SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/15/2022 8:57 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-1 “Intro
to Matt. 13:1-17”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
13:1-17
Message of the verses: “1 On that day
Jesus went out of the house, and was sitting by the sea. 2 And great multitudes
gathered to Him, so that He got into a boat and sat down, and the whole
multitude was standing on the beach. 3 And He spoke many things to them in parables,
saying, "Behold, the sower went out to sow; 4 and as he sowed, some seeds
fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up. 5 “And others fell
upon the rocky places, where they did not have much soil; and immediately they
sprang up, because they had no depth of soil. 6 “But when the sun had risen,
they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. 7 “And
others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out. 8 “And
others fell on the good soil, and yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some
sixty, and some thirty. 9 “He who has ears, let him hear." 10 And the disciples
came and said to Him, "Why do You speak to them in parables?" 11 And
He answered and said to them, "To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the
kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been granted. 12 “For whoever has, to him shall more
be given, and he shall have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what
he has shall be taken away from him. 13 “Therefore I speak to them in parables;
because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor
do they understand. 14 “And in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is being
fulfilled, which says, ‘YOU WILL KEEP ON HEARING, BUT WILL NOT UNDERSTAND; AND
YOU WILL KEEP ON SEEING, BUT WILL NOT PERCEIVE; 15 FOR THE HEART OF THIS PEOPLE HAS BECOME DULL,
AND WITH THEIR EARS THEY SCARCELY HEAR, AND THEY HAVE CLOSED THEIR EYES LEST
THEY SHOULD SEE WITH THEIR EYES, AND HEAR WITH THEIR EARS, AND UNDERSTAND WITH
THEIR HEART AND RETURN, AND I SHOULD HEAL THEM.’ 16 “But blessed are your eyes,
because they see; and your ears, because they hear. 17 "For truly I say to
you, that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did
not see it; and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.”
I really don’t know where to start with this
introduction as there are many things on my mind because I listened to two
sermons from John MacArthur that were actually just the introduction to chapter
thirteen, and I have to say that I learned a lot of new things from those
sermons that I did not know before. I
knew that chapter thirteen was a great turning point in Matthew’s gospel, as I
have heard or read things about it that showed me this was a turning
point. The reason that I thought it was,
was because of what the scribes and Pharisees had accused Jesus of doing
miracles by the power of Satan, and then we find in chapter thirteen that Jesus
begins to speak in parables because He had given up on the people because of
being accused of doing miracles in the power of Satan.
I
have checked and found out that the commentary from MacArthur’s book on Matthew
chapter thirteen is over 70 pages in length so all I can say is buckle your
seat belt as we will be here for a considerable length of time.
I
listened to the two introductory sermons while doing my walk yesterday and one
of the things that I learned was that in this chapter these different parables
speak of the church age, which is a part of the mysterious kingdom age. It is mysterious because the church had not
been prophesied in the Old Testament, but as mentioned it is a part of the kingdom
which we will have many things to say about as we work our way through this
chapter.
I
have to say that I have had the good pleasure of attending two great churches
since the Lord save me. The first one
for 32 years which I attended had two wonderful pastors, and then after the
next pastor came I had to get out of there, and finally he got out of
there. However after leaving to find our
next church we had a great pastor there for almost ten years, but he left to go
to be the President of Baptist Mid Missions, a very wonderful missionary
group. We got a new Pastor and let me
just say that I am getting use to him, but also to say that he does a very fine
job in teaching the Bible, something that I so much enjoy. However this is not the usual for the history
of the church as there has been many things taught about what the function of
the church really is all about, and what the church should accomplish. As mentioned Jesus is giving these parables
in the 13th chapter of Matthew to help us understand what the church
is about and even what will happen to the church in its long history. John MacArthur writes “Some foundational
truths for understanding the mission of the church are found in the thirteenth
chapter of Matthew’s gospel. The Lord of
the church reveals the nature of the church and the spiritual characteristics
of the period of time often referred to as the church age. In this marvelously prophetic chapter, Jesus
describes the character of the era between His firs and second comings.”
Lord
willing we will continue to look at this introduction in our next SD, but I
will probably not quote all 17 verses tomorrow.
3/15/2022 9:44 AM
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