16 February 2011

Psalm 101, 109; Isa 63:15-64:9; 1 Tim. 3:1-16; Mark 11:27-12:12

The prophet looks for faithfulness and the knowledge of God in the land and sees nothing. The most terrible judgment of all is the fear that God is no longer with us, He no longer cares for us at all. Could there be anything worse than that for His people? Isaiah begs the Lord to come and do some awesome deed so that there would be recognition of Him and His power by both Israel and her enemies. The absence of God is worse than His judgment in some ways. Isaiah’s desire is for God to reveal Himself so that the people’s memory of Him will be kindled, they will remember who they are and whose they are.

The authority question is tossed out. They can’t find a way to stop Him or answer Him so they ask who gave Him the authority to do these things. The answer, we know is from the Father, the same as the answer to the question He poses to them in response. As they will not make a response to Him, neither will He give them a response. They refuse to accept the authority He claims. The leaders prove they are not complete idiots in that they perceive that Jesus told the parable against them. They still, however, continue plans to do just as He prophesied in the parable, so they only get a slight pass in the intelligence estimate. Application isn’t their strong suit.

Paul lays out the qualifications for leaders in the church. I just preached on this issue as at one time our church had qualifications that would have caused Paul some significant upset. Our by-laws required two things, the senior pastor had to “recognize” you and you had to have contributed financially in the last year. When you see what Paul laid out it is embarrassing to see what we did and what many churches do in choosing leaders. Discipleship and evidence of godliness should be our qualifiers instead of worldly success or friendliness. Until we choose leaders whose lives are set on Jesus we will never get mission right, we will continue to fail to keep the main thing the main thing. Our leaders need to be able to keep the focus and the first evidence of that is that their lives are focused.

Great Father of glory, pure Father of light,
Thine angels adore Thee, all veiling their sight;
But of all Thy rich graces this grace, Lord, impart
Take the veil from our faces, the vile from our heart.