Tag Archives: teaching

It’s tough at home (Mark 6:4) July 27, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Psalms 87-89

see the whole year’s plan [here](http://www.bible-reading.com/bible-plan.pdf)

Today’s Devotional

Mark 6:4
Jesus (seeing this): A prophet can find honor anywhere except in his hometown, among his own people, and in his own household.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

Do you really want to test your faith? Do you really want to know if what you’ve found in Christ is real and can stand up to the test of the world and the ridicule of those you ran around with as an enemy of God and His kingdom? Then live Christ in front of your family. Day in and day out live the life God wants you to live. Share what God puts on your mind. Do the tasks He calls you to do. Love the way He wants you to love within your family.

When you live your life in front of your family, they know if you are real. You can’t put on a façade in front of them, at least not very long. They know your past. They know your habits. They know the things you’ve started and quit. They know the resolutions you’ve made through the years and failed in keeping. They know the buttons to push to get you riled up and send your emotions flaring. Your family knows you better than anyone else.

When Jesus came back to His hometown to share the message that the kingdom of heaven was at hand, He shared it in the synagogue where He grew up as a boy. The rabbi and the elders in around the facility probably told Him and His brothers more than once that they needed to stop running on the property when they were growing up. The scribes sitting around the synagogue remembered Him sitting in their classes just learning the scriptures. Yes, He had an uncanning interest and skill in learning them, but Jesus was still just a kid in the class and played and sang and rough-housed with all the other boys. The scribes watched Him grow up around them.

The people of Nazareth watched Jesus in His father’s carpenter shop. He cut wood, hauled scraps, sanded rough planks, delivered finished products to customers. He learned His father’s trade and became a carpenter Himself. Somewhere along the line, Jesus’ father died and Jesus took up His father’s work to provide for the rest of the family. But everyone in the town knew Him. It was a small town and there were few secrets. They all even knew that Jesus was too old for Mary and Joseph to have been married when He was conceived.

Everyone knew everything about Jesus. So now, He was preaching in their synagogue. This illegitimate son of Mary and Joseph that grew up in their village. How could He talk to them about the scriptures? How could this carpenter school them in how God thinks we should live and act? What makes this laborer think He can challenge the teachings of the scribes and interpret the scriptures better than the rabbis who studied in Jerusalem?

It was tough for Jesus, the thirty-year-old man, the Son of God, to be heard in the town where His mother raised Him as a toddler, a teenager, and a young adult. Those older adults, those scribes and rabbis just couldn’t see past the teenager that grew up in their town. They couldn’t see the wisdom and knowledge Jesus gained over those last twenty years because they didn’t want to consider that He really was the Son of God. Why would God live in Nazareth? Surely He would live in Jerusalem and learn in the Temple if He were to come in the form of man, right? Jesus couldn’t be the Son of God. They watched Him grow up in their town. They knew nothing good came out of Nazareth…because they lived there.

Doesn’t say much for what their chamber of commerce put on their city advertisements, does it?

So what does that tell us about living for Him in our own homes? What do we learn from this short exchange in which Jesus declares that prophets receive honor everywhere except in their own hometown? I think He tells us we still need to witness to our lost family members, but expect them to question your faith. Don’t be surprised when they ridicule your newfound relationship with God. Don’t be surprised when they don’t believe you have been changed by the power of God’s Spirit living in you.

Like those living in Nazareth, family and close friends that have known you all your life, will always be the most skeptical of your changed life in Christ. They have seen you try those fad diets, New Year’s resolutions, organization trials, exercise programs, and all those other things that lasted a month or two before you fell into your old habits. They will think the same of your life in Christ. And even when the see the change over time, they will not recognize the change because they will test it over months and years to see if it sticks and by then they will put blinders on and forget the old you. Satan will put a veil over their eyes and try to hide the truth from them. It is hard to share the gospel with family. Not impossible, but hard.

What are we to do? Keep doing exactly what Jesus did. He still taught in the synagogue even though many didn’t listen. He still healed even though many didn’t come to Him. He performed a few miracles even though many didn’t believe and limited the usefulness of God living in their town. Jesus still did exactly what His Father asked Him to do. And that’s what Jesus expects us to do. Listen to Him and carry out His will, even in our families.

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.

What are you teaching? (Titus 2), June 30, 2015

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Scriptures

Today’s Bible reading plans include:

Ready – Titus 2
Set – Psalms 104; Titus 2
Go! – Amos 7–9; Psalms 104; Titus 2

Titus 2
1 As to you, Titus: talk to them; give them a good, healthy diet of solid teaching so they will know the right way to live.
2 Here’s what I want you to teach the older men: enjoy everything in moderation, respect yourselves and others, be sensible, and dedicate yourselves to living an unbroken faith demonstrated by your love and perseverance.
3 And here’s what I want you to teach the older women: Be respectful. Steer clear of gossip or drinking too much so that you can teach what is good 4 to young women. Be a positive example, showing them what it is to love their husbands and children, and teaching them to 5 control themselves in every way and to be pure. Train them to manage the household, to be kind, and to be submissive to their husbands, all of which honor the word of God.
6 Encourage the young men in the same way: in every situation, they should learn to control themselves.
7-8 Titus, you have to set a good example for everyone. Go out of your way to do what is right, speak the truth with the weight and authority that come from an honest and pure life. No one can argue with that. Then your enemies will cower in shame because they have nothing bad to say against us.
9 Advise all the servants: Work hard for your masters, and be loyal to them. Strive to please. Don’t be rude or sarcastic. 10 Don’t steal or embezzle your masters’ property. Show them you are trustworthy, and all the credit will go to the teaching of God our Savior.
11 We have cause to celebrate because the grace of God has appeared, offering the gift of salvation to all people. 12 Grace arrives with its own instruction: run away from anything that leads us away from God; abandon the lusts and passions of this world; live life now in this age with awareness and self-control, doing the right thing and keeping yourselves holy. 13 Watch for His return; expect the blessed hope we all will share when our great God and Savior, Jesus the Anointed, appears again. 14 He gave His body for our sakes and will not only break us free from the chains of wickedness, but He will also prepare a community uncorrupted by the world that He would call His own—people who are passionate about doing the right thing.
15 So, Titus, tell them all these things. Encourage and teach them with all authority—and rebuke them with the same. You are a man called to serve, so don’t let anyone belittle you.

Today’s Devotional

From today’s background scripture God might say:

Have you ever thought about what you should share with those around you? Too often you just assume your children and those around you at work, church or your neighbors will just pick up your habits and learn what you want them to learn. Unfortunately, life doesn’t work that way. You need to be a little more deliberate in your approach to teaching what you want those you care for to learn.

If you look at the advertising around you, you’ll find the world is pretty good at teaching impressionable young minds what it wants to teach. For instance, regardless of the known dangers of tobacco use, teenagers and young adults continue to pick up the habit and tobacco products still rake in almost half a trillion dollars in sales each year.

You see the tobacco advertisers teach children it’s cool to smoke or dip, and they teach them well. They are deliberate in the way they distribute their information and hide the truth about the damage that comes from their products. And so young people decide the teaching by the cancer societies won’t happen to them. The sales of products climb. And profits continue to grow.

The same can be said of alcohol, drugs, both legal and illegal, many of the foods you eat that you know don’t provide good nutritious value for you. But the teach of the advertisers help you decide the diseases won’t happen to you and so you partake. Adam and Eve did the same thing in the Garden of Eden with Satan’s advertisements about the forbidden fruit. Then it was too late for them.

So what do you want your children to learn? If you teach a Sunday School class, what do you want your students to learn? What do you want your neighbors to understand about you or about Me? What lessons do you want your co-workers to learn about spiritual things?

Remember, My command to you was to go and make disciples … in all the world. To meet the requirement I gave you requires deliberate action on your part. Perhaps it’s time to sit down and decide what you want others to see in you that you want them to know and learn. What habits do you have that you want your children and grandchildren to adopt? What do you want them to see and do? Can you respond like Paul, “Whatever you have seen me say or do, you do the same and you’ll find Christ.”?

Only deliberate action will overcome the plan Satan has in place to deceive those around you he wants to snatch from My kingdom. And perhaps only you can reach some of those with whom you interact each day. So what will you show them? What will you share with them? What will you teach them so they will know Me?

Paul gave Titus some clear instructions that I want to make sure you know fit you as well. “Talk to them; give them a good, healthy diet of solid teaching so they will know the right way to live.” Do this and you will fulfill My desire for you to make disciples in the world where you live.

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.