Luke-10:21-42-niv

John the Baptist gave his questioners a brief sentence that I have called the "hope and the despair" of mankind. He told them that "a man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven." John was not referring to men's gifts. He was speaking of spiritual truth. Divine truth is of the nature of the Holy Spirit, and for that reason it can be received only by spiritual revelation. In his New Testament letters, the Apostle Paul declares again and again the inability of human reason to...

For Reading and Meditation:     Luke 10:25-37

We continue focusing our thoughts on what it means to be "merciful". One of the best ways to understand the word is to compare it with grace. Have you ever noticed, that the introduction to every one of Paul's epistles from Romans through to 2Thessalonians, includes the words: "Grace and peace to you from God our...

For Reading and Meditation:     Hebrews 4:12-16

Yesterday we ended with the case of the woman who said that she didn't know how to mourn, when in reality her problem was she didn't want to mourn. Whenever we are unwilling to face a negative emotion, it implies that we are not in control of it, but that it is in control of us. Christians are often taught to pretend...

For Reading and Meditation:     Mark 6:45-51

Yesterday we said that we all want to be happy - and rightly so. This is a deep-rooted instinct which God has built into us. But happiness is not something you make but something you receive. You cannot make happiness any more than you can make love. You can express love but you cannot make love. So it is with happiness....

THE things of time are transient, the things of eternity are permanent. The world passeth away. The body must die; earthly connexions must be dissolved; but the soul must live for ever. The welfare of the soul is the one thing needful. If the soul is in a sanctified and healthy state, it will be found at the feet of Jesus; it will relish His words; and enjoy His communications more than the riches feast. We shall be seeking to know Him, love Him, believe Him, obey Him, and enjoy Him....

The Saviour was "a man of sorrows," but every thoughtful mind has discovered the fact that down deep in his innermost soul he carried an inexhaustible treasury of refined and heavenly joy. Of all the human race, there was never a man who had a deeper, purer, or more abiding peace than our Lord Jesus Christ. "He was anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows." His vast benevolence must, from the very nature of things, have afforded him the deepest possible delight, for benevolence...

Her fault was not that she served: the condition of a servant well becomes every Christian. "I serve," should be the motto of all the princes of the royal family of heaven. Nor was it her fault that she had "much serving." We cannot do too much. Let us do all that we possibly can; let head, and heart, and hands, be engaged in the Master's service. It was no fault of hers that she was busy preparing a feast for the Master. Happy Martha, to have an opportunity of entertaining so blessed a...

Mary sat quietly at Jesus' feet and heard His word. Martha was flustered and upset in her service, and resented the fact that Mary didn't pitch in to help. The Lord Jesus didn't correct Martha for her service but for the spirit in which she was doing it. Also there is a suggestion that Martha's priorities were wrong; she shouldn't have put service above worship.

Many of us are like Martha. We are achievers, who would rather be doing than sitting. We pride ourselves on being organized,...

Luke 4:16-30

Christ never forgot the place where He had spent His childhood years. We are not given many facts of His life there. Nothing indicates that there was anything unusual in the story of the thirty years He spent there. The more we think of His life at Nazareth as simply natural, without anything unusual - the nearer shall we come to the true picture of the

Luke 10:25-37

This is one of the great parables which only Luke has preserved for us. If Luke's gospel had not been written, we never would have had this beautiful story. This suggests one reason why we have four Gospels instead of one. No one of the four, tells us all about Christ or records all of His sayings. Each one gives facts and incidents and...