WHEN A LOSS BECOMES A GAIN

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

Then Jesus said to His disciples, “Whoever wants to be My disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? For the Son of Man is going to come in His Father’s glory with His angels, and then He will reward each person according to what they have done.”

“Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.”

Matthew 16:24-28

Then He called the crowd to Him along with His disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be My disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? If anyone is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when He comes in His Father’s glory with the holy angels.”

And He said to them, “Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see that the kingdom of God has come with power.”

 

Mark 8:34-38, 9:1

Then He said to them all: “Whoever wants to be My disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow Me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit their very self? Whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when He comes in His glory and in the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.”

“Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God.”

Luke 9:23-27

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Here’s a rule I was taught from my earliest years of being able to understand it:

You need to win to gain.

Maybe you had the same rule imbedded in you.

To get the best education, it was important for you to get the best grades in school and there was this sense that you were competing against your elementary and adolescent peers to have the best chance for a bright future with college being the golden nugget. Schools have awards they present and those awards represent winners, those who have won and gained recognition and/or status. Scholarships get rewarded to those who have outperformed others to win the monetary prize. And those scholarships bring people into college where another contest awaits, this one regarding GPA’s and the associated honors that come for those who outrank their fellow students. Ultimately, the grand prize comes in landing that good paying job, something that requires someone to…you got it…contend with opponents who also want that great job. In the end, there can only be one winner.

You need to win to gain.

Here’s another case in point, this time looking at athletics. Perhaps this is the best example of the rule ingrained in me since youth for you see in sports, there are rarely instances when no one wins or loses. In sporting contests, there is always a winner and loser. Those who win, move onto greater things like the playoffs with the ultimate goal to be the last team standing, the overall champion of your sports league. You win to gain and those who lose go home. There are no spoils for the losers.

Why have this discussion within a Christian devotion?

Because it sets the table for Jesus to teach us that once again, things from a Christ-perspective often runs counter intuitive to the ways of the world, and in the case of our scripture passage for today, the rule that you have to win to gain. Look at His words again here from Matthew:

Then Jesus said to His disciples, “Whoever wants to be My disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? For the Son of Man is going to come in His Father’s glory with His angels, and then He will reward each person according to what they have done.”

“Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.”  Matthew 16:24-28

Jesus was defined by His selfless sacrifice. He had it all, more than anyone else who has ever walked the earth. Power. Authority. Popularity, at least among the people He helped. He had it all going for Himself. For after all, He was the Son of God Himself. From a worldly perspective He was a winner, except in the eyes of the Jewish religious establishment who wished Him dead.

And yet, Jesus willingly allowed Himself to be conquered by His foes. He handed Himself over freely to His opponents and suffered terribly in their hands, beaten and then forced to carry His own cross on His battered body to the place where He was crucified and died. All His enemies looked at Him as a loser and themselves as winners. But they had it backwards.

You see, Jesus has to lose to gain.

Go back to yesterday’s devotion and scripture passage. Jesus had told His disciples of the deep suffering and hardship He would face, even confessing He would be killed. But that wasn’t how the story would end. Rather, Jesus told them that “on the third day” He would be “raised to life”. Death was not the end for Him for He would gain a new life better than the one He had, one that would have Him ascend to heaven having accomplished what God sent Him to do to sit at His Father’s right hand, given authority over everything in heaven and on earth.

Jesus had to lose to gain and we are expected to follow His lead. He tells us so Himself:

“Whoever wants to be My disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?”

If you want to be in with Jesus, or in other words, to be a Christian, then you have to set yourself aside, humble yourself, pick up your cross, and follow Him. You have to be willing to lay your own life down for Him as He did for you. You have to be committed to trade in your desires for the desires of God, just as He did. For Jesus tells us that we can only get to true and everlasting life He offers by trading in the temporary worldly life we currently live.

In other words, we can only gain life by first losing it.

And when we do, when we are willing to acquire eternity for our souls by giving up any aspirations of cashing in on what the world offers, then everything we do in life is for Jesus, for His purposes, and for His glory. We find our treasures from heaven and not from earth (Matthew 6:19-21).

In the end translation, it’s a simple case of addition by subtraction. For a reward awaits those who choose submission over rejection, sacrifice over self centeredness, salvation over destruction, life over death. For Jesus promises this to those who choose to lose their lives to find life in Him:

“For the Son of Man is going to come in His Father’s glory with His angels, and then He will reward each person according to what they have done.”

Jesus is coming back and when He does, everyone on earth is going to be judged. Those who are in Him will enter into the glory of God and dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Those who chose to gain the world and lose their very souls will suffer in eternal damnation.

At judgment day, we will receive the outcome we deserve based on our choice to either follow or reject Jesus. On that day, my prayer is that you chose to lose your life to gain it by accepting His offer of salvation, experiencing the truth first-hand that a loss can indeed become a gain.

Amen.  

In Christ,

Mark

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UNDERSTANDING YOUR DESTINY

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In Christ, Mark

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

From that time on Jesus began to explain to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that He must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.

Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to You!”

Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”

Matthew 16:21-23

He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that He must be killed and after three days rise again.

He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him.

But when Jesus turned and looked at His disciples, He rebuked Peter.

“Get behind Me, Satan!” He said. “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”

Mark 8:31-33

And He said, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and He must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.”

Luke 9:22

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

God sent His only Son from heaven to earth for one distinct purpose: to be the Savior for all mankind. That meant that a special atoning sacrifice would have to be made because the very inherent sinfulness of every man and woman was when kept them separated from God. If people were going to have the chance to reach Him, a perfect, sinless, unblemished offering would have to be offered up and that offering was in the person of Jesus, the man John proclaimed as the “Lamb of God” who had come to take away the sins of the world.

This was Jesus’ destiny, one that He fully understood.

It’s important for us to remember this because it adds understanding and insight to our scripture passage today. Look at Matthew’s account again here:

From that time on Jesus began to explain to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that He must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.

Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to You!”

Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”  Matthew 16:21-23

In these three verses, we find Jesus trying to tell His disciples about what was ahead for Him, that He would go to Jerusalem where He would suffer at the hands of the Jewish religious authorities who would end up killing Him. But Jesus wouldn’t stay dead for long because He assures His followers that He would “be raised to life” on the third day. Essentially, He was telling His disciples His destiny but as we see, they weren’t ready to accept that.

For we read where Peter pulls Jesus aside and rebukes Him, the servant trying to correct the Master, saying:

“Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to You!”

Peter was not willing to believe that Jesus, the one He had just identified as the Messiah and Son of the Living God, could ever experience anything as horrific as being killed. After all, who could do anything to the man who had put His incredible power on display time after time after time? Surely, no mere man, Jewish religious leader or not, could do anything to harm Jesus.

But note here that Peter was essentially speaking against the plan God had already set forth for His Son. Peter wasn’t ready to accept the greater divine picture that was being developed right before His very eyes. He only saw things in the now and could never see the things Jesus described as happening to Him.

Well, we find Jesus giving a rebuke of His own, one that was amazingly harsh,

“Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” 

Let’s break this reprimand down into three parts:

1. “Get behind Me, Satan!”

It’s not that Peter was Satan but he like anyone else could be used by the enemy to speak sinful words. Jesus knew His destiny and it was His Father had set forth. Anyone speaking words that would detour Him from carrying out God’s purposes was speaking words grounded in Satan. Jesus would not be tempted or swayed from what He had to do, no matter how terrifying and horrible His end would be.

2. “You are a stumbling block to Me”

This is an extension of the first part. Anything that would get in the way of Jesus fulfilling His destiny was a speed bump on His road of fulfillment. Peter’s words served to make Jesus stop and censure him when He could have been doing more constructive and productive things with His time which He knew was short as it was.

3. “…you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” 

Had Peter been in tune with the concerns of God, He would have been encouraging Jesus to persevere and carry out His mission, the mission His Father had set Him out on. Peter would have been cheering Jesus on and thanking Him for His willingness to stare down such future suffering in order to save all mankind and usher in a way for every man and woman to come to God.

But Peter’s mind was not on the things of God. Rather, he was measuring what Jesus said against worldly standards and human concerns. He was basing his response to Jesus’ telling of His destiny against how he perceived everyone else in comparison to His Master. Peter believed no one could rival Jesus and thus saw anyone doing harm to Him, let alone kill Him, as an impossibility.

Through His own words, we find that Jesus is laser-focused on what was still ahead. Calvary and the cross were still a ways off but Jesus had His eye on the target, understanding His destiny and the reason His Father had sent Him to earth in the first place.

Today and every day, let us celebrate Jesus’ loyalty. Let us praise His obedience to the will of God, His Father and ours. And may we celebrate that through Jesus’ willing and willful sacrifice, bearing the penalty for sin we deserved, we as Christians, have not only the understanding, but the blessed guaranteed assurance that death will not be the end for us, but rather an entry point into glory as we receive the reward of salvation and dwell with Jesus our Savior and God the Father forever.

Amen.  

In Christ,

Mark

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WHO DO YOU SAY I AM?

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In Christ, Mark

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** Follow The Christian Walk on Twitter @ThChristianWalk

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”

They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

“But what about you?” He asked. “Who do you say I am?”

Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”

Then He ordered His disciples not to tell anyone that He was the Messiah.

Matthew 16:13-20

“Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” 

Matthew 18:18

 

Jesus and His disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way He asked them, “Who do people say I am?”

They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.”

“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”

Peter answered, “You are the Messiah.”

Jesus warned them not to tell anyone about Him.

Mark 8:27-30

Once when Jesus was praying in private and His disciples were with Him, He asked them, “Who do the crowds say I am?”

They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, that one of the prophets of long ago has come back to life.”

“But what about you?” He asked. “Who do you say I am?”

Peter answered, “God’s Messiah.”

Jesus strictly warned them not to tell this to anyone. 

Luke 9:18-21

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

It might seem hard to believe today as Christianity has advanced more than 2,000 years but there was a time when Jesus suffered from a bonafide identity crisis. He had come just as the prophets had predicted with events in His life aligning with those predictions and still people were too blind to see He was indeed the Messiah, the Son of God Himself who had been sent by His Father to save all mankind.

We find this matter of identity crisis at the forefront of today’s scripture excerpts from three of the four gospels with John being the only outlier. We’ll look at the words from Matthew’s account again here:

When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”

They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

“But what about you?” He asked. “Who do you say I am?”

Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”

Then He ordered His disciples not to tell anyone that He was the Messiah.  Matthew 16:13-20

As the passage opens, we find Jesus having traveled north of the Sea of Galilee to the city of Caesarea Philippi, named by the Roman tetrarch Philip, the son of Herod the Great. Philip named the city Caesarea Philippi to pay homage first to Caesar, the Roman Emperor, and then himself. It was here that we find Jesus asking His disciples an open ended question:

“Who do people say the Son of Man is?”

Knowing the whisperings of the people, the disciples told Jesus:

“Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

In other words, the people were confused as to Jesus’ identity. They really didn’t quite know who He was but the majority of the guesses were that He was no more than another special messenger sent by God, a messenger of the ilk of John or Elijah, Jeremiah or one of the other prophets.

Jesus received this response but then we find Him asking a follow up question:

“But what about you? Who do you say I am?”

Not surprisingly, we find Peter speaking up first and saying:

“You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

We read where these words were like beautiful music to Jesus’ ears as He immediately speaks these words of praise to Peter, words that surely indicated to him and the rest of the disciples that Jesus was exactly who Peter said He was:

“Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”

In essence, Jesus was giving Peter a huge atta-boy in the presence of his peers but note He doesn’t credit Peter with speaking such words of profound truth on his own. Rather, we find Jesus redirecting all the recognition to God, His Father and Peter’s, the One who sends all truth to His people from the heavens through the work of the Holy Spirit.

And because Peter had allowed himself to be led by God to Jesus’ proper identity, he would receive a reward, a treasure from heaven for his humble submission to the divine leading of his heart, mind, and soul. Jesus promised Peter that he would be the rock on which He would build His church and that this church built on the rock would never be overcome. Jesus promised Peter something better than the keys to any city or earthly kingdom; He assured Peter that the very keys of heaven would be given to him.

What was Jesus getting at?

He was giving Peter a foreshadowing of what was to come, a time when Peter would use the Gospel to either loose people for heaven, bringing them to find their salvation through Jesus, their Savior, or bound them if they refused to accept the Gospel offer of salvation. Those choosing to remain shackled in their sins would be destined to face God’s eternal wrath and judgment through damnation.

Salvation or damnation?

Peter would hold the key and that key would be the Gospel as we see in this passage from the Book of Acts after Jesus ascended to sit at God’s right hand:

Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. These people are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:

“‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out My Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on My servants, both men and women, I will pour out My Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy. I will show wonders in the heavens above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord. And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’”

“Fellow Israelites, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through Him, as you yourselves know. This man was handed over to you by God’s deliberate plan and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing Him to the cross. But God raised Him from the dead, freeing Him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on Him. David said about Him:

“‘I saw the Lord always before me. Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest in hope, because You will not abandon me to the realm of the dead, You will not let Your holy one see decay. You have made known to me the paths of life; You will fill me with joy in Your presence.’”

“Fellow Israelites, I can tell you confidently that the patriarch David died and was buried, and his tomb is here to this day. But he was a prophet and knew that God had promised him on oath that he would place one of his descendants on his throne. Seeing what was to come, he spoke of the resurrection of the Messiah, that he was not abandoned to the realm of the dead, nor did his body see decay. God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of it. Exalted to the right hand of God, He has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear. For David did not ascend to heaven, and yet he said:

“‘The Lord said to my Lord: ‘Sit at My right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for Your feet.”’

“Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.”

When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?”

Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”

With many other words he warned them; and he pleaded with them, “Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.”

Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.  Acts 2:14-41

These happenings occurred immediately after the Holy Spirit had come upon the believers gathered at Pentecost and note how eloquently Peter uses the keys to the kingdom of heaven, the Gospel of salvation through Jesus Christ, to loose about three thousand people from sure judgment and destruction. All because He knew who Jesus was and wasn’t afraid to tell others.

Friends, we have all been called to be like Peter, empowered with a powerful message of eternal life for all who would place their belief, faith, hope, and trust in a Savior named Jesus, the only One who can bring someone to God the Father forever. For there is a still a major identity crisis today with so many not knowing who Jesus truly is. The Lord wants to use us to clear up any confusion and give it to people straight.

After that, the choice is theirs (to be loosed or bound) because they would have been told exactly who Jesus is by those He called and empowered to do so, those who like Peter can properly answer the question:

“Who do you say I am?”

Amen.  

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it.

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