JANUARY 30 THE JESUS QUESTIONS JQ#02 “For if you love those who love you, what reward have you … and if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others?” (Matthew 5:46-47)

 

JANUARY  30  THE JESUS QUESTIONS

   JQ#02  “For if you love those who love you, what reward have you …

and if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others?”

 (Matthew 5:46-47)

LIVING FOR JESUS  Daily Prayer    

JESUS, the Eternal Unchanging God of my Salvation. Lord I praise You

 for Your Faithfulness and Unfailing Grace You extend to all who call upon 

Your Name, Jesus. Lord, I pray today the same prayer I prayed in 2004: 

“Jesus, praise Your Holy Precious Name for You 

are Worthy of our praise. All glory we give to Thee and to Thee alone. 

Lord may we do nothing in our lives that is not a praise to You 

and may all that we do bring Honor to Your Death on the Cross, 

that man may know that the Father God loved mankind enough that

 He would provide Salvation to a sinful world through the 

DEATH, BURIAL, AND RESURRECTION

 of His Only Begotten Son, Jesus, 

who for our sakes suffered greatly for our sins. 

He was Innocent before the Father, yet as He bore our sins on the cross,

 He also had to suffer the rejection of a Holy Father who cannot look on sin —

 all this suffering of the Innocent so that the guilty world can live 

the Victorious Forgiven-life through the Victor Himself, Jesus Christ!”     

AMEN

THE JESUS QUESTIONS

JESUS used JQ#01 to remind us that it is not about what we can take 

from the world but what we give to the world that gives us worth by 

stating very plainly that we “are salt” and that we “are light” and we

 must stop and think about the Truth of God contained in “salt” and “light” 

from God’s Viewpoint in order to grasp the Lesson Jesus Teaches and why

 He would start His 33 JESUS Questions by using “salt” and “light” and

 to State a Truth of God about who we “are” in God’s Plan — 

“You are the salt of the earth…You are the light of the world…” 

(Matthew 5:13a & 5:14a) 

Jesus does not command us to become “salt” and “light” but Jesus

 makes His Divine Point by first stating that we “are” 

and then Jesus asks the Question JQ#01

 “…but if salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned?” (Matthew 5:13b)

 Jesus immediately gives us the Answer in the form of “Consequences” 

as He says, {about tasteless salt} 

“…it is good for nothing but to be thrown out 

and trampled underfoot by men” (Matthew 5:13c) 

and {about light} 

“A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp

 and put it under a basket…” (Matthew 5:14, 15a). 

Jesus sums up the Truth of God using common logic but we must first

 focus on what is TRUE or we will miss the TRUTH of God. Jesus

 illustrates this by JQ#01 and lays out the “FORMAT for HIS TEACHING” —

 (T1) We are to look for the OBVIOUS TRUTH that the

 Question will focus us on then 

(T2) Jesus will give us the Answer if we will Listen. 

(T3) Jesus uses God’s Law of Choice and Consequence to

 make His Divine Point. God’s Law of Choice and Consequence 

can be found throughout the Holy Bible and its importance

 is verified by the OBVIOUS TRUTH that it was applied 

to the first man and woman, Adam and Eve. 

To emphasize His Divine Point, God spoke everything but mankind into existence!

 However, after God had created everything else we read in Genesis

 that God made man with His own Hands and God used His own Breath

 to breathe life into man and then God again used His own Hands to remove

 a rib from Adam’s side which God used to make Eve, the woman which

 God presented to man to be a helpmate! God then “planted a garden” 

 and placed the man into the Garden of Eden to 

“tend {work} and to keep it {treasure it}” (Genesis 2:7-15) 

and God established the Law of Choice and Consequence — 

“And the LORD God commanded the man saying, 

{TRUTH — GOD PROVIDES} ‘Of every tree of the garden

 you may freely eat; 

{The LAW} but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil 

you shall not eat, 

{of CHOICE} for in the day you eat of it, 

{and CONSEQUENCE} you shall surely die.’” (Genesis 2:16-17) 

The LORD God established with the 1st Law of Choice and Consequence 

that the “penalty for disobeying God {sin} is death” but the reward

 for obeying God is “eternal life”. 

God gave us a “CHOICE” in the form of FREEWILL and therefore we

 are under obligation to look at God’s Holy Word for the TRUTH OF GOD 

to guide us in making “Choices” but we should keep in mind

 that the “Rewards” and “Penalties” have already been laid out before

 the foundations of the world and 

God applies them fairly and equally to all mankind! 

Therefore with that TRUTH of GOD in mind, let us apply that to JQ#01 —

 Truth: God made us and expects us in our “natural” state to be “salt and light”.

 “Law”: Salt and Light are used to add taste to those that use salt which

 must be consumed to get the salt flavor out of it and

 Light makes things visible to those who use the light to find their way.

 Rewards for a Good “Choice”: Using salt adds flavor to our lives 

and being in the light, we can see to find our way. 

Consequence (penalty) of a Bad “Choice”: without salt, life is bland and 

tasteless and without light we will stumble and fall and get off the path

 and lose our way in life. 

These “Truths” are common to man and when common logic is applied

 to each situation it will reveal these “Truths” — but once we see the Truth, then we are faced with a “Choice” and our responsibility to God is to use our God-given intellect to use His Word to make good “Choices”! 

If we stop and think, we can see the rewards and penalties but we must look

 through “Spiritual” eyes because our worldly eyes are tied to the 

“physical” world which contains the same

 3 “TEMPTATIONS” Jesus faced 

after His baptism by John in the Jordan that is

 COMMON to ALL MEN: 

 >>1<<“lust of the flesh, 

>>2<<the lust of the eyes, and 

>>3<< the boastful pride of life” 

(1 John 2:16) 

— the worldly temptations that are common to all mankind!

 JQ#01 teaches us about God, Jesus, ourselves, and about our attitude

 toward others, and keep in mind that this is JQ#01 and God thought it

 important enough to make it the first Question/Lesson! So it will 

behoove us to consider that “salt” and “light” are worthless unless they 

are used to help others — my observation is that “salt” is a natural 

occurrence and can be considered of being “physical” but “light” is still

 an unknown quantity and one of the mysteries of God and in my opinion

 falls into the “spiritual realm” because the first “Words” that God spoke

 came when God looked at the world and saw darkness and chaos,

 “Then God said, ‘Let there be light’ and there was light.” Genesis 1:3. 

God’s Holy Word is given to give us understanding and God has 

demonstrated that He Will Provide for ALL our NEEDS — 

the TRUTH OF GOD is the WORD OF GOD 

and since we are made in God’s image, He declares our likeness to Him

 when He states His Truth that we “ARE SALT” and we “ARE LIGHT” !!!

 With the Lessons of JQ#01 fresh in our mind, let us then look at 

JQ#02: “For if you love those who love you, what reward have you …

and if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others?”

 (Matthew 5:46-47) 

and consider both the Lesson Truth of JQ#01 and this general truth statement 

about God (that is “TRUE” because of His Great Love for us), and it goes like this:

 “There is nothing that we can do to deserve the Love of God 

but the Good News is that God’s love is not dependent on 

who we are or what we do. 

God Loves us because He chooses within Himself to Love us 

and His Love is totally dependent on who God IS, therefore,

 there is nothing we can do to lose His Love!” 

This idea of God choosing to love us in spite of our sins because of 

who He IS 

could possibly be (in my opinion) 

the Root Cause of Grace itself 

and makes a really good place to start looking at JQ#02 — 

(Context: Matthew 5:18 - 6:24) and the Question(s) 

contained in Matthew 5:45,46, & 47. 

For JQ#02 we will look at the context of the Questions and also consider

 “In all these things we are more than conquerors 

through Him who loved us.” (Romans 8:37) 

and the fact that we cannot be separated from the love of God! 

Then we should also consider why Jesus concludes JQ#02 

(4 questions asking the same thing, I think) with a this command:

 “Therefore you shall be perfect, 

just as your Father in heaven is perfect.”  (Matthew 5:48).

 If you have as much trouble being “perfect” as I do

 then JQ#02 is a great Lesson from the Master Teacher to help us improve!!!