Long ago God spoke to our ancestors by the prophets at different times and in different ways. In these last days, he has spoken to us by his Son (Hebrews 1:1-2, CSB).
Are you listening? Because God is speaking.
God spoke in a variety of ways in the Old Testament. The revelation given through the Old Testament prophets was brought in various ways – sometimes through parables, narrative, prophecy, psalms, proverbs, and sometimes through some very dramatic or unorthodox methods:
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“A God-fearing woman named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth from the city of Thyatira, was listening. The Lord opened her heart to respond to what Paul was saying” (Acts 16:14, CSB).
The events in these verses take place during Paul’s second missionary journey. Paul and Barnabas had decided to go visit the churches they had established during their first missionary journey. When they disagreed about who should be on their evangelistic team, they parted company and Paul selected Silas to accompany him on his second missionary journey.
Paul and Silas set out across the regions of Phrygia and Galatia, which is in the eastern half of the modern country of Turkey. But, Paul’s plans to journey north into the region of Bithynia were constrained by the Holy Spirit and instead they traveled west to Troas on the coast of the Aegean Sea.
At Troas Paul had a vision of a man pleading with him to cross over the Aegean Sea into Macedonia, just to the north of the modern country of Greece. Paul and Silas would evangelize in Macedonia and eventually travel south into the Greek cities of Athens and Corinth.
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Then the Lord came down to look over the city and the tower that the humans were building. The Lord said, “If they have begun to do this as one people all having the same language, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let’s go down there and confuse their language so that they will not understand one another’s speech.” So from there the Lord scattered them throughout the earth, and they stopped building the city. Therefore it is called Babylon, for there the Lord confused the language of the whole earth, and from there the Lord scattered them throughout the earth (Genesis 11:5-9, CSB).
The tower of Babel was probably a ziggurat, which was a common archaeological structure in ancient Mesopotamian cities. Archaelogists have unearthed dozens of ziggurats in the region, the most famous being the Great Ziggurat of Ur in Iraq. It is a huge, 4,100 year old structure made up of more than 700,000 baked bricks.
Ziggurats, unlike the pyramids in Egypt that were tombs for pharaohs, were stairways for the gods. The defining structure of a ziggurat was a long stairway leading to the top where a room with a bed and table was prepared for the deity. The stairway was not for people to climb up, but for the god to come down.
In these verses God “came down” to look over the city and the tower the people were building up to heaven. But, God didn’t need to be invited or enticed to come down from heaven to the earth nor did He need to descend a stairway to facilitate His descent.
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“Truly I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do. And he will do even greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it…. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever. He is the Spirit of truth” (John 14:12-17, CSB).
As Jesus and His disciples shared a last meal together, Judas Iscariot’s impending betrayal was revealed by Jesus to His disciples. Once Judas left the dinner to carry out his unscrupulous scheme, Jesus spoke openly and intimately with His remaining disciples about the events that were about to unfold and what they meant. John 13:31 – 17:26 replays the conversation Jesus had with His disciples.
As Jesus was explaining to His disciples that the only way to know God the Father was through Him, Philip asked Him to show them the Father and that’s all they would need to believe. Jesus reminded the disciples that the Father was in Him and the words He spoke and miracles He performed were by the power of God the Father.
Then, Jesus added that not only did He have the power to do God’s works, He also had the power to enable those who believed in Him, His disciples, to perform the miracles He performed and even greater ones than He did! When Jesus said to ask in His name and He will do it, He was granting His power of attorney.
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Then one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot (who was about to betray him), said, “Why wasn’t this perfume sold for three hundred denarii and given to the poor?”…. Jesus answered, “Leave her alone; she has kept it for the day of my burial. For you always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.” (John 12: 4-8, CSB).
A group of Christian individuals and organizations recently developed an advertising campaign for American TV called “He Gets Us” (www.hegetsus.com). This group states that they are a diverse group of people passionate about the authentic Jesus of the Bible who want everyone to understand Jesus as he’s depicted in the Bible.
The campaign has purchased airtime to broadcast its commercials on national television. Recently, the campaign purchased airtime for two commercials during SuperBowl LVII at a cost of millions of dollars for each 30-second spot. The campaign says it plans to to invest a billion dollars on spreading its message of the Jesus of the Bible.
Spending millions of dollars on “messaging” has, of course, generated criticism from both the socially-conscious Christians on the theological left and the fundamentalist Christians on the theological right. The biggest criticism of the campaign, however, is its spending on marketing, which is seen as money that could be spent for funding community programs for the poor and advocacy for the oppressed.
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“When Jesus turned and noticed them following him, he asked them, ‘What are you looking for?’ They said to him, ‘Rabbi’ (which means ‘Teacher’), ‘where are you staying?’ ‘Come and you’ll see,’ he replied. So they went and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day.“ (John 1:38-39, CSB).
Jesus’ first two disciples were actually disciples of John the Baptist before becoming Jesus’ followers. One of them was Andrew and the other was not named but perhaps was John, the author of this gospel.
Nevertheless, the two left John the Baptist to become followers of Jesus.
John the Baptist didn’t seem to be grieved by the two abandoning him and following after Jesus. In fact, John actually encouraged his disciples to follow Jesus: “The next day, John was standing with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God!’ The two disciples heard him say this and followed Jesus” (vs. 1:35-37, CSB).
Then the dominoes started to fall.
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The way we sometimes present the gospel would make this verse read more like this: “For we sinned so much that God gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him will quit sinning.”
We make the gospel out to be about our sin rather than God’s love. We send people down the Roman Road–“all have sinned” (Romans 3:23)–instead of up the Via Dolorosa–“He gave His only begotten Son” (John 3:16).
“And I have been chosen as a preacher and apostle to teach the Gentiles this message about faith and truth. I’m not exaggerating—just telling the truth.” (1 Timothy 2:7, NLT).
The Apostle Paul was certain about his calling from God and the message he was supposed to teach and preach.
Paul understood that all his efforts were a part of God’s plans and purposes and so he did it because God called him.
“God our Savior…wants everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and one mediator between God and humanity, Christ Jesus, Himself human, who gave Himself–a ransom for all, a testimony at the proper time.” (1 Timothy 2:3-6, NLT).
If you are one of those laconic people who likes things stated simply, concisely, and succinctly, then you definitely like this summation of the gospel written by the Apostle Paul in his first letter to Timothy.
“For we are not able to do anything against the truth, but only for the truth” (2 Corinthians 13:6, HCSB).
The Apostle Paul is telling the Corinthians in this verse that regardless of their opinion about him, the truth of the gospel will prevail.
Paul said that as an apostle he had exercised no power over those who received the truth of the gospel. And any apostolic power he had exercised was to defend the truth of the gospel by instructing, reproving, or censuring those that opposed, denied, or contradicted it.
Steve's Bible Meditations 