Today’s scripture: Matthew 12:22–32 (ESV-text and audio) (KJV) (The Message) What might God be saying to me?
My thoughts (Keith Phillips):
“It’s time to take the world back for God.”
That’s essentially what Jesus was announcing when he said at the beginning of his ministry, “The Kingdom of God is here!” Something had gone horribly wrong in the world which God had created, and the people of God were patiently waiting for God to clean it up: “O, if only the Messiah would come. Then, everything would be rosy and gay!” (Well, maybe those first century Jews didn’t quite say that, but they were putting all their hopes in God to take care of a situation which they, and their predecessors, had created; we sometimes do that, too.)
Jesus came teaching the Good News of unconditional love, of an equitable system of justice, of peace and freedom. Jesus came touching the untouchable, healing the diseased, exorcising the demon-possessed, even raising the dead to life again. Yes, the Kingdom of God is here! Just look around you, and you can see that it’s true. Our God reigns!
But there were the nay-sayers, refusing to see, refusing to believe what was/is right in front of their eyes, refusing to act like God reigns. They even had the audacity to declare that Jesus was doing what he was doing, not by the awesome loving power of God, but by the malevolent power of Satan.
This scripture passage is a lawyer’s dream. Jesus presents three rational, incontrovertible pieces of evidence that he could not possibly be doing what he was doing through some evil power. And like most rational proofs in a non-rational argument, they fell on deaf ears. And the clincher is in Jesus’ statement of the consequence of that which he defined to be blasphemy against the Holy Spirit: it cannot be forgiven.
The Message paraphrases it clearly: “If you deliberately persist in your slanders against God’s Spirit, you are repudiating the very One who forgives. . . . when you reject the Holy Spirit, you’re sawing off the branch on which you’re sitting, severing by your own perversity all connection with the One who forgives.”
The issue is not that they, or we, have done something that is unforgivable, but rather that they, and hopefully not we, had cut themselves off from God by a steadfast refusal to participate in God’s reign in this world. The sin cannot be forgiven because of their refusal to receive the forgiveness. God isn’t going to clean up the world, or us, without our cooperation and collaboration.
Desmond Tutu, former Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town, South Africa, and a Nobel Peace Prize recipient, is quoted as saying: “God without you, won’t; you without God, can’t.”
Thought for the day: Don’t you think it’s time to take the world back for/with God? The Kingdom of God is here!
We encourage you to include a time of prayer with this reading. If you need a place to get started, consider the guidelines on the How to Pray page.