SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 7/8/2023 9:19 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-2 “The Counter Question”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
21:24-27
Message of the verses: “24 Jesus said to
them, "I will also ask you one thing, which if you tell Me, I will also
tell you by what authority I do these things. 25 “The baptism of John was from
what source, from heaven or from men?" And they began reasoning
among themselves, saying, "If we say, ‘From heaven,’ He will say to us, ‘Then
why did you not believe him?’ 26 “But if we say, ‘From men,’ we fear the
people; for they all regard John as a prophet." 27 And answering Jesus,
they said, "We do not know." He also said to them, "Neither will
I tell you by what authority I do these things.”
In verse 26 we can see that the religious leaders
continued to discuss Jesus’ question, they realized that if they answered the
opposite way they would also be in trouble.
If they said John’s ministry and message were from men, they would lose
what little credibility they had with the people and would even incite their indignation,
because the multitude still believed John was a prophet, and of course that is
a true statement. These Jewish leaders
did not believe that John was a prophet; however they dare not state this in
public. So they did what they had to do
and that is to tell Jesus we do not know.
Jesus then said to them "Neither will I tell
you by what authority I do these things.”
Jesus knew that if He would have given them the answer that they would
have used it against Him and probably would have tried to have Him killed right
then. However Jesus was in complete
control of when He was to die and that was on Passover day. These people did not really want to know the
truth, but they wanted to get rid of Jesus because He was interfering with
their false religion and control of the people.
John
MacArthur writes “The religious leaders persisted in rejecting the light Christ
sent them, and He therefore turned it off.
He had no more teaching for the scribes, Pharisees, chief priests, and
others whose self-satisfaction blinded them to the truth of the gospel and
their own need for it. For them there
would only be further warning and condemnation.
In a long series of woes, Jesus was about to declare judgment against
them for doing their deeds to be seen of men, for refusing to enter the kingdom
themselves and for hindering others from entering, for being blind religious
guides, for being outwardly righteous but inwardly wicked, for honoring the
ancient prophets in name but being of the same mind as their forefathers who
killed the prophets, and for being a brood of vipers destined for hell (Matt.
23:5, 13, 16, 27, 30, 33).”
I
think that it is best for me to end this SD today (Saturday) because I don’t
like to make long SD’s on Sunday due to the fact that I am again teaching
Sunday school and I desire to do my Spiritual Diaries in the morning. I have to say that the above paragraph has a
lot of things in it to think about. This
kind of thing still goes on in our world today as there are still many false
teachers who are making a living off the gospel, but aren’t teaching the truth
about it, and that is a shame. Remember that
when a person is truly born-again that the thing that they will do in their new
life is to produce fruit. 7/8/2023 9:44
AM
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