JULY 24 THE JESUS QUESTIONS JQ#22 “Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with my own things?” (Matthew 20:15)

 

JULY 24  THE JESUS QUESTIONS  JQ#22  

“Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with my own things?” 

(Matthew 20:15)

LIVING FOR JESUS  Daily Prayer   

JESUS, I have failed You in so many ways but Lord, I turn to You 

and to You alone for Forgiveness of my weakness of mind and my desire

 to satisfy my selfish desires. I know that “wanting” anything but Your purpose

 in my life is wrong. How can I pray for the Holy Spirit to fill me when I hold

 a memory of my old sin-ways locked deep in a special treasure box

 covered with selfishness and hid in the dark recesses of my soul? 

There is nothing I think or do that God cannot see and yet I think I can

 hold back a part of my old sinful self and hide it from God?  NO! 

I yield it ALL to God, and pray not my will but THY Will be done in my life. 

I can make no decisions for myself any longer that is outside the Will of God,

 I can only work to achieve His purpose with whatever condition I find myself in.

AMEN

THE JESUS QUESTIONS

Jesus is always directing His Questions to a specific detail of 

God’s Truth 

such as JQ#21 drew our attention to the problem of sin 

which drew our attention to the great extent that God Himself has gone 

to in order to resolve our sin issue and now in JQ#22 Jesus is using

 a parable to summarize another problem that we encounter in living our

 daily lives - that problem being that if we are not fully aware of the issue

 then we will be unwillingly obeying the “doctrines of men” instead of the

 “commandments of God”! 

For example, Jesus begins this section with another encounter with 

the Pharisees who were the religious legalists of His time on earth and 

specifically the subject of divorce. Jesus rebutted the arguments the 

Pharisees were making by going back to God’s original intent 

for marriage by stating the Genesis account of the original creation:

 “So God created man in His own image; 

in the image of God He created him; 

male and female He created them.” (Genesis 1:27) 

Jesus continued from the original account in the Holy Scriptures with

 the original intent of God regarding marriage as He referred to this passage:

 “…But for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him. 

And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, 

and he slept; and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the 

flesh in its place. Then the rib which the Lord God had taken from 

man He made into a woman, and He brought her to the man. 

And Adam said: ‘This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh;

 she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.’ 

Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother 

and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” 

(Genesis 2:20-24) 

By going back and referring to the account of the original creation of man

 by God from the same Holy Scriptures the Pharisees were trying 

to make their argument from and reminding the Pharisees 

how God Himself instituted the first marriage between the first man 

and the first woman, the Pharisees could not argue against the 

Truth of God 

and God’s own actions and thereby Jesus completely nullified any

 argument the Pharisees tried to make about Moses allowing the 

Israelites to divorce “legally”. It is most important to note that the Pharisees

 were trying to use the argument that because a prophet of God 

from a previous generation had said divorce was “legal” so then 

it should be “legal” for this generation because of “legal precedence” 

established by Moses. “Legal precedence” is the main legalist argument 

of our present generation. However, Jesus reminded them of the 

Truth of God

 that even the prophets of God, even one with the stature of Moses, 

is not above the 

Law of God, 

for Moses, even though he had been chosen by God to lead Israel 

to the “Promised Land”, Moses himself was not allowed into 

the “Promised Land” because Moses had disobeyed God’s instruction 

to “speak to the rock” (Numbers 20:8) and thereby Jesus had nullified

 the Pharisees argument that it was “legal” to divorce their wives 

because Moses, being the representative of God, had said divorce 

was “legal”, and Jesus by pointing out that God, not Moses, is the 

final “Judge” and this lesson proved the 

Truth of God 

that only those things that are “legal” in God’s Judgment is the only 

basis for establishing a Moral Standard and declaring that which is truly “legal”.

 Jesus summed up this important 

TRUTH OF GOD 

as Jesus shut down the Pharisee’s argument that Moses said it 

was “OK” to divorce when Jesus concluded with this statement: 

“Therefore what God has joined together, 

let not man separate.” (Matthew 19:6b) 

Jesus continues this Lesson on the problem of “following the doctrines of men”

 verses “obeying the commandments of God” by using “children” to show the

 TRUTH OF GOD !  

Jesus confirmed this

 TRUTH OF GOD 

when the disciples were arguing about “who is the greatest in heaven”

 and Jesus set a young child in their midst and said that they 

“must become as little children to even enter the kingdom of heaven” 

and here again the disciples were making a human mistake 

of trying to interpret what they mistakenly thought that God would do

 by rebuking those that were bringing their little children to Jesus for healing.

 However, Jesus once again demonstrated that what they “thought” 

was the “proper” behavior for children was not what God intended,

 “Jesus said, Let the little children come to Me, 

and do not forbid them; for such is the kingdom of heaven.” 

(Matthew 19:14) 

Don’t you think if the disciples that were 24/7 listening to Jesus could be wrong

 about living their daily lives and the way they treated others 

that we who only occasionally listen to God could also be mistaken 

about how we interact with those in our daily world? 

If the disciples of Jesus had to be reminded that they must not live according

 to what they “supposed they knew what God had intended” but 

live their daily lives and interact with each other by studying and knowing

 what God has already demonstrated and declared Himself!!! 

Don’t you think we would be wise to re-evaluate our “traditions” 

and to weed out those things that we do that are the “doctrine of men” 

and make sure that we are “following the commands of God”

 in our daily lives?!?!?