Tag Archives: Luke 11

Deceptive Traps

Pharisees and Scribes set Traps for Jesus – Luke 11:53-54 Opening Thoughts: After several months in Luke 11 I am finally closing this chapter. The Bible is so packed with information that is so easily missed if we simply treat it like some type of daily duty, spending 30 minutes slamming through our four chapters, simply to make it through our “Bible in a Year” program. I’m not entirely dissin’ the Bible in a year idea, but if we are not stewardly with our time spent in God’s Word, we incur the risk of coming to false conclusions, getting caught in traps set for us, and ultimately we take the chance of misunderstanding the Gospel all together. Instead we can end up mistaking it for more of a self help guide for “your best life now road map, with a twist of see you at the top because I’m a kingdom child” attitude, rather than a […]

Woe to You Scribes Part 3 – The Scribes Prescribe the Wrong Key

Luke 11:52 – The Scribes and the Key of Knowledge The Wrong Key: Recently I locked myself out of an office space and when I went to retrieve the key they gave me something that resembled a rats nest wrapped around a ring. There were literally a couple dozen keys on there. Since the building owners hadn’t used the internal keys for a couple of years it was my job was to go upstairs and try every single key in the door. Long story short, I tried all the keys and not a single one worked. What’s even worse than having keys that won’t fit into the key slot, is finding one that seems to fit but when you turn it the door won’t open. Regardless of whether it fits in the door or not, if it doesn’t open it you either have the wrong key or wrong door. In Luke 11:52 we find ourselves listening to Jesus as he […]

Woe to the Scribes Part 2 – Killed the Prophets and Apostles

Luke 11:47-51 – Jesus Rebukes the Scribes Opening Thoughts: I want to open up tonight by talking about the “180 Movie”, I find that it goes hand in hand with my text. First of all if you have not watched 180movie.com I encourage you to do so as soon as you’re through reading this post. In 180 Movie Ray Comfort interviews several people in regard to the holocaust. One question he asks people is “Do you think that Hitler was a bad guy or a good guy?” Most of the people answered “bad guy”, after all it’s not rocket science to agree with that statement right? Most of the people interviewed saw the holocaust as horrific and felt that even the common people who were brainwashed by Hitler into thinking Jews were not humans were just as guilty as he was. Many of them said that if they had been there and […]

Jesus Hates False Religion and Even Called People Names

Woe to You Pharisees Part 3 – Unmarked Graves and White-washed Tombs Opening Thoughts: When I was in high school someone played a trick on me, they grabbed a quarter and placed it on a white piece of paper, then they took a pencil and drew around the quarter with the pencil making a nice quarter size circle. They then told me that I was to place the quarter in one of my eye sockets and squeeze down on it to hold it there, while at the same time looking at the paper with my other eye, and with my face over the circle I was to try and drop the quarter into the hole perfectly. I was told it could be done and there were people out there who had been able to do it. Of course each time I tried I missed the circle and every time I missed […]

Woe to You Pharisees Part 2 – Taking the Best Seat

Luke 11:43 Opening Thoughts: What’s the first thing that you think about when you see a sign that reads “Beware of Dog”? My first thought is “keep walking” maybe even run! People post signs like that because they are trying to protect their stuff, themselves and their homes from being broken into. The “beware of dog” sign will keep away anyone who values life. Although my main text comes from Luke tonight I wanted to direct your attention to Mark as well. In Luke Jesus is addressing the Scribes and Pharisees directly and in Mark He’s addressing the people about the scribes, their teachers. These leaders were all the Jews had ever known, they are the teachers that they went to for advice and council, they were taught by them and now out of the blue Jesus is telling them to ‘Beware of the scribes’. He was trying to ward people away from […]

Fools and Their Traditions

Hand Washing Rituals – Luke 11:37-41 Opening Thoughts: I’m going to start tonight by saying that Danae and I appreciate all of you that have been reading our material and posting your wonderful comments. It is encouraging to hear someone say, “What you wrote really spoke to me and has caused me to study the Word more”. What we hope not to hear is, “This is great, now I can just read your blogs and forget about reading my Bible!” Isn’t this what has actually happened in much of our church culture these days? We read books, articles, blogs, Twitter updates, Facebook Status updates and more, yet so many people don’t actually read their own Bibles. In many ways we’ve become more like cult followers rather than Christian Disciples. We have people read our Bibles to us and shed their opinions, then we can either agree or disagree according to […]

Woe to You Pharisees Part 1 – Tithing

Luke 11:41 – Woe to You Opening Thoughts: Have you ever been in the situation where you have been invited over to someones house for dinner and there is ongoing friction between you? Is it hard to enjoy yourself or even keep your cool for that matter? Let’s see what Jesus does. For those of you who are reading in for the first time I will set a bit of a background to the text. Jesus was invited to one of the Pharisees homes to eat. However He quickly stirred up a hornets nest when he failed to follow the traditions of men by way of ceremonial hand washing. Jesus purposely stirred things up so that He could point out areas of hypocrisy, how’s that for a meal with Jesus? Once the ice has been broken Jesus begins to pronounce woes on them along with revealing their sin. Luke 11:42 […]

How Great is the Darkness?

If the Light in You is Darkness – Luke 11:33-36 Opening Thoughts: About 14 years ago my brother-in-law was new to our family, he moved to our town from up north. One day we were out at a restaurant eating nachos and he asked me which ones were the jalapenos and which ones were the olives. He knew that jalapenos were hot and he didn’t like hot food. He hadn’t eaten either before and didn’t have a clue what was what. So, like a good brother-in-law, I told him that the green ones with seeds were the olives and the black ones were the jalapenos and that he should stay away from those. He then proceeded to fill his mouth with what he thought were olives but turned out to be the dreaded jalapenos. His eyes were soon opened to the truth and he would be sure to never make […]

Ask, Seek, Knock – Luke 11:9-13

Knock and it will be opened – Luke 11:9-13 Opening Thoughts: Many of you that are following our blog will notice that we have attempted to be faithful to our daily posts but have come up seriously short this past little while. Our desire is to blog daily but good intentions are often interrupted by the most wonderful things in the world “children”. We have 3 wonderful kids and I can’t imagine life without them, but these little people are many times why we don’t get around to blogging. Their regular bedtime is 7pm and by the time we close the door to their room it’s often 7:30. Then there’s the “Mommy & Daddy, can I have a drink?” questions…. or the “I have to use the bathroom!” requests. Being a parent is super tough, there has to be a limit right? I mean by the 4th request for a […]