January 12, Reading Notes

Genesis 26:17-27:46

26:17-33

So how is faith shown? Abraham showed great, visible faith, though you have to remember that we see him over 25 years of waiting. If all we have about him was condensed, we might only have a couple weeks of action recorded. Still, Abraham was given a promise that required believing, moving to a strange land, completely in God's hands. Great Faith.

Then you have Isaac, who inherited everything, the promise, the cattle, the wealth. He doesn't seem to do much. In a way, this might be a picture of many churches and believers today, who kind of grasp what we are living and supposed to do, but are lost in daily life in the land. They have been given their local church, but didn't have to strain to see it come into being. Even with Isaac, living a sort of drifting life, there is still faith and still a clinging to the importance of the promise. Things work best, of course, if we as disciples keep the focus sharp.

We have two events that show that Isaac was a man of faith. It might have been faith with a fuzzy focus, but it was still tough faith.

Isaac was pushed around quite a bit, and finally Abimelech made a covenant with Isaac as he had with Abraham. Can you figure out one or two aspects of Isaac's faith in the promise?

1. Isaac doesn't….

2. Isaac doesn't….

26:34-35

Esau will appear as a tragic figure; but in all, I don't think he was any worse than Jacob. Here, the mention is made of something he did to make life miserable for Isaac and Rebekah. It is setting up what comes later when Rebekah suggests sending Jacob to Laban.

It might also suggest the effect of living in the land on the family.

27:1-46

Of note here for us as disciples is that none of this anxiousness and trickery was necessary. Ironically, it brought great and tragic results to Jacob. (Even when Jacob and Esau meet again later, notice which one of them has the ulcer.) A loving and sovereign God, having made His promises to us, can fulfill His will without us having to help with lies and deceit. God is utterly faithful and will fulfill His promises, but He is never mocked.

Isaac must have been having some poor health and thought that death was near. Actually, he lives for at least another 20+ years. He is right in wanting to pass on the blessing, that is, the blessings of the promise of God to Abraham. As the first born, it was natural to have this go to Esau. I don't think the parents honored the "lentil" incident (25:29-34).

Vs. 29 is the actual part of the blessing that God gave to Abraham.

Esau's grief does show some faith, though too late. He must have believed that he truly lost something.

There is no perfection on earth and all families struggle, but if we have to struggle, we at least have to struggle well. Isaac and Rebekah do not appear to have made the promise a focus of their lives and family. They don't appear to have tried to unite the boys in the specialness of what God was doing in the world and through their family. Reading this, I can't help but feel bad. I think they were, like so many Christians/would-be disciples, drifting, content with daily life, and lost on earth.

Matthew 9:1-17

This is a great portion for disciples.

In healing the paralytic, Jesus faced off against the religious right and made a bold claim. The claim was not that he could forgive sins, but that He was the Son of Man. He was the king who would reign eternal, from Daniel 7. Even under pressure, Jesus showed compassion. This event has an interesting link to what happens later in John 5, if you notice the words Jesus uses here that are repeated by the Pharisees there.

As disciples, we have to speak the truth. It might make us look silly to the liberals and liberal to the fundys, but we have to follow Christ. Jesus did not change God's message to attract the masses or to please the religious establishment. His focus was pleasing the Father and doing His will.

The cause & effect of disciple making. If you are firm on the truth and authentic and are willing to accept all men in the love of Christ, people get brave and follow. So how did what happened in 9:1-8, make what happened down the street, a couple days later in 9:9 possible? What finally gave Matthew this resolve? Realize too, that Jesus had done other miracles and had taught in Capernaum, so Matthew's decision was a process.

Why did Matthew have this party? What was he trying to accomplish? He was a new disciple, wanting to see his friends become disciples.

Jesus is in trouble, first with the Pharisees, and then with John's disciples.

When you read, year after year, certain questions pop up that seem unsolvable and are not too important, so you just say, "Whatever."

How important was the friction between Jesus and John's disciples? Who knows. As you can see reading the OT and Matthew, a lot of information is not given. There can be years between two verses and we are only given very pertinent facts. But here is some interesting trivia. The last recorded use of tongues in Acts is in Acts 19:6. Here Paul finds a group of John's disciples who were still holding to John's message and didn't know about Jesus' resurrection or the coming of the Spirit. Tongues is always used as a bridging device to show the Jews that God was reaching out with the Gospel. The gift was necessary to break down Jewish prejudice and to bring unity as in Acts 11. It is significant that this gift was used with John's followers, all of whom would have been Jews.

Also, if you look at the parallel passage in Luke 5, you will see that Jesus' first ever use of a parable was in trying to, very gently, give an explanation and teach John's disciples. Obviously, unlike Andrew and that other guy (probably John), not all of John's disciples followed Jesus. The first parables were used to help John's disciples.

All disciples love and follow Jesus in the mission of reaching the lost and making disciples who make disciples. This brings unity, not denominationalism or being a member of a particular movement or church.

Psalm 10:16-18

Great words in this psalm. Jacob and Rebekah would have benefited from holding this confidence in a quiet heart. Me too.

Proverbs 3:9-10

Words to be held and heeded, but not abused by those following Christ. Your Father knows what you need and will reward, though not always with gift cards and cash.