Skip to main content
Jesus sent out the twelve apostles with these instructions: 
"Don't go to the Gentiles or the Samaritans, but only to the people of Israel - God's lost sheep. 
Go and announce to them that the Kingdom of Heaven is near. 
Heal the sick, raise the dead, cure those with leprosy, and cast out demons. 
Give as freely as you have received!
Matthew 10:5-8 NLT
This is the start of a long set of instructions given to the apostles who Matthew names and who Jesus had just specifically empowered. 
This has a different feel to Jesus commission in Matthew 28 to go to the whole world.
What can we learn?
God has a heart for the lost. 
Jesus is at the centre of it all.
His mission is restoration of what's been broken, spiritually, physically, even death itself will be restored to life. 
I wonder why he mentions leprosy - my guess is that the person with leprosy is excluded, kept apart, treated as unclean, untouchable, so this is about relational restoration where we are welcomed in, embraced, held. 
God wants us to live generously. 
How can I live generously today?
Be part of the restoration project today?
Does my heart look out to see and seek the lost? Those who need a shepherd, the Good Shepherd?
#wordsofJesus 
#redletterBible
#restoration 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. He existed before anything was created and is supreme over all creation,  for through him God created everything in the heavenly realms and on earth. He made the things we can see and the things we can't see - such as thrones, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities in the unseen world. Everything was created through him and for him. Colossians 1:15-16 NLT OK so this is an English translation of a letter Paul wrote to a church 2,000 years ago, but does it feel like Paul is wrestling with words and ideas to try and capture all of who Jesus is, of who God is, of how does it work that the walking around Jesus was also there before the beginning of the beginning of everything we can see and touch and know. Not only that but Jesus was somehow the agent of everything that has been made in the physical, social, and spiritual.  Jesus is at the centre of it all.  Walking around Jesus. Cooking fish for breakfast Jesus. Heart aching as he ...
Post a Comment
Read more
Now rescue your beloved people. Answer and save us by your power. ... Who will bring me into the fortified city?  Who will bring me victory over Edom? Have you rejected us, O God?  Will you no longer march with our armies?Oh, please help us against our enemies,  for all human help is useless. With God's help we will do mighty things, for he will trample down our foes. Psalm 108 6, 10-13 NLT After the most beautiful and uplifting worshipful first half to this song, David takes us somewhere completely different in the second half.  It's all about victory, power, winning, it's all about him. The "mighty things" he wants God to do are all on the outside, all about power, and David's writing sounds like he's a bit lost in his quest to win. And I do the same thing. Praise God and ask him to fix my problems. Fix the classroom/online/workplace bully, fix my finances, fix my relationships, fix my problems. So as I sit with this psalm of 2 halves, its a bit of a mir...
Post a Comment
Read more
That is what the Scriptures mean when they say,  "No eye has seen,  no ear has heard,  and no mind has imagined  what God  has prepared  for those  who love him." 1 Corinthians 2:9 NLT Paul is explaining why the people who were running the world at the time were OK having Jesus put to death - because they didn't get it that there's more.  God is more. The future is more. More than we can grasp or imagine. Paul talks of the mystery of God, yet somehow we want God to be small enough to understand, to predict, to manage how we want or expect God to be.  But Paul reminds this church, and us, that He is More.  I wonder if Paul would ask us with all our wonderful technology if we're looking to that for answers to questions it cannot answer, that the "more" we need is found in the mystery of God and it's OK to not get it all, it's OK that He is beyond our grasp and understanding.  And. We have Jesus. Jesus is God confined and limited like ...
Post a Comment
Read more