MAY 02 THE JESUS QUESTIONS
JQ#14 “Jesus said to them,
‘Have you understood all these things?’”
(Matthew 13:51)
LIVING FOR JESUS Daily Prayer
JESUS, indeed Lord we seek to know You and the Father as we seek
to know the will of the Father for our lives. We can see from Your Life
that we are to “live” the “Truth of God” in our lives so that those who
observe our “Gospel” will have the Father revealed to them as You
revealed the Father by both the Way You Lived
and the Way You Died.
Lord Jesus, may the Holy Spirit indwell us so extensively that all that
others can see in us is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
that we are all One.
Lord Jesus I beg again for mercy and grace and my daily bread and pray
that each day I again die to my old worldly self so that I may be
resurrected with the newness of spirit in Christ and declare boldly
that my life is not mine but Thine!
AMEN
THE JESUS QUESTIONS
Jesus starts Teaching JQ#14 with a lead in Question
to get us thinking about the
Truth of God
then he asks the
“Kingdom Question” —
“Who is My mother and who are My brothers?”
(Matthew 12:48)
The context for this Question begins with Matthew 12:38 and runs
through Matthew 13:52. In the previous verses
Jesus had just asked us to consider our
“Spiritual Expectations” of the Kingdom of God
and had pointedly asked us if our lives
are making a contribution to the uplifting
of God and His Kingdom
or are we tearing down the Kingdom by our unbelief.
Jesus has been Teaching us that
it is how we live that is going to be the “Truth of God” in our lives
and Jesus has been Living the Perfect Example of what He has been
Teaching about “The Father”. Here in this section of scripture running
from Matthew 12:38 through Matthew 12:51 Jesus ties several concepts
together for us using parables and using the “precept upon precept”
method through which we are given insights on the Kingdom of God
that can only come from a special understanding that can only be
revealed by the
Power of the Holy Spirit.
By looking at the Lessons Jesus has already Taught we can glimpse
where Jesus is taking us next by realizing that He has established
the foundation for the next big
Truth of God
which Jesus introduces with His next Question
JQ#14A “Who is My mother and who are My brothers?”
(Matthew 12:48).
All along Jesus has been referring to
God as “the Father”
and
Jesus has proven Himself to be the “Son of God”
and Jesus has been Teaching that we are born into a physical life but
by the Desire and Design of the Creator
we have been given an “eternal spiritual soul”
which will ascend to God
upon the death of the “physical” body.
Now Jesus continues Teaching us on this “spiritual” plane as He transitions
to the next revelation of the Kingdom by Teaching about
“the sign of the prophet Jonah”
(Matthew 12:39)
where Jesus introduces
His Resurrection
to the Pharisees who had demanded Jesus give them a “sign”.
Jesus answers that the only
“sign” the “evil and adulterous generation”
will get is the
“sign of the prophet Jonah”
as Jesus tells them point blank,
“For as Jonah was three days and three nights
in the belly of the great fish,
so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights
in the heart of the earth.”
(Matthew 12:40)
The “sign of the prophet Jonah” taken literally can only mean that
God’s plan for the Kingdom is that Jesus will have to die
and be in the “grave” for three days
but then God Himself will Resurrect Jesus as He did Jonah
for only the Power of God can accomplish such things!
Jesus then says that the fruit of Jonah’s resurrection was
that the men of Nineveh “repented” and now Jesus is saying that this
“evil and adulterous generation”
will be given a chance to repent when
God Resurrects Jesus on the Third Day.
Jesus then adds that the sign of the queen of the South was to
“understand”
the wisdom of Solomon and now
“indeed a greater than Solomon is here”
(Matthew 12:42)
Then Jesus ties these “Spiritual signs” together as He confirms
the spiritual connection as He Teaches about the
“unclean spirit” that gets “seven other spirits”
and they “enter and dwell”
in those that do not accept the
Truth of God
and therefore are known as “this wicked generation”
which is a generation that does not believe in God,
they reject God, and they refuse to accept
the gift of God which is His Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ.
God is Teaching that in order for us to enter the kingdom of God
we must realize it is a “spiritual realm”
and we must align ourselves “spiritually” with the “Father”.
Jesus now introduces the concept of the
“Family of God”
as He asks
JQ#14A “Who is My mother and who are My brothers?”
We all know that our “physical life” begins
with our biological mother and father
so aren’t you curious now to
“understand these things”
and to know how our
“spiritual life”
will begin and how exactly
do we become a member of this
“spiritual family” ?
