Young People’s Blog

“Pilate therefore said unto Him, Art Thou a King then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a King. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth My voice. Pilate saith unto Him, What is truth?” (John 18:37-38).

Pilate was the Roman governor, and he began to question the Lord Jesus. The Lord Jesus answered his question, telling Pilate, “What you say is true,” for the Lord Jesus was a King. But then the Lord Jesus reached his conscience by mentioning the truth, and pointing out that all who were of the truth would gladly hear what the He had to say. He told the truth about everything—who God was, what man was, how sinful man was, what man needed in order to be saved, etc. The Lord Jesus made everything clear.

But Pilate did not want to hear. He dismissed the Lord Jesus by saying, “What is truth?” He did not really want to know the truth, and eventually he condemned an innocent man to death. This world has not changed, and if the Lord Jesus were to come to this world today in the same way, this world would again find some way to get rid of Him. But all who will come to Him as lost sinners can be saved.

“And when He had looked round about on them with anger, being grieved for the hardness of their hearts, He saith unto the man, Stretch forth thine hand” (Mark 3:5).

“Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamor, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice” (Ephesians 4:31).

Sometimes people ask the question, Is it ever right for a Christian to be angry? The two verses we have today would seem to contradict one another. The Apostle Paul tells us in Ephesians 4 that we are to put away all wrath and anger, yet in the verse in Mark 3, we find that the Lord Jesus looked around on some of the Jews with anger. On another occasion we know that He made a scourge of small cords, and drove all the animals out of the temple, as well as their owners. He also overturned the tables of the money changers, and the seats of them that sold doves. While the word anger does not appear in the accounts of all this, yet it is certainly reasonable to think that the Lord Jesus was angry with all those people. So, if the Lord Jesus was angry on some occasions, does that mean it is all right for us to be angry sometimes?

On Monday we will look at the answer to this seeming contradiction. Perhaps you can think about it for a day or two, and see if you can think of a verse that might answer the question.

“And Jesus said unto her…It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it unto the dogs. And she answered and said unto Him, Yes, Lord: yet the dogs under the table eat of the children’s crumbs” (Mark 7:27-28).

 If you read the whole story of what happened here (Mark 7:24-30), you will find that this woman who approached the Lord Jesus was a Gentile. To some of us, the way the Lord Jesus spoke to her might seem rather insulting. But the Lord Jesus had been sent to the nation of Israel, and the Gentiles had no right to approach Him and claim His healing power.

However, when the woman admitted who she was, and took her place as a little dog who did not have the same rights as the children, then the Lord readily granted her request.

This incident points out the truth that none of us really has any special claim on the Lord Jesus. He came and offered Himself to the Jews as their rightful King, but they rejected Him. Now the Lord Jesus is offering salvation to whosoever will, but we must come as lost, guilty sinners, asking to be saved only because of the mercy of God. When we come in that way, the Lord will always receive us.

“Then the Pharisees and scribes asked Him [the Lord Jesus], Why walk not Thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands?” (Mark 7:5).

“There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man” (Mark 7:15).

It is certainly a good thing to wash our hands before eating, especially after we have been to town, or to the store, etc. But the Jewish leaders were using this tradition as if it were part of the law of Moses, while at the same time they were using other traditions that actually went against the law of Moses.

The Lord Jesus did not say that it was wrong to wash your hands before eating, but He pointed out that it was not what we eat that defiles us, but what we say and do. It is our wicked hearts that defile us by our sins, and not what we eat.

It was true that in the Old Testament the Israelites were not to eat certain birds and animals, for they were unclean according to the law, but all of this had a typical meaning. The Lord Jesus always kept the law, but He pointed out that real sin came from the heart, and not from what we eat.

“Fear God, and keep His commandments: for this is the whole duty of man” (Ecclesiastes 12:13).

“What shall we do, that we might work the works of God? Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent” (John 6:28-29).

At the end of the book of Ecclesiastes Solomon reminds his readers that their responsibility was to fear God, and keep His commandments. Later, when the Lord Jesus became a man and came into this world, those who heard Him asked Him what God wanted them to do. In the Old Testament the nation of Israel was used to doing things to please the Lord. But the Lord Jesus’ answer was plain; the most important thing they could do was to believe on Him.

Sadly, most people did not believe on the Lord Jesus when He was here on earth, although many wanted to do something to please God. It is much the same today. Many people want to do something to earn their salvation, but God’s way of salvation is for us to believe on the Lord Jesus.

Yes, we can do good works for God after we are saved, but we cannot do anything to please God with a sinful nature. First of all we must come to the Lord Jesus, and believe on Him.

“Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them” (Ecclesiastes 12:1).

In the book of Ecclesiastes, written by King Solomon, we have a lot of wisdom imparted to us by a very wise man. God had given him a lot of wisdom, but he had also learned things through his own experience. In our verse for today he reminds young people to remember their Creator before they get old.

When we are young, we tend to think that we will have our fun first, and then think about eternal matters when we get older. But it is a fact that most people get saved when they are young. When they get old, they do not find much pleasure in natural things anymore, and later in this chapter (Ecclesiastes 12:3-7) there is a description of what happens when we get old and our bodies and minds begin to fail.

However, if we are not saved, when we get old we often do not have much interest in spiritual things either. Very few people get saved when they are old. If you are not saved, now is the time to accept the Lord Jesus as your Savior.

“But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18).

Several days ago, my wife was standing in an airport, waiting to pick up some people who had come to visit us. She saw an advertisement on the wall for the Subaru car company, showing a four-wheel drive vehicle driving through a river. The slogan underneath was “Grow through what you go through.” They meant that it would be an enriching experience to drive a Subaru, for you would be able to go through rough places where other cars could not go. Of course, their main motive was to sell more Subaru cars, but I thought it was a good slogan for a Christian too.

The Lord does not want us merely to go through various experiences in our Christian life, but wants us to grow spiritually through them all. He allows all the things that we go through, and allows them for our good. We can learn lessons from these experiences that will last forever. Most important, we can learn more of God’s grace, and how much He has done for us. Let us learn to value the experiences God puts us through, and ask the Lord what we are to learn from them.

“I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none” (Psalm 69:20).

When the Lord Jesus went to the cross, there were none that took pity on Him, or wanted to comfort Him. His own nation, the Jews, had rejected Him, and they asked the Roman governor, Pilate, to crucify Him. Then the Roman soldiers used the chance to mock Him and torture Him further. His own disciples forsook Him, and one of them (Peter) denied Him with oaths and curses. This is what man did to the Son of God, and we are all guilty.

Yet He went ahead with what the Father had given Him to do, and did not turn back because of man’s sinful heart. He looked ahead to the time when you and I would be saved, and now He says, “It was worth it all!” What a wonderful Savior we have! How our hearts should want to praise Him, and love Him, for all He has done for us!

“And He called unto Him the twelve, and began to send them forth by two and two…and commanded them that they should take nothing for their journey, save a staff only; no scrip, no bread, no money in their purse” (Mark 6:7-8).

On this occasion, the Lord Jesus sent His disciples out to preach, to cast out devils, and to heal people. As God, He was able to give them this power. They were not to take anything with them for support, but were to go in faith, trusting the Lord to provide what they needed. Later on, we find that they did not lack anything; the Lord saw to it that they were provided for.

Some of you may wonder what a scrip is, as many people do not understand what it was. It was a small pouch or satchel made from the skin of the kid of a goat, and was generally used to carry small amounts of food for a journey. But the disciples were not to take even this, for the Lord would provide for them.

Today you and I are privileged to serve the Lord too, and if He calls us, we can depend on Him to supply what we need in order to serve Him.

“And there fell upon men a great hail out of heaven, every stone about the weight of a talent…for the plague thereof was exceeding great” (Revelation 16:21).

In our verse for today, we see another aspect of God’s judgment on sinful man. This time it is not simply a warning; it is direct judgment from God, because man has not repented of His sin. If you are truly saved, you will not be here on the earth when this awful judgment comes.

This time God will use hail, and hail that is large enough to do tremendous damage. The Hebrew talent weighed at least 75 pounds, and some estimate it to have weighed up to 100 pounds. Can you imagine chunks of ice that large coming down as hail? They would easily smash to pieces houses, trees, and many other things, as well as killing anyone who was hit by one.

I remember being in an area of the state of Iowa, U.S.A. a few days after hail the size of small apples had come down, and it did a lot of damage. But that would be nothing compared to hail weighing 75-100 pounds.

Again, if you know the Lord Jesus as your Savior, you will not be here to fall under this judgment from. Do you know the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior?