John 11

Wow! I just need to do a better job of keeping this up-to-date!

John 11 is so rich, that I just have to deal with it in parts. This passage is especially close to my heart, and I think you may have heard me speak in chapel on the first part of this (March 31, 2004 ring a bell?--probably not--I just checked back over my PowerPoints to see when I modified it last). As most of you know, when I was in college I had a roommate that was killed in an auto accident. John 11:21-37 was the text read at his funeral. If you have already read that passage, read it again with that set of circumstances in mind. We already know how the story in John 11 turns out, but put yourself in their sandals for a few moments. Can you hear the hurt in the questions they ask and feel the pain that caused even Jesus to shed tears?

Back to that in a few moments. As John 11 opens, Jesus is not in Jerusalem--He's not even in Judea, apparently. But Lazarus, a good friend is sick (possibly from Leprosy or its complications--if you're curious as to why that might be, ask and I'll tell you why that might be the case). His sisters, Martha and Mary, send word to Jesus, hoping to compell Him into action. But when Jesus receives word, He hangs around where He is for 2 more days. The text does not say, but I imagine someone among Jesus' followers wondering or even possibly suggesting that they leave for Bethany right away. But He doesn't leave, offering for His explanation that death will not be the end, but God will be glorified in this situation. Finally, Jesus tells His talmidim that they're heading back down to Judea. The disciples remind Jesus of what almost happened the last time He went there, but after a short discussion, including Jesus telling them that Lazarus is already dead, they agree to join Him on His journey, spurred on by Thomas "the twin" (that's what "Didymus" means), who appears to be convinced that this will be the end of the line for all of them.

We'll pause there and pick up tomorrow.

John 10

This passage about the sheep and the shepherd is really interesting. Remember the story I told about the 4 different flocks that came to that shelter in the desert in the Middle East. They all came at once and each of them sheltered their sheep in the same pen for the evening. The shepherds slept in the gaps in the walls so that no sheep could get out (or other animal in) without the shepherd's knowledge (think--I am the gate). In the morning, then, the shepherds stood apart from each other and took turns calling the sheep. Then the sheep sorted themselves out by listening to the shepherds' voices and following the one they recognized. The question I have to ask myself is: Am I listening to the The Shepherd enough to recognize His voice when He calls me? In verse 22, we read that Jesus was in Jerusalem at the feast of Hanukkah ("Hanukkah" is the Hebrew word for "dedication").

Funny Story

Last week, when my wife was logging onto the internet from our home computer (we still have dial-up at home--no, I don't ride a dinosaur to work everyday), our three-year-old son was sitting on her lap and took an ill-timed stab at the keyboard which changed our username and password to our account. Naturally, we had no idea what random keys he hit and since we didn't have the old username and password (yeah, should've written those down) we were stuck without internet access for a while. It's fixed now, so I'm back to blogging...sorry for the delay.