AUGUST 12 THE JESUS QUESTIONS
JQ#24
“Is the power and authority of baptism
from heaven or from men?””
(Matthew 21:25)
LIVING FOR JESUS Daily Prayer
JESUS, Precious is the Name above all names, Jesus, My Redeemer,
my Savior. Lord I can Praise and Glorify Your Holy Name for You
have delivered my soul, You have restored the Joy of my Salvation
and I once again can see and feel Your Guiding Hand lifting me up
and leading me on. Jesus keep me on the paths of righteousness
and keep me centered in Your will. I pray that my repentance be
turned to true service to You and to the Kingdom and that my
repentance will be an acceptable offering
before the LORD-Whose-Name-Is-Great!!!
AMEN
THE JESUS QUESTIONS
Jesus continues His confrontation with the “Supreme Court” that had
been abusing their position with God to promote the “doctrines of men”
and had become trapped themselves in those doctrines. When
they perceived that they were losing their power over “the multitudes”
to Jesus (who was demonstrating the True Power and Authority
of God) that they actually conspired to dispose of Him. Jesus had been
in the temple of God in Jerusalem where He had driven out the
“moneychangers”, and those that were “buying and selling”
in the temple, and “the seats of those that sold doves” (Matthew 21:12).
Jesus then declared the temple a “house of prayer” and healed
the multitudes that were brought to Him in the temple, thus
restoring the Temple of God back to the Purpose for God
establishing His Holy Temple in Jerusalem {See Psalm 147:2-6}
— every problem, sickness, ailment, disease, or
broken-heartedness that was brought before Jesus in the
temple of God and spread before the Lord in His
“house of prayer” had their prayers answered as Matthew records:
“[all that] came to [Jesus] in the temple…He healed them…
but when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful
things that He did…[the chief priests and scribes] were indignant.”
(Matthew 21:14-15)
One must ask that if the chief priests and scribes
“saw the wonderful things”
that Jesus was doing for the multitudes in the way of
answered prayers that had been lifted to God in the house of God,
then why on earth were the chief priests and scribes “indignant”?!?!?
I cannot get past the fact that Jesus is exerting the
True Power and Authority
in the Temple that bears God’s name, in Jerusalem,
the city that God declared as the “City of God”,
and yet the self-appointed “rulers” can look upon the
True Work of God
and become “indignant” ???
— it can only be that the “rulers” feared losing their self-appointed
“power and authority” more that they feared the source of
“True Power and Authority”
and that the “indignant” will defend their little bit of power and fame
however temporary and fleeting it may be. This is a major problem
Jesus encountered and it is a major problem that society today
is encountering and therefore we should look carefully at how Jesus
reacted to those that defend the “doctrines and traditions of men”
over the “commands of God”!!! Jesus addressed the indignation
of the “power mongers” that He encountered while doing
“wonderful things”
in the temple of Jerusalem with the same type of response that He
had used when facing Satan and the Temptation in the wilderness ——
“And Jesus said to [the indignant chief priests and scribes],
‘Have you never read’…”
(Matthew 21:16)
and then Jesus quoted the Holy Scriptures to the “indignant” chief priests
what God had to say about the matter at hand. Matthew then records that
after Jesus quoted from God’s word that
“Then [Jesus] left them and went out of the city to Bethany,
and He lodged there.”
(Matthew 21:17)
It is just as significant a point that Jesus leaves Jerusalem
after His confrontation with the “chief priests and elders”
(Matthew 21:23) and goes to “Bethany” and “lodged there”
as it was when He “drew near to Jerusalem” that He
“came to Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives” (Matthew 21:1)!!!
The significance of Jesus entering Jerusalem on Palm Sunday and being
hailed by the multitudes as the “Son of David” cannot be overstated,
especially when Jesus immediately went to the temple and drove out
those that had been defiling the house of God by making it a commercial
establishment instead of a house of prayer, and we know that it was
the Sanhedrin Supreme Court that was located in Bethphage that
had given permission (probably there were many “bribes” given to
the Supreme Court) to the moneychangers and those that bought
and sold in the temple to use the temple for commercial gain!
Now that Jesus is exposing the “problem” we must read closely what
it is that Jesus does next, for He never leaves a problem exposed
without presenting the resolution to that problem — and so now Jesus
has cleaned the temple of “money changers” as His first order
of business upon entering Jerusalem, then after the confrontation
He retired to “Bethany” — do you suppose that when Jesus returns to
Jerusalem in the morning that He will resolve the problem? Another good
question that it is appropriate to address to those that see the
“wonderful things” that Jesus does and then they become “indignant”
at the mention of His Holy Name,
“Do you suppose that just because Jesus left
and went to lodge outside the city for the night
that He will ignore the problem in the city?”
——— or
to speak the language that our society listens to today
I’ll ask the question in Hollywood language —
“Just because [Jesus] walked away
do you think you are safe?
Did you not hear
what He said as He was leaving ———
“”I’LL BE BACK””
