VIDEO Precious Memories – Patty Loveless

Jan 23, 2010

Precious memories give us a picture of God our Father and His love for us. When I was a child, my father, a milkman, would pass by my grade school in his milk truck right when school was letting out. Knowing that his next stop would be at the little grocery store at the bottom of the hill, my sister and I would call to our friends, “Come on! Dad will buy us something!” We’d then run with metal lunch pails knocking knobby knees down to the store and surround my father as he worked. He would stop what he was doing, and with a smile, empty his pockets of change treating us all to a bit of candy. In this way, my father taught me about the grace of God, undeserved but freely given.

I’d like to encourage anyone commenting on this video to relate their own precious memory.

The song by Patty Loveles can be found on the “How Great Thou Art” CD and purchased from ITunes.

The Story of Passion Week (As Told by the FSB)

The last week of Jesus’ ministry, often called Passion Week, was packed with action—powerful teaching, bold confrontation, intrigue, and prophecy both fulfilled and made anew.

Passion Week begins when Jesus rides into the Jerusalem on a donkey to the adulation and cries of, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” The account is recorded in several different places in Scripture, but the most detailed is found in Matthew 21:1–11.

In this one event, Jesus fulfilled a number of Old Testament prophecies about the Messiah, something he did no less than 68 times in his life. This chart details each of them:

prophecychart

Jesus found many opportunities to preach throughout Passion Week. The Parable of the Two Sons (Matthew 21:28–32), Parable of the Tenants (Matthew 21:33–45), Parable of the Wedding Feast (Matthew 22:1–14), The Great Commandment (Matthew 22:34–40), and the Seven Woes to the Scribes and Pharisees (Matthew 23:1–36). And whenever Jesus taught, the religious leaders were close by to challenge him. One of their Passion Week challenges came in the form of a trick question about taxes, intended to trap Jesus. The Pharisees asked him if it was lawful to pay Roman taxes—a clever question because whether Jesus answered yes or no, the answer could be used against him. Jesus managed to answer without giving them the ammunition they anticipated. The Faithlife Study Bible notes explain: “Jesus both settles the matter and avoids incriminating Himself. The coin had Caesar’s image and title on it, and therefore by extension, belonged to Caesar—it was his currency. However, if Caesar got his due, God should likewise receive His due—the whole earth is His and everything in it (Psalm 24:1). What they were required to give God was of far greater worth than a coin—their entire lives. The currency of the kingdom of God is based on following Christ.” The Faithlife Study Bible also includes this great image so we can visualize the coin in question:

silverdenarius

After this, the religious leaders in Israel began making plans to kill Jesus. Scripture uses a unique word to describe their actions—dolos. It means deceitful, underhanded, or treacherous. The FSB’s study notes point it out and suggest that Matthew used it to contrast Jesus’ innocence and righteousness. I also see a link to A Greek–English Lexicon of the New Testament, since I have that book in my Logos library (don’t forget that books you get on Logos.com network automatically with your other resources to make them more powerful). The last night of Jesus’ ministry was spent with his disciples celebrating the Jewish holiday of Passover. He instituted our New Testament observance of communion in the midst of the Passover celebration. Afterward, Jesus and his disciples walked from the city to pray in the Garden of Gethsemane, where he would be arrested later that evening. We sent a video-production team to Israel to capture images and video of important locations like this. You can take a virtual stroll through the garden in the study notes on Matthew 26:36:

jesuslife.passion_infographic

Judas Iscariot, one of Jesus’ disciples, led his enemies to the garden where they could arrest him in secret. Ten of the disciples fled, but Peter jumped to his defense, wounding a servant of the High Priest. Jesus intervened, reminding him that the armies of heaven stood ready to defend them all, but he chose not to call on them. The religious leaders of Israel bribed witnesses to accuse him in a secret trial held in the council chamber. The Faithlife Study Bible includes this image, helping you imagine the setting:

Sanhedrin

They found Him guilty, but lacked the authority to carry out the death sentence they sought, so they brought Jesus to appear before Pontius Pilate, the Roman Prefect in Jerusalem. For years, Scripture was the only record of Pilate. Many skeptics denied his existence until an inscription was uncovered by Robert Bull in 1982. With this archaeological discovery, the details of the biblical narrative were once again confirmed accurate:

pilatesinscription

Though Pilate did not want to order Jesus’ execution at first, eventually he succumbed to the public pressure whipped up by the religious leaders. Jesus was crucified outside the city walls at a place called Golgotha, which means “place of the skull.” Protestant archaeologists in the nineteenth century identified this hill as the most likely spot because its location fits the biblical description and the rock formation does resemble a skull. The Faithlife Study Bible includes this image:

golgotha

If the story ended there, we probably would not know it today. But of course, Jesus did not stay dead. Three days after his execution, two women traveled to his tomb to pay their respects and felt an earthquake beneath them. When they arrived at the tomb, they found it empty. An angel told them not to fear, because Jesus had risen from the dead. The account is recorded in Matthew 28, and the Faithlife Study Bible puts it this way:

This chapter contains the most important event in human history: the resurrection of Jesus the Messiah from the dead. In fulfillment of his prediction, He conquers the grave and rises again to life.

So we celebrate, once a week on Sunday and once a year on Easter, the victory that Jesus won over death, hell, and the grave. He is risen. He is risen indeed.

By Ray Deck III

To explore Passion Week and the rest of Scripture in a new way, download the free Faithlife Study Bible on your smartphone or tablet today.
https://faithlifebible.com/app?p=4883&utm_source=blog.faithlife.com&utm_medium=blog&utm_content=thestoryofpassion&utm_campaign=faithlife2014q2

An Extravagant Love

Matthew 16:6-13; John 11:1-46

She was the only one who believed Him. Whenever He spoke of His death, the others shrugged or doubted, but Mary believed because He spoke with a firmness she’d heard before. And she believed because she’d doubted before.

She’d questioned His affection for her family when He hadn’t arrived in time. “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

But she saw that Jesus wept with her.

And then He spoke.

“Lazarus, come out!” And after four days in a stone-sealed grave, Lazarus walked out.

As Mary kissed the now-warm hands of her just-dead brother, she turned and looked at Jesus. He was smiling. She would never doubt His words again.

So when He spoke of His death, she believed.

She carried the large vial of perfume from her house to Simon’s. It wasn’t a spontaneous gesture. But it was an extravagant one. The perfume was worth a year’s wages. Maybe the only thing of value she had. It wasn’t a logical thing to do, but since when has love been led by logic?

Common sense hadn’t wept at Lazarus’s tomb. Love did. Extravagant, risky, chance-taking love.

And someone needed to show the same to the giver of such love.

So Mary did: She stepped up behind Jesus and poured out the jar. Over His head and shoulders. Down His back. She would have poured herself out for Him, if she could.

The fragrance of the sweet ointment rushed through the room.

“Breathe the aroma and remember one who cares,” the gesture spoke. “When You feel forsaken, remember that You are loved.” The other disciples mocked her extravagance, but don’t miss Jesus’ prompt defense of Mary. “Why are you troubling this woman? She did an excellent thing for Me.”

This wasn’t the first time He’d defended her either. When her sister Martha demanded that Mary help with household duties instead of sitting at His feet, Jesus said, “There is only one thing worth being concerned about. Mary has discovered it.”(Luke 10:42 NLT)

Jesus’ message is as powerful now as it was then: There is a time for risky love. There is a time to sit at the feet of the One you love, to pour out your affections on Him. And when the time comes, seize it.

–Max Lucado

All the Lonely People

“I looked on my right hand, and beheld, but there was no man that would know me: refuge failed me; no man cared for my soul.” (Psalm 142:4)

This is one of the saddest verses in the Bible. To be all alone, not knowing where to find refuge from problems that bear heavily at times—this is the lot of many lonely people.

Sometimes, of course, one’s feelings of loneliness may be because of unconfessed sin, as when David lamented after his crime of adultery and murder: “When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me” (Psalm 32:3-4). Outwardly silent, but inwardly roaring—that’s the way it is when a believer tries to rationalize and hide his sin from God and man. The remedy in such a case is obvious: “I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the LORD; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Selah” (Psalm 32:5).

When the problem is not one of unconfessed sin, the Lord is always there to comfort and guide, if we ask Him. Following the sad complaint of our text, David made a statement of hope and faith. “The righteous shall compass me about; for thou shalt deal bountifully with me” (Psalm 142:7).

There was a time, in fact, when the Lord Himself was all alone. When He was arrested, “then all the disciples forsook him, and fled” (Matthew 26:56). But that was not the worst of it. “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46). Jesus died all alone on the cross—the loneliest and most forsaken person in all human history—as even His heavenly Father had to abandon Him when He took our sins and died for us. Thus, He understands our own need and is always there. “For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted [or ‘tested’], he is able to succor them that are tempted” (Hebrews 2:18). HMM

They are of those that rebel against the light

They are of those that rebel against the light; they know not the ways thereof, nor abide in the paths thereof.—Job 24:13.
Thy people shall be willing in the day of Thy power.—Psalm 110:3.

SEE, in Thy hands I lay them all—
My will that fails, my feet that fall;
My heart that wearies everywhere,
Yet finds Thy yoke too hard to bear.
KATHARINE T. HINKSON.

THE way may at times seem dark, but light will arise, if thou trust in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him. That light may sometimes show hard things to be required, but do not be distressed if thy heart should rebel; bring thy unwillingness and disobedience to Him, in the faith that He will give thee power to overcome, for He cannot fail. “Greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world,” so keep close to Him, and the victory will be won. But do not, I beseech thee, neglect anything that is required, for disobedience brings darkness; and do not reason or delay, but simply follow the leadings of the Holy Spirit, and He will guide thee into all peace.
ELIZABETH T.KING.

He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him

He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him. Psalm 91:15

And Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, Oh that thou wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me! And God granted him that
which he requested. — Ask what I shall give thee. And Solomon said unto God, … Give me now wisdom and knowledge, that I may go out and come in before this people. — And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore.

Asa cried unto the LORD his God, and said, LORD, it is nothing with thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no power … O LORD, thou art our God; let not man prevail against thee. So the LORD smote the Ethiopians before Asa. O thou that hearest prayer, unto thee shall all flesh come.

1 Chronicles 4:10. 2 Chronicles 1:7,8,10. 1 Kings 4:29. 2 Chronicles 14:11,12. Psalm

I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine eves

I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine eves: nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee. Psalm 31:22

I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing: I am come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me. — Waters flowed over mine head; then I said, I am cut off. I called upon thy name, O LORD, out of the low dungeon. Thou hast heard my voice: hide not thine ear at my breathing, at my cry. Thou drewest near in the day that I called upon thee: thou saidst, Fear not.

Will the LORD cast off for ever? and will he be favourable no more? Is his mercy clean gone for ever? doth his promise fail for evermore? Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies? And I said, This is my infirmity: but I will remember the years of the right hand of the most High. I will remember the works of the LORD: surely I will remember thy wonders of old. — I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living.

Psalm 69:2. Lamentations 3:54-57. Psalm 77:7-11. Psalm 27:13.