JULY 03 THE JESUS QUESTIONS JQ#21 “What do you think about fish, taxes, lost sheep, forgiveness, and your fellow servants?” (Matthew 17:25, 18:12,33)

 

JULY 03  THE JESUS QUESTIONS  

JQ#21  “What do you think about fish, 

taxes, lost sheep, forgiveness, and your fellow servants?” 

(Matthew 17:25, 18:12,33)

LIVING FOR JESUS Daily Prayer    

Jesus, we give You all the Praise for You

 are the One that is Worthy of All Praise. 

Lord Jesus, the more I study Your Word, the more I realize

 what a tremendous Sacrifice that You made and when I consider

 that the world has always turned from Your Sufficient Grace

 to the disappointments of the world, it really is amazing that 

You would become our Salvation at such Great Expense!?! 

 Lord, I shudder to think of the many times that I have rejected Your Truth

 and chased after the pleasures of this world and Lord, 

the scary part is that occasionally I will let my physical desires 

dust off old memories of my worldly life and for a moment 

I forget the despair that my disobedient spirit caused in my old life 

and I turn from Your “Way” back into the shadows of this world, 

but then Your Grace shines the Light of Truth on my iniquity 

and I can see and appreciate what Great Love You have demonstrated

 towards all sinners and I return to the well lit path of the 

“TRUTH of GOD” and the “joy of my salvation” 

and once again raise my voice in Praise to the One

 that Sacrificed so much to set me free from sin.    

AMEN

THE JESUS QUESTIONS

Jesus addressed not only the Truth of God that we are “equipped” by God

 with the necessary tools to “answer” all the questions life presents to us

 but He also revealed in greater detail the difference between living 

a temporary life in the “physical” world with our flesh 

and preparing our souls for our “eternal spiritual” life in the “spiritual” world —

 

Jesus has drawn us a clear picture so far that illuminates 

in our darkened mind that the “Spiritual World” is “Eternal” 

and that all “souls” will spend their “Eternity” either 

in the Presence of God in Heaven 

or those “souls” that choose to reject God 

will spend their “Eternity” separated from God in Hell. 

With JQ#21 Jesus is Teaching us that if we will use our God-given 

intellect to make good choices with our Free Will 

that we will be able to “reason” that

 the “world” offers us nothing “eternal” 

and the “eternal” offers us nothing “worldly”. 

Jesus points out to Peter with JQ#21 that if Peter will stop and “think” 

that Peter will see this distinction being played out in our daily lives

 as Jesus asks Peter 

“From whom do the kings of the earth take customs or taxes, 

from their sons or from strangers?” (Matthew 17:25) 

Peter gave the correct answer when he said 

“from strangers” (Matthew 17:26) 

At this point we should stop and think about “taxes” and the fact 

that “taxes” are part of this “physical” life but we should also

 understand that Jesus is pointing out that if we follow Him that 

just by living our daily lives and looking at everything from a 

“spiritual” perspective that we will see God’s Provisions 

for us to be able to make our way through this “physical” world

 without compromising our “souls” — 

Jesus instructed Peter to pay the “temple tax” and fulfill his 

“physical/worldly” obligation but Jesus also instructed Peter

 to trust that God will provide his daily needs through his daily life 

which was fishing. We have a valuable Lesson to learn from

 “fish” and “taxes” if we look at this “miracle” from God’s Perspective! 

We can go about our daily lives and realize that 

God knows our needs before we ask 

but we must “trust” Him and do those things 

that He instructs us to do — 

Jesus used the “fish” because Peter knew about fishing, 

but God is able to provide our needs using the things we are familiar

 with but we have never looked at them from the perspective that

 God has placed us in that position so that when we open 

our “spiritual” eyes and “Trust” Him with our “Spiritual” hearts 

that He will be able to show us His Glory 

which is Always Surrounding our Daily Lives 

but we just don’t stop and “Think” about what we see 

from God’s Perspective! 

Who would have ever thought

 that paying “taxes”

 could be a way to Glorify God? 

JULY 02 THE JESUS QUESTIONS JQ#21 “What do you think about fish, taxes, lost sheep, forgiveness, and your fellow servants?” (Matthew 17:25, 18:12,33)

 

JULY 02  THE JESUS QUESTIONS  

JQ#21  “What do you think about fish, 

taxes, lost sheep, forgiveness, and your fellow servants?” 

(Matthew 17:25, 18:12,33)

LIVING FOR JESUS  Daily Prayer   

JESUS, forgive me for all the time that I have spent worrying 

about the things of the world that have no impact on my spiritual well being. 

Lord You have demonstrated to me time and time again 

the Faithfulness of the Father to Provide everything we need

 to live a Holy life and yet we succumb to the flesh 

and seek to live a “worldly” life 

and when we look to things of this world to give us happiness

 we are always disappointed. 

Lord Jesus You have never disappointed us 

and the Father has never failed us

 in any way so why 

Lord do we insist on holding on so tight to that which disappoints us?

 Lord I pray for discernment to know when I am letting myself drift back

 into the concerns of the world which is always in a direction away from You,

 for when we finally realize we are adrift in the sea of worries 

that we are in a boat without a paddle 

and that Lord is a sinking feeling! 

So Lord, open my spiritual eyes so that I can see my way back

 to the course you have set for me and I will rely not on my ability

 to row my own boat but on Your Promise

 to never leave us nor forsake us!!!    

AMEN

THE JESUS QUESTIONS

Jesus never lets an opportunity to Teach “satellite” Lessons go to waste

 as He seizes every opportunity to reveal several 

Truths of God

 to us just by asking a Question that makes us stop and “think” 

about the world around us, and when we have to use our 

God-given intellect to understand our own individual lives 

we learn that God has equipped us with two invaluable tools 

with which we can use to work our way through all our daily problems;

 

God’s Tool #1 is our “Free Will”

 which is the characteristic we possess that is most similar to the 

“image” of God 

in that with our

 Free Will Gift from God 

we can see that our future can be influenced by the

 “Choices” we make using that Free Will 

which is ours and ours alone.

 By giving us Free Will and making us live with the 

“Consequences” of our “Choices”  

God has given us the “Power”

 to influence both our future and our past 

and we cannot defer that Power to another entity, 

we must exercise our Free Will and demonstrate our 

God-given responsibility of self-sufficiency by using only our God-given abilities. 

God’s Tool #2 is our “God-given Intellect” 

which we must use in conjunction with 

God’s Tool #1 our Free Will to make Godly-decisions 

that will affect our “Spiritual Well Being” 

thereby influencing our eternal destiny. 

If we abuse our Free Will by not using our God-given Intellect 

then we are in reality going against God’s Will for our lives 

and going against God is NEVER a good thing 

for the path away from God leads to the destruction of our soul,

 and that can never be considered a good thing. 

We see Jesus telling Peter to stop and use his God-given intellect

 to “observe” the “physical” world and make “Spiritual” sense 

out of our day-to-day lives when Jesus asked back-to-back Questions 

“What do you think, Simon? From whom do the kings of the earth

 take customs or taxes, from their sons or from strangers?”

 [JQ#21a & b] (Matthew 17:25) 

Peter now has to use his God-given intellect at the insistence of God Himself

 because Peter is standing before God in the form of the “Son”

 knowing that the Question Jesus is asking Peter is because

 of a question Peter was going to ask Jesus. 

By Jesus “anticipating” what Peter was going to ask and “preventing”

 Peter from asking it, Peter now knows that 

Jesus is God because only God knows 

what we need before we even ask! 

Peter also knows that by Jesus asking the Question about where

 “…do the kings of the earth take customs or taxes…” 

that Jesus knows everything about him 

and now Jesus is instructing Peter to stop and 

“think” 

— Peter will find out that he already knows the “answer” 

to the Jesus Question but like us, we know the Truth of God 

but need instructions on how to properly apply that God-given knowledge

 to living our daily lives. 

Peter gave a one word answer to the tax collectors when he said

 “Yes” to their question about paying the temple tax 

and now Peter gives a two word answer to Jesus 

when Jesus asks Peter about

 “the kings of the earth” collecting taxes 

as Peter responds to Jesus 

“From Strangers” (Matthew 17:26). 

Jesus demonstrated to Peter that Peter has all the answers

 (consider that Peter got both answers correct 

and only had to use three words to answer two questions)

 if he stops and uses his God-given intellect to “think” 

— but what we all must learn from Jesus is how to incorporate the

 Truth of God 

with our daily lives. 

Jesus demonstrated that He is God by then performing 

the miracle of the fish and the coin through the daily life of Peter

 when Jesus sent Peter fishing. 

It was only when Peter obeyed God that the miracle occurred 

because Peter had to first cast his net in “Faith” 

in order to pull up fish in his net — 

this was an activity Peter performed thousand of times before

 but this time Peter was following God’s instructions 

and the results was the resolution of Peter’s problem with taxes! 

Only God can take our daily lives and solve our problems

 by our listening to Him and simply keep doing our day-to-day tasks because 

God chooses to work His Miracles through us 

while we go about living daily for Him 

— can’t you see the Glory of God in your daily life 

or do you need to stop and 

“Think” about it from God’s Perspective?