Author: Norm

This man wants to inherit eternal life.For the Jews, this meant life in God’s restored kingdom of Israel.This man wanted to make sure he was going to be part of the kingdom.The Jews knew that lawless, disobedient people would not be in that kingdom.This man was doing his best to be good enough, to obey…

If there is a picture in my mind of Jesus, it is this one.Jesus is not bothered by the children.Jesus is bothered by those who hinder or harm the children.Consider who these children are, because Jesus wants us to be like them. These children were weak, dependent, under the authority of others.They did not understand…

Question, who wrote the Law?I’ve always understood the Moses Law as written by God.What that Law stated was God’s will from the beginning of creation.Yet Jesus says that what Moses wrote does not reflect God’s creation will.What Moses wrote was written for a specific reason: our hardened hearts.Divorce is not God’s will from the beginning,…

What exactly does it mean to be ‘salted with fire’?Jesus has just been talking about the fire of gehenna.Gehenna was a valley outside of Jerusalem used as a dump.It had an accursed history, a place of child sacrifice (Jeremiah 7:31).There were worms in the garbage and constantly smoldering fires.It was not a place you wanted to…

Some christians are adamant that we talk about ‘hell’.I could spend a lot of time on what ‘hell’ does, and does not mean.Suffice it to say, Jesus is talking about God’s judgment.And in this passage He makes clear who is under God’s judgment. God is passionate about “these little ones”.Jesus says that this refers to…

We have this tendency to divide ourselves into camps and clubs. We label others as either with us or not with us. We are constantly dividing, narrowing the definition of who belongs. There is a sermon illustration I once heard that points to this: “Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump….

The way of Jesus is backwards.It goes against what we think is natural or normal.Actually, what we see as normal is unnatural.God did not design us to put ourselves over others.God designed us to love like Him, which mean going beneath. This section starts with Jesus talking about His suffering and death.The disciples do not…

This is the other verse in this section that stood out to me.First of all, there are a few source texts that include ‘and fasting’.To fast is a way of intensifying your prayer, to increase its power.Yet in this moment Jesus is not fasting, that we know of.Nor does He seem to pray; He just…

There are two lines in this passage that stand out to me.The one above speaks to my own experience of faith and belief.I believe, and yet I still do not fully believe.I admit it, I belong to the unbelieving generation (Mark 9:19). Jesus is not angry with people who have weak faith.The translation of Jesus’s words…

Jesus says that some of them will see the kingdom of God come with power.Here on this high mountain, Peter, James and John see something powerful.He is transformed before their eyes in blazing glory.In a sense, He has the same experience as Moses and Elijah.Moses and Elijah represent the Law and the Prophets.In other words,…