SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 5/4/2023 10:45 AM
My Worship Time
Focus: PT-2
“Political Power Play”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
20:20-21
Message of the verses: “20 Then the mother
of the sons of Zebedee came to Jesus with her sons, bowing down and making a
request of Him. 21 And He said to her, "What do you wish?" She said
to Him, "Command that in Your kingdom these two sons of mine may sit one
on Your right and one on Your left.’”
I remember listening to the sermon from John
MacArthur that goes along with this passage and he put it this way, which is
the way that it is seen in Mark’s gospel.
He talked about having one of his children coming to he and his wife and
they would say something like I want you to say yes to what I am going to ask
you. Well in his family this never
happened, and this is like what the mother of James and John was asking Jesus,
that is to do something that she was asking Him before she told Him what it
what she wanted Him to do. I have to say
that because Jesus knew what it was that she wanted that it probably did not
make a lot of difference.
Now
I mentioned that James and John’s mother was actually the aunt of Jesus as Mary
and their mother were sisters. James and
John were actually first cousins of Jesus. You have to look at all four gospels to figure
all this out. I guess that the best way
to understand this is to quote a paragraph from MacArthur’s commentary. “The three of them may have been trying to
capitalize on their family relationship to Jesus. By comparing the gospel accounts of the women
who stood vigil near the cross, it becomes evident that the mother of James and
John was named Salome, and was a sister of Mary, the Mother of Jesus (see Matt.
27:56; Mark 15:40; John 19:25), making her Jesus’ aunt and James and John His
first cousins. In addition to relying on
their relationship as Jesus’ cousins, the brothers perhaps also thought to play
on Jesus’ affection for His mother by having her sister approach Him for the
favor.”
We
see in verse 20 that Salome, the mother of James and John bowed down which was a common act of obedience given to ancient monarchs, and the
mother may have been trying to flatter Jesus by appealing to Hi sense of power
and royalty. It seems that she was
treating Him like a King, which of course He was, but as mentioned before I am
not sure if she knew this at this time. It was known of the near eastern kings
that they like to give favors to others as it would pride themselves by doing
this. Think of how John the Baptist was
murdered as seen in Mark 6:23 “And he swore to her, "Whatever you ask of
me, I will give it to you; up to half of my kingdom.’” The result of giving this girl what she
wanted was the death of John the Baptist.
What
James, John, and their mother wanted was like a blank check, and I have to
believe that they knew that this was not a legitimate request. Think for a moment of what their nickname was
“Sons of Thunder.” I want my sons, the
sons of thunder to sit on Your right and on Your left in your kingdom. I realize that they would change after the
church began, and also that James would become the first to die for the cause
of Christ in the church age, but they had not changed that much yet.
MacArthur
concludes this section by writing “Like the scribes and Pharisees who loved ‘the
place of honor at banquets, and the chief seats in the synagogues’ (Matt. 23:26),
James and John longed for prestige and preeminence and to be exalted over the
other apostles. Like the self-seeking
Diotrephes (3 John 9), they loved to be first.
But that is not the way to greatness in the kingdom of God.”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I can learn from this passage to be humble
and not to talk a lot which is what our Bible Study was about last night.
My Steps of Faith for Today: I desire to
continue to think about Philippians 4:8 as this is the verse that I have been
attracted to for a long time, that is off and on for a long time.
“Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.” (NASB95)
5/4/2023 11:13 AM
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