The nation is turning every which way in search of security
and peace. They are accused of turning
to the king of Assyria to help them and this is no help at all, they will, in
fact, go there in exile. They should be
turning to the Lord in repentance in accord with both 1 Kings 8 and 2
Chronicles 7 but they are looking for earthly alliances as though this is an
earthly problem. Ultimately, in chapter
6 they will turn to the Lord but their expectation is that if they do, it won't
take a long time and therefore they are committed to Him only so long as it
requires for their fortunes to be restored.
They are not intending to be faithful and to return in truth, forsaking
all others, but only in a superstitious way, with sacrifices and offerings as
appeasement and not atonement for sin.
Sound familiar?
Can you imagine how offensive it was to the Pharisees to
hear Jesus make the claim to be the Son of Man and that He is Lord of the
Sabbath? That would stop anyone in their
tracks. What an answer, I am above the
Law as only the one who gives the Law can be.
Is there any possible way this could be misunderstood as a claim to
equality with God and the fulfillment of Old Testament messianic prophecy? It was perfectly acceptable to save life on
the Sabbath. If your animal was stuck in
the mire you could indeed rescue it on Sabbath.
Jesus applies that principle to the man with the withered hand and then
heals him. The response of the leaders,
fury and a desire to do something about Jesus.
How about fear and awe?
Paul's visit to the temple to appease the Jews went about as
well as he probably expected it would.
The assumption is made that he has taken one of his converts into the
temple and defiled it with the presence of the Gentile, that he had no respect
for the temple. The crowd simply
believes what it hears, and they bodily remove Paul, shut the gates of the
temple and then begin to beat him. The
scene rapidly deteriorates into nothing more than mob violence and in
attempting to sort it out, the Roman authorities are confused since no one
seems to know exactly what Paul has done or not done, their stories don't
agree, just as they didn't when they sought to accuse Jesus. Religion is always an enemy to truth.
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