Hello everybody, and welcome in to episode 108 of the Bible 2021 podcast. We are reading Matthew 10 today and our focus is on why we must lose our lives for Jesus + Can Christians bless houses? We are a daily 10 minute podcast, where we will dig in to the truth of the Word of God by reading one Bible chapter a day and discussing it. Welcome to new listeners in Laguna, Philippines, London, UK, Ontario, Canada, Assam, India, Salinas, California, Phoenix, Arizona, Grand Rapids, Michigan and Nashville, Tennessee. Thanks for listening! Our goal is to encourage DAILY Bible reading, so you can jump in at any time and join with us. We want to invite as many people as possible to join us in daily Bible reading, so help spread the word and share the podcast Don’t forget about our web-page, Bible2021.com – contact page, show notes, transcript and more– Click here for our Bible 2021 reading plan\
Let’s start with the less serious of our two topics. I suppose I framed the question a bit cheekily, but it is a legit question that is brought about by our text today. Can followers of Jesus somehow bless households, or families in a household? The answer appears to be yes:
12 Greet a household when you enter it,13 and if the household is worthy, let your peace be on it; but if it is unworthy, let your peace return to you.
Among Evangelical Christians, I would rank this command of Jesus amongst the lowest followed and obeyed commands of Jesus. How often have you blessed a household when you’ve entered it, and what does it even mean to let your peace rest on it, or return to you?? Luke 10:5 will likely help us understand this passage a bit better:
5 Whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace to this household.’6 If a person of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; but if not, it will return to you. Luke 10:5
So this is Jesus telling His disciples (and His followers!) to pronounce a blessing of peace on a house and household that they visit. The blessing seems to be more targeted towards the people of the house (“if a person of peace is there, your peace will rest on him.”) than the house itself, but it is indeed a blessing. If you are familiar with the Old Testament, you will know that priests gave blessings, and perhaps the most famous blessing is the Aaronic blessing:
22 The Lord spoke to Moses: 23 “Tell Aaron and his sons, ‘This is how you are to bless the Israelites. You should say to them, 24 “May the Lord bless you and protect you; 25 may the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; 26 may the Lord look with favor on you and give you peace.”’ Numbers 6:22-26
So, God’s priests were to bless God’s people. You might be thinking that you don’t have to do such a thing, because you are not a priest, but au contraire, mon frère: If you are in Jesus, you are indeed a priest!
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his possession, so that you may proclaim the praises of the one who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. 1 Peter 2:9
So – as God’s royal priests, you and I should bless a household of people when we visit! Let’s read our passage, and then dive deeper.
vs 39 sticks out to me as a vital teaching of Jesus:
39 Anyone who finds his life will lose it, and anyone who loses his life because of me will find it. Matthew 10:39
He expands on it a bit more later on in Matthew:
25 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life because of me will find it. Matthew 16:25
This is serious business, and quite upside-down counterintuitive, as much of Jesus’ teaching on the Kingdom of God is. If you want to find eternal life in Jesus, you must lose sovereignty over your own life, bowing the knee to Jesus. Let’s allow Spurgeon to splash some ice-cold and sobering water in our face with his commentary on this verse:
God grant you grace to say, “What can it matter to me what men say as long as I am right?” They cannot break bones with their jests; and if they did, there have been Christians who have not only suffered the breaking of their bones, but the burning of their whole bodies for Christ’s sake sooner than deny his sacred claims. What did Jesus say? “He that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.” He who, to gain the whole world, would keep back a solitary truth, is a huge loser for his pains. He is mean and base, and not worthy to be numbered amongst those who follow the Lamb wherever he goes. Oh! if I speak to one who hesitates, let me remind him that, however it may look to-night to be a daring step to be decided for Christ, it will look very differently soon when the great trumpet shall sound, and ring o’er earth and sea, and the dead shall rise, and the judgment-seat shall be set, and the great white throne shall be unveiled. Then it will be seen to be a far more desperate daring to deny the Lord even to save life itself. What will the cowards do in that day who, to please men, forsook their Lord? What will they do who suppressed truth and stifled conscience when the Shepherd begins to divide the goats and the sheep from each other? Ay, what will they do who find themselves driven with the goats, though once they half decided to be numbered with the sheep? They were near the fold, but never entered. What will they feel when he shall say, “Depart! Depart! I know you not. You knew not me in the day of my humiliation. You were ashamed of me in the world. You blushed at my name. You covered up what was in your conscience in order to avoid man’s laughter and rebuke. You knew not me, and now I know not you. Depart! Depart!” In proportion to the light against which you have shut your eyes will be your horror when that light shall blind you into eternal night. In proportion to the violence which you have done to your consciences will be the terror which your awakened consciences will work in you. In proportion to the nearness of the kingdom within which you came shall be the dreadful distance to which you will be driven.
C. H. Spurgeon, “For the Candid and Thoughtful,” in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons, vol. 26 (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1880), 71–72.
End of the Show: Bible memory verse for April James 4:6 “But he gives greater grace. Therefore he says: God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.”
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