MARCH 02 THE JESUS QUESTIONS JQ#07 “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26)

 

MARCH 02  THE JESUS QUESTIONS

  JQ#07 “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?” 

(Matthew 8:26)

LIVING FOR JESUS  Daily Prayer    

JESUS, Lord I pray that Your Spirit will continue to consume me, Lord

 I proclaim as Paul did, I know that I have not yet attained the goal but I press

 on to the finish which is a race that I cannot run on my own strength,

 Lord I need You, I need Your daily Mercy and Grace and I do TRUST You

 to finish the good work You have begun in me. 

There is nothing in me besides YOU that can move my soul towards

 the prize of the high calling of service to the Kingdom so therefore refresh

 and renew in me a “Right Spirit” and “create in me a clean heart O God”!    

AMEN

THE JESUS QUESTIONS

JESUS is asking a most revealing Kingdom Question with 

JQ#07 - “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?” 

(Matthew 8:26a) 

and so far we haven’t even really considered the context in which this

 personal Question was asked. We looked at the immediate circumstance

 of Jesus and His disciples being in a “great tempest” after they had 

followed Jesus onto a boat and then when the tempest beset them

 His disciples panicked — but Jesus was sleeping. Of course, we like the

 disciples, see the waves and the tempest and we consider the physical

 consequences of drowning in our storms but we miss the spiritual

 consequences of (1) following Jesus through the storm and (2) trusting

 Him to “calm” even the worst “tempest” in our lives and (3) to know

 that our “faith” in JESUS is the only thing in our earthly lives 

that has “Sublime Eternal” consequences. 

The larger context of the circumstances of the “Teachings” of Jesus

 to His disciples should also be observed in terms of what the disciples

 had seen Jesus doing immediately prior to them getting on the boat

 and then ask ourselves if those actions of Jesus should have built

 their “faith” in His Power and Divine Nature???  

After Jesus Taught the disciples the parable of the

 “two builders”

 (Matthew 7:24-27)

 which introduced the concept that 

we should build the “foundation” of our “faith” on “solid rock”,

 (see 1 Samuel 2:2b “Nor is there any ROCK like our God.)

 Jesus then laid the “ground floor” of our “faith in Jesus” by (1) healing

 the servant of a centurion as Jesus connected His Healing Power to

 our Faith Building when Jesus told the centurion

 (A)

 “I will come and heal him.” (Matthew 8:7)

 and (B)

 “Then Jesus said to the centurion, 

‘Go your way; as you have believed, 

so let it be done for you.’ 

And his servant was healed that same hour.” 

(Matthew 8:13).

 Jesus continued His Lesson on His Healing Power when next He came

 to Peter’s house “ … [Jesus] saw [Peter’s] wife’s mother lying sick

 with a fever. So He touched her hand, and the fever left her. 

And she arose and served them.” 

(Matthew 8:14-15) 

That very same evening the disciples had witnessed the villagers where

 Peter lived bringing “to [JESUS] many who were demon-possessed. 

And He cast out the spirits with a word, 

and healed all who were sick…” 

(Matthew 8:16) 

So Jesus gives the parable of the “two builders” to encourage 

the disciples to “build their faith” on Him and then He immediately

 demonstrates His Divine Power and Compassion for all people 

by “healing” both their “physical” and their “spiritual” ailments! 

When the tempest arose, the disciples acted like they hadn’t seen

 these Divine Attributes of Jesus — all the disciples could see was

 the “physical world” as they got into a boat, and then the boat gets in

 a great storm, and the wind and the waves of the tempest makes the

 disciples go into full panic mode — and the first thing Jesus says 

upon awakening and seeing their panic is,

 “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?”

 (Matthew 8:26) ???  

JQ#07 should awaken us to the “obvious” that 

Jesus is in control 

of both the “physical” and the “spiritual” worlds

 and that He also has control over the natural world 

in which we 

live our day-to-day lives. 

If we also look at His Resurrection  we will see that 

He has control over our eternity as well so “Why are we fearful 

of the world and death” when all we have to do is to have 

FAITH in the ONE who died for our sins, 

rose the third day, sits at the right hand of God

 and makes intercession for us?    

Jesus gave us all the resources we need to build our

 “Faith in God” 

but He wants us to hammer a nail or two ourselves!!!

MARCH 01 THE JESUS QUESTIONS JQ#07 “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26)

 

MARCH 01  THE JESUS QUESTIONS

  JQ#07 

“Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?” 

(Matthew 8:26)

LIVING FOR JESUS Daily Prayer

JESUS, Lord I come before You this morning renewed and refreshed

 in Your Spirit and I praise You for Your Love. Lord, we deserve punishment 

but You Lord bore our sins and iniquities on 

THE CROSS AT CALVARY WHERE YOU DIED AND BECAME 

THE ONLY ACCEPTABLE SACRIFICE FOR ALL SIN. 

Through Your Great Sacrifice our sins have been paid in full. 

Lord I know that I am not worthy of Your Love and that my unworthiness

 has been substituted by Your Righteousness and in the Father’s eyes I am

 an heir to the Kingdom because of what was accomplished by You, God,

 and the Holy Spirit on Resurrection Sunday — I pray that every day I will

 awake and arise to face the world and that I will keep full in my mind

 that You ARE RISEN victorious over the world and that You 

will walk with me every step of my Journey to Truth!    

AMEN

THE JESUS QUESTIONS 

JESUS in JQ#07 has begun Teaching the Importance of 

“Faith in God” 

in our daily lives and the 

Ultimate Importance of “Faith in God” for 

our Eternal lives!!! 

Our “Faith in God” cannot  become “sight” 

unless we understand that without the “Light of Jesus” we will remain

 blind and in darkness — for until we are “born again into the light” that the world is

 “without form, and void; and darkness” (Genesis 1:2) covers our daily lives.

 When Jesus asks a Question, He is challenging us to use our God-given

 intellect to open our spiritual eyes and exercise our

 “trust” in God’s Infinite Knowledge.

 In JQ#07 Jesus ties together two terms “fearful” and “faith” and His use

 of these two terms in such close proximity should get our attention.

 When I stopped and re-read the Question trying to see the “Sublime Obvious”,

 I was rewarded by seeing that Jesus asked the “Question” but He also

 gave the “Answer” while asking the “Question”!  The “Divine Obvious” that

 came to me was to look at JQ#07 in two parts but keeping them tied 

together like this:

 Part A (the Question) “Why are you fearful” and

 Part B (the Answer) “O you of little faith”. (Matthew 8:26a)  

The Question is about being “fearful” and He answers His Question 

by directing our attention to our “faith”. 

Jesus puts the Question and the Answer together 

because He does not want us to over-think ourselves 

and therefore He makes it clear that we must grow our

 “Faith in God” 

if we desire NOT to be “fearful”. 

There is no other way to grow our “faith” without “Trusting God” and if we

 do not see God’s “Divine Obvious” world with our “spiritual” eyes we will

 not Trust God — and if there is no “Trust in God” then our lives will be

 lived in “fear” of the world that we see with our “physical” eyes! 

I believe it is of great importance in our 

“Spiritual Growth” that we acknowledge

 the “Divine Obvious” thing God did to address the problem of darkness

 in His Creative process — for in Genesis 1:3 the first SOLUTION spoken

 BY GOD in the new Creation was “Light” which God introduced

 into His newly created earth TO RESOLVE THE PROBLEM that the earth was

 “without form and void” and was immersed in “darkness”. 

(Genesis 1:2a) 

The only source of power God employed was 

“the Spirit of God” (Genesis 1:2b) 

and He demonstrated the Spiritual Power of God

 when in the next verse we read:

 “Then [after acknowledging the emptiness and darkness] 

God said, ‘Let there be light’ and there was light 

[problem solved by the Spirit of God!].” 

(Genesis 1:3)  

From these first three verses we see that God assessed the negative

 aspect of creation which is “lack of purpose” and “darkness” and solved

 the problem with  “the Spirit of God” speaking the solution with

 “let there be light.  — then — 

{through the Miracle of God’s Holy Spirit} 

“And there was light” . 

Just as God saw “darkness” as the problem and “light” as the solution,

 Jesus saw “fear” as a problem and “Faith in God” as the solution 

and the answer to all our questions and fears should be

 to focus our “spiritual eyes” on Jesus. 

Jesus told the most intellectual “Pharisee” of his generation named Nicodemus

 (who admitted Jesus was from God 

but Nicodemus wanted to know

 what Jesus had come to teach?)  

Jesus told Nicodemus,

 “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again

 he cannot see the kingdom of God” 

(John 3:3) 

and then Jesus made it perfectly clear 

that just as we have a “physical” birth

 into the world that we must have a 

“spiritual birth” to enter “the kingdom of God” 

when He tells Nicodemus:

 “That which is born of the flesh is flesh 

and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” 

(John 3:6) 

and in JQ#07 Jesus tells us to grow our 

“Faith in God” to calm our “fears” —

 therefore we should open our 

“Spiritual Eyes” 

to see the growth potential in what God accomplished 

in His Crowning Glory 

of Resurrection Sunday if we just “BELIEVE” in

 God’s Only Begotten Son Jesus who defeated death 

and the grave and offers Eternal Life through

 “FAITH IN GOD THE FATHER”!