Tag: Jesus

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The Undead

In the parable about the rich man and the beggar, Lazarus, Jesus shares an intriguing story. In it, both men die; Lazarus goes to heaven, but the rich man ends up in hell.

Desperate to spare his family from the torment he is suffering, the rich man makes a request of Father Abraham to send Lazarus back, warning those he loves. Abraham reminds him that they have already failed to heed the prior warnings that others have given.

The man persists, asserting that they would surely listen to someone who has returned from the dead. Abraham’s words are somber, saying “they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.”

This was later proved to be correct. After Jesus’ resurrection, hundreds of dead people came back to life, went into the city, and appeared to many. Yet despite hundreds of formerly dead people walking around the city, only a 120 believed and were waiting in the upper room as Jesus commanded.

What happened to all the rest? They saw the miracle of Jesus’ resurrection and hundreds of the undead, but they remained unchanged.

Jesus’ prophecy was correct, that “they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.”

Though not everyone will be convinced, some will be. I am; are you?

[Luke 16:19-31, Matthew 27:51-53, and Acts 1:14-15]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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The Third Time’s a Charm

In Jude’s short letter, he often writes in triads, listing three items or offering three examples.  He does this with such regularity that when he deviates from this in verse 12, I thought I had misread the text.  Consider the following triplets:

  • three actions of God: called, loved, and kept (and if you implicitly see the Holy Spirit in doing the calling, then the Trinity is implied here as well: Holy Spirit, Father, and Jesus); verse 1.
  • three blessings: mercy, peace, and love; verse 2.
  • three historic warnings: leaving Egypt, deserting angels, and Sodom and Gomorrah; verses 5-7.
  • three negative actions: pollute their bodies, reject authority, and slander angels; verse 8.
  • three bad examples: Cain, Balaam, and Korah; verse 11.
  • five negative allusions: shepherds who feed only themselves, clouds without rain, dead autumn trees, wild waves, wandering stars; verse 12.
  • three characteristics of ungodly men in the church: cause division, follow natural instincts, and do not have the Spirit; verse 19.
  • three prescriptions: build up your faith, pray in the Holy Spirit, and stay in God’s love; verses 20-21.
  • three ways to show mercy: help doubters, save others from destruction, and carefully rescue others without being taken down; verse 22.
  • three attributes of God: keeps us from falling, presents us without fault, and has great joy; verse 24.
  • four praises for God: glory, majesty, power, and authority; verse 25.

As someone who also has a propensity of writing in threes, Jude’s style is especially appealing to me.

[Read Jude 1]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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A Servant of Jesus

In the post “Who is Jude?” I speculated that Jude might be Jesus’ brother.  Aside from that, we only know one other thing about him.  Jude views himself simply as “a servant of Jesus.”

Today, in a time when religious people parade their titles and promote their education as if they were badges of godly distinction, someone who calls himself a servant would be shockingly countercultural.

When people introduce themselves as “Reverend,” “Bishop,” “Elder,” “Doctor,” “Prophet,” or my favorite, “Reverend-Doctor” so-and-so I wonder about their motives.

Who are they trying to impress?  Others?  God?  Or maybe it’s a futile attempt to convince themselves they are someone who they truly know they are not.

How refreshing it would be for someone to simply say that he or she is a servant of Jesus.  What a great and significant credential it would be, perhaps the best one possible.

I don’t think titles and degrees mean much to Jesus; he is looking for servants.  After all, Jesus himself said he came to serve.  Shouldn’t we — as his followers — do the same?

[Jude 1:1 and Matthew 20:28]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Bible

Who is Jude?

In the Bible, there is only one mention of a man named Jude.  That lone reference occurs in the opening greeting of the letter that he wrote.

However, Jude is a variation of Judas.  Apparently, Judas was a common name two thousand years ago:

  • Judas Iscariot: who betrayed Jesus
  • Judas (not Judas Iscariot): another follower of Jesus
  • Judas son of James
  • Judas the Galilean
  • Judas on Straight Street: whose house Saul (Paul) went to after his encounter with God
  • Judas (called Barsabbas): an early missionary
  • Judas, a brother of Jesus

We can rule out Judas Iscariot, because he committed suicide before this letter was written, while Judas the Galilean is an historical reference.  That leaves five others for possible consideration.

Another clue is that Jude is the brother of James.  There are also several James mentioned in the Bible.  Do any of those men named Judas have a brother James?  The answer is yes.  Jesus had four brothers (technically half brothers): James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas.

It is quite possible that Jude is Jesus’ brother.  Regardless of who he is, it is his message — warning against ungodly people in the church — that matters.

[Jude 1:1, mentions of Judas, Matthew 13:55]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Jude’s Advice

In Jude’s letter, he warns Jesus’ followers to be on the alert for ungodly people in the church.

After detailing their characteristics, Jude tucks in a bit of advice at the end of his letter.  Implicitly, it is his recommendations on how followers of Jesus can avoid being ungodly, offering three prescriptions to promote godliness:

  1. Build up your faith.
  2. Pray in the Holy Spirit.
  3. Remain in God’s love.

These, then, are three essentials that we are to actively pursue: faith, prayer, and love.

Although some items on Jude’s list of ungodly behaviors may be far removed from us, other aspects might be quite close, such as speaking against things we don’t understand and being divisive.

What about grumbling and finding fault?  For those who follow Jesus, these are apparently all forms of ungodliness.

However, we can do much to avoid these errors as we actively seek to build up our faith, pray with the Holy Spirit’s power, and abide in the love of God.

By following Jude’s advice, we can avoid the error of ungodliness.

[Jude 1:20-21]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Cannibalism

Jesus said many things that surprised and even shocked his followers.  One of his more appalling statements was that we needed to eat his body and drink his blood.  That’s a hard thing to swallow — literally and figuratively.  Gross.

He asserted that those who ate his body and drank his blood would have eternal life.  Jesus’ followers had trouble dealing with this and many stopped following him because of that.  I would have had second thoughts, too.

Of course, Jesus wasn’t issuing a call for cannibalism, he was speaking metaphorically.  However, ascertaining precisely what he meant is a bit challenging.

Just as we need food and drink for physical life, we need Jesus’ body and blood (his death) for spiritual life.

Eating his body and drinking his blood is a euphemism for accepting him and his death as the solution for the wrong things we have done.

Also, eating his body and drinking his blood foreshadows communion (aka the Lord’s Supper, the Eucharist), which serves as a regular reminder of his sacrificial death for us.

Eating his body and drinking his blood was not a physical call to cannibalism, but a spiritual invitation to salvation.

[John 6:54-55 and John 6:60 & 66]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Don’t Drink Blood / Drink My Blood

Among the many “laws” (that is, rules and regulations for right behavior), that God — through Moses — gave the nation of Israel was an unconditional prohibition against drinking blood.

Every Hebrew would have been taught this from early childhood.  Breaking this law would have been unthinkable to them, a repulsive act to even consider.  Drinking blood was strictly verboten.

Then Jesus came along with his radical teaching that shocked many.  He told his followers that they needed to drink his blood.  His followers — all Hebrews — were appalled.  Viewing his statement as heresy, many turned their backs on him and left.

The idea was so repulsive to them that they were unable to get past the shock of a literal interpretation to consider that it might just have a figurative meaning.

In making this bold statement, Jesus was foreshadowing his sacrificial death.  Succinctly, his blood would be spilt as a redeeming, life-restoring sacrifice.

Jesus wasn’t contradicting the laws of Moses.  Instead, he voiced his intention to fulfill it.

[Leviticus 17:10-12 and John 6:54-55]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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You are In Christ, Crucified with Him

The apostle Paul writes to the church in Galatia about being “crucified with Christ.”  In his letter to the church in Corinth, he states, “You are in Christ.”

That is a hard concept for me to grasp, yet, the phrase “in Christ” occurs some 90 times in the Bible.  It appears in about half of the New Testament books, from Acts to 1 Peter, encompassing the writings of Luke, Paul, and Peter.

What does it mean to be “crucified with Christ” and to be “in Christ?”

Watchman Nee, in his book Sit, Walk, Stand, offers a most helpful illustration.  He says, “If I put a dollar bill between the pages of a magazine, and then burn the magazine, where is the dollar bill?”

It is turned to ashes, along with the magazine.  What happens to the magazine also happens to the dollar.  “Their history has become one.”

“Just as effectively,” he continues, “God has put us in Christ.  What happened to him happened also to us.  All the experiences he met, we too have met in him.”

“Our history,” he concludes, was “written in Christ before we were born.” We were crucified with him.

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Jesus is the Reason

In studying the short letter to Philemon, we’ve looked at the central players of Paul (the author), Philemon (the recipient), and Onesimus (the subject).

There are also brief mentions of eight others: Timothy, Apphia, Archippus, Epaphras, Aristarchus, Luke, John-Mark, and Demas.

The foundational character, however, is Jesus.  He is mentioned more often than any other in this letter, a total of six times.

The reality is that without Jesus, none of this matters.  He is the ultimately the reason why this letter was written and he is the reason why each person was mentioned.

Without Jesus, Paul would not have been a missionary; without Jesus, Onesimus would have no desire to return to his master; and without Jesus, Philemon would have no reason to show mercy and offer forgiveness. 

And it is because of Jesus that each of the eight other characters are worthy of inclusion.

Jesus is the reason for the letter to Philemon — and the entire Bible.  Without him, nothing else really matters.

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.

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Demas, the Deserter

Whereas John-Mark had an early collapse and then made a comeback, Demas started strong but ended in failure.

Demas began well.  In Paul’s letter to Philemon, Demas is called a co-worker and in Paul’s letter to the Colossians, Demas sends his greetings.  Clearly he was involved with Paul’s ministry in a helpful and supportive role.

However, in one of Paul’s darker moments, he sadly laments that Demas “loved the world” and “deserted me.”  Despite his one-time standing as a co-laborer of Paul, Demas did not finish well.

Jesus said, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.”  Demas first looked back and then he went back, turning his back on Paul, on ministry, and on God.

Unlike John/Mark who started poorly and finished strong, Demas started well and finished poorly.

Looking on our past, we see both successes and failures.  Today we stand at a crossroads.  What will our future look like?  Will we turn our back on our faith like Demas or finish well like John-Mark?

[Philemon 1:24, Colossians 4:14, 2 Timothy 4:10, and Luke 9:62]

A lifelong student of the Bible, Peter DeHaan, PhD, wrote the 1,000-page website ABibleADay.com to encourage people to explore the Bible. His main blog and many books urge Christians to push past the status quo and reconsider how they practice their faith in every area of their lives.