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In Christ, Mark
In Christ, Mark
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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy
word.
As the time approached
for Him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. And He
sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready
for Him; but the people there did not welcome Him, because He was heading for
Jerusalem.
When the disciples James
and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call fire down from
heaven to destroy them?” But Jesus turned and rebuked them.
Then He and His
disciples went to another village.
Luke 9:51-56
This ends
today’s reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
After having tracked Jesus through the
Gospel of Matthew up to the cusp of His triumphal entry into Jerusalem and His
last week of human life, I have been going back through the other Gospels to
cover passages not shared in Matthew’s account. For anyone who reads and
studies the Bible knows that each of the four Gospel writers wrote from their
recollection of being with Jesus or from the testimonies of those who were and
in a lot of places, the Gospels are not in harmony.
Today’s passage is one such place as Jesus
and His disciples were on their way to Jerusalem as the time for Jesus to be
taken up to heaven drew ever nearer. Look at these words from Luke’s Gospel,
the ninth chapter:
As the time approached for Him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus
resolutely set out for Jerusalem. And He sent messengers on ahead, who went
into a Samaritan village to get things ready for Him; but the people there did
not welcome Him, because He was heading for Jerusalem.
When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you
want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?” But Jesus turned and
rebuked them.
Then He and His disciples went to another village. Luke 9:51-56
It was a long journey to Jerusalem from
Galilee and depending on the route one took, a person might pass through the
region of Samaria on the way and encounter the residents of that region, the
Samaritans.
Before we move along too much further, we
should take a look at the relationship that existed between the Jews and
Samaritans.
Here’s a hint. It wasn’t good.
Look at these words from the Gospel of
John:
Now
He had to go through Samaria. So He came to a town in Samaria called Sychar,
near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was
there, and Jesus, tired as He was from the journey, sat down by the well. It
was about noon.
When
a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give Me a
drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
The
Samaritan woman said to Him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can
you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)
Jesus
answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a
drink, you would have asked Him and He would have given you living water.”
“Sir,”
the woman said, “You have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can
You get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us
the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
Jesus
answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever
drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them
will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
The
woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and
have to keep coming here to draw water.”
He
told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
“I
have no husband,” she replied.
Jesus
said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you
have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you
have just said is quite true.”
“Sir,”
the woman said, “I can see that You are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on
this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in
Jerusalem.”
“Woman,”
Jesus replied, “believe Me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father
neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do
not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a
time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the
Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the
Father seeks. God is spirit, and His worshipers must worship in the Spirit and
in truth.”
The
woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When He comes, He
will explain everything to us.”
Then
Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am He.” John 4:4-26
There’s no need to beat around the bush
here. The Samaritans hated the Jews and vice versa. They were enemies and as we
see in this passage, much of it was centered on the matter of worship and more
specifically, where that worship should happen.
The Samaritans worshiped God but were stuck
on the proper place of worship being Mount Gerizim which was within their
region. They believed in their side of this so much that they erected their own
temple and even had their own copy of the Torah, the first five books of the
scriptures also referred to as the Books of the Law or the Pentateuch.
Of course for the Jews, the only proper
place where God was to be worshiped was Jerusalem where God’s holy temple was.
This was why Jews from all over Israel journeyed to Jerusalem to observe
certain major religious festivals such as Passover.
And so there was a real chasm between the
Samaritans and Jews, one that we see in the words of John’s Gospel led to the
different societies not associating with one another. We also sense the
division through the words of the woman when Jesus asked her to get Him a
drink:
“You
are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?”
The woman had no idea that she was speaking
to no ordinary Jew. She later would think He was a mere prophet but through her
later words, we see that she believed that the Messiah would one day come, a
belief that Jesus made sure she knew was fulfilled in meeting and speaking to
Him in the flesh.
One other important note to glean from this
passage before we go back to the verses from Luke that serves as our focus
scripture for today’s devotion. Look at these words of Jesus:
“Woman,
believe Me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this
mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we
worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming
and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit
and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is
spirit, and His worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
Jesus wasn’t going to get into a debate
with the woman about whether Mount Gerizim or Jerusalem was the proper place to
worship God. Rather, He first made it clear that the Jews had it right for the
time being before letting the Samaritan woman know that a day would come when
God would be worshiped in neither place the Samaritans and Jews held sacred.
Rather, a new heaven and earth would come into play and all who gained eternal
life, those who drank of the living water Jesus offered, would worship God and
Jesus there in Spirit and in truth.
Keep all this in mind now as we turn back
to the verses from Luke.
As Jesus was approaching
Samaria, He sent an advance party into a Samaritan village to prepare the way
for His arrival. We’re not told specifically which disciples were sent ahead
but the general feeling among most theologians that James and John, the two
named the “sons of thunder” by Jesus, were are part of that group.
Well, we read where the
welcome was not warm as the Samaritans got wind that Jesus and His disciples
were heading to Jerusalem.
Did I mention the
Samaritans and Jews despised one another?
Well, James and John
were less than happy at the lack of hospitality extended to their Master by the
Samaritans. Such was their level of displeasure that they raged with anger and
wished nothing but harm to the Samaritans, asking Jesus of they could “call
fire down from heaven to destroy” their rivals. They must have been thinking of
a scene when Elijah summoned fire from the heavens to consume his water logged
sacrifice in full view of all the priests and worshipers of Baal.
To James and John,
judgment was the proper response to the rejection they were suffering from the
people in the Samaritan village.
Jesus didn’t quite agree
with their suggested course of action. Not even a little.
For look at the way He
responded to the two men, the sons of Zebedee and among the first four
followers Jesus called:
Jesus turned and rebuked them. Then He and His disciples went to
another village.
Jesus’ reaction was not one of retribution.
It wasn’t an eye for an eye. He didn’t go all Sodom and Gomorrah on the
Samaritans, even though He surely could have if He desired.
No, He didn’t do any of these things.
Rather, He rebuked His disciples for even suggesting such an act and simply
moved on. He walked away, showing grace as only Jesus could do and in doing so,
He showed His disciples (and us today) how we are to deal with rejection.
James and John allowed rejection to move
them to a place of sinful fury. Their rage led them to act on their emotions
and seek to get even instead of moving toward mercy and forgiveness. Consumed
by hatred, present and past, for the Samaritans, James and John were not able
to move on without exacting punishment on those who had done them and Jesus
wrong.
Friends, this is why we have to walk with
Jesus through every day and each encounter within. For left to our own devices,
we will typically react in all the wrong ways when someone wrongs us. We tend
to want to be the exactor of judgment and in doing so, we trump the only One
who is permitted to judge.
It was not James and John’s place to
conjure up any consequences for the Samaritans. It was only Jesus’ place and
this is what brought His rebuke on the disciples.
As we live our lives each day, let’s try to
not repeat the mistakes of the biblical past. When we’re rejected, let’s in
turn choose to reject anger, showing grace instead and moving on while letting
any issuance of justice to Jesus, the only true Judge, the One who God has
given all authority over heaven and earth (Matthew 28:18).
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
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