April 18: Believing His Salvation.
HIS SIGN.
"No sign will be given...but the sign of Jonah the prophet."--Matthew 12:39
Do miracles produce real faith? This is a question that many religious groups have tried to answer till this day; there is even an ongoing dialogue about it on the internet. Yet the biblical account reports that after experiencing God's miraculous deliverance through the Red Sea (Exodus 14) and the supernatural provisions of food and water (Exodus 16), Israel still questioned if God was with them (Exodus 17:7). This was the case many times in the Bible stories. In light of these events, we ask: is there anything that can produce real faith in Jesus?
Having described several miracles of Jesus, Matthew recounts how the scribes and Pharisees came to Him asking for a sign (Matthew 12:38). Signs and miracles had legitimized the ministry of some of the Old Testament prophets, such as Moses and Elijah. But Jesus could read the hearts of His inquirers and knew that they had mocked and misinterpreted even His exorcisms (see Matthew 12:24). Jesus answered: "An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet; for just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights heart of the earth" (Matthew 12:39, 40). Jonah was a reluctant prophet who had tried to run away from God's call to proclaim His grace to Nineveh. It was a pagan city, which later became the capital of Assyria, whose populace eventually repented from their ways when Jonah finally preached to them. But the prophet himself was in dire need of God's grace. While on his rebellious journey, he ended up in the belly of a fish for three days, pleading with God in prayer. We find the heart of the gospel in the plea of Jonah: "Salvation is from the Lord" (Jonah 2:9). In a remarkable parallelism, Jesus announces to the Pharisees and scribes that His sacrifice on the cross would be the only sign that they would have about His identity and mission. If we are to avoid skepticism and desire to guard ourselves against unbelief, we must ask God for a daily revelation of Jesus' sacrifice for us. That's the only convincing sign!
My Response:___________________________________________________________
HIS SIGN.
"No sign will be given...but the sign of Jonah the prophet."--Matthew 12:39
Do miracles produce real faith? This is a question that many religious groups have tried to answer till this day; there is even an ongoing dialogue about it on the internet. Yet the biblical account reports that after experiencing God's miraculous deliverance through the Red Sea (Exodus 14) and the supernatural provisions of food and water (Exodus 16), Israel still questioned if God was with them (Exodus 17:7). This was the case many times in the Bible stories. In light of these events, we ask: is there anything that can produce real faith in Jesus?
Having described several miracles of Jesus, Matthew recounts how the scribes and Pharisees came to Him asking for a sign (Matthew 12:38). Signs and miracles had legitimized the ministry of some of the Old Testament prophets, such as Moses and Elijah. But Jesus could read the hearts of His inquirers and knew that they had mocked and misinterpreted even His exorcisms (see Matthew 12:24). Jesus answered: "An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet; for just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights heart of the earth" (Matthew 12:39, 40). Jonah was a reluctant prophet who had tried to run away from God's call to proclaim His grace to Nineveh. It was a pagan city, which later became the capital of Assyria, whose populace eventually repented from their ways when Jonah finally preached to them. But the prophet himself was in dire need of God's grace. While on his rebellious journey, he ended up in the belly of a fish for three days, pleading with God in prayer. We find the heart of the gospel in the plea of Jonah: "Salvation is from the Lord" (Jonah 2:9). In a remarkable parallelism, Jesus announces to the Pharisees and scribes that His sacrifice on the cross would be the only sign that they would have about His identity and mission. If we are to avoid skepticism and desire to guard ourselves against unbelief, we must ask God for a daily revelation of Jesus' sacrifice for us. That's the only convincing sign!
My Response:___________________________________________________________
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