60IN60 Day 25 - Thurs May 31

It's Day 25 and we're in Luke 11.

Where God Spoke To Me:
- Verse 1 - For all of us who aren't particularly good at prayer or find prayer difficult, it's encouraging to know that the disciples asked Him to teach them how to pray and He didn't rebuke them for that.

Help:
- Verses 49-51 - This is tough to understand, but I take it to say something like, "You all are in an advantaged position - you have all the history of Israel to look back on and learn from.  Yet, rather than learning, you're every bit the hypocrites that your forefathers were.  Therefore the guilt just continues to pour out on you."
- Verse 52 - What is the "key to knowledge"?  He doesn't say here.  One obvious explanation would be that the key is Jesus.  Another possibility, given the Pharisees' habits, was that the key is avoiding hypocrisy.

If you want to read the chapter online, here's a link.

If you have a question or comment, email me at butcher@ymail.com.


Your Thoughts And Questions:
- "In the Amplified version, just wanted to ask if there was any validity to 'collect my inheritance' as an interpretation of 'bury my father' in Matthew 8?" - Jesus' denial of the man's request to go and bury his father is a hard saying.  That certainly seems like a reasonable request.  In trying to make sense of that, several explanations have been offered.  One of those is that some scholars argue that in that culture that statement would have had a lot to do with receiving his inheritance.  Toward that, those scholars argue that the man's father may not have been dead, but rather the man may have been saying something like this, "Before I follow you Jesus, I have to wait on my elderly father to pass and receive my rightful inheritance."  That, though, is just one interpretation of the statement.
- "I’m thankful for the pastor’s comments.  I didn’t view David’s wise son like this before.  To me, Solomon come across as a philosopher who is missing the whole point.  The type who think their life away, idealists.  Or am I off base here?" - I think that's a piece of the puzzle.  Solomon definitely had that abstract thinking thing going on.  I think a big piece of it is also that he got compromised by competing loyalties: to his foreign wives, to his own understanding, etc.  All of that led him to not put absolute trust in God's instructions.  Ecclesiastes is a fascinating example of the end result of that type of thinking.  Solomon has literally everything that this world can provide him and he still finds life meaningless.  Without God, life is ultimately without purpose.

- "What does the Bible say about cremation?" - Even though this wasn't in our passage, I'm always willing to answer the Biblical questions you have.  Some people have strong feelings against cremation, but the Bible does not speak directly to the subject.  There is no verse explicitly condemning or condoning cremation.  Because there is no injunction against it, my view is that cremation is a legitimate option for the Christian if they so choose.  Ultimately we all return to dust sooner or later after our death and nothing we do in that regard will intrude on God's ability to resurrect us in the last day.