Psalm 119:145-176; Obadiah 15-21; 1 Pet. 2:1-10; Matt. 19:23-30
Today we have Obadiah’s take on the end of things. All see the same things concerning the righteous remnant and Jerusalem. Those who have come against God’s people have come against the Lord Himself and their treatment of His people will be recompensed. It would seem that what we have done to others will be done to us in the end if we are outside the covenant. Obadiah sees the people of Jacob/Israel and of Joseph as the instrumentality of the Lord’s judgment against the house of Esau who are historically their brothers but who have gone after other gods. Remember that the person Esau, brother of Jacob, son of Isaac, married a foreign wife to spite his parents, particularly his mother. From there the nation that comes from him is outside the covenant.
These words of Jesus concerning the difficulty of a rich man entering the kingdom of heaven is in response to the encounter with the rich young man who has walked away from an invitation to enter and also to follow Jesus. Wealth was frequently seen as evidence of God’s blessing so the disciples are astonished that Jesus has spoken against the wealthy in this way. The difficulty is that we don’t always want to enter the kingdom badly enough to give up the kingdoms we already have. Jesus has been consistent in this teaching about the kingdom and our understanding of the true value of things. He compared the kingdom with a treasure in a field and the man who sold everything in order to buy the field or the pearl of great price and in many other ways. It is clear that we must understand that the kingdom of heaven is worth any price and nothing compares with it and so long as it does we are guilty of idolatry. Jesus’ reply to the disciples’ astonishment is that with God all things are possible. We enter the kingdom because of what Jesus does for us. When we see the kingdom in all its glory we will wonder how we ever valued anything else at all.
The stone that was rejected has become the chief cornerstone. It seems incredible to imagine that the stone that was most important and valuable and perfect could be rejected by the builders who later realized its true value and honor. In Jesus we see that reality perfectly. The only truly good man who ever lived, the only truly righteous man, was rejected and put on a cross but the Lord accepted the sacrifice and now He is the cornerstone of the church. Peter incorporates the images from Isaiah to speak to those of us who, before Jesus, were truly not a people, were not loved, had not received mercy and had no hope but who in Jesus are all those things and more. Our self understanding is to be that we are a royal priesthood and a holy nation, let us embrace that understanding and set about being just that.
Let us wonder; grace and justice
Join and point to mercy’s store;
When through grace in Christ our trust is,
Justice smiles and asks no more:
He Who washed us with His blood
Has secured our way to God.
No comments:
Post a Comment