Friends,
Tim Smith offers this -- Gary Morsch is the founder of
Heart to Heart in Kansas City. As a physician, he has done magnificent work
around the world taking medical supplies to low income people. Many years ago,
he took a trip to Calcutta and Mother Teresa's House for the Destitute Dying.
He took 90 volunteers and 12 million dollars of medical supplies. As he made the trip, he thought to himself,
"A lot of these people don't have to die. I can save their lives, and
maybe we can turn it from the House for the Destitute Dying to the House for
the Hopeful Living." He was going to make that happen. When they arrived, Sister Priscilla began to
assign everyone their tasks. As this was happening, Gary put his stethoscope
around his neck to let Sister Priscilla know he was a doctor. Everyone got their assignment and Gary found
he was the last person. She directed him
to come with her. They went to the woman's unit and didn't stop to help
anybody. They kept going and went to the men's unit and he thought this is
where he was going to begin to help. But instead, they walked into the kitchen.
He asked, "What do you need for me to do here?" She said, "Just
follow me." They walked out the
door, and he sees a huge pile of putrefied trash. She hands him two plastic buckets and a
shovel and saw. "What we need you to do is haul this garbage to the city
dump just down the street two blocks away. You can't miss it." Then she
smiles at him, turns and walks away. He
is standing there thinking, "Did she not see my stethoscope. I'm a doctor!
Doesn't she understand what I can do with these hands?" In a silent shock and a bit of self-pity, he
began wondering what to do. But there was only one thing to do. So all day, he
carried buckets full of putrefied trash to the city dump, and by the end of the
day having moved that entire pile, he was a sweaty, sticking mess. He walked back into the building and saw this
sign from Mother Teresa: "We can do no great things, only small things
with great love." He said, "At
that moment, my heart wilted. On this day, Mother Teresa pierced the armor I
had worked so hard to construct. And my life was changed by the act of hauling
garbage down the street and becoming a servant for others in need."
In essence, this is what Jesus communicates to some of
the religious people of the day who are following Him and asking
questions. In this section of Matthew
(9:9-17), Jesus presents two pictures…one is concerning the physician and the
other is the bridegroom. Each picture
comes in response to questions from those in His audience. The Pharisees are already in full opposition
mode as they come to Jesus’ disciples to ask them a “religious” question. The question is intended to trap them,
because if they are good religious Jews, and most of them appear to be, then
they should only be able to come up with the one answer required…the one that
pleases the Pharisees. Jesus, hearing
this question, intercedes on His disciples’ behalf and makes a statement that
would cause the religious leaders to have to pause for a moment in the midst of
their attacks to consider what He is saying.
And what is it that Jesus is saying?
He is not making a case for a religious argument that people should go
to a doctor if they are sick as opposed to staying home hoping for some
miracle. He wants the Pharisees to
consider the big picture concerning what god they really serve. Do they really serve the God, the Creator and
Sustainer of the universe…or a religious symbol of a god that they choose to
serve in the name of God? If they would
understand and serve the one true God, then they would know Jesus, and that He
came in order that sinners might have a relationship with Him and His Father.
So, Jesus quotes a basic and critically important principle
from the Old Testament (Hosea 6:6) to show to them that right religion has
always been about people more than about “principles”. Or, that our principles should be about
helping people rather than keeping laws that prevent us from helping people. And this is certainly the prevailing thought
that continues in this section, as Jesus entertains a question from John’s
disciples. On the surface, this portion
of the passage might appear unrelated to the first part, but they walk hand in
hand. Continuing with the theme of
adhering to the law, the disciples of John notice a difference between
themselves, the Pharisees and Jesus’ disciples concerning fasting. They all (the Pharisees and John’s disciples)
would keep regular fasts by which they would dedicate themselves to the keeping
of ritual traditions. John’s disciples
would be in mourning, because their leader is being detained in prison. But,
the allusion to the bridegroom is Jesus speaking about Himself, and that while
He is with them, they should be rejoicing at having Him. So, Jesus indicates that “fasting” is a
matter of joy not sorrow. He has come to put a new face on their religious
traditions. The Christian life is a feast not a funeral.
Much as he does with the Sabbath and other traditional
practices, Jesus wants them to understand that there is a larger picture that
they need to grasp. This is why He moves into the illustration concerning the
wine and the wine skins. Jesus comes to fulfill the law of the Pharisees and
John and bring “spiritual wholeness.” Jesus
did not come to “patch us up” religiously, only to have us fall apart. He comes
to fill us to the full…and to overflowing.
The Jewish religion was a worn-out wine skin that would burst if filled
with the newness of the Gospel that Jesus is bringing. He knows that the old ways, or old paths of
the old law are not going to be sufficient in order for newness and wholeness
to take place. This is His purpose in
coming…to fill us up and make us mature in Him.
Ken Pell from the First Church of the Nazarene in Broken
Arrow, OK shares this -- There is not much you can do about it. Once you have
been around it everybody else knows. I’m talking about the red dirt of western
Oklahoma. It’s caused by the iron in the soil that, after being oxidized, turns
to rust. It seems that nothing can erase or clean the stain from that red dirt
on your shoes once you have walked there. If you have new shoes – everyone
knows -- because they are not red ... yet. If you are from the city (OKC or
Tulsa, for example) and you make your way into the western ranch lands everyone
can tell "you’re not from these parts" simply by looking at the color
of your shoes. The inverse is also true; if you go to the city and are wearing
shoes that you have previously worn out "out there" everyone knows
where you are from. It’s not a
judgmental thing. The cities in Oklahoma are intimately connected to the ranches
and open lands; no one thinks they are better or inferior; it is simply a
recognizable and distinct line of demarcation. There is simply no getting
around it. Godly love (Agapé) is like
that too. It is such a contrast from the world’s love that it becomes
immediately recognizable and "different." The world looks at the
sacrificial, serving, grace-filled love of God and says "You’re not from
around these parts." It cannot be duplicated, at least not for long, it
can be "faked" for a little while (vv. 1-3) but even the masquerade
is evidence that it isn't Godly love. When it has been poured into your hearts
it cannot be hidden; that’s the nature of God’s love. It's just there and
influences the lives of those it touches.
False religion in the name of Christianity is suspicious,
protective, distrusting, critical, and prejudiced…whereas the freedom that
Christ brings liberates us to love completely, be at peace, serve with vigor
and be willing to learn and thrive in fellowship together. This is the point that Jesus is trying to
make concerning the attitude of the Pharisees, and even John’s disciples, as
compared with those who would be His disciples…there is supposed to be a BIG
difference. And so it is amazing that
believers today will still settle for a watered down gospel that is inept in
order to empower their lives or make any real significant difference in this
world, because it is more focused on keeping relatively meaningless regulations
than on being like Jesus. Jesus does not
want us to settle for the old wine skins that we have in our lives that are
incapable of producing love, joy and peace…but, wants us to be filled with the
Spirit who can bring these virtues alive in us.
Jesus does not want us to settle for the old traditions, such as the
illustration of keeping a regular fast for the purpose of keeping a regular
fast, and miss the genuine life that He has to bring. Jesus didn’t intend for us to do the same
thing day after day, week after week, settling into a rote system without
hardly lifting up our heads to breathe the spiritual air that is there for us
to breathe. Jesus did not intend for us
to go through the motions of so as to miss out on what it is that He is really
wanting to do in and through us! This
passage is the essence of Jesus’ religion…we need to consider and reconsider
what it is that Jesus expects from us. We
have a mission here on this earth to fulfill, and we need to continue to invent
and reinvent the wheel as it relates to what it is that Jesus wants us to
discover in relationship to this.
Blessings, Don
