Matthew 14 (spring, AD 29) King Herod really loved the sexy dancing of his niece, and made a drunken offer to her that resulted in the beheading of John the Baptist to please her Mum. It’s tragic to see that Herod was “distressed” (v.9) at the idea but went along with it anyway, more concerned … More Day 51: Jesus and John the Baptist’s death
Mark 7:1-23 (AD 29) Why did Jesus speak so harshly to the religious leaders in this incident? They asked a question that seemed, from the words alone, to be a genuine enquiry: why were Jesus’ disciples not following one a tradition established by previous leaders. Jesus’ response of immediately calling them hypocrites showed that, as … More Day 50: Hypocrites & legalists
Matthew 10:26-11:1 (AD 28) ‘Peas on earth.’ ‘Give peas a chance’ (my favourite piece of graffiti, which was on a railway bridge over a motorway outside London for 20 years). Or as the famous Christian song/hymn says, ‘PEEEEEEEAAAAAAA…son earth’. But what does the Bible say about peace? Compare these three passages from three different gospels, … More Day 49: Peas on earth?
Matthew 9:35-10:25 (AD 28) An army Captain once told me an officer should never tell his troops to do something or go somewhere he isn’t prepared to do or go himself. Not that I pay attention to what every army officer tells me – I heard from another that I was supposed to be a … More Day 48: Do not worry about what to say
Matthew 9:27-34 (AD 28) If the Pharisees were on Twitter and tweeted, “It is by the prince of demons that [Jesus] drives out demons” (as per verse thirty-four), I think their tweet would have gone viral…and not in a good way. They would have received a stream of mockery, facepalming and eye-rolling gifs. Their statement … More Day 46: Pharisees getting desperate
(Apologies: this should have been Day 41 to stick to chronological order, and yesterday’s reading should have been given today.) Luke 7:36-8:3 (AD 48) Jesus did not forgive the woman because of what she did for him, and the woman was not forgiven after Jesus declared her forgiven. What Jesus told the Pharisee host is … More Day 42: How much do you owe Jesus?
Matthew 12:22-50 (AD 28) In v.27 Jesus says, “…if I drive out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your people drive them out?”. There may to have been some successful instances of exorcism by Jewish people – i.e. it wasn’t just Jesus and his disciples. The difference with a mere human doing the exorcising is … More Day 41: When Jesus was accused of being Satan
Luke 7:11-35 (AD 28) Christians are often accused of valuing blind faith over scientific evidence. It’s frustrating, as Jesus a lot of his ministry talking to people urging, commanding, goading, encouraging, provoking and asking that they value the evidence of what they could see. Jesus avoided, on a number of occasions, giving a straight answer … More Day 40: Believe the evidence
Luke 7:1-10 (AD 28) Doctrinal correctness can mean the difference between heaven and hell, life and death, being with God or being without God. And yet it is often, also, not the biggest problem. The same priorities that must often drive us to emphasise correct doctrine, will sometimes mean we must ignore (at least in … More Day 39: Doctrine isn’t always the thing
Matthew 7:7-29 (AD 28) “do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (v.12) The summation of the Law often gets turned into an anti-Law: ‘As long as I wouldn’t mind it happening to me I can do it to someone else, so go … More Day 38: Making God in our image
Paul T Reynolds 