October 27th, 2000
Luke 19:1-27
Luke 19 opened with the question "Do we have Christ in our lives?" and if so, how can we get closer? And if not, how do we get there?we had a few responses (i.e. meditatin'/thinkin' 'bout God if you don't know Him, and/or Readin' the Bible, praying (talking with God), or sharing with people to remind us of what drew us near to Him first). in Luke 19 we see that zacchaeus really wants to see Jesus as He's entering Jericho...but there is a problem. ya see...if ya look at verse 3, we find out zacchaeus is a tad on the short side. In fact, not only is he short, but he's also being blocked by a crowd. first off, let's take a moment to look at who Zacchaeus was...short, wealthy, chief tax collector. In those times people didn't like tax collectors very much. in fact, i'm not sure people like them all that much now-a-days.
anyhow, as we see in verse 4, zacchaeus does something about his obstacles. what does he do? he climbs up into a sycamore fig tree to see Jesus. so then the question was posed...'what blocks us from Christ?'. some people answered, friends, t.v., computers, things that 'we like to do', school...and so on. well, as we look on in the Word, in verse 5, we find that Jesus calls up to zacchaeus... and tells him to come down because He 'must' stay at his house. so then we discussed what the importance of Jesus stopping and acknowledging zacchaues in this way. not only did he notice him in a tree full of branches way high up with a crowd formed around him...but He told him He 'must' stay at his house. Christ at that point, placed the obligation on Himself to go see this man, because He recognized this man's devotion.
in verse 7 we see that the crowd began to talk and gossip about this situation, calling zacchaeus a 'sinner'--but Christ saw his heart and saw that he was willing to go to great lengths to see Christ and be with Him. so in verse 8 when he tells Jesus he'll give all his possessions to the poor and if he's cheated anyone, he'd pay 'em back 4 times the amount, Christ acknowledges his willingness to change' and tells him that he will be saved, not because he was giving his riches away, but because his heart was seeking Christ to be with Him, and God knew it was genuine.
the two main points were that we 'can' all have the desire to seek Christ, but what 'will' we do to be with Him? that can, comes with the desire to have a personal relationship with God, but the will part comes from the actions taken to be closer to Him. for zacchaeus, he had the desire to see Jesus, and took the steps to climb the tree to get His attention. and Jesus showed zacchaeus how much He wanted to spend time with him...with verse 5. that's the way Jesus is with us, in James 4:8 it says "Come near to God, and He will come near to you". someone pointed out that it seemed like Christ met zacchaeus half way...the Lord always meets us where we are at. we began to talk about 'how much time does it take for us to get closer to God?' how much time does our obstacles take up? with all that in mind, do we think we could spend just one min with God a day? complete devoted, just God time? just one min? andthe majority if not all agreed yes,...there see ms to be things we feel we have to do and things that draw us away from this basic desire to know God more, but then we also realize that we do have 'time' to give to Him. and once you begin to give that time to Him,...complete and focused, it continues to grow, b/c it will seem like you have more and more to tell God, as you begin to trust in Him more. one min becomes five, and five becomes ten, and so on with ease, b/c just like a really good friend that you love to 'just be with', God is that kind of friend with you. He loves to just spend whatever time you'll devote to Him, listenin' to us tell Him what's goin' on and He doesn't get tired of listenin', when some of our other friends might. (plus, when we listen to Him, we know His advice is the best, b/c He always has our best at heart).
Isaiah 30:18 says, "therefore the Lord longs to be gracious to you, and therefore He waits on high to have compassion on you. for the Lord is a God of justice. how blessed are all those who long for Him." He is waitin' for us to just come and be with Him, so He can have compassion on us!… that's purty awesome stuff to know not only do we wanta spend time with Him, but He wants to spend time with us. spending the time with the Lord will help you get closer to Him and build that personal relationship through Jesus Christ…so take that first step and climb that tree! on the tail end of the lesson we got talkin' 'bout luke 19:11-26...'bout the parable of the ten minas. in this, we saw that the master represented God, and the servants represented Christians, and the minas were talents/gifts that He has entrusted us with. some of those gifts we pointed out were, paitence, love, musical talents, kindness, gentleness and one of the greatest responsibilities that we can use those gifts towards is spreading the gospel. as we read about the 3 servants and what they chose to do with the minas the master gave them, we see that 2 used them and in return were rewarded. we discussed how those rewards would be not always of this earth, but treasure in Heaven. but when we looked at the third servant, he kept the mina hidden, and it didn't help anyone, nor did it even help himself. and that is in comparison to us with our gifts, and sometimes we choose to not use them for various reasons (i.e. we don't feel they are important, we don't recognize them, we are afraid to...etc.)...but that helps no one. in fact it hurts a lot of people, who might not get to experience the gifts He's given to you b/c you decided not to share them. one person mentioned how using the gifts wisely and not wasting them is how we need to treat these gifts. some people don't recognize the gifts given to them, but as a Christian, they should realize that we all have an individual testimony (that is personal and like no one else's) that He has given us and with that He gives us the Holy Spirit Who has all the gifts and resides w/in us. the Spirit is the same for everyone, but there are certain gifts that one person might be more inclined at than another b/c we enjoy then and work at them or things that come with ease. to share our testimony is a responsibility we all have and the Holy Spirit will lead us to enhance those gifts in us, that will help us with this responsibility that truly is a privilege to share with others, what God has done in our lives.
[-Van]