Febuary 29.12 ethot

Matthew 27:37 (27–37) “This is Jesus the king of the Jews.”

John tells us that the inscription over His head was written in Hebrew, Latin and Greek (John 19:20). I guess Pilot wanted the Jews, the Romans and the rest of the world to know who this man was?

Hebrew was the Jewish language, although most of them spoke in Aramaic. Latin was the pure Roman tongue and Greek was the commercial or business language of the day like English is today.

In a way Pilot’s effort worked because just about everybody on the planet knows the name Jesus, whether they know who He really is or not. People still either revere His name or curse His name. The question that came to my mind this morning was; in what way have I been proclaiming His name to my own people, the people over me and the people I deal with everyday?

Loyalty involves not just remembering who my God is, but helping others to remember as well.

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Febuary 28.12 ethot

Matthew 27:19 (1–26) “Have nothing to do with that righteous Man;”

It is true that one of the best pieces of advice a husband can get is to listen to his wife, even when she seems to make no sense. Pilot wasn’t going to render civil justice at the whim of his wife, but he should have listened more carefully at what she said.

It was now too late to return Jesus without a judgment (He had been seen by Herod, Luke 23:8–12). So he made the politically expedient choice rather than to dispense justice. Following his wife’s direction, he tried to wash his hands of the case but it was too late.

Jesus was innocent (righteous) and should have been released, but politics was more important than what was right. Like today, right depends on the circumstances.

Courage involves setting your fears aside so you can do what is right.

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Febuary 27.12 ethot

Matthew 27:4 (1–10) “What is that to us?”

Like Peter Judas couldn’t stay away. There was something about what he had done that kept pulling at him. When he realized that he had betrayed an innocent man he was overwhelmed with grief and determined to make it right.

Judas was not just returning the thirty pieces of silver; he was trying to buy Jesus back, cheap. This sale had no money back guarantee. Everybody knows that if you buy a car and then try to sell it back there will be penalties even if you could sell it back. Jesus, of course is not a car, but we have to realize that time wasted can’t be bought back.

Remember the story of the prodigal son? The world only cares to use you for it’s purposes, they don’t really care about you. Jesus cared enough about Judas to select and train him, but the choice to join, to stay or leave was Judas’ alone. You have a choice, also. Make the right one and prove it every day.

Alertness is not just to danger. It involves paying attention to opportunities God presents for real change, right now.

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Febuary 24.12 ethot

Matthew 26:73 (69–75) “Surely you too are one of them; for the way you talk gives you away.”

If Peter was trying to keep a low profile, it was apparently not working very well. There were people there who had heard enough of the way Jesus and His followers spoke to know they where different.

Now it could just be that Jesus and His group, being from Galilee, just sounded different culturally, but there were all sorts of people there for the Passover. I wonder if the difference wasn’t that being with Jesus made their speech change. I say that because, to make him sound more like the others, Peter started to curse.

Peter’s language, like that of all who had decided to be with Him, had cleaned up. They sounded like Jesus. If you wonder what that sounds like, not only should you read through the four Gospels, but Paul tells us the specific way believers talk to each other in Ephesians 5:19.

Now I wonder if I sound like I’ve been with Jesus?

Wisdom involves recognizing how God is using my story to influence the lives of others.

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Febuary 23.12 ethot

Matthew 26:64 (57–68) “Jesus say to him, You have said it yourself;”

Still in his confusion about what happened in the garden, Peter could not stay away, could you?

There were many other occasions when Jesus was faced with false, foolish and just plain silly accusations, but He always had an answer. There was even one time when He just walked through the mob and they were not even aware.

What was different about this time, why couldn’t He shut their mouths or just walk away? The answer is simple yet hard. Simple in that it wasn’t complicated what He was required to do, hard in that it would go against His natural instincts as a man.

God doesn’t ask us to do a lot of complicated stuff, He knows us too well. But what He does ask is hard because it goes against what we would rather do. Jesus is only asking us to follow Him, simple enough. But, we must follow Him wherever He went, that is much harder when we see where He went.

Decisiveness involves learning how to make decisions based on an understanding of God’s ways and God’s will.

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Febuary 22.12 ethot

Matthew 26:56 (42–56) “But all this has taken place to fulfill Scripture of the prophets.”

Although it seems heroic of Peter to try (although completely overwhelmed) and protect his Lord (John 18:10), Jesus points out that nothing that anyone can do can keep what is necessary to happen from happening.

We need to realize and accept this concept no matter how hard it is to accept. Nothing, not even Satan, let alone you can stop God’s plan from obtaining its goal of saving man from himself and re-establishing the relationship between He and man as it was originally intended to be.

It’s not that God wants us all to just run away, it takes more courage to face our attackers with the truth than with a sword or a gun. None of us will probably ever need this level of courage in our witness, so what’s keeping us from witnessing right where we are?

Courage involves setting your fears aside so you can do what is right.

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Febuary 20.12 ethot

Matthew 26:40 (31–41) “So, you men could not keep watch with Me for one hour?”

Overwhelmed with emotion over the things He was about to suffer He took with Him the inner circle of disciples to pray for Him and them. He must have poured out everything He knew about what was about to happen to the extent that they were grieved as well, Luke 22:45.

Earlier at the dinner table Jesus had warned them all that they would runaway when the soldiers came for Him and they all protested. The loudest one was Peter, who said he would die first. Yet, when Jesus came to check on His prayer warriors they had fallen asleep.

He said, “you men” couldn’t stay up one hour, how do you expect to stay up for the real battle, 26:41. It’s not so important for us men to say it as it is for us to be it when the time comes. It’s much better for us to keep our mouths shut and just show up for the task.

The Lord has called men to watch over their wives and His church with the weapon of prayer, Ephesians 6:18. Lets just do our job.

Courage involves setting your fears aside so you can do what is right.

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Febuary 17.12 ethot

Matthew 26:30 (17–30) “After singing a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.”

During the Passover meal (commemorating the day the angel of death passed over the first born of Israel to kill the first born of Egypt) Jesus reveals that He knew someone would betray Him from within His own group.

He also institutes the first communion meal. The purpose of the meal then became to remember what Jesus was doing for them and for us. That is that He was offering Himself up as a sacrifice to God for our sins. At the end of the meal they sang a hymn. Scholars say it was probably one of the traditional hymn found in Psalms 115–118.

In this hymn I found this verse: “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His godly ones.” It makes me wonder how many of us are Godly. The first step towards being Godly is to trust that the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross is enough to save me. But that is only the first step, 2 Peter 1:5–8.

Faith involves resting all my hopes for tomorrow on God’s proven promises rather than on man’s faltering word.

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Febuary 16.12 ethot

Matthew 26:2 (1–16) “You know that after two days the Passover is coming and the Son of man is to be handed over for crucifixion.”

Jesus had already mentioned that He was there to be put to death, Matthew 16:21, 17:22, and 20:18. It was not news to them, but apparently the reaction to those words was reflective of the message He had just finished delivering.

Mary (John 12:3) understood Jesus words and apparently believing them had prepared for His burial, 25:1–13. Where as the disciples, lead by Judas Iscariot (John 12:4) were angry that the perfume wasn’t sold and distributed to the poor, 26:9, they apparently knew better (25:14–30).

I don’t think that Mary thought it was a happy occasion, but a sad one, that the Son of God had to come and make Himself a sacrifice to save a people who didn’t yet know who He really was and what He was doing. I don’t think Mary poured out that perfume with great joy, but with great sadness. She must have thought the disciples were crazy, but she said nothing.

Discernment involves knowing when to take action and when to just listen.

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Febuary 15.12 ethot

Matthew 25:45 (31–46) “Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of the least of these, you did it to Me.”

Before entering into the millennial reign the Jews will be judged as to where their heart has been, if they remained true to their commitment to the Messiah (Jesus). The parables of the virgins and talents talk about that judgment of the Jews through the Seven Year Tribulation period. But, the parable of the sheep and goats is not about Israel.

In v. 25:32 the word nations is in other cases translated Gentiles. So this story is about the judgment of the non-Jewish peoples who saw the needs of the Jews and helped, in spite of the danger to themselves. These are gentiles who believe, at that time, that Jesus is the Savior and Messiah.

In all three stories the proof of their belief was their behavior (what they did). The sheep will then go one to reign with Jesus and the Jews (the five virgins, the loyal slaves). But the goats along with the unprepared virgins and the disloyal slave will go into eternal punishment.

One way, then, to look at our stay here on earth and at this time is what am I doing with this opportunity to prove to Him that I believe, as He proved to me He loves me, Romans 5:8.

Humility involves recognizing the mercy and grace of God in our election.

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