SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 7/8/2016 8:22 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-2 of The Purpose
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 9:2-5
Message of the verses: “2 And His disciples asked Him, "Rabbi,
who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?" 3 Jesus
answered, "It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it
was so that the works of God might be displayed in him. 4 “We must work the
works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day; night is coming when no one can
work. 5 “While I am in the world, I am the Light of the world.’”
We want to
begin this SD by looking at another possible reason that His disciples asked
the question “who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?” Let us go back to the section in the book of
Exodus that contains the Ten Commandments and look at Exodus 20:5 “"You
shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous
God, visiting the iniquity
of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of
those who hate Me.” Now we want
to look at Exodus 34:6-7 “6 Then the LORD passed by in front of him and
proclaimed, "The LORD, the LORD God, compassionate and gracious, slow to
anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; who keeps lovingkindness for
thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin; yet He will by no means leave
the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the
grandchildren to the third and fourth generations.’” I want to make a comment on these verses in a
different vain as I have been dealing with some people who only believe that
God is love and do not want to talk about His other attributes and these verses
show that not only is God love, but that God is also just. Ok back to our topic. We want to now look at Numbers 14:8 and then
Deuteronomy 5:9 “8 "If the LORD is
pleased with us, then He will bring us into this land and give it to us-a land
which flows with milk and honey.” “’You
shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous
God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, and on the third and
the fourth generations of those who hate Me.”
Now how do
we understand these passages in the right way?
John MacArthur writes “Such passages, however, must be understood in a
national or societal sense. The point is
that the corrupting effect of a wicked generation seeps into subsequent
generations. This is axiomatic, an obvious
reality. The idea that a child will be
punished for the sins of his own parents is a concept foreign to
Scripture. Deuteronomy 24:16 commands, ‘Fathers
shall not be put to death for their sons, nor shall sons be put to death for
their fathers; everyone shall be put to death for his own iniquity; each man
who eats the sour grapes, his teeth will be set on edge.’ (Jer. 31:20-30) Ezekiel 18:20 adds, ‘The person who sins will
die. The son will not bear the
punishment for the father’s iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment
for the son’s iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon
himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself.’”
Some
examples from the OT on how sons will die for their fathers sins in a setting
in society are from the exodus of the nation of Israel as that generation
sinned greatly before the Lord and He told them that everyone over the age of
twenty would die in the wilderness so that none of them, other than Caleb and
Joshua would enter from that generation into the Promised Land. The sins of the fathers caused the sons
twenty and older to die. When you look
at when the Northern Kingdom was destroyed by the Assyrians the same thing
happened as the father’s sins caused death to their children.
You may be
wondering about the passage in Jeremiah 31:29 that talks about “The fathers
have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” The John MacArthur study Bible has this note
in it on this verse: “This was apparently
a proverb among the exiles’ children born in Babylon, to express that they
suffered the consequences of their father’s sins rather than their own.” “Our fathers sinned, and are no more; It is
we who have borne their iniquities (Lamentations 5:7).”
Now Jesus
gives an answer to His disciples in verse 3 “"It was neither that this man
sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed
in him.” Jesus corrected the error that
the disciples were asking about, as there is not always a direct link that is
between suffering and personal sin.
There is an entire book in the Old Testament that speaks to this and
perhaps His disciples forgot about the book of Job. Job’s friends, if you can call them that,
tried to convince Job that the reason he had such calamity befall on him was
because of some hidden sin he had committed, but Job would hear none of that,
and Job was right too. I also want to
offer up another example that Jesus was questioned of and then answered that
question as found in Luke 13:1-5 “1 Now on the same occasion there were some
present who reported to Him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed
with their sacrifices. 2 And Jesus said to them, "Do you suppose that
these Galileans were greater sinners than all other Galileans because they
suffered this fate? 3 “I
tell you, no, but
unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. 4 “Or do you suppose
that those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them were worse
culprits than all the men who live in Jerusalem? 5 “I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will
all likewise perish."”
We can see
that the first two chapters of Job and the story of this blind man tell us very
similar things “so that the works of God might be displayed in him.” MacArthur quotes F. F. Bruce: “This does not mean that God deliberately
caused the child to be born blind in order that, after many years, his glory
should be displayed in the removal of the blindness; to think so would again be
an aspersion on the character of God. It
does mean that God overruled the disaster of the child’s blindness so that,
when the child grew to manhood, he might, by recovering his sight, see the
glory of God in the face of Christ, and others, seeing this work of God, might
turn to the true Light of the World.”
MacArthur adds “God’s sovereignty chose to use this man’s affliction for
His glory.”
Now we come
to the verse that we spoke briefly about in our last SD “We must work the works
of Him who sent Me.” We can see that the
disciples were looking backyard on the blind man’s condition while Jesus was
looking forward to how this can be used for God’s glory. MacArthur adds “John frequently used the verb
dei (‘Must’) to describe Jesus’
active fulfillment of the mission given Him by the Father (cf. 3:14; 10:16;
12:34; 20:9). Here the plural pronoun ‘we’
includes the disciples, who also were empowered to do ‘the works of’ the Father
‘who sent’ Jesus.”
“As long as it is day” speaks of a sense of
urgency in order to get the work done for He goes on to say “Night is coming
when no one can work.” Now this speaks
of Jesus being taken away from them in His death as the disciples would be
taken over by the darkness and would not be able to work until the Holy Spirit
came upon them at Pentecost as seen in Acts chapter two.
Jesus then
adds “While I am in the world, I am the Light of the world.” We can be sure that the Lord continues to be the
Light of the World even after His death for He arose from the dead and is now
in heaven as He continues to use His people to do His work on earth until He
comes again. We, His people are to
continue to do His work and spread His Word throughout the world. “I preach as never sure to preach again, and
as a dying man to dying men.” This quote is found in MacArthur’s commentary and
is from a Puritan preacher, Richard Baxter.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Richard Baxter’s quote is a good one for me
to follow, although I am not a preacher, I can help get the Word out around the
world through the wonderful technology of the internet, and it is my desire to
do this each and every day.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: “Be diligent to present
yourself approved to God, a worker who doesn’t need to be ashamed, correctly
teaching the word of truth.”
Memory verses for the week:
(Romans 6:1-2): “1. What shall we
say then? Shall we continue in sin that
grace may increase? 2. May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in
it?”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Isaac” (Genesis 21:1-3).
Today’s Bible question:
“Who wrote most of the Psalms?”
Answer in our next SD.
7/8/2016 9:24 AM
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