DESTINY’S BIBLE STUDY NOTES AND QUOTES

(The LIFE and MINISTRY of JESUS #32)

Barriers Broken Down (See Matthew 15:21-28, Mark 7:24-36)

After the encounter with the pharisees, Jesus withdrew from Capernaum, and crossing Galilee, went to the hill country on the borders of Phoenicia. Looking westward, he could see the ancient cities of Tyre and Sidon, with their heathen temples, their magnificent palaces, and markets of trade, with the harbors filled with shipping.

Behold, a Canaanite woman came out from those borders, and cried saying, “Have mercy on me oh Lord, Son of David, my daughter is severely demon possessed.” (Matthew 5:22)

Christ knew this woman’s situation. He knew that she was longing to see Him, and He placed Himself in her path. By ministering to her sorrow, He could give a living representation of the lesson He designed to teach. For this, He had brought His disciples into the region.

He desired them to see the ignorance existing in cities and villages close to the land of Israel. The people who had been given every opportunity  to understand the truth were without a knowledge of the needs of those around them. No effort was made to help souls in darkness.

The woman urged her case with increased earnestness, bowing at His feet and crying, “Lord help me!”

Jesus, still apparently rejecting her entreaties according to the unfeeling prejudice of the Jews, answered. “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.”

This answer would have utterly discouraged a less earnest seeker. But the woman saw that her opportunity had come. Beneath the apparent refusal of Jesus, she saw a compassion that He could not hide!

The same agencies that barred men from Christ eighteen hundred years ago, are at work today. The evil spirit that built up the partition wall between Jew and Gentile is still active. Pride and prejudice have built strong walls of separation between different classes of humanity.

Christ and His mission have been misrepresented, and multitudes feel that they are virtually shut away from the ministry of the gospel. But let them not feel that they are shut away from Christ. There are no barriers which man or Satan can erect that faith cannot penetrate.

In faith the woman of Phoenicia flung herself against the barriers that had been piled up between Jew and Gentile. Against discouragement, regardless of appearances that might have led her to doubt, she trusted the Savior’s love!

It is thus that Christ desires us to trust in Him. The blessings of salvation are for every soul. Nothing but their own choice can prevent anyone from becoming a partaker of the promise in Christ by the gospel.

Caste is hateful to God. He ignores everything of this character. In His sight, the souls of humanity are equal in His sight.

“Seek the Lord, in the hope that you might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us.” (Acts 17:27)

“Whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” (Romans 10:13)

The True Sign (See Matthew 15:29-39; 16:1-12, Mark 7:31-37; 8:1-21)

Jesus would not send the people away hungry, and He called upon His disciples to give them food. Again, the disciples revealed their unbelief. At Bethsaida they had seen how, with Christ’s blessing, their little store availed for the feeding of the multitude; yet they did not now bring forward their all. Moreover, those he fed at Bethsaida were Jews; these were Gentiles and heathen.

Every miracle that Christ performed was a sign of His divinity. He had been doing the very work that had been foretold of the Messiah. But to the Pharisees these works of mercy were a positive offense. The Jewish leaders looked with heartless indifference on human suffering. In many cases their selfishness and oppression had caused the affliction that Christ relieved. Thus his miracles were to them a reproach.

That which led the Jews to reject the Savior’s work was the highest evidence of His divine character. The greatest significance of His miracles is seen in the fact that they were for the blessing of humanity.

The highest evidence that He came from God is that His life revealed the character of God. He did the works, and spoke the words of God. Such a life is the greatest of all miracles!

Enmity against Satan is not natural to the human heart, it is implanted by the grace of God. When one who has been controlled by a stubborn, wayward will is set free, and yields himself wholeheartedly to the drawing of God’s heavenly agencies, a miracle is wrought, so also when a man has been under strong delusion comes to understand moral truth.

Every time a soul is converted, and learns to love God, and keep His commandments, the promise of God is fulfilled. “A new heart will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you.” (Ezekiel 36:26). The change in human hearts, the transformation of human characters, is a miracle that reveals an ever-living Savior, working to rescue souls.

The disciples were inclined to think that their Master should have granted the demand for a sign in the heavens. They believed that He was fully able to do this, and that such a sign would put His enemies to silence. They did not discern the hypocrisy of these cavilers.

The hypocrisy of the Pharisees was the product of self-seeking.

Those who classed themselves with the followers of Jesus, but who had not left all to become His disciples, were influenced in a great degree by the reasoning of the Pharisees. They were often vacillating between faith and unbelief, and they did not discern the treasures of wisdom hidden in Christ.

Even the disciples, though outwardly they had left all for Jesus’ sake, had not in heart ceased to seek great things for themselves. It was this spirit that prompted the strife as to who should be greatest.

As leaven, if left to complete its work, will cause decay. So does the self-seeking spirit work the defilement, and ruin of the soul.

It is the love of self, a desire for an easier way than God has appointed that leads to the substitution of human theories and traditions for the divine precepts.

Only the power of God can banish self-seeking and hypocrisy. This change is the sign of His working. When the faith we accept destroys selfishness and pretense, when it leads us to seek God’s glory, and not our own, we may know that it is of the right order.

“Father, glorify thy name.” (John 12:28). This was the keynote of Christ’s life, and if we follow Him, this will be the keynote of our life.

He commands us to “walk, even as He walked,” and “hereby we do know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments.” (1 John 2: verses 6, and 3).