Monday, April 29, 2013


DAY 119
How NOT to Win Friends and Influence People
1 Kings 6 & 7 and Luke 20:27 – 47
Solomon builds the Temple. It is the grandest building. We will read more about it and how it was built in a coming book of the Bible and so I will refrain from commenting here. Many people have recreated what they think it looked like and here is a link:
In the New Testament Jesus’ authority is still being challenged. One of the ironies is that it is taking place in the Temple. Not the grand temple we have read that Solomon built, something less and that story is coming. The challengers have moved from the Pharisees to the Sadducees. They were the ones who controlled the Temple and in some ways they feel the most threatened by Jesus. A necessary tension existed between the Sadducees and the Romans. The Romans allowed the Sadducees to be in power, but the Sadducees knew they could only “go so far.” They didn’t like the Romans, but knew they needed to them if they wanted to stay in power. The Sadducees were therefore not really interested in a Messiah, unless of course they could control him.
One of their beliefs was that there was no resurrection. The Pharisees did and they did not. It is a little like the way different Christian denominations will have different views on serious theological subjects. They therefore would be hanging on every word of Jesus’ answer. His answer of course is brilliant. He sees eternity and he knows that eternity is not filled with death, but life.
He then challenges them with a question. It is equally brilliant. He quotes a Psalm and asks them how this can be? The answer is that the Psalm can only be if He is in fact the Messiah, the Lord.
He is having a good day, and so to top it off He turns to the people and tells them to be careful of the Scribes (those would be Sadducees)…he certainly is not making friends at this point. Our Lord is interested in doing his Father’s will much more than He is in making friends.
I titled today, “How NOT to Win Friends and Influence People” in part to have a little fun, but also in part to remind myself that love of and obedience to God is what ultimately matters. Jesus is being obedient, right now He is standing up to all of them, and ultimately he we ascend to heaven, but only after he experiences the Cross.

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