Often we believers fail to speak
up for fear of being PC (politicly correct). We forget that even Jesus was
called into account by the chief priests and elders of the people, “By what
authority are you doing these things?” they asked. “And who gave you this
authority” (Matt 21:23b NIV)? Paul reminds us, that we too have authority in
Christ Jesus, “These, then, are the things you should teach. Encourage and
rebuke with all authority. Do not let anyone despise you” (Titus 2:15 NIV).
1 comment:
Gail;
-----It was proper for the chief priests and elders to question about Jesus’ authority. We live in a fractured world The ground is fractured through the bedrock and crust clear to the mantle; it no longer works in harmonious unison producing stable, firm landscapes for dwelling and farming. It renders devastating earthquakes as fractured sections grind against one another, each seemingly of its own authority. The people are fractured. They do not work and play in unison, enjoying the land together even though it quakes. They give their unity to thousands of small bands grinding against one another with each its own authority. And belief is fractured. The knowledge of mankind presents countless masters grinding against each other like the blindness of stupidity, the arrogance of acclaimed authority. The total of it all begs for someone to have all authority. And here comes this Jesus. He claims that authority. Yet He looks quite ordinary.
-----Mental stability is built upon conservation of core beliefs. The Christian’s core beliefs are stabilized by Scripture. We hold it up to be the highest authority for the formation of what we think. We hold the Holy Spirit up as the higher authority for transforming our thoughts into beliefs and developing those into emotions and actions. We hold Christ up as a higher authority for having made a way for this to come to us, and His Father up higher for having determined all this to be the way things will work. And we know all this authority because we can hold in our hand the far more complete story of it than the chief priests and elders had.
-----By what means, then, should they have come to know Jesus’ authority like we do? Jesus’ works were everywhere to be seen. Their reality was undeniable. People were not only abuzz over them, they were showing all the signs of belief in His power by flocking to Him in droves to be healed of their infirmities. This was much different than the fractured nature of things. It was a putting together in this place of grinding up. And then there was the testimony of His ideas. People flocked to Him to hear what He said, because His propositions did not fit the world’s fractured philosophies. It was simple, to the point, and directive towards one glorious finality. Not only was it not fractured, it alluded to how man’s ideological fracturing could be repaired, curing his social fracturing so the earth itself could one day be healed.
-----The chief priests and elders were so frightened at the challenge Jesus was to their own authority, they forgot to think. That’s what happens to people captured by panic. They ground against God’s authority with their own. They charged against His ideology like gnats into the candle flame, authorizing thousands of scoffers to dig themselves into the grinding earth. Thinking is important. They should of questioned their own authority, always the first step to finding God’s authority. Finding God’s authority is the first step to being built up in unity, rather than questioning it.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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