PLEASE READ THIS FIRST: Matthew 16:5-12
What do you sense the Lord saying to you in this passage?
“How is it you don’t understand that I was not talking to you about bread?” (Matthew 16:11)
I once heard a teacher talk about how Jesus chose his disciples.
Jewish boys were educated, and the smartest ones were chosen to be students of the Torah.
Those that were not as smart ended up going into the family business, like fishing.
Did Jesus choose “unschooled, ordinary” (Acts 4:13) disciples on purpose?
And is this why they have such a hard time understanding Jesus?
Jesus often used symbolic, analogical language and they were straight-talking labourers.
His words about “little faith” may seem like criticism, but I hear them with love.
The same love that saw and chose them, the same love that knew their limits.
Our limits and weaknesses may be different, but we are equally slow to understand.
The key for the disciples and for us is that we have “been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13)
Jesus welcomes the weak and the small, and works with them from where they are.
We may be slow learners, we may be simple-minded, but with the Spirit we are enough.
I may grasp things his first disciples didn’t, but there are things they knew that I don’t.
It is not a shame to not understand, it is a shame to be unwilling to admit it.
PRAYER
Lord, for all that I know (or think I know), there is much that I do not. My faith is weak too. Thank you for choosing and working with me, and that I can learn with you!
“Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees.” How do we know what is truth and what is deception? There are many religions and each have many practices – but do they help us or distract us from finding the truth – from growing in faith? For me it all comes down to Jesus and the HS working in me. Even as I become more familiar with the Bible – I grow in discernment – but mainly through the HS helping me, nudging me, inspiring me with just the right thought or notion that blesses me. Lord let me not be carried away with the whims and notions of the day or my own brand of cleverness – but test them all by your HS!
Growth.
Increase.
Learning.
Oh be careful what you hear and follow through on. The religious leaders taught their laws/rules but did not follow God’s way. They put their ways first. There are still leaders today who lead the people astray not following God’s way. I need open ears and eyes that see to discern how to serve my God, to walk in His footsteps. And the only way to discern is to have His Spirit lead and guide me. His Spirit needs to live within me so that I can live for Jesus every day.
1 Spirit of God, who dwells within my heart,
wean it from sin, through all its pulses move.
Stoop to my weakness, mighty as you are,
and make me love you as I ought to love.
2 I ask no dream, no prophet ecstasies,
no sudden rending of the veil of clay,
no angel visitant, no opening skies;
but take the dimness of my soul away.
3 Did you not bid us love you, God and King,
love you with all our heart and strength and mind?
I see the cross there teach my heart to cling.
O let me seek you and O let me find!
4 Teach me to feel that you are always nigh;
teach me the struggles of the soul to bear,
to check the rising doubt, the rebel sigh;
teach me the patience of unceasing prayer.
5 Teach me to love you as your angels love,
one holy passion filling all my frame:
the fullness of the heaven-descended Dove;
my heart an altar, and your love the flame.