial proportion of the most pristine pages! Even those prophets that we feel more familiar with, like Jonah, have often only featured in our Christian lives in the form of Sunday school stories. Well, it's time to do something about that! The books of the minor prophets are full of incredible truths which will help us to understand the character and heart of God. If you've ever felt intimidated or confused by these particular books in the Bible then I hope you will join me as I give an overview of each book and I really hope you'll be inspired to have a closer look at each one for yourself. The minor prophets are no less important than the major prophets (such as Isaiah and Jeremiah) but their prophetic books are shorter in length and therefore referred to as 'minor'. The books of the minor prophets were written over a long time span, ranging from the eighth century BC to the fourth or fifth century BC. We're going to look at them in roughly chronological order, which is a little different to the order they appear in the Bible. The dating of certain books, such as Obadiah and Joel, is uncertain and scholars disagree about when these books were written. So please forgive me if the order in which I tackle the books is not the precise order that you expect! It's first helpful to consider what the role of a prophet is. When we think of the word 'prophecy' we often think about predictions relating to the future. Now, the prophets did sometimes speak about things that had not yet happened, but much more often they spoke about present events and announced God's thoughts and messages to the peoples of Israel and Judah. Prophets were not generally regular teachers of God's word (that was the task of the priests). Instead prophets were raised up at particular times and for particular situations, to speak God's words to the people. They were able to see things and understand things that other people could not. As we look at the 12 books of the minor prophets we will see some common themes emerging. The prophets repeatedly spoke of the fact that God had chosen Israel for a covenant relationship; they declared the sad truth that the majority of Israel had sinned against God and turned away from him; they warned about coming judgement; and they declared the promise of renewal and restoration that would follow judgement, both in the immediate future and at the end of history. As we study each book we need to first look at what book meant to the people who first heard the message. When we have understood this we can then consider how each book speaks to us today. Our first study will begin next Thursday in the book of Jonah. I hope you'll join me then! Tabitha Tap or click here to download this episode as an audio mp3 file

Study 12 - Luke 9: 1 - 50 The end of the ministry in Galilee This is an important chapter for at least 3 reasons: it contains the important question ‘who is this’ 9: 9 the even more important answers ‘the Messiah’ (v 20) and ‘the Son of God’ (v 35). That Jesus calls himself ‘the Son of Man’ (v 22) is also important. it ends the second and long section of Luke’s Gospel Chapters 3 to 9: 50. Telling us that Jesus sets out for Jerusalem in verse 51 indicates the end. This whole section is about Jesus’ Ministry in Galilee. Read verses 1 to 9. Jesus gives surprisingly detailed instructions about how the apostles were to go on the very first mission in the first 6 verses. Of course the culture in which they were to operate was very different from today’s – anywhere in the world. We might wonder if he sent us on mission what Jesus would forbid today. Would it be car, mobile phone, ipod, radio, credit card, bottle of spring water? Would we survive without these things? Question 1 - Under what circumstances should we ‘shake the dust off our feet’ as Jesus told his disciples to do if they were not welcomed? This is a tricky one to answer. Perhaps Paul did this in Philippi. It says ‘they went to Lydia’s house. Then they left.’ The locals could not be said to have welcomed him. It says ‘the crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas’. But there are stories in the history of the church where people have worked and ministered in a new area for a very long time before anyone has come to faith. When that has finally happened there has often been a real movement of the Spirit. It is hard to say the workers should not have waited. The next story is of the feeding of 5000 people. We read that in v 10 - 17. The account of the feeding of the 5000+ (v 10 – 17) is written so as to remind us of the last supper. It includes the words: taking bread – giving thanks – broke – gave to. Question 2 - What do the statements ‘Jesus said “you give them something to eat” ‘ and ‘the disciples picked up 12 basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over’ mean as comments on the Lord’s Supper? We meet at the table of our Lord to receive grace and renewal from him as we remember the most significant event in history. Yet we bring food to the table – we have a part to play in the ceremony. Such is the grace of God that we have much left over afterwards. For all the wonder of the simple ceremony we have a part to play. By the order Luke puts things in he suggests that in the eating of bread they recognized the Messiah. In the eating of bread on the way to Emmaus they recognized the Lord (24: 30, 31 which says: When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight. Question 3 - How does that thought, whether taken from this story of the feeding of the 5000 or the event on the Emmaus road, translate into our communion service? It is his ceremony, not ours. We are to see, beyond the bread and the cup that he is there and blesses us. Read verses 18 – 27. Herod asked ‘who is this’ earlier in the chapter. Peter answers here, as Jesus prayed and talked to his disciples in a way that was completely meaningful in that culture. Question 4 - Peter said that he was the Christ or the Messiah of God. What is the best and most accurate way to answer the question ‘who is this’ in your culture? The answer will depend on where you are. To many people to say he is the Christ is only to give him a name, so that is not very meaningful. The Son of God is one possibility, but that can be misunderstood in some cultures. The Saviour is another possibility. The title Jesus used of himself ‘Son of Man’ is difficult and puzzling, which is perhaps why Jesus used it. It meant no more than ‘a male human being’ but is used almost as a title in Dan 7: 13 of a person who seems to represent the people of God (Dan 7: 22, 27). Jesus may have used it as a clean sheet of paper on which he was able to write a meaning himself. The question ‘who is this’ receives a further answer in what we call the transfiguration, that is the event when the whole appearance of Jesus was radically changed. Read verses 28 – 36. Question 5 - We must try to think of what this would have meant to the 3 disciples who witnessed what happened. What will their first reaction have been to the presence of the 3 figures? What will the brightness of Jesus’ clothes have meant to them? And then what will they have thought when they heard the voice from heaven? There are really 3 questions there. Seeing the 3 figures they will have thought Jesus was of the same importance as Moses and Elijah. Then seeing how changed he was in appearance they will have decided he was the most important of the three. Finally the voice will have said to them that he was fundamentally different and important in a completely different way than Moses and Elijah, who represented the Law and the Prophets and therefore the whole of the OT and Judaism. The voice that told them to ‘listen to him’ also tells us ‘to listen to him’. Finally we read verses 36 – 50. We will stop there and not at the end of the chapter because the next verse says ‘Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem’ and there are many statements that he was ‘on his way’ in the next 11 chapters. Luke has written a journey documentary in those chapters. This is the end of his ministry in Galilee, the northern province of that area, and the furthest from Jerusalem. These 2 episodes both remind us that the Christian way is not one of human strength and power. Not only are the disciples unable to heal the boy with the evil spirit and required to start acting in a more childlike and less assertive way but Jesus is going to be betrayed and killed as we read further back in the chapter. This has been well summarized in the phrase ‘the way up is down’. Question 6 - when we kneel before Jesus and confess our sins we say we are down. He will then lift us up. That is the Christian way. Have you set out on that way for yourself? Only yourself and the Lord know the answer to that question. I hope it is the right one! May the Lord be with you. Right mouse click to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Study 11 - Luke 8: 1 - 56 Faith and faithfulness Part 2 What experience have you ever had of what were clearly demonic powers? It is thought that the Joanna of 8: 3 and the Junia of Rom 16: 7 may be different versions of the name of the same person. (It should be Junia, a woman’s name; Junias is a man’s name and a mistranslation) If so, we may presume Joanna/Junia was an apostle because she fulfilled the requirements of Acts 1: 21, 22, even though being a woman meant she could not be one of the twelve. Luke is careful not to forget the women! Neither should we! We noted in the last study that one word in the Greek means both ‘faith’ and ‘faithfulness’. 1) How do we use these words? What is the difference in meaning in our common usage of them? 2) The central passage of these chapters is the familiar parable of the sower (8:1–8). Which meaning, faith or faithfulness, is it encouraging us to think of as the most important? A parable is designed to be about one most important point but while doing so usually teaches several other theological ideas. 3) Which parts of this parable imply the following things: the Kingdom comes: a) slowly, it is not a noisy in-breaking event; b) as a work of grace; c) necessarily including fruit bearing; d) with the promise of hope. 4) This parable is usually called ‘The Parable of the Sower’. What else could it be called? What was Jesus really emphasising? What should the title be? 5) What are the present day meanings or examples of: taken by the devil / no root / choked by life / producing a crop? 6) Suppose some seed fell in a stream, floated away, landed, and grew where the farmer could not harvest them? What would the meaning of that be today? 7) Why are the secrets of the Kingdom of God so hard to understand (8: 10)? What did Jesus mean by talking about hearing as though that is difficult? Did he really teach in parables so that people would not understand what he said (8: 10)? What did he mean by saying we have to be careful how we listen (8: 18)? See also 8: 21. 8) We cannot easily make ourselves have ‘noble and good hearts’ (8: 15). What – in very practical terms - does Jesus expect us to do in the light of this parable? The next two short stories highlight contrasting attitudes of acceptance and rejection to Jesus, as did the story of Simon the Pharisee and the unnamed woman (7: 36 – 50). Faith(fulness) is weak in those who should be strong (8: 22 – 25) and rejected in those who had the opportunity to have it (8: 34 – 37). 9) Over the centuries many believers must have prayed frantically when faced with death by drowning. Many will still have drowned. These did not drown(8: 24, 25). Why? 10)The people of Gerasa thought about what it would mean for them in money terms if Jesus was around and decided they would be better off without him (8: 36, 37). How very 21st century! What was Jesus’ response? What does that say to us? We noted the final dual healing of a woman and a man’s daughter (8 : 40 – 56) reflects that of a man and a woman’s son in the first two episodes in this section (7: 1 – 17). 11)What does this dual healing tell us about faith? How strong does faith have to be in order to be answered? How far is it true to say it is always answered? Or when is it not answered? 12)Why did Jesus tell the demon-possessed man to go and tell (8: 39) and Jairus and his wife to keep quiet (8: 56)? Tap or click here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Luke 7:1–50 & 8:40-56 Faith and faithfulness Part 1 The whole of chapters 7 and 8 make up one section of Luke’s narrative so we will read them together though we will only look at chapter 7 in detail in this study. Not least because of the striking similarities and differences in the people involved between the first and last passages 7:1–17 and 8:40–56. 1. Jesus Restores Health and Life! (Luke7:1–17 and 8:40–56) Question 1.What is the second passage about? How does it differ from the first passage? The second passage is about healing of a woman and the bringing back to life of a man’s daughter. Remember: the first was about the healing of a man and the bringing back to life of a woman’s son. Luke has obviously put these particular stories at the beginning and end of this section very deliberately. He has carefully constructed the whole section. The important question is why has he done this–apart from the fact that this was the way that they wrote things in the Roman world of those days? When we look at the two chapters together we will see that he has built them so that the stories of the second part reflect the first part. The first part has two healings, 7:1–17; an account of the doubts of John the Baptist. 7:18–35 and then tells us about contrasting attitudes to Jesus, 7:36–50. The second part reverses that order telling us about contrasting attitudes to Jesus, 8:19–33, 38, 39; then the doubts and rejection by the Gerasenes, 8:34–37 and finally the two healings we have already looked at in 8:40–56. In the middle is a parable about the man who sowed some seed, getting different reactions from the different types of soil. We can think of this as a reflection because the second half is the mirror image of the first half. There are many of these reflections in the Bible. One very obvious example is in Amos 5: 4b–6a, although unlike most of the Biblical reflections that one does not have an important middle. In most of them the middle is important to explain why the second half is different from the first. In our example here in Luke the middle, the parable, is clearly very important, though it does not alter the second part significantly. Luke wants us to see that the whole section is about faith and faithfulness. One Greek word has both meanings whereas we split the two apart in English. By ‘faith’ we mean mainly mental agreement with the teachings of a religion–‘faith’ goes on in our heads. By ‘faithfulness’ we mean living in a way that follows the teachings of that religion–‘faithfulness’ goes on mainly in our actions. We will look at that more in the next study. 2. Jesus and the Centurion (Luke7:1–17) Not for the last time Luke has a story about a centurion. He wants Theophilus (and us) to understand that Christian faith was acceptable to these significant people in the Roman world. Question 2.We are told many good things about the centurion (7:2–5). We are told nothing about the widow of Nain. What can we learn from that? There will have been plenty of people around with a vague faith in God who kept the religious laws, but this Gentile Centurion recognized that God was at work in Jesus and was prepared to act accordingly by trusting Jesus. Are we prepared to turn a vague faith into action when God works? Just possibly Luke knew the centurion because he joined the early church, but the widow of Nain did not, so he did not know her. 3. Doubts of John the Baptist (Luke 7:18–35) Question 3. John expected the Messiah to act like his idea of what a Messiah would do. Jesus quotes Isaiah 35: 5,6 and 61: 1,2 to tell him he is wrong. In what ways was John wrong? What did they expect the Messiah to do? What was Jesus doing that was unexpected? John evidently shared the general expectation of what the Messiah would do. John will have understood himself to be the messenger of Malachi 3: 1 –3; 4: 1–3 and therefore that all that those verses suggested would happen. Particularly if you live in a hostile society it is important, and encouraging, to remember how hostile the society in which Jesus and the early church lived and worked was. 4. Jesus and Debts! (Luke 7:36-50) Question 4.What does Jesus mean when he talks about debts (7:39–43)? Do we have big or small debts to be cancelled? (We probably think we have only small debts to pay (v 41,42) but big or small counts the same!) Do we show as much love as we should for Jesus who cancelled our debts? Jesus was talking about the way in which those who followed him and were members of the people of God needed to remember that they were in debt to God. We, living later, know that we rely on Jesus dying for us to cancel the things in our lives, which stop us, being accepted by God. Since ‘all have sinned’ it does not matter whether our sins are big or small they still stop us being accepted by the Lord. Only in Christ can we have acceptance by God. 5. Jesus, the Pharisee and the woman! (Luke 7:36-50) Question 5. The Pharisee in the final episode of this chapter (v 36–50) is clearly much more concerned with things and ideas. The woman is only concerned with people. What can we learn from these two stories? It is important to remember that some people are very concerned with people but some (a smaller number), find their interest is taken more by ideas and things than people. Both sorts of people are necessary in a healthy church and a healthy society. Conclusion Question 6. In what ways has this chapter stressed faithfulness? Nearly all this chapter (and the next) is about people acting out their faith as a result of what they saw Jesus do. They were in a very positive way following him, not just thinking about him. That is faithfulness. The message to us must be that we have to follow Jesus, not just go to church on Sunday. Tap or click here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Luke 6: 27-49 The New Way of Jesus Part 2. Kingdom Ethics Luke’s Sermon on the Plain continues. We read together Luke 6: 27-49 This is a shorter version of Matthew’s sermon but it still contains no less than 22 separate points! We will look at them in groups. 1. Love your enemies v27, 28 It is easy to miss some of the practical implications of these statements. They mean, for instance, that a Christian will never refuse to speak to someone, whatever they may have said or done. And it will affect our behaviour towards someone who wants the same job as we do. Question 1: What effect will it have on us if we force ourselves to speak kindly in those sorts of situation? Where else can you think of where obeying Jesus might have some positive results in our everyday and family life? Pause. Even if we have to force ourselves to speak well in that sort of situation doing so will have a good effect on our underlying attitudes towards that person. If we fall out with someone at work we must be careful to greet them in exactly our usual cheerful way the next morning. They will find it very hard to respond in anything other than the same way. It is hard to obey Jesus when the inevitable problems of family life occur. Are you the person who is always the first to try and mend a damaged relationship? 2. Not standing up for our rights v29-31 Is it really possible to act like this in the real world? What happens if someone takes my bicycle? Do I give them my motorbike? Perhaps Jesus is making one of his outrageously impossible statements (camels through needles; plucking out eyes etc.) so that we remember better the principle behind what he said. Total obedience to what Jesus taught here would rapidly lead to us having no money at all! Question 2: What should we do in the practical things of every day to put the principle behind these statements into practice? Pause. I think the only possible answer to this is to say we have to be careful not to put ourselves first in what we do but put others in front of ourselves. It is, of course, a great deal easier to say that than to actually do it in the real world we live in. It is also, of course, a great deal easier to hear it said and mentally agree than to go out and do it! 3. Doing better than expected v32–35a Probably ‘lending’ in that culture, as in many, was a nice way of talking about giving somebody something. Question 3: Should we ever lend like that without expectation of a return? Shouldn’t we call it what it is from the beginning if that is what we intend, rather than using such double talk? Pause. Not all the things our culture wants us to do are necessarily what we should do as followers of Jesus. In some cultures it is more important to say something that pleases the person we are talking to than to tell the truth. Jesus said he was “the way, the truth, and the life”. That means we must be in all things as truthful as we can possibly be even if that is against our culture and traditions. 4. The results of this behaviour v35b, 36 We will probably see that we will have all sorts of problems in living up to what Jesus said. It is so difficult to obey what he said and still live life in the real world. Perhaps it is impossible. But Jesus was probably doing this deliberately to make us see that we can never in ourselves be good enough to appear before the Lord God. We can only rely on his mercy and goodness consequent on the self-sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross for our acceptance. Question 4: Why does Jesus call us sons, or children, in this context (v36b)? Pause. This is to emphasize that we are in a personal relationship with the Father God. And that again can only be through the acceptance that Jesus obtained for us by his death on the Cross. When we call God our Father that means we accept all our fellow Christians as our brothers and sisters. 5. What we give will be what we get v37, 38 The first sentence in v37 is sometimes used to suggest we should never judge anything or anybody at all. But, of course, we do! If we didn’t, how could we ever correct anyone and life in and out of the church would be impossibly difficult. Question 5: How should we understand v37 in such a way as to be realistic and yet follow Jesus properly? Pause. Matthew adds ‘in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.’ (Matt 7: 2). If we are prepared to face the truth and be judged by it we may make other people face the truth. If not, not! Verses 37b and 38 could be taken to mean simply the better you are the better your life will be. Life is never as easy as that (Ps 73: 1-5, 13, 14). Question 6: How, then, do we understand what Jesus meant? Pause. Some people teach a false gospel which promises obvious material blessing to the believer. This is clearly not the way the Kingdom in the world works as Ps 73: 2, 13, 14 points out. The book of Job and Luke 13: 1 –5 say much the same. What we are promised is reward for faithfulness in the day of the Lord when the world comes to an end. We are to look to our own reward and not make judgments on what should happen to other people. 6. How to live for the Kingdom v39–45 The parables of the blind, the student and the plank all, in different ways, emphasize that we need to be walking in the Way of Jesus if we want to be good and do things that matter in the kingdom of the Spirit. We need to be able to see, to be properly trained and not be blinded by things that should not be there. Then the parable of the good tree emphasizes that we need to be the right sort of tree. Being a better thorn bush will not lead to fruit, just bigger thorns! Question 7: How can we tell whether someone, or ourselves, is the right sort of tree? Pause. When we set out to follow Jesus we are told that we shall be saved at the final day. But we are also told that account will be taken of the whole of our lives as followers (Rom 14: 10, 12; 2 Cor 5: 10). It is hard to see how these two teachings fit together. It is best to take them both as the Lord’s word to us and strive to live in the light of both of them. 7. The Summary v46-49 Luke’s version of this story is slightly different from Matthew’s perhaps more familiar one. It is often called ‘the parable of the Wise and Foolish Builders’. That is a good title for the parable in Matthew, not so good for this one of Luke’s! Question 8: What title would more accurately summarize this parable? Pause. The word ‘foundation’ is the most important one in this parable. It ties this parable to many other Biblical verses. Perhaps the most significant is Isaiah 28: 16 which refers to the temple but is used by Peter (1 Pet 2: 6) of Jesus. In Peter’s little picture Jesus is the all important foundation. Peter, like Jesus, emphasises that we are to do the building. Click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 audio file

Luke Looks Back Chapter 8 (Luke 6:17 – 6: 26) The Way of Jesus: blessings and woes Luke wrote his own version of Matthew's more famous Sermon on the Mount. It is much shorter and was preached in 'a level place'. Probably Jesus, like any travelling preacher, used much the same material many times and these are two slightly different reports of what he said. Please do read Luke 6: 17 - 26 The biggest differences occur in the list of blessings and the woes that Luke, but not Matthew, has after them. Luke has only 4 Blessings and 4 matching Woes. Understanding them can be tricky! Blessing 1 (v 20). Question 1: Say which of the following statements are true or false comments about this Blessing? And why? a. All poor people are already in the Kingdom because they are poor and therefore can be sure they will be saved when they die. b. All the poor people who met King Jesus as he walked round Galilee were in the Kingdom because they had met the King and therefore would be saved. c. Jesus was only talking about those who were, and are, spiritually poor - they would be in the Kingdom (Matt 5: 3). d. Jesus didn't say anybody is 'in' the Kingdom he told them who it belongs to. That means it is wide open for the poor but they still have to set out to follow Jesus whole heartedly to be 'in' the Kingdom. It is certainly true that Jesus had a special feeling for the poor people he met and got on better with them than rich people but just poverty by itself does not let anyone into the Kingdom so the first 3 are all false. To "follow Jesus" is the all important way into the Kingdom which is about what the fourth statement said. That first blessing was about something that was happening then (present tense). The next 2 blessings 2 and 3 are about the future (future tense). Blessing 2 (v 21a): Jesus was talking to a big crowd. In those days many people did not get enough to eat and would be hungry. Matthew interprets this as being about hunger and thirst for righteousness and we should probably understand this that way. The difficult word righteousness is about establishing a relationship (the basic meaning of the word translated righteousness) between the Lord and his people. Which can only be done by making a person good and holy before God, which, fortunately, God by his grace will do for us, for we could never be good enough ourselves. Question 2: Are you hungry, in this spiritual sense, now? Are you prepared to wait to be satisfied later? When will 'later' be? Or are you in too much of a hurry? The Bible consistently teaches that the final justice of God at the judgement day will right all wrongs, particularly for the poor and the hungry who trust him now. But of course most of the answer to this question is something you are going to have to meditate on yourself. Blessing 3 (v 21b): Someone has said "those who wish to serve him best are conscious most of sin within". Question 3: Is it worth weeping over our sins now for the promise of laughing later? Have you any advice for yourself and others as to how to think more about the future and make that a more important factor in the way you live? Blessing 4 (v 22, 23) The most important point about all the Blessings only comes in this last one. Question 4: What is the great condition of this Blessing and all the others (here it is again)? Are the problems of this Blessing certain to happen for the true follower of Jesus? Our joy depends on following the Son of Man, as Jesus called himself. Whether we will be hated, despised, insulted and rejected depends on where we have to live in this world. Some of us have it easy, others do not. 4 Woes. v24 - 26. Jesus does seem to have a rather poor view of life. He seems to think being rich, well fed, cheerful and well thought of are all bad things. Most of us probably disagree and would defend our right to disagree. What then can we make of these sayings? Perhaps we can start this way - you probably know somebody who is rich, fat, always cheerful and in the middle of a group of people and yet you would not at all like to be that person. Why is that? Question 5: What are the bad things about being rich, fat, always in the middle of a group of people? Why then did Jesus make these his woes? You will need to think hard about this one. People like this all too often are what they are because they are careless of other people. They think only of themselves and what they can get out of life, regardless of how many people they hurt and offend on the way. But they have a sort of life force that seems to push them through life successfully. The Psalmist in psalm 73 grumbles about these sort of people and comforted himself saying "God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever". Right mouse click or tap here here to download as an audio mp3

Luke Looks Back Chapter 7 Luke 5: 27 – 6: 16 The Way of Jesus: people and problems This passage is a mix of good things about people and some problems Jesus has for us to consider before we start on his positive teaching in the next passage. The Call of Levi First there is the story of the call of Levi and a strong suggestion that what he did was good. Then two more stories in which Jesus was challenged over the things he did that people thought he should not do: Luke 5:27 - 32 Eating with those with whom one should not eat! Luke 5:33 - 39 Eating when one should not eat! Luke 6:1 - 11 Doing what one should not do! Finally Luke gives us the complete list of the Apostles. First Jesus was eating with those with whom one should not eat - according to those we will call 'the serious' because they were serious about their religion. We read Luke 5:27-32: eating with those with whom one should not eat! Levi seems to be the same person called Matthew in the other gospels and therefore the person who wrote what we call Matthew's Gospel. Question 1: What Jesus said to Levi was extremely brief. Just two words: "follow me". How does that differ from what one would expect a religious teacher to say to a possible disciple? This is not a call to follow a system, a philosophy, or a religion. It is a straight call to follow one person: Jesus. The true call to discipleship is just the same today. There are many half-hearted Christians in the world today. A good question for them is "do you follow Jesus?". Question 2: Meals are particularly important in Luke's Gospel. Only Luke calls this one a "great banquet" and says the serious people "complained" about who was there. Why does Luke emphasise what happened here so much? Luke recognises that, for Jesus, life and faith were all about including people in as much as possible rather than turning them away as not good enough, not learned enough, not old enough - anything else for which people are 'not enough'. Doing that still upsets people who consider themselves serious in matters of religion! Jesus and rules! In the next story Jesus did not argue against the principles of the Law of Moses but against all the many little rules that people had added to it. He knew that if people are given many rules they will forget the greater principles they should be thinking about. So concern for all these detailed rules would hide the new things he was teaching, particularly those relating to the work of the Spirit. The challenge to us is to identify which of our rules, written or unwritten, get in the way of what we should really be doing. All too often we continue to do the things that our parents and grandparents decided were the right things to do when they were young. But the world we are living in is changing all the time, perhaps faster than it has ever done before. The things that are not part of the necessary centre of our faith may need to be changed. Jesus explains that in some very vivid and exciting short sayings. Read Luke 5: 33 - 39 : eating when one should not eat! Question 3: What would you identify as your problems - as a group or as an individual? What are your 'old wine skins' that need to be changed? How? In what way? The answers to both this and the next question are going to depend very much on your circumstances. Jesus said "the old wine is better". He is being sarcastic. He knows many think old things are better than new things as old wine is better than new wine but he is challenging his followers to new and better things. Question 4: What are the things that tend to prevent you, together or individually, moving on to the new and better things of faith? Remember Paul said "if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!" The last two stories Luke 6: 1 - 5 and Luke 6:6-11 are both about Sabbath keeping. The Sabbath was the Saturday religious day of the Jews. The early Christians changed their day of celebration to Sunday, the first day of the week, in memory of the resurrection of Jesus. This was one of the three things (keeping the food laws, Sabbath keeping, circumcision) Jews of that time did to show that they really were the people of God. We read Luke 6: 1 - 11: doing what one should not do! Question 5: What do Christians in your culture do to show that they are Christians? In particular, what things do they do that are really just a matter of custom and tradition and not really necessary to show they are Christians? Are those things good things of themselves or do they really hinder other people becoming Christians? Question 6: What did Jesus think about Sabbath keeping? What did Jesus think was more important than rules like that? What would Jesus think about the rules you have identified in your world? Micah, an Old Testament prophet said "what does the Lord desire of you? To act justly, and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God" and said that the Lord did not want offerings and sacrifices. Although Jesus never actually quoted those words he often alluded to them. Jesus chooses and appoints his disciples. Read Luke 6: 12 - 16. Of those 12 men only one, John, is certainly known to have died of old age. Peter was crucified upside down (because he did not want to be crucified the same way up as Jesus) in Rome, Thomas probably got the furthest and was killed in south India, the rest died here and there in the ancient world as they proclaimed the good message of Jesus. Question 7: In calling the Twelve Jesus commissioned them not only to action on his behalf but imitation of him in both life and work. So it is today. Which part of the Christian way do you find most difficult? Tap or click here to download as an audio mp3

Luke Looks Back Part 6 Luke 4:31-5:26 - The Authority of the Messiah This passage has been carefully structured by Luke around the idea of authority. It starts off with 2 episodes in which Jesus shows his authority by first driving out an evil spirit and then healing many people. It ends with 2 episodes in which Jesus heals a man of leprosy, a symbol of evil, and heals a paralysed man. In between these 2 pairs of episodes Jesus shows his authority by proving that he, a carpenter, can catch more fish than the fishermen can. This middle story is the most important because it shows the authority Jesus had most clearly. First we read Luke 4: 31 - 44 Question 1: Twice in these episodes, when the man with an evil demon calls him 'the Holy One of God' and when the demons call him 'the Son of God', Jesus was more accurately identified by demonic powers than by ordinary people. Why was that? What are our modern day equivalents? That is a hard question to answer. Perhaps the otherworldly powers were more sensitive to the power of Jesus than ordinary people were. Are we as sensitive to the things of the Lord as we should be? Question 2: Why does Luke tell us that Simon's mother-in-law went straight back to the housework. Luke tells us how complete and natural the healing was. Simon's mother-in-law was able to go back into the kitchen and work. In the ordinary way she would have needed time to recover from the fever. The healing by Jesus was very special. In the same way when he heals us of our problems, physical, mental or spiritual, he often heals us instantly. The story of Luke 5: 1 - 11 is clearly the most important part of this passage. Fishing with nets in the Sea of Galilee was done when the fish rose to feed on the surface at night. There could only possibly have been a shoal near the surface in the daylight if a new fresh water spring had opened up in the seabed. (This is an area of volcanic activity). Jesus knew something nobody else did. We read these verses now. 5: 1 - 11 Question 3: What might Simon and John have said to each other when they thought Jesus could not hear when he, a carpenter, told them to go fishing in broad daylight! "Who does he think he is?" "Telling us where and when to fish indeed." "What does he know about it?" "He's only a carpenter." "Thinking because he is a prophet he knows where to fish. What rubbish!" And so on. A boat of those days has been dug up. It was 8m long and 2m wide. So it would have needed a crew of rowers and would have held a lot of fish before it began to sink! So this was a very big catch meaning enough money for many weeks for the families concerned. Question 4: What did Peter do which he must have done so that nobody else was able to share their good fortune (listen again to v 7)? Signalling instead of shouting would have stopped other fisherman realising what had happened and joining in the big catch. Question 5: What does this episode teach us about the relationship between money and spiritual commitment? Practical rewards do sometimes follow devotion of time and energy to spiritual matters as they did in this case. But they do not always do so. We must be prepared to sacrifice things for the sake of the Kingdom. Question 6: Peter wanted to distance himself from Jesus when he 'fell at Jesus' knees and said "Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man"' because he thought the unclean contaminated the clean and he was unclean. How did Jesus view this? What is the implication for us? Peter was following the teaching of the OT. Leviticus 10: 10 says, 'distinguish between the holy and the common, between the unclean and the clean'. These teachings were mainly about ceremonial cleanliness. Jesus ignored such things. He taught that the things that matter are love God and loving our neighbour. Ceremony is not important in the Kingdom of God. Question 7: Peter recognised the authority of Jesus over him as a result of the events on the lake. How do we know Jesus has authority over us? The disciples had seen a great miracle. But so do we when the Almighty God calls us to follow him and we respond. He then forgives our sins, promises us final salvation at the end of the ages and gives us his Holy Spirit to guide us until then. If we do not recognize his authority we are poor judges of what is good and great and what is of great advantage for us! Read Luke 5: 12 - 26. "Leprosy" in the Bible may not have been what we call leprosy these days but any of many skin diseases. Question 8: Jesus said "I am willing" and touched the man. What does that tell us about Jesus? Jesus entered fully into human life. He related easily to the outcast, leper man and touched him. That made him, Jesus, unclean under Jewish law but Jesus ignored that. He was interested in the realities of life not the details of religious practice. Question 9: The paralysed man's sins were forgiven not because of his faith but of 'their faith'. Do you think one person's faith can work to heal someone else today? If faith cannot work like that there is not much point in praying for anyone else - which we all do. It is lovely the way Jesus says 'I am willing' to heal someone and calls the guy on the stretcher 'friend' even although his friends have just made a mess of the roof of what was probably his, Jesus' , house. Click here to download as an audio mp3

Luke Looks Back Chapter 5 Study 5 - Luke 4:14-30 The Announcement of the Messiah We start off this study with a question. Question 1: Where was your hometown? What was, or is, memorable about it? Read Luke:4:14 to 23. Nazareth was the hometown of Jesus, where he grew up. It was a small village in the middle of the province of Galilee, mainly of Galileans but including some Jews from the far away province of Judea. The people of Galilee were often of mixed ancestry so there is likely to have been considerable antagonism between them and the purer blooded Judean Jews who regarded themselves as the only proper Jews. As a result Judean Jews of Nazareth, as the family of Jesus were, were most probably foreigners in their own community. The two slightly different peoples were probably not friendly to each other. That, not the best of places, was where Jesus spent most of his childhood days! Luke uses the story of what happened when Jesus read from the OT book of Isaiah in the synagogue there, to start explaining how we are to understand the ministry of Jesus. Jesus had to deal with a strong expectation among ordinary people that the Messiah would behave in certain ways. He had a major job to change that expectation. Jesus read just one and a half verses from Isaiah 6. We will read more verses to get the context of what he read. We may assume his listeners knew the passage well so that hearing the verses he read they would immediately remember the following verses. Listen carefully to the picture these verses give. Isaiah 61: 1 - 7. Question 2: What would those verses have made them think Jesus was going to do if he really was the Messiah? What would they have been expecting him to call on them to do? Like many of the other passages in the Old Testament that talk about the Messiah these verses would have made them expect leadership in a successful military campaign against the Romans. Brothers, called the Maccabees, had led Israel against the Syrians 200 years earlier with great success. If he succeeded the men would expect to have to join his army. Of course, we know that such a venture would have been hopeless. The Roman armies were exceedingly difficult to beat. Only the most warlike of peoples in other parts of the Empire had any success against them, and then not for very long. Question 3: The next half verse in Isaiah to the one Jesus read says 'and the day of vengeance of our God'. He stopped without reading that out. What would that have suggested to the people who listened to him? I think they would have found it a great puzzle, which is why they listened to what he said next so carefully. He seemed to be promising that he would be a mighty spiritual leader but not a war leader. They would have thought of 'the day of vengeance' as the day when their God would bring the world they knew to an end with the defeat of the hated Romans. Read Luke 4:24 - 30 Question 4: Jesus went on to remind them of the stories of the widow of Zarephath and Elijah (1 Kings 17: 2 - 10a the brook Kerith was east of Jericho, Zarephath was the other side of Israel near Sidon, a Phoenician city)) and of Naaman and Elisha (2 Kings 5: 1, Aram was another name for Syria ). Why did Jesus do that? What point was he making, apart from the obvious one of 'not in my hometown'? All these places were outside Israel. He was saying that as they rejected him he was going to go to other people outside Israel. They did not like that idea at all. Quite why he did that is a bit of a mystery. Question 5: If a politician, wanting to influence people and starting off an election campaign was nearly lynched - murdered by a mob - as Jesus was he would not be likely to get on very well. The story does not give a good impression of Jesus. Why does Luke tell us about this episode when he could so easily not have done so? What is it about the ministry of Jesus that Luke wants us to think about? Luke is expecting what he writes to be read mainly by Gentiles - Romans. He has emphasised that the 2 great prophets Elijah and Elisha helped Gentiles. Christian faith is for all peoples, not any special nation or people group. Probably the fact that Jesus was rejected by the Jews like this made him sound better to a Roman, like Theophilus! But, above and beyond that, Luke will have chosen this episode because it gives such a clear picture of what Jesus was going to do in his ministry. Question 6: It says, "Jesus walked right through the crowd and went on his way". What does that suggest? It tells us that Jesus had an unusual air of authority about him. Perhaps too, that angels protected him. Question 7: Looking now at the whole story - what 2 things is Jesus emphasising by what he says and does that are of fundamental importance in our understanding of God and of faith? He has appealed to the Scriptures of the Old Testament to establish who he is. And the Scripture he read emphasised the work of the Spirit both for preaching and healing. These are the 2 fundamental sources for our understanding too - the Scriptures and the Holy Spirit - though we have, of course, the tremendous advantage of having the writings of the New Testament as well as those of the Old. Click here to download as an audio mp3

Luke Looks Back Chapter 4 Luke 3:19-4:13 The Preparation of the Messiah: his baptism Luke rather oddly records the imprisonment of John (3: 19, 20) before the baptism of Jesus by John. He does this because only Jesus is really important in the rest of the story. He continues his account of the preparation of Jesus for his ministry with first his baptism and then his temptation. 1) Ice breaker. What was the most memorable part of your baptism (if you were old enough to remember it) or confirmation? 2) Matthew tells us why Jesus was baptised (Matt 3: 15). Luke is only concerned with what happened when he was (v 21 - 23). Which major Christian teachings are important in what happened? Why is it important for us to hear about these before we hear about Jesus starting his ministry? Genealogies were important in those days to show who someone was. Why this one is considerably different from the one that Matthew gives is not clear. Both are carefully structured around (different) multiples of seven. Probably Luke is most interested in his last line: Jesus was the son of God. The main purpose of the three temptations is to teach us things about Jesus. Things like the order of the temptations, different in different Gospels, are not important. We will explore five emphases of the temptations in the following questions: 3) The temptations make clear the nature of Jesus' work as the Son of God. In which verses in this story is Jesus called the Son of God? What sort of Messiah will the people have been expecting from texts like: Gen 49: 10; Num 24: 17 - 19; 1 Sam 21: 11 (an example of how a Davidic king was supposed to be); Ps 2: 6 - 12; Is 11: 1,4,10 - 14; Dan 7: 13, 14, 27; Zec 9: 9 - 17? How do the temptations show that what they were getting was very different from what they expected? Which were fulfilled then and which are still to be fulfilled? 4) Share something of how your own understanding of Jesus has changed during your Christian life as you have learned more about him. 5) The temptations of Jesus are very like some of the great events of Israel's history. Read Ex 16: 2 -4; 17: 1 - 7; 32: 1 - 4; and 1 Cor 10: 1 - 7. Which story in Exodus is like each one of the 3 temptations? What is the fundamental difference between each pair of experiences? 6) The temptations demonstrate the antagonism of Satan to the Kingdom of God. In some churches Satan is never mentioned; some talk too much about him, blaming him for every thing that goes wrong even when it is a very human fault. How would you rate our emphasis on Satan: too much, too little or just right? How does it compare with the emphasis in Luke's story? 7) The temptations emphasise that Jesus' ministry is the fulfilment of scripture. Identify how they do this. This emphasis is particularly important in the end of Luke's Gospel at Lk 24: 32. What do you find the hardest part of reading and learning from scripture? What tips can you give other people to ease the problem? 8) The temptations show Jesus' followers a way to resist temptations. The basic ideas behind the three temptations are 1) using your faith for personal gain; 2) using it to make yourself look good before other people; 3) putting God to the test in practical ways. Look at each temptation and decide whether those are the right descriptions of them. If not, what is? In what ways, often trying to hide their real motives, do people sometimes try to put God to the test? Which of these temptations do you experience most? 9) The devil left Jesus 'until an opportune time' (v 13). When, or under what circumstance, does he get a good opportunity to go after us? What can we do to discourage him? Click or tap here to download as an audio mp3

Luke Looks Back Chapter 3 Luke 3:1-18 Heralding the Messiah Luke continues with his careful introduction to Jesus' ministry. He tells us all about John because John came before, and announced, Jesus. One thing he is going to make very clear throughout his book is that while John was a prophet Jesus was more than a prophet. First we read Luke 3:1-9 Luke in 3: 4 - 6 uses Isaiah's great picture of hope in Isaiah 40:3-5, which prophesies the return of the Lord and his people to Jerusalem after the exile, as a picture of the coming of the Lord Jesus to the people of God. John is the voice. Jesus is the Lord. An obvious first question to make you think, although it does not come directly from this passage is this: What is your hope? How far does your hope change the way you live from day to day? Where should our hope be placed? Obviously the first part of that question has an individual answer, not an only right one. Our hope should be placed on being with Jesus in his heavenly kingdom and then after our resurrection on being part of his kingdom when heaven and earth meet to form the new heaven and new earth that is our ultimate destination. Second question: the basic message that John preached was 'a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins'. How does this compare with the messages you hear preached these days? Are the differences only because John was preaching before the life and death of Jesus and the preaching you hear is from long after? Or are there differences there ought not to be? Again the answer to that question depends on your situation. The last verse we read: ' the axe is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.' Is harsh. Third question: in what ways can we see that happening in our day and in our society? Yet another question where the answer depends on who we are and where we are. When you look at the world today and see what a mess it is in because of men's greed and lust for power it hasn't improved much since John's day. Part B - Read Luke 3:10-18 When the people asked him how they were to live to show they had truly repented John gave them 4 practical examples in this passage. Two ways they were to look after the poor: giving tem clothes and food. Two ways they were not to be corrupt and to be good and honest in all things: the examples of the tax collectors and the soldiers. Question 4: If he had been talking to us what examples would he have given? Were his examples, particularly the first two, really practical? (It would not be long before they ran out of spare clothes and food.) How realistic are the examples you think he might have given to you? How well can we follow these examples when we have to live in the real world we find ourselves in? Pause. Yet again the answers will all depend on who and where you are. John talked about 3 things: a prophetic warning of coming judgement (flee from the wrath to come... the axe at the root of the trees ...); calling for justice and compassion in our dealings with others (sharing clothes and food ... honesty in all things ... ); and a right attitude to the coming Messiah (accepting the baptism of the Holy Spirit ). Question 5: Different churches major on one or other of the present day equivalents of these.' Which do our churches make the most of? On which do we fall short? Pause. Like all the questions on this passage we have to ask ourselves how they apply to us. And I cannot tell you what your answers should be! Click or tap here here to download as an audio mp3

Luke Looks Back Chapter 2 Not all the stories commonly believed about the birth of Jesus are true to the actual facts. He was born before Herod died in 4 BC ,in Bethlehem, which was not his parent's home village, probably in an ordinary house (the word translated 'inn' can mean a guest room or just the sleeping area in a house; the manger would be between the family area and the livestock area). Not all the stories commonly believed about the birth of Jesus are true to the actual facts. He was born before Herod died in 4 BC ,in Bethlehem, which was not his parent's home village, probably in an ordinary house (the word translated 'inn' can mean a guest room or just the sleeping area in a house; the manger would be between the family area and the livestock area). Luke 1:1-20 Question 1. Luke carefully says the birth of King Jesus occurred during the reign of Caesar Augustus (v 1), who was a great and good Roman Emperor who brought lasting peace to a world in which there had been many wars. What does he want us to learn from this? One of the main themes of this, as all the Gospels, is the collision between the kingdom of Caesar and the kingdom of God. Luke was writing to Christians who might be martyred for refusing to say Caesar is Lord because they believed Jesus is Lord. Luke wants us to understand the enormous significance of what was happening. Question 2. Why does Luke choose to focus on the low caste shepherds rather than Matthew's high caste Wise Men? As we noted in the first study Luke emphasises the poor, the weak and the lost; not the rich, the healthy and the found. The title 'Christ the Lord' appears only here in the NT. The word 'Christ' has two meanings. It is a Greek word of the New Testament equivalent to the Hebrew word 'Messiah' of the Old Testament. Here, and generally in the Gospels, it is a title meaning 'the Anointed One'; later, in the Epistles it becomes part of Jesus' name. The most recent English versions use 'Messiah' when it is a title; 'Christ' when it is a name. Here it should be "the Lord Messiah". Our nearest translation in everyday words is "King Jesus". It is important to remember that when Luke uses this title he means 'the very special God-appointed Anointed One'. Question 3. A lot of people travelled to Bethlehem: Joseph and Mary, the shepherds, the Wise Men. Why did each of them go? What did they intend to do when they got there? Why are we told these things? What are we meant to learn from what happened? They all travelled in the purposes of God. It was important that those from both the top and the bottom of the society of those days should be there to see the baby King. They probably had only the vaguest idea of why they were there; they were there for our benefit - so we could be told about them and marvel at the stories. Luke 2: 21-52 Question 4. What does Simeon say (v 30 - 32) which introduces a new and important idea that neither Zechariah nor Mary mentioned? Simeon relates what is happening to the lives of ordinary people. They will experience salvation and the promise made to Abraham long ago that "all peoples on earth will be blessed through you" will finally come true. Question 5. Remembering that the Romans occupied their country, what did Anna mean when she spoke about the 'redemption of Jerusalem' (v 38)? She was probably thinking in a very practical way that the Romans would be thrown out of Jerusalem. It wasn't going to work like that! She spoke something that was a true prophecy but not in the way she thought. Question 6. In order to emphasise that Jesus came for both men and women Luke pairs up a story involving a man with one involving a woman at least 27 times in his gospel. Identify where he does this in these first two chapters. Which is the most important member of the pair on each of these occasions? Zechariah and Elizabeth, Joseph and Mary, Simeon and Anna. The men and the women are about evenly balanced in importance. Question 7. What do the episodes from the childhood of Jesus (v 40, 46 - 48, 51, 52) tell us about Jesus? What are we being told here: he was God or he was a man? Which do you find it most difficult to believe? Why? His life as a human being is being emphasised here. Jesus appears to have been a particularly bright and intelligent lad. Right mouse click or tap here to download as an audio mp3 Right mouse click or tap here to download as a PDF

Luke Looks Back Chapter 1 Introduction Luke 1: 1 - 80 Preparations for the Advent of the Messiah This is the first of a set of studies of the life of Jesus written by a man called Luke. The studies are in the form of sets of questions for a group, or an individual, to think over and discuss. In his first 4 verses written in different, better Greek than the rest of the book, Luke announces what he is going to do. Luke makes it clear he is writing history by emphasising the way in which he has researched the life of Jesus and the surrounding events. The other three Gospel writers write life stories more narrowly focused on Jesus. Luke was writing to a man called Theophilus who, judging by the formal way Luke addresses him, must have been someone rather important. Study 1 Reading: (Luke 1: 1 - 4), Here is the first question: Luke wants to give Theophilus 'certainty' about the things he has been taught by Christians (v 4). Where can we get certainty about the things we have been taught? Theophilus's certainty was to come from what Luke wrote: facts of history. Our's comes from the same place: the record of how God related to his people and the world, told to us in the word of God, the Bible. Luke starts off with background information about Jesus, explaining the story of his cousin, John the Baptist. This sort of information is the way Greeks wrote history. Luke is being careful to fit in with the expected ways to write history of his day. Study 2 First we get a description of Zechariah and Elizabeth, the parents of John in Luke 1:5-25. Second question: What were the good things about this couple that made them the right sort of people to be the parents of a prophet? There were also some things about them that were not so good. What were they? What are we meant to learn from these good and 'not so good' things? Notice here: The good things are obvious; the not so good ones less so. Childlessness was a great disgrace in their culture. We shall see that Luke keeps on drawing attention to people who were poor, of low status and generally disadvantaged. Luke, like Matthew, emphasises the very special and unique way Jesus was conceived Study 3 Read Luke 1:v 26 - 38 Question 3 . What would the village gossips have said had happened? (note what was said in Jn 8: 41 which probably refers to this. The village gossips will have concluded that Mary was not a virgin and Jesus was born illegitimately. The "no reputation" of some of the older English translations of Phil 2: 7 will have had a very literal practical meaning for Jesus and his mother. Question 4: Why was Jesus conceived this way? What difference did it make to who he was? Jesus had to be fully human so that he could share our humanity (Heb 2: 14) and to be fully God so that his sacrificial death could be effective for more than just himself. In the early church they said "Jesus was as we are and therefore he will help; in other ways he was not as we are and therefore he can help" Although the point is never made in the New Testament it is likely that only through the virgin birth (more accurately, the virgin conception) could he be both. The angel said he was to be called the 'son of God' (v 35). That was a very special title in those days. The king of Judea was considered to be a 'son of God' (Ps 2: 7). So was the whole nation of Israel (Hos 11: 1). The Romans called their Emperor the son of a god. It does not mean that God had intercourse with Mary. That is a dreadful thing to suggest. Study 4 Read Luke 1: 39 - 56. Mary's song is lovely. What can Mary possibly have meant by v 51 - 53? (Herod was still alive and a very dangerous man, half crazy and vicious to anybody he thought might challenge his rule.) Herod (the first Herod, Herod the Great) was a terrible man who killed many people including his favourite wife and his own sons on the merest suspicion of treason. Mary must have been speaking prophetically, going far beyond what could have been expected from the young village girl that she was. Study 5 Read Luke 1:57 - 80. What happened (v 62,63) was very like the late change of name that seems to have been a frequent mark of someone having something very special to do. (Abram = Abraham; Simon = Peter, Saul = Paul etc.) What would those who heard the prophecy of Zechariah have thought he meant by the first part of what he said where he praised the Lord (v 68 - 75)? And how would they have understood the second part where he spoke about the future of his baby (v 76 - 79)? Which part sounds like politics and which like preaching? It is important to remember that the whole life of Jesus took place against a background of continual trouble between the people of that country and the occupying power of Rome. There were many attempted rebellions against the Romans. The Jews did not understand how they could be the Lord's people and not be in control of their own country. Even the ordinary Jewish people were desperately hoping a strong man would appear and lead them in a military campaign against the Romans. There were major rebellions against Roman rule both before and after the time of Jesus all of them unsuccessful. Those about 40 years and 120 years after the death of Jesus were particularly unsuccessful and eventually led to terrible revenge being taken by the Romans and the deaths of millions of people. This background is reflected in what Zechariah said. I hope that at the news of the coming Saviour your heart has leapt within you as the baby John leapt in Elizabeth! 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Minor Prophets - Malachi Welcome to the last installment in our series about the minor prophets. Our final book is Malachi, the last book in the Old Testament. There is something very exciting about this book! Perhaps it's the sense of anticipation contained within it. The first book of the New Testament lies just over the page! But before we get there, Malachi has serious words from God to convey to his people. The name Malachi means “my messenger” and this theme is picked up during the prophecy. It is likely that Malachi was a contemporary of Ezra and Nehemiah, writing in the mid 5th century BC. God then accuses the people of stealing from him by not bringing him the proper tithe of their offerings. Similar to the situation with the animal sacrifices, the people were keeping back more than they should have done, causing offence to God. This charge is leveled against the whole nation, not just the priests. God challenges the people to test him, declaring that if they would only bring the whole tithe to him, he would bless them abundantly in return. The behaviour of the people in regard to their offerings demonstrates their lack of trust in God's gracious provision. In chapter 3 verse 14 the people sum up their spiritual destitution by declaring that it is futile to serve God. However, God takes note of a small remnant of faithful people who continue to worship him properly with a right heart. He carefully records their names to ensure that they are preserved. The book of Malachi ends with the promise of the coming Day of the Lord, when evil will be judged and destroyed and those who have been faithful to God will be restored and healed. The final words of the book declare that Elijah the prophet will come before the Day of the Lord. Who was that? When did that happen? Download and listen to the audio mp3 to discover more about this amazing book of Malachi. Click or tap here to download the audio mp3

Minor Prophets - Joel We've reached the book of Joel. I had some degree of dilemma about where to place Joel in the roughly chronological order of the series and that's because the estimates of when the book was written vary widely from the 9th to 4th century BC. After looking at the content of Joel's prophecies, I decided to go with the scholars who argue that Joel was written after the exile to Babylon, dating it somewhere around the year 500 BC. Joel evidently has knowledge of Judah and Jerusalem and it seems likely that he was from Judah himself. His name means “Yahweh is God” and we are told that his father was called Pethuel. Other than that, we know little about Joel himself. Joel is similar in style to several of the other minor prophetic books, being written in the form of oracles of judgement and salvation, mostly in poetic style. Joel appears to have written during a time of national calamity for Judah. Key themes of his book are the Day of the Lord, the need to repent, the promise of God that he will dwell in the midst of his people, and the future promise of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. We may also try to hide the parts of our lives, or the aspects of our character that we are embarrassed or ashamed about, but God knows us better than we know ourselves. Nothing is hidden from his sight. As our loving Father, he longs for us to acknowledge these things before him and rend our hearts in response. Nothing will come as a surprise to him - he already knows! We can try all sorts of things to fix our own hearts and we can sometimes convince ourselves we've done quite a good patching up job. But in truth, only God can perform the heart transplant we need. He is the one who can renew our hearts and clean us from the inside out. And his invitation stands open to anyone who would call on his name. Download and listen to the audio mp3 to discover more about this amazing book of Joel. Click or tap here to download the audio mp3

Minor Prophets - Zechariah We've reached the book of Zechariah. After the very short books of Obadiah and Haggai, I found Zechariah to be quite a contrast. It's a much longer book with 14 chapters, and the style of prophetic writing is quite different too. There is so much that we could choose to look at in this complex, beautiful book, but it would be beyond the scope of this podcast to look in detail at all the prophesies that Zechariah received. We will start with a brief historical background and an overview of some of the main themes of the book, and then I'll focus on some of the prophecies that were fulfilled most clearly in the life of Jesus. We'll end with some thoughts to take away for our own lives. Download and listen to the audio mp3 to discover more about this amazing book of Zechariah. Click or tap here to download the audio mp3

Minor Prophets - Haggai As with several of the other minor prophets, we don't know much about Haggai himself. We can be quite sure about the dating of the book though, because Haggai included precise dates for the oracles he received from God. These details place the book in the year 520 BC, and between the months of August and December. Haggai was a contemporary of the prophet Zechariah. Finally, Haggai reminds us that a more glorious temple is coming, and in fact has already come. Haggai spoke God's prophecy about a temple that would be filled with God's glory, more glorious than the first temple. When Jesus died on the cross the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The way to God was opened and there was no longer a need for God's people to meet him within the confines of the physical temple, through the mediation of a priest. In the book of Haggai, God promises to the people of Judah that he is in their midst. In the book of Revelation we see the ultimate realization of this promise. Download and listen to the audio mp3 to discover more about this amazing book of Haggai. Click or tap here to download the audio mp3

Minor Prophets - Obadiah We've reached the little book of Obadiah. He was the most minor of the minor prophets, in that his book is the shortest! In fact, it's the shortest book in the whole of the Old Testament with just one chapter, containing 21 verses. Obadiah means “one who serves Yahweh”. We're not told anything else about the prophet him-self. In the course of the prophecy, the fall of Jerusalem (which happened in 586 BC) is referred to as a past event and the fall of Edom (which happened in 553 BC) as a future event. So it is likely that the book was written between these events. The seemingly obscure prophecy of Obadiah is part of Jesus' great story. It's all about him. Be-tween the lines of prophecy about Edom and Judah we see the greater picture of God's redemption plan and his justice, mercy and grace. When the risen Jesus walked on the road to Emmaus and ex-plained to the amazed disciples how the Law and all the prophets spoke about himself, I like to think that he said a bit about Obadiah. Download the audio to find out more concerning this amazing book of Obadiah! Click or tap here to download the audio mp3

Minor Prophets - Habakkuk Today we've reached the book of Habakkuk. There's an awful lot of wisdom and truth packed into the three short chapters of Habakkuk's prophecy. We don't know much about the man Habakkuk himself. The way he writes his prophecy is unusual. It reads like a personal diary or journal and it takes the form of a conversation between Habakkuk and God. The intended audience was the people of Judah, but they are not directly addressed. The time of writing was around 620 BC so Habakkuk was a contemporary of Zephaniah and Jeremiah. Listen to the audio to find out more about this amazing book of the Bible! Click or tap here to download the audio mp3

Minor Prophets - Zephaniah Zephaniah was a contemporary of Jeremiah, Nahum and possibly Habakkuk and his prophecy was written during the reign of king Josiah of Judah. Josiah reigned between 640–609 BC. The prophecy includes reference to the future destruction of Nineveh, capital of Assyria, so it was likely written before the date of this event, which was 612 BC. The little territory of Judah was the only surviving part of the original people of Israel. The northern kingdom of Israel had been overthrown and Judah was under the control of the Assyrians. King Josiah was a good king who undertook significant religious reform in Judah, trying to turn the people back from worshipping idols to worshipping their God. Josiah's father, Amon, had been a wicked king, and his grandfather, Manasseh, was one of the worst kings in the history of Judah, doing evil in God's sight and turning the people away from God. The king before Manasseh was called Hezekiah. We read his story in the book of Isaiah. Download the mp3 to find out more! You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you. (James 4:4-10 ESV) Click or tap here to download the audio mp3

Minor Prophets - Nahum Nahum prophesied about the destruction of the city of Nineveh, the capital of the nation of Assyria. If Nineveh sounds a bit familiar, it might be because you've listened to the first instalment in this series about the book of Jonah! In some ways, Nahum is like a sequel to Jonah. The date of writing of Nahum can be narrowed down to somewhere between 660 BC and 630 BC. We can deduce this because of the historical events that Nahum refers to during his prophecy (unless of course you don't believe in predictive prophesy!). We don't know anything about Nahum apart from the fact that his home town was called Elkosh. It's not certain where this was, but it was probably in Judah because at the time of his prophesy, the kingdom of Israel had ceased to exist. The book of Nahum reminds us that God is all powerful, omnipotent. He is not a tame god who is passive and powerless but he acts on behalf of his people. He is a God of justice who cannot pass over sin and evil but he must act justly to uphold his own honour and the welfare of his chosen people Israel. Moreover, God had promised to spare a remnant of his people, specifically from the tribe of Judah, in order that the Messiah, the deliverer, would come from his people. The future of the people of Israel often seemed under threat but God always faithfully preserved and restored a remnant to preserve the line of Abraham. Click or tap here to download the audio mp3

Minor Prophets - Micah Micah came from the town of Moresheth in Judah, southwest of Jerusalem - other than that, we are not told anything else about the man himself. The book doesn't tell us how God called him. His name can be translated as a question which asks: Who is like Yahweh? Micah's prophesy came during the years of kings Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah of Ju-dah (who ruled between 750 BC and 687 BC). Hosea and Isaiah prophesied at roughly the same time. The main themes of Micah are God's judgement and for-giveness. In this book we will discover the prophesy about Jesus' birthplace and meet the Messiah as the Good Shepherd. Click or tap here to download the audio mp3

Minor Prophets - Hosea Today we are looking at the book of Hosea! Hello, welcome back to our series looking at the books of the minor prophets. If you have ever felt that God is distant, disinterested, and aloof from his crea-tion, or you've thought that God is a cruel, heartless God who punishes his creation harshly, then the book of Hosea has truth for you. This short prophetic book contains heartrending descriptions of God's feelings for wayward Israel. It is one of the parts of the Bible that most vividly demonstrates the intensity of feeling and the depth of emotion in the heart of God. Hosea prophesied during the latter half of the eighth century BC. This was one of the most turbulent and difficult times in Israel's history, just before the captivity to Assyria. The nation of Israel went through six kings in about 30 years. There was violence, political intrigue and great instability.   Hosea's words speak to us today. Come and listen to find out more of how these ancient words speak to you! Click or tap here to download as a mp3 file    

Minor Prophets - Amos Today we are looking at the book of Amos! Amos was a prophet during the time of King Uzziah of Judah and King Jeroboam of Israel. His prophecy came somewhere roundabout the year 760 BC, give or take a few decades! At this time Israel and Judah were enjoying an unusual spell of prosperity and political stability. This was especially the case in Israel, where the land was very fertile and abundant crops were growing. The threat from the kingdom of Assyria seemed to have lessened, at least for the time being, so life was pretty good.  Amos' words speak to us today. Come and listen to find out more of how these ancient words speak to you! Click or tap here to download as a mp3 file    

Minor Prophets - Jonah! Today we are looking at the book of Jonah! Of all the books of the Minor Prophets Jonah is perhaps the one that people are most familiar with, or at least they think they are familiar with the story line. Many people will have heard about Jonah and the giant fish. But there is a lot more to the book of Jonah than this! Come and listen! Click or tap here to download as a mp3 file    

Minor Prophets with Tabitha Introduction   I met Jesus when I was 11-years-old. God had blessed me with a believing family and I sung in church choirs from the time I could read. But I didn't have a personal relationship with Jesus until a certain day in 1990. I'd gone to a violin exam, which was being held in a local church. Waiting nervously for my turn to perform for the examiners, I picked up some leaflets that were sitting on a table in the church foyer. I read one of these leaflets on my own later that day. The message of Jesus dying and rising again for the sins of all people was not brand new to me, as I'd heard it many times before, but at that moment, it was like I heard it and understood it for the first time. I cried my 11-year-old eyes out and then asked my mum if I could get my own Bible. Of course, she agreed! I've always identified very strongly with the words in Amazing Grace, “I once was lost but now I'm found, was blind but now I see”, because that's exactly what it felt like. I made the decision to follow Jesus from that day onwards. Over the last couple of decades God has been teaching me from the Bible with the help of the Holy Spirit and many great human teachers. It's gradually become clear to me that my primary spiritual gift is teaching. I feel very privileged to be able to share in the ministry of Partakers. Over the next few months I'm going to be taking a tour through the books of the minor prophets. I reckon that if you lined up the Bibles of a sample of believers (myself included!) and looked at the pages that looked least worn and thumbed you would find that the minor prophets account for a substantial proportion of the most pristine pages! Even those prophets that we feel more familiar with, like Jonah, have often only featured in our Christian lives in the form of Sunday school stories. Well, it's time to do something about that! The books of the minor prophets are full of incredible truths which will help us to understand the character and heart of God. If you've ever felt intimidated or confused by these particular books in the Bible then I hope you will join me as I give an overview of each book and I really hope you'll be inspired to have a closer look at each one for yourself. The minor prophets are no less important than the major prophets (such as Isaiah and Jeremiah) but their prophetic books are shorter in length and therefore referred to as 'minor'. The books of the minor prophets were written over a long time span, ranging from the eighth century BC to the fourth or fifth century BC. We're going to look at them in roughly chronological order, which is a little different to the order they appear in the Bible. The dating of certain books, such as Obadiah and Joel, is uncertain and scholars disagree about when these books were written. So please forgive me if the order in which I tackle the books is not the precise order that you expect! It's first helpful to consider what the role of a prophet is. When we think of the word 'prophecy' we often think about predictions relating to the future. Now, the prophets did sometimes speak about things that had not yet happened, but much more often they spoke about present events and announced God's thoughts and messages to the peoples of Israel and Judah. Prophets were not generally regular teachers of God's word (that was the task of the priests). Instead prophets were raised up at particular times and for particular situations, to speak God's words to the people. They were able to see things and understand things that other people could not. As we look at the 12 books of the minor prophets we will see some common themes emerging. The prophets repeatedly spoke of the fact that God had chosen Israel for a covenant relationship; they declared the sad truth that the majority of Israel had sinned against God and turned away from him; they warned about coming judgement; and they declared the promise of renewal and restoration that would follow judgement, both in the immediate future and at the end of history. As we study each book we need to first look at what book meant to the people who first heard the message. When we have understood this we can then consider how each book speaks to us today. Our first study will begin next Thursday in the book of Jonah. I hope you'll join me then! Tabitha Tap or click here to download this episode as an audio mp3 file

Holy Spirit The Holy Spirit is one of the three persons of the Trinity. As such we do not refer to the Spirit as “it” or “that”, but rather Him! Wherever the Holy Spirit is, the Father and Son are also present because they are one (John 14v18-23). The Ministry of the Holy Spirit What is the ministry of the Holy Spirit and His relationship with you as a Christian Disciple? 1. Glorify Christ: His prime role is that He will glorify Jesus Christ the Son of God (John 16v13-14). He does this by testifying (John 15v26) and witnessing for (Acts 1v8) Jesus Christ. 2. The Paraclete – Comforter: He stands alongside (John 14v16) and lives in all believers (John 16v7). 3. Declares God’s Word: For you, the Holy Spirit interprets and illuminates the Bible, as you submit to Him and the Bible (John 16v12-15; 1 Corinthians 2v10-16)! 4. Convicts: The Holy Spirit convicts you of sin, righteousness and judgment (John 16v8) 5. Salvation: As Christian Disciple, you are born of the Holy Spirit (John 3v3-8). For without the Holy Spirit, nobody can be a Christian Disciple (Romans 8v9; Gal 2v20; Colossians 1v25-27) 6. Sealing / Ownership: The Holy Spirit indwelling you is assured proof of you being God’s possession (2 Corinthians 1v22; Ephesians 1v3), for the Holy Spirit is a deposit, guaranteeing your future redemption, salvation and inheritance (Ephesians 1v13; 2 Corinthians 1v22). 7. Filling: This speaks of the Holy Spirit’s control or domination of your life. The imperative here is that we are to be filled, and go on being filled (Ephesians 5v18). 8. Sanctification: As you walk, live in, and are led by the Holy Spirit, you are being transformed into the likeness of Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 7-18), (Galatians. 5v16; Romans 8v13). 9. Baptism: While this Holy Spirit baptism usually occurs at your conversion, it does sometimes after afterwards! The Biblical accounts show both of these occurrences. As Billy Graham once said “I don’t care how you get Him – get Him!” 10. Service: The Holy Spirit equips you for service by giving you spiritual gifts and working in you to will and to act according to His purpose (Philippians 2v13). Finally, how is the Spirit seen? The Spirit’s work is in greatest evidence, where people’s lives become more holy and more like Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 12v3; 2 Corinthians 13v7). Look back on your life and see how the Holy Spirit has been working in and transforming you since your conversion. Then ask Him to reveal to you the areas you still need transforming. Click or tap here to download as a mp3

Psalm 23 1 The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want. 2 He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, 3 he restores my soul. He guides me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. 4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. 5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. 6 Surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever. Right mouse click to save/download this as a mp3 audio file

  A Tale of 4 Christians     Today I want to introduce you to four friends of mine. They all would say they are Christian disciples of a sort. I wonder if you will recognize any of them! Every church has people like these four characters. Which one of these are you like? Which do you think is the committed disciple? For more to read and think about, please read Matthew 25:31-46.   Fenster Fe-elgood First we have Fenster! He runs around to every meeting he can find that has some aspect to do with Christianity. He believes in God and likes to always feel good, regardless of anything else! When he goes to a Church worship or prayer service, usually twice on Sunday, it's for a good entertaining time! He has no time for doctrine and thinks sermons and teaching in Church are utterly mundane and pointless, and sees no point in acting out his faith, coz they don't make him feel good. As you can probably tell, Fenster's prime reason to live is to feel good. The way to holiness for him is by going to as many religious events as he can, and feeling good because of it. Fenster is holy in the eyes of the world! Amber Al-laction And there is Anya. Anya Al-laction by name and AllAction by nature!! She runs around like the proverbial headless chicken, doing good to everyone and everything! Anya believes God exists but thinks the commitment part of Christianity is all a bit too much. Involved in such diverse groups from Greenpeace to the local homeless shelters, she has no time for Church or doctrine. She wants to change the world! Anya's prime reason to live is to do good and be active. The path to holiness for her is being involved in doing good deeds. The society she lives in think she is a holy person because of it! Thornton Topheavy And you have to meet Thornton! Thornton Toph-eavy is also holy in his society but for different reasons! He has so much knowledge about God in his head; it's amazing his head doesn't explode! He can quote Augustine, Martin Luther, Jean Calvin, Jurgen Moltmann and John Stott verbatim, complete with page reference and book title! His passion is for doctrine and doctrine alone, and this helped him to a First at Oxford University. He isn't concerned with living out his faith; he is only concerned with reading more about God! Thornton's prime reason to live is the accumulation of knowledge! He believes the path to holiness is by gaining as much head knowledge as he can possible store! Calina Christlike Calina is foolish in the eyes of the world because she has a firm faith, prays daily and reads the Bible fervently. She is involved in the Church, attending prayer meetings and homeless tea-runs. She goes to her local Bible college for evening classes to learn more about the God she wants to serve. She is getting head knowledge but wants to apply it to her life so it goes from head to heart! Her prime reason to live is Christ and to be Jesus to other people. Believes that the path to holiness is to be as much like Jesus as she can, growing more and more like Him constantly. Knowing that she is doing this, makes her feel good, as she can see herself living out her faith in Jesus, who is her joy! Right mouse click or tap here to save as mp3 audio file.

Think Spot 10 March 2025 What we say, as well as what we don't say, as Christians is very important. The Bible is very clear on that. 1 Peter 2:1 “Therefore rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy and slander of every kind.” James 4:11-12 “Brothers do not slander one another...who are you to judge your neighbour?” The definition of slander is words falsely spoken that damage the reputation of another or an abusive attack on a person's character or good name or to attack the good name and reputation of someone.So next time you go to say anything negative about someone or to criticise their actions, think again, you might be disobeying God and breaking a command. The Apostle James powerfully shows how a small thing such as the tongue is able to cause much damage. He says that the tongue is a world of evil that corrupts the whole person ...and is itself set on fire by hell (James 3:3-8). Christians are very good at gossiping but disguising it as prayerful concern. We pass on a juicy bit of information about someone and then ask the person to pray about the situation. As Christians we should not pass on any information about anyone else unless the person concerned has asked us to. It is not our place to do so even if it is for prayer. However, sometimes it is also what we don't say that causes problems. We stay silent when in fact we do need to give that word of love, encouragement, rebuke or kindness. Social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook can be fabulous sites if used properly. How often to we stay silent when we should say something kind? We get a message from a friend and we don't reply to it.  How often do we say something when we should stay silent instead of slandering, complaining, gossiping or bickering? Prayer Now, a prayer to help you into this new week. Father, we thank you for words. We thank you that we can communicate words of life to other people. Help us to use words wisely as we interact, communicate and deal with other people, especially our loved ones and work colleagues. May the Holy Spirit, guide, rebuke and counsel, as we use the amazing gift of words to us, as we seeks to live a life worthy of Jesus Christ. Amen.   Tap or click here to save/download this audio Podcast as a MP3 file  

Christian Disciple and Evangelism (Part 3) Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 file For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." Mark 10v45 Jesus Christ was the man born to die – this is what we celebrate at Christmas – when God who is outside of both time and space, entered history in the form of a human baby. His purpose as explained in Mark 10v45 was “to give his life as a ransom for many.” The Apostle Paul also preached this, but what was his methods and his message in full? Paul’s Method Reasoned from the Scriptures Paul knew that Scripture had been revealed, inspired and illuminated by God Paul knew that Scripture equipped for service Paul knew that Scripture helped get to know God more Paul knew that Scripture revealed God’s programme Paul knew that getting to know Scripture was vital in order to be used in Evangelism. Meet where people are Synagogue (Acts 18v4, 6) Market place / work (Acts 18v3) Invited people to home (Acts 18v7) Forged relationships (Acts 18v2, 8, 17) Prepared to change strategy (Acts 18v6) Paul overcame his own fears and limitations of his own weaknesses and relied totally on God’s power when witnessing Why is the cross so central to the Gospel? Paul’s Gospel was “Jesus and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2v2). The Gospel is the cross! As important as the incarnation, resurrection and ascension are, without Jesus’ death on the cross there would be no Christianity, and subsequently no hope for the world! Therefore, the interpretation that we place on Jesus’ death is paramount! That He died is without doubt, but why did He have to die and what gain do we have as His Disciples? The Gospel Message! By His very nature, God is loving and compassionate, forgiving, faithful and slow to anger (Exodus 34v6-7). This is the part, if we are being honest all of us are most comfortable with!! Yet God is holy, righteous and just and must punish sin because of this very same nature. That is the part we as 21st century people are uncomfortable with! We love to think of God as being all love and gentleness, but don’t like to think of Him as a Judge who must punish disobedience But remember that God loves righteousness and hates wickedness (Psalm 45v7). Therefore sin & disobedience must be dealt with and it cannot simply be ignored. Sin is humanity’s problem. The Problem - Humanity's sin Sin is what separates humans from God and as a consequence leads to both a spiritual and physical death (Romans 6v23, Isaiah 59v2). Nobody escapes as all have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory (Romans 3v23). In the Old Testament, sins were dealt with by blood sacrifices of atonement as coverings for sin (Leviticus 17v11), for without the shedding of blood there can be no remission of sin (Hebrews 9v22). The Solution – God to the rescue! The solution lies not in continual animal sacrifice of the Old Testament because Hebrews 10v4 reminds us that the blood of animals cannot take away sin but was only a veneer or covering. That was why it was necessary to repeat time and time again! It is only through the death of Jesus, that sin is taken away (Hebrews 9:v11-15, 26-28), and that was only needed once! Therefore Jesus is our permanent sacrificial substitute! That is why the elements of bread and wine in Communion or Breaking of Bread are symbolic, and not somehow changed into actual flesh and blood, as some would have us believe. Substitution Jesus died for our sin, the just for the unjust (1 Peter 3v18). That is how God is both just and the Justifier of sinners and that is why Jesus needed to be both fully God and fully human! If he lacked either, it would not be the full substitutionary sacrifice that was necessary to bear the permanent consequences of sin! This substitution was the sacrifice, required in order that Jesus as the Lamb of God could take away the sins of the world (John 1v29). He was the propitiation for all sin! Propitiation Propitiation is the turning aside of God's anger by the offering of the sacrifice of Christ. Towards sin and sinful behaviour God necessarily has great fury, anger and wrath (Jeremiah 21v5). Hebrews 10v30-31 reminds us, “It is dreadful to fall into the hands of the living God.” Yet as Micah 7v18 “He is slow to anger and quick to forgive”. God's anger and judgment of sin falls on Christ, instead of us. We need to approach God to appease His anger, in order to accept it (Romans 3:25; Isaiah 53:5; John 2:2, 5:6). 1 John 4v10: This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice (or propitiation) to take away our sins. To some people, even some in the church, this is abhorrent! The very thought that God could willing send His son to be a blood sacrifice for sin is tantamount to child abuse! Richard Dawkins calls Jesus’ crucifixion an act of sado-masochism! Neither of these opinions is valid or true. God’s requirements are very clear as John 3v16 says it all in response to this “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life”. If there were any other way, would not God have done it that way? Redemption (Ransom) Mark 10:45 Not only was it propitiation, but also an act of redemption! In the time of the New Testament, this word was used to refer to the buying back of a slave - the price paid to buy the slave’s freedom. God paid redemption so that humans can be freed from the slavery to sin (John 8:35 Romans 7:14). The price was paid (1 Peter 1:18-19) and so we are redeemed with the precious blood of Christ (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). As Christian Disciples, we are bought at a price, and we have a new position before God! We are bought out of slavery to sin, into glorious freedom where we are now slaves to righteousness (Romans 6:19); slaves to Christ (Romans 6:22). We are also Jesus Christ’s personal possession (1 Corinthians 16:19). But it is our responsibility to choose that way! God does not coerce forcefully – He leaves it as a choice for humans to make as individuals. What is our response to this to be? Sacrifice, substitution, propitiation and redemption can be summed up in one word: love. For 1 John 3v16 states: “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.” Jesus told us to take up our cross if we are to follow Him as His Disciple (Luke 9v23). Are you as a Christian Disciple willing to take up your cross and do all you can do to love others? For more to think about please do read Acts 17 & 18, ask yourself the following questions, writing them down if you can, and see how you respond or react to them. Then why not share your answers with your spouse or a close friend, so that you can pray over any issues together. Q1. When I evangelise, what is the message I proclaim? Q2. What can I adapt from Paul’s methods in order to help my evangelise? Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 file

Christian Disciple and Evangelism (Part 2) Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 file But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry. 2 Timothy 4v5 Dealing with Evangelism All Christian Disciples are called to do the work of evangelism. Not everyone will be an evangelist, yet we are called to tell and show others about Jesus – that is evangelism. a. Overcoming barriers. There are at least six main reasons why Christian Disciples do not evangelise: · Do not know the bible well enough to answer questions · Entire friends are already Christian Disciples · Testimony is perceived to be dull and tedious · Others will wonder what took you so long, if you evangelise them now · Don't know if my friends are true Christian Disciples or not · There is no easy way to tell the Gospel Christian Disciples overcoming these hindrances, are then liberated to evangelise their local community. b. Early starters! New believers were actively encouraged to evangelise from the time of their conversion. There seems as if there was not a two step process of conversion and then later undergoing evangelism training. More likely, that they gained perceptions about evangelism, whilst they were being evangelised. Evangelism is to be what a Christian Disciple is, rather than an activity that a Christian Disciple engages in. c. Changing perceptions! The approach to evangelism has changed over the last few years. As Christian Disciples, it is the job of all Christian Disciples to evangelise and witness about Jesus, using the skills and perceptions they inherently hold. We are not to leave it up the Billy Graham’s and Luis Palau’s of this world. There is not just one style of evangelism. Interpersonal, invitational, serving, testimonial intellectual or confrontational styles are available for churches and Christian Disciples to use. An Christian Disciple's use of any or all of these styles would be dependent on their own personality, talents and skills. d. Lead by example! New Testament church leaders led by example, and actively persuaded others to do as they did. Paul commanded that the Corinthian church follow him as he imitated Jesus (1 Corinthians 11v1) This is a model imbued with dynamism, by which others can go on doing the work in their own way, without relying upon the church leaders! e. Lead by teaching! As evangelism is prayed about, activated upon, discussed and enacted, Christian Disciples undergo evangelism training, even if they aren't aware of it at the time. A good method is for training to be given, not just as a one off exercise but throughout the year. The reason for this, is so that every member has an opportunity to undergo some formal training when it is convenient for them as they see the leadership committed to evangelistic training! This training needs to be promoted from the front, so that every member can see the seriousness that the leadership think about evangelism. Bill Hybels recommends that every member of his church undergo evangelism training every two years!. f. Neither powerless or alone! The main lesson for Christian Disciples to learn, is that evangelism can only truly be effective when undertaken under an umbrella of prayer and the work of the Holy Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit's power and authority, which allows the skills and talents of all people to be used as effective Gospel messengers. As Christian Disciples we need to continue reminding ourselves that it is Jesus Christ who is building the church, and that with the Holy Spirit's power, we are neither alone nor powerless! After all, He is a Holy Spirit of evangelism. That is why as Christian Disciples, we need not fear the supposed rise of fundamental atheism or any other religion or –“ism”. We have the power of the Living God within us, to equip and use us for His glory and mission. People may be able to remove the supposed ‘spirit of Christmas’ from schools and other government buildings, but they can never take away the Spirit of Christ that indwells all Christian disciples. g. Innovative evangelism! Not only would this make it new for the congregation, but possibly add an element of excitement, particularly if old evangelistic methods are being employed, and seemingly ineffective. Some ideas such as, having a prayer stall at the local market, or taking over a vacant shop on the high street for the explicit purpose of praying for people. The church could offer the use of its website as a local community forum, or 'virtual local community hall, for community notices. Another way would be to hold internet-based events and/or forums, so that those who are housebound or are part of what some call the Internet Generation, have a platform to converse and discover about Christianity, particular for their youth and student work. Rightly or wrongly, the truth is that people are gathering like that, and discussing Christian issues. New methods also can be seen as making use of every opportunity, or as Michael Green puts it “godly opportunism”. When in Corinth, despite his nervousness and worries, Paul knew God was in control (Acts18v10) and that’s why he stayed a further 18 months following his vision where God promised protection, security and companionship (Acts18v11). Paul endured in the face of opposition (Acts18v12-16). The Jews went to the Roman proconsul Gallio, complaining that Paul had started a new religion, for starting new religions was forbidden under Roman law. Anything that was a religion before the Romans assimilated was seen as a legitimate religion ie Judaism. Gallio however dismissed the Jewish case as mere internal bickering about minor details, and kicked the case out of court as it were. In doing so, Gallio had now made Christianity a legitimate religion within the Roman Empire, and this is why Paul stayed in Corinth a good deal longer (Acts18v18). Paul did not succumb to the temptations around him, because he only sought one thing – to declare “Jesus and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2v2). Perhaps that is how Paul won Sosthenes for Jesus Christ, as we read in 1 Corinthians 1v1, how he was travelling with Paul at the time of writing. The world around likes to play clever tricks with us, just as the Jews did with Paul in Corinth. But we are to be, as Jesus commanded in Matthew 10v16, “shrewd as snakes and harmless as doves.” We are to stay faithful to Jesus and sometimes it is difficult! It means staying faithful to Jesus and His will, regardless of opposition and alternatives. By doing this we endure and remain faithful to Him. For more to think about please do read 1 Thessalonians 1v3-10, ask yourself the following questions, writing them down if you can, and see how you respond or react to them. Then why not share your answers with your spouse or a close friend, so that you can pray over any issues together. Q1. What are the barriers that you need to overcome in order for you to evangelise? Q2. Are you enduring and being persistent in your Christian lifestyle and evangelism? Q3. How am I as a Christian Disciple, living a life that is shrewd like a snake and harmless as a dove? Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 file

Christian Disciple and Evangelism (Part 1) Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 file Paul writing in 1 Corinthians 2v1-5 regarding his first contact with the city of Corinth: “When I came to you, brothers, I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit's power, so that your faith might not rest on men's wisdom, but on God's power.” When he was going the 50 miles or so from Athens to Corinth, Paul was alone. He had left the intellectual centre of the ancient world, Athens, and entered Corinth, the cultural capital of the ancient world. Do you sometimes think that Paul was like a superman, always brash and utterly confident when engaged in evangelism? According to that passage, he entered with great nervousness, weakness and fear. He was not confident in his own ability or the way that he spoke and reasoned. But why should Paul have been this way with the city of Corinth? Corinth The city of Corinth is located on the narrow isthmus linking northern and southern Greece. It had two ports on either side, where small ships and boats could be dragged on greased planks the 3-mile journey across the isthmus, thus saving themselves a 200-mile journey through dangerous waters. It was therefore a natural place for fantastic links for commerce and culture across the known world. The world famous Isthmian games were held there. Paul’s reasoning for deciding to go there was probably along the lines of “If its good enough for commerce and culture to be spread from Corinth, even better for the Gospel to travel far and wide from that hub.” So he enters Corinth. But alas, with culture and commerce came its evil triplet – immorality. The temple, which overlooked Corinth, was dedicated to the goddess Aphrodite and had 1,000 prostitutes. Aphrodite was the goddess of love and sex. In those days to go “corinthianizing”, meant to go actively seeking immorality. These reasons are why Paul entered Corinth nervously – the proud and cultural intelligentsia, endemic immorality and the many temples to many gods including Aphrodite and Poseidon. The Corinthians were post-modern people, even before post-modernity! Their motto – “If it feels good, do it!” Paul Paul was nervous and weak in his own strength, but he was supremely confident in the Lord and the power of the Spirit to use him. What can we learn from Paul’s visit to Corinth and how do we apply them to our lives today in the 21st century? After all our modern cities and towns are no different from ancient Corinth! Evangelism Paul’s Message – The Gospel The Gospel is Trinitarian – The Gospel is The Father’s mysterious revelation through the Son’s work on the cross in the power of the Spirit The Gospel is Three Dimensional Breadth of the Bible – all of Scripture is about God’s plan of Salvation. Depth of the cross Length of God’s mission The Gospel is anathema and unpopular. The Gospel is never popular, and if it is, then it is not a truly Biblically Gospel. We have a false Gospel being preached where financial prosperity is the central claim. We have a false Gospel where Jesus is a cure all being the central claim. For Paul, and for all true Christian Disciples, “Jesus and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2v2) is the true Gospel. Paul faced Jewish opposition · To the Jewish mindset, it was unthinkable that the Messiah would be crucified on a pagan Gentile cross (Acts18v6, 12-17). Paul faced Gentile opposition · Jesus’ exclusive claim to be the only way, the only truth and only life challenged Corinthian pluralism & universalism! The Corinthians lived a life filled with many gods, why would they want to settle for just the One – particularly one who had died? · A life of holiness challenged Corinthian immorality! Exercise self-control? You are having a laugh, Paul. Ha ha. · God’s power challenged Corinthian cultured intellect! Some of the Athenians told Paul he was a babbler, and so would have the cultured and refined Corinthian intelligentsia. · Humility challenged Corinthian pride. To kneel at the cross, takes great humility. The Corinthians were a proud and cultured people, to whom the thought of humbly kneeling before a God was anathema. Much better to be devoting yourself to a goddess of sex. What more could a young Corinthian want than the mixture of religion and sex? The same applies today. We are shouted down if we dare exclaim that Jesus is the only acceptable path to God. We are told there are no such thing as moral absolutes any more, and what’s right for you may not be right for me and providing I am not hurting anyone, stay out of my private business. Sex and sexuality are worshipped and adored as if they were gods in themselves. In an age of Scientific materialism and hyper-rationalism, people cynically laugh at us and say that we worship a dead man. We are often called fools for believing in Original Sin and deluded for believing in a God. Have you been called those things? I know I have. Humility is not looked upon as a strength today, its frowned upon as a weakness. The world says that if you want to get ahead in life, you need to be strong, show some backbone and don’t ever back down to anybody or anything. Certainly never admit you were wrong and had made mistakes! The way of the Gospel is to kneel before the Cross, admit your mistakes and sins and be prepared to serve and take up your own cross. The world is quite willing to accept a harmless baby at Christmas, but not the violence of the cross that followed. That is why even atheists like Richard Dawkins like to sing Christmas Carols! The danger of Christmas is when the glorious incarnation of Jesus Christ, being both fully God and fully human, is diluted into fantasy along with Santa and his elves. For more to think about please do read Acts 18v1-17, ask yourself the following questions, writing them down if you can, and see how you respond or react to them. Then why not share your answers with your spouse or a close friend, so that you can pray over any issues together. Q1. Am I using all opportunities to build relationships and tell others a truly biblical cross-centred Gospel? Q2. Am I growing and changing into the very likeness of Jesus? Right mouse click or tap here to save/download this as a MP3 file