Jesus: and Friends

Issues about friends, contamination, undesirables, acceptance, and sin became a problem

Jesus: your servant

Jesus: your servant

 
Background: The disciples had been contesting their place in their (expected) “pecking order”. Jesus gives them (us) a rebuke and gave a weighty explanation of his role in the flesh.

Jesus: told his betrayal

They were told; 

there was an agenda, but, whose was it?

The first four books of the New Testament, the Gospels, clearly recount that Jesus told his friends, and others, what was to befall him at the "end". The first (but different) such encounter in the text comes in John. (Was that the chronological first - I wonder? For the John pericope, see previous post: “Jesus: Lifted Up”.)

Matthew, Mark and Luke have several clear reports, with increasingly detailed words from Jesus.

Jesus: Lifted Up (v.2)

Jesus: "lifted up"

I wonder how the original hearers reacted when they heard Jesus say this:

Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him (John 3:14-15, CEV).

Jesus: is the Good News

The Birth of Christ story gives a prominence to some men on watch who had a fright one night, which turned out to be really something, something beyond, imagining...

Jesus: Followed; and UNfollowed

 There was a time when the numbers were noticeably growing, and then they weren't.

A field-preacher named John (the baptiser) had started the upheaval. He was the "warm up". Jesus was the point of the moment. Jesus returned to Galilee with the power of the Spirit. News about him spread everywhere. He taught in the Jewish synagogues, and everyone praised him. (Luke 4:14-15, CEV). Jesus had connected with John down in Judea. He went back to Galilee to increasing popular notice, to crowds assembling, to excitement.

Jesus: and the evil (v3)

The devil; Satan

In our New Testament (NT), "the devil" is first mentioned in Matthew 4 and Luke 4; Mark, in his comparable, very brief mention, has the name “Satan” in place of “devil” (1:13). The setting is Jesus’ “temptation”: Will Jesus pay heed to the evil one's prompts to take the easy way? (I suppose under the conventions of writing it makes sense to capitalise the word that seems to be used as a name.)

In the pages of the NT, evil forces are taken seriously, but not feared, by those who follow Jesus.

There came a stage when Jesus expanded his reach in his community by delegating and sending out. This involved followers confronting the works of evil: Summoning his twelve disciples, he gave them authority over unclean spirits, to drive them out and to heal every[a] disease and sickness.[b]...

Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those with leprosy,[a] drive out demons. Freely you received, freely give. ... 

If anyone does not welcome you or listen to your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that house or town. Truly I tell you, it will be more tolerable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town. (Matthew 10: 1,8, 14-15, CSB). Mark and Luke have comparable reports. I note that "spirit" and "demon" are used as equivalents (see further following).