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Daily Bible Study

October 25, 2024 Bible Study — Consider Carefully How You Listen

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Today, I am reading and commenting on Luke 8.

I think I wrote about this a few days ago, but I was really struck by how Jesus said “Therefore, consider carefully how you listen,” right after telling His disciples that there is nothing hidden that will not be disclosed.  He follows that by saying that those who have will be given more, and those who do not have, even what they think they have will be taken from them.  This begins when His disciples asked Him what the Parable of The Sower meant.  Before explaining the parable to them He tells them that the knowledge of the secrets of the Kingdom of God had been given to them, but that others though seeing would not see and though hearing would not understand.  Jesus tells us that one does not light a lamp in order to hide the light from the lamp.  Instead, one lights a lamp in order to illuminate an area.  Further, the purpose of the lamp is to provide light to everyone who enters the room.  As a result, that which was hidden in the dark is revealed.  Then Jesus extends His metaphor by telling us that what is concealed will be brought out into the open.  This leads me to realize that Jesus is talking about the Kingdom of God.  By the light of His presence God is going to reveal that which is hidden in the dark, and He is going to drag out into the light that which is concealed behind various means of obfuscation, whether that is words which seem to mean one thing but mean another, or hidden behind walls.  Which brings me back to being careful how we listen and to those who do not have losing what they think they have.  As I look at this, I think about people who listen closely, but only hear what they want to hear.  I think that is what Jesus is talking about when He says be careful HOW you listen.  It’s important that we put aside our preconceived notions and listen to what God is actually saying to us.  We need to listen to the entire message, not just the parts we like.  One result of not listening correctly can be seen in those today who focus on the “God is love” part of the message and dismiss the parts which require us to be disciplined.  In time, they start to lose an understanding of what God’s love is and think it is an excuse to do whatever we think best at the moment.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Daily Bible Study

October 25, 2023 Bible Study — That Which Is Hidden Will Be Revealed, so Be Careful How You Listen

Today, I am reading and commenting on Luke 8.

Every year I run into a point where I have trouble not seeing some part of Luke as just a restatement of what I went over in both Matthew and Mark.  Today is that time, or at least the first time this year.  As I was trying to put together what to write my thought was that everything I am seeing in today’s passage went through my mind when it came up in Matthew and/or Mark.   Then I realized that I had not written about one of the thoughts I had about the Parable of the Sower and the Parable of the Lamp.  When explaining to His disciples why He taught with parables, Jesus said that He did so in order that those who did not truly follow Him would not understand His teaching.  I understand Him to mean that those who reject Him will fail to understand what He taught, even if they study it.

He follows that up with the Parable of the Lamp which He concludes by saying, “Be careful how you listen. Whoever has will be given more, whoever does not have, even what they think they have will be taken from them.”  The first part of that seems strange.  What does how we listen have to do with hidden things being revealed? Or, even with those who have being given more?  We should be careful how we listen, because when we listen to Jesus’ teaching, when we read the Bible, we will find that for which we look.   If we look for understanding and knowledge of God, we will find it.  If, on the other hand, we look for faults and flaws, we will find those as well.  However, in the latter case, we will lose whatever understanding of righteousness and God’s will we had when we started.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Daily Bible Study

October 25, 2022 Bible Study — Be Careful How You Listen, Because What Is Hidden Will Be Disclosed

Today, I am reading and commenting on Luke 8.

So, I want to write about what Jesus says about lighting a lamp and what He says immediately following that.  The wording here is similar to what Matthew writes in the Sermon on the Mount.  As a result, we tend to view it as being about doing good deeds openly so as to bring glory to God.  However, here Luke records Jesus as saying it means that what is concealed will be brought out into the open.  So, the message here is different, but then it gets even stranger.  Having said that what is hidden will be revealed, Jesus tells us we should therefore be careful how we listen.  And, that whoever has will be given more and those who have little will have the little they have taken away.  The part of this which I do not quite understand is the part about being careful how we listen.  It seems to me that the part about what is hidden being revealed should tell us something about how we should listen, but I am not quite sure I see the connection.  Now that I have written that I have some thoughts on how these things tie together.  At least part of the point is that we should listen for what we are NOT being told when someone tells about an event, we should listen for the “gaps” which indicate that something is being left out.  We should listen for where people are being dishonest with us, but also for where the people who are telling us about it missed “the other side of the story”.  Those things will eventually come out, and if we may discover we have made bad decisions based on what we should have known was an incomplete account of what was going on.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Daily Bible Study

October 25, 2021 Bible Study — The Demon-possessed Man Sought Out Jesus, Not The Other Way Around

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Luke 8.

From time to time when I read the story about the demon possessed man on the opposite side of the lake from Galilee I am struck by the fact that he met Jesus when Jesus stepped off the boat.  So, Jesus did not go looking for him, he went to meet Jesus.  Then he demanded to know what Jesus wanted with him (OK, it was the demons which were possessing him, but my point still holds).   Jesus did not seek out the demon-possessed man to make him change, to drive out his demons, it was only after the demon-possessed man sought Him out that Jesus was able to help him.   While we are called to seek out the lost, there are some who can only be helped when they seek us out.  I have several friends who have chosen self-destructive lifestyles and this passage reminds me that I cannot help them until they are ready to be helped.  Of course, that time may come with them accusing me of being hateful for telling them that their actions are self-destructive.  I must pray more and harder for those friends.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Daily Bible Study

October 25, 2020 Bible Study Focusing Our Efforts To Spread God’s Word To Those Who Are Receptive, While Recognizing That We Can’t Always Tell The Difference

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Luke 8

Usually when I read the parable of the sower I spend some time worrying about what kind of soil, and, if I write in this blog about it, suggesting that my readers think about themselves in that light.  However, today when I read it I thought about what it means for us sharing God’s word with others.  Now the simple answer would be that we should seek to share the word of God with those who fit into the fertile soil category.  That simple answer is not wrong.  However, the parable implies that the seed gets distributed on all of these soils and that the farmer does not really know whether the soil is fertile ground or shallow ground.  So, while the farmer surely chose how he scattered the seed to minimize how much went on to the path and how much fell among thorns, he realized that, in order to get seed to all of the fertile soil, he had to allow some of it to fall in those locations.  Now comes the important thing, some of that hard soil might have gotten broken up, and someone might come along and pull out the thorns.  Also, we should not assume that we can tell shallow soil from good soil.  So, while we should focus our efforts for spreading God’s word to those who are fertile soil, we should also remember that we cannot necessarily tell which soil is not fertile.

Daily Bible Study

October 25, 2019 Bible Study — People Will Get In Our Face and Demand That We Leave Them Alone

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Luke 8

Luke mentions that Jesus began a teaching tour accompanied by the Twelve and some women He had cured.  I suspect that Luke named women were sources for parts of his account.  More importantly, Luke was telling his readers that these women, both those he named and the others who were there, were every bit as authoritative as to what it meant to be a follower of Christ as the Apostles.

I really want to explore the story about the homeless guy mentioned here.  We usually think of him as the demon-possessed man, and that is fine because that is what the passage tells us he was.  However it also tells us that he was homeless.  It helps me visualize him to think about the homeless men I have seen in various urban areas.  The locals had attempted to help him, but he reacted violently so they eventually gave up.  I wrote that because I do believe this passage should influence the way in which we deal with the homeless.  I am just not sure in what way.

Now that I started writing about this I want to point out one other lesson.  This guy approached Jesus and demanded to know why Jesus was interfering with him.  Jesus did not approach the demon possessed man.  We will run into such things with people around us.  They will come to us, then demand that we leave them alone. That does not mean that they are demon possessed.  I just want to point out that we will have to face situations like that.

Daily Bible Study

October 25, 2018 Bible Study — Be Careful How You Listen

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Luke 8.

    Every year when I get to the Gospel of Luke I wonder if I am being repetitive with what I write about the stories which are repeated in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Jesus comments after saying that no one lights a lamp and then hides provides my starting point today. What is written here is very similar to what is written in Matthew. However, there are some slight differences which bring up something we need to which we must pay heed. Jesus says that we must pay attention to HOW we hear. In my writing on the earlier similar passages I pointed out that just because we hear the word of God does not mean that we are listening. Luke’s version reminds us that when we listen with preconceived notions we will hear what we want to hear rather than what God wants to say to us. Jesus tells us that if we do that, it will cause us to lose what little understanding we already had of God’s word and will.

    Many of the accounts of Jesus driving out demons make me think of those with mental illness, but today’s did especially. Part of the reason it did was because of something a Facebook friend posted this morning:

Therapist: “Do you want to talk about…?”
Me: “No, no, no. that is a load bearing neurosis, you move it and this whole thing comes down around us.”

That struck me as rather similar to what the demon-possessed man first said to Jesus, “Why are you interfering with me?” Which is similar to what so many people who are stuck in sinful mental illness say when you try to show them God’s plan for their happiness. Their whole self-identity rests on their sin and self-deception. Their whole lives rely on the support of their sin. Sometimes we have to knock down that support and seemingly destroy their lives so that they can build a new life, only this time based on Jesus. We, also, need to not be afraid to do that to ourselves. Sometimes we have allowed sin to replace God’s will and become an indispensable support for our lives. When we discover we have done that we have to be willing to tear our whole life down and start again.

Daily Bible Study

October 25, 2017 Bible Study — What Type Of Soil Am I?

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Luke 8.

    We often think of Jesus as traveling with just the Twelve (and perhaps a few more men based on the qualifications Peter lists for choosing a replacement for Judas). However, this passage tells us that in addition to the Twelve there was a group of women who traveled with Jesus throughout His ministry. Luke reports that these were women whom Jesus had cured of disease or evil spirits. The way Luke describes them, these women received much the same teaching which the Twelve Apostles received.

    Often times when I read the parable of the sower, I fear that I fall into the category of the seeds that fell in among the thorns. I know that I easily get preoccupied with the concerns of this world, paying my bills, satisfying my wants. However, today I was struck by the contrast between the seed which fell on the rocky soil and the seed which fell on the good soil. I am not sure why I pictured it this way, but I pictured the seed on the rocky soil quickly sprouting and growing a large, impressive flower, only to wilt before the flower turned to seed. While I pictured the seed on the good soil growing slowly, producing lots of small, inconspicuous flowers, but producing a few seeds, then flowering again and producing more. That is not the image which Jesus’ listeners would have had, but I think it is true to the intentions of the parable. Those whose faith is showy and splashy do not necessarily produce any results, while those whose faith is consistent and steady will change the world around them in ways that it may take years to observe. I fear that I am one of those whose faith is choked out by the cares of this world, but I pray that I am one of the “good-hearted” people who cling to God’s word to patiently produce results.

Daily Bible Study

October 25, 2016 Bible Study — The Women Who Followed Jesus

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

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Today, I am reading and commenting on Luke 8.

    I do not think I have ever given much thought to Luke’s passage here about the women who accompanied Jesus and the twelve as they traveled around Galilee. It is somewhat interesting that these women were travelling around with a group of men in that culture. At least a couple of these women were prominent women. In particular, Luke mentions the wife of Herod’s business manager and a woman named Susanna, someone with whom he appears to assume his audience is familiar. I conclude from this that Susanna was someone who was significant in the early Church (or at least in the area where he was sending this letter). However, the part of this which caught my attention is that these women were covering the expenses of Jesus’ ministry out of their own resources. The way Luke words this suggests that some amount of support for Jesus and the Twelve came from people in the towns they preached in, but that these women provided the expenses which could not be covered that way. The fact that Luke emphasizes that these women did this out of their own resources suggests that he wants to make it clear that they were not using their husband’s or their family’s money to support Jesus. These were women who HAD their own resources to support Jesus’ ministry.

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    In reading the parable of the lamp in Matthew, Mark, and now in Luke I have started to realize that there is something there more than what I have traditionally understood. My traditional understanding of it, and what I remember being taught about it, is that we should stand up and not be shy about others learning that we are believers in Christ. However, Jesus immediately follows this parable by saying that secrets will eventually be revealed and that the hidden will be exposed. While that suggests that Jesus may mean something other than the traditional understanding, the very next thing makes it certain. The next thing Jesus tells us is that we need to be careful how we listen to what He says, that we need to really work at it. Those who don’t just hear what He says, but actually listen will gain more understanding, but those who think they do not have to listen will lose what little understanding they already have. I don’t quite understand how these things connect. The best I can come up with is that we need to make sure that we let people know that our actions are motivated by what Christ teaches and that we are constantly striving to understand Him better. Let our words and our actions shine light upon Jesus and His teachings.