October 30, 2021
Please use the comment section on this page to share insights from today’s reading OR your own personal Bible reading.
Reading along with us in Luke? Here’s today’s reading:
Luke 5 (NIV)
Jesus Calls His First Disciples
1 One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret, the people were crowding around him and listening to the word of God. 2 He saw at the water’s edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets. 3 He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat...........Continue Reading
It has always impressed me that the disciples dropped everything ( their livelihood) and followed Jesus. They recognized who He was and trusted Him completely. I pray that I will learn to trust Jesus completely.
“They say, ‘the old wine is better.'” That’s why we don’t take to heart what they say.
I’ve prayed many times out fishing that if I cast my net to the other side Lord bless my fishing trip. Nope!! Well I’ve done ok but not like this passage. I to would respond like Peter. Lord please go from me. I am not worthy of your blessings. !! The men that made a hold in the roof. It was there faith why Jesus healed their friend. Interesting!!
The faith of the man being lowered through the roof is comendable. Jesus states that He can see the man’s faith. I believe Jesus saw this through the man’s actions and the lengths he would go to see Jesus. However, it was not his works that gave him forgiveness of sins, it was by faith alone. The works were the evidence for his faith.
Luke 5
I love that Jesus’ teachings were frequently through parables and pictures much like the fish in the boat. Object lessons are not just for children but for adults as well to really have that “a-ha” moment where you grasp the lesson being taught
I also love Jesus’ approach to people and where his time was spent. Sinners and tax collectors and the people that needed Him was where you would find Him and when He was done He didn’t bask in the limelight of so many people wanting to see this amazing man but rather spent quiet time alone with His father…
“15Yet the news about him spread all the more, so that crowds of people came to hear him and to be healed of their sicknesses. 16But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.”
It is interesting that many were coming to Jesus to be healed of some infirmity, but Christ also offers the forgiveness of sin. It seems that people immediately seem to know who He is. The Pharisees recognize that only God can forgive sins.
When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!” And Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid. From now on you will catch men.”
“And when they could not find how they might bring him in, because of the crowd, they went up on the housetop and let him down with his bed through the tiling into the midst before Jesus.
When He saw their faith, He said to him, “Man, your sins are forgiven you.”
And the scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, “Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?”
Jesus states His power, “But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins”
Jesus answered and said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.”
Our culture has pridefully wandered away from recognizing its own sinfulness and need for forgiveness of sin and a Savior.
Oh to be a fly on the wall observing these events. To see Jesus, and by virtue of His reputation and/or His mere presence to ask the men to use their boat, to be trusted to take another trip out to sea, and then ask them to follow Him would be incredible. We can imagine Peter’s response confronted by this miracle and maybe also Jesus’ penetrating eye: I can’t be associated with this. I can’t be accepted. And isn’t it true that really anything we receive from God is if He is willing. So what faith is found in this leprous man to see that and say it to Jesus. God is always able. It is just a matter if it is right and good.
And what an amazing exchange with the Pharisees in the next account. It’s pretty clear that Jesus could have just healed him like He had so many before. But considering His audience and what they needed to understand about Him and also how they would have attributed this man’s condition to sin, Jesus addresses the most important condition…..sinfulness. He probably knew the response He would get, but rather than avoiding it, He welcomed it. It is obviously harder to heal a man than to tell him to tell him his sin is forgiven. SO to do the greater, means the “lesser”, yet more important is also true.
And what grace and influence is found in the call of Levi. The Pharisees just don’t know what to do with this Jesus….but amongst sinners is exactly where He wanted and needed to be.