Doug Van Pelt

Not good enough for the manure pile

Jesus said:

"Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is fit neither for the soil nor tfor the manure pile; it is thrown out. He who has ears to heard, let him hear."

When Jesus ate at the home of a prominent Pharisee, He was being carefully watched. A man with dropsy was there. I wonder if he was "planted" there as a healing trap? Or if he was just there; or if he came to be healed by Jesus. Jesus asked if it was lawful to heal on the Sabbath. No one answered, and so He healed the man. Then He asked them, "If one of you has a son or an ox that falls into a well on the Sabbath day, will you not immediately pull him out?" The answer is an obvious "Yes," but they were afraid to answer in the affirmative and thus align themselves logically with Jesus. As long as they denied the truth there, they could remain behind their "wall" of their false universe. If they accepted one truth, it would destroy the foundation of their belief system and they'd have to follow Jesus.

I can relate to that. Once someone realizes or puts faith in the fact that Jesus did miracles and was indeed the Son of God, then the only proper response is to worship Him. There's not really a middle ground of, "Oh, well, yeah, He is going to judge me one day, but I can just hang loose here and kind of ignore Him in the meantime." Not really. With the acknowledgment that He is God comes the responsibility to treat Him as such. We still have a choice, but it is a defiant one.

The cost of following Christ can be challenging, but I can say from experience that it's been worth it for me.

Posted by Doug Van Pelt at October 25, 2005 09:38 AM