Today's Reading: Matthew 19: 23-30
**For a simple and good way of Daily Devotion method please click this link: Subject Shifting Devotion.pdf.
Please click this link to read Matthew 19: 23-30
Bible Study
To understand the real meaning of this passage is not easy. Because there are quite a number of explanations. N.T. Wright says:
Some people have suggested that the saying about the camel going through the eye of a needle is actually a reference to a gate in Jerusalem that was called 'the needle's eye'. A camel would need to unload all it was carrying on its back to get throughit. Other people have pointed out that a word very similar to 'camel' meant a sort of rope; maybe he was talking of threading a sailor's rope through a seamstress's needle. But both of these suggestions miss the point. As we have seen in this chapter and the previous ones, Jesus often exaggerates hugely to make his point. It's like saying, 'You couldn't get a Rolls-Royce into a matchbox.' The point is not that you might achieve it if you tried very hard, or that there was a particular type of small garage called a 'matchbox'; the point is precisely that it's unthinkable. That's the moment when all human calculations and possibilities stop, and God's new possibilities start. What is impossible in human terms, Jesus' followers are to discover to their amazement, is possible to God.
Jesus is then offering a vision of God's whole new world in which everything will be upside down and inside out. He uses pictures we have become accustomed to in the gospel story. The son of man sitting on his glorious throne takes us to chapter 7 of the prophetic book of Daniel, where God's kingdom will be established at last with the overthrow of evil and the vindication of God's people. Then those who have given up everything to follow Jesus will find themselves not only rescued from eternal death, but actually ruling with Jesus himself in the new world.
Those who have been considered as unimportant and the lowest of mankind who were being killed because of Jesus would one day being raised to the ruling seats, but those who have been considered to be top leaders using their power to do thing might one day find themselves unable to do anything become the last.
So, do you know whether you are really following Jesus in his way?
Let's have a time to be still and give the Holy Spirit space to speak through the passage of scripture we have just read. Offer this time up to Jesus as you listen to him, while listening to "Gabriel's Oboe"
Spiritual Journal
What I heard from Jesus today is: MI for you, MP for Jesus!
What I received from Jesus today is a very important reminder that mission impossible for us is mission possible for Jesus!
It's impossible for the rich man to give up his possessions, but in Jesus many Christians have done that including me. Why? Because Jesus helped us to do it. He has his own way to help us to jump through those hurdles!
The more closer to Jesus each day the better Jesus can help us to experience those mission impossible to become mission possible!
Dear Lord Jesus,
Help us to follow you more and more closely each day that we can experience more mission impossible to become mission possible. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
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