Authentic Faith - The Pharisee and the Tax Collector
In the parable of the pharisee and the tax collector, we see the...
Who do you say Jesus is? While some try to minimize him to simply a good teacher of life lessons, Jesus actually doesn’t give us that option. Jesus claimed - and proved - to be the Christ, the Son of God and one with the Father. To follow Jesus means to put our own interests aside as we sacrificially live and love like Jesus.
God provides. It’s a simple statement, yet we can be quick to forget it when challenges in life make us think that our needs won’t be met. When Jesus miraculously provides food for thousands of people from a single meal, he teaches his disciples an important lesson about God’s provision, love and care for His people. God doesn’t just provide - He provides in abundance.
What does it look like to proclaim God’s Kingdom to the people around you? Just as Jesus gave his disciples a mission to go out into the world to tell people about the Kingdom of God, we have that same mission today. No matter where our day-to-day lives takes us - work, school, family, sports, hobbies and more - we have an opportunity to point others toward the hope of God’s Kingdom. Are you ready to be sent by Jesus?
The most desperate moments of life are what often draw us most strongly to Jesus. The stories of Jairus’ daughter and the woman with the flow of blood show us that when life brings its biggest challenges, we can find hope, comfort, and peace through the power of Christ and his love for us. But our desperation for Jesus should also extend beyond the times of trial we face and into our everyday lives. Through these stories we’re faced with the question: are we desperate for Jesus every day?
Jesus has power and authority over the powers of darkness - Satan and his demons. While it can be easy to be distracted by the preoccupation our culture has with the demonic, God’s Word is clear in its warning against any association with those powers. Instead, the Bible calls us to focus on the beauty and power of Christ: the one who has overcome every power of darkness, who saved us through His sacrifice, and who called us out of darkness into His glorious light.
Knowing the good news about Jesus and the redemption we have in him is an incredible gift. But Jesus calls us to do more than just know the gospel - he calls us to live it out. When we truly understand the truth about the gift of grace we’ve received, it should motivate us to share that truth with the people around us. Jesus calls us to be his light in the world, reflecting his love everywhere we go and sharing - in both words and actions - the hope we have in him.
When the gospel is shared, it can be met with many different reactions. Some reject it out of a hardness of heart. Some are excited about it but then lose interest when it doesn’t fit their own agenda. Some receive it sincerely but find it difficult to live out amongst the busyness of life. And some receive with their whole heart, striving to live out a life of faith daily. Jesus tells a story of these four reactions as he teaches his disciples - and us - about the kind of heart God is looking for among His people.
Humility comes from recognizing our sin and need for a savior. In an incredible display of humility, a woman washes Jesus’ feet with her tears and hair, recognizing her own sin and Jesus’ power to forgive. As the self-righteous religious leaders look down on her, Jesus gives them a reality check and reminds us all that his forgiveness is for everyone, but only if we’re first willing to be honest about our own sin.
What happens when God doesn’t meet our expectations? Maybe it’s an unanswered prayer or a situation doesn’t go the way we’d like, but we’ll all encounter times when we realize we’ve put an expectation on God. As Jesus confronts the expectations of the people around him in his day, he reminds us that true faith avoids false expectations. Instead, he calls us to expect God’s plan and purposes to be revealed in His way and in His timing, trusting in faith that God’s way is always the perfect way.
Jesus’ miracles came from both a response to people’s faith as well as his compassion for those who were suffering. As he traveled from place to place, he was revealing the Kingdom of God - a kingdom free of sickness and suffering, where even death has been overcome. As his followers, Jesus asks us to share his compassion for the lost and broken as we tell others the good news about the Kingdom of God.
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Sermons by: Jeff Stevens
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