Bogota June 2011: Day 5

This morning after breakfast we resumed our series of devotions by admiring…

Jesus the Radical

I never read the book of Luke without being shocked and surprised at some of the things that Jesus says. No matter how many times I read it when I come back to it the next time I’m surprised at how radical what He says sounds to me. He says things like

Luke 6:2 “Blessed are you when men hate you, and ostracize you, and insult you, and scorn your name as evil, for the sake of the Son of Man.  23 “Be glad in that day and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven. For in the same way their fathers used to treat the prophets.  24 “But woe to you who are rich, for you are receiving your comfort in full.  25 “Woe to you who are well-fed now, for you shall be hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.  26 “Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way. 

Luke 9:23   And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.  24 “For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it.  25 “For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself?  26 “For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in His glory, and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels. 

Luke 9:57   As they were going along the road, someone said to Him, “I will follow You wherever You go.”  58 And Jesus said to him, “The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.”  59 And He said to another, “Follow Me.” But he said, “Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father.”  60 But He said to him, “Allow the dead to bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim everywhere the kingdom of God.”  61 Another also said, “I will follow You, Lord; but first permit me to say good-bye to those at home.”  62 But Jesus said to him, “No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.”

Luke 12:49   “I have come to cast fire upon the earth; and how I wish it were already kindled!  50 “But I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is accomplished!  51 “Do you suppose that I came to grant peace on earth? I tell you, no, but rather division;  52 for from now on five members in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three.  53 “They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.” 

Luke 14:25   Now large crowds were going along with Him; and He turned and said to them,  26 “If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple.  27 “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.  28 “For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it?  29 “Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who observe it begin to ridicule him,  30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’  31 “Or what king, when he sets out to meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and consider whether he is strong enough with ten thousand men to encounter the one coming against him with twenty thousand?  32 “Or else, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace.  33 “So then, none of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions.

Jesus was not the milktoast guy that is portrayed in the movies. Jesus was passionate for God and the expansion of His kingdom. The world wants a Jesus that is tame and manageable and they want His followers to be tame and manageable. But like Lucy in Chronicles of Narnia when she asked about Aslan, who typifies Jesus in the story, “Is He a tame lion?” and the answer, “He is not a tame lion… but He is good.” Jesus is not a tame lion. Jesus shook Palestine to its foundations. Jesus ruffled feathers and make no mistake about it. If you follow Him you will too.

Jesus ruffled His own family –

Mark 3:20   And He *came home, and the crowd *gathered again, to such an extent that they could not even eat a meal.  21 When His own people heard of this, they went out to take custody of Him; for they were saying, “He has lost His senses.”

Mark 3:31   Then His mother and His brothers *arrived, and standing outside they sent word to Him and called Him.  32 A crowd was sitting around Him, and they *said to Him, “Behold, Your mother and Your brothers are outside looking for You.”  33 Answering them, He *said, “Who are My mother and My brothers?”  34 Looking about at those who were sitting around Him, He *said, “Behold My mother and My brothers!  35 “For whoever does the will of God, he is My brother and sister and mother.” 

Jesus ruffled His friends and neighbors  –

Mark 6:3 “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? Are not His sisters here with us?” And they took offense at Him. 

Jesus ruffled the religious leaders of His day –

Luke 11:53 …the scribes and the Pharisees began to be very hostile and to question Him closely on many subjects, 

Mark 3:22 The scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and “He casts out the demons by the ruler of the demons.”

John 8:48   The Jews answered and said to Him, “Do we not say rightly that You are a Samaritan and have a demon?” 

Matt. 27:1   Now when morning came, all the chief priests and the elders of the people conferred together against Jesus to put Him to death;

Jesus was just too radical in His devotion to God, His love for others, and in His boldness in following His calling. And if you follow Him you will be criticized and thought to be crazy too. But remember…

Heb. 12:3-4   For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. You have not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin…

A man from history who imitated Jesus’ radical life was…

William Carey

A shoemaker in whom God lit a fire for India… 8 years of fighting against his denomination trying to get there… went to India in 1793… his wife refused to go… he went to the dock and then returned home three times to beg her to come and finally she and the children did come. Shortly after arriving he was swindled out of all of his money, went to work in an indigo mill, was misunderstood by his supporters for going to work and they cut off his support, his 5 year old son Peter dies, his wife loses her mind and even tries to kill him at one point. She dies. 7 years of preaching before first convert, floods, daughter in law and grandchild die in a river crossing, fire burns the printshop and all of the manuscripts he has worked years translating…  BUT GOD

When he died at age 73 (1834), he had led in the translation and printing of the Scriptures into forty languages, he had been a college professor, and had founded a college at Serampore. He had seen India open its doors to missionaries, and he had seen many converts for Christ.

“The Christian Church,” according to J. D. Freeman, “owes more to William Carey and his mission than to any other man or movement since the days of Paul.

God gave Carey Unconquerable Persistence.

Let’s not worry about being misunderstood or thought to be crazy… let’s imitate Jesus and Carey and go love some little children for Jesus.

We headed back to the sweet boys at Amparo De Ninos orphanage today. No sooner were we off the bus and a monster soccer game broke out. I got in on the Frisbee with Juan David and others. After a couple of hours of play two boys from the orphanage collided on the field and everyone heard the one boy, Nicolas’, leg snap! We got scissors and cut his pant leg and sure enough it was broke. We could see a large bulge on the side of his leg at the calf. Our team includes a doctor, nurse, coach, and former military personnel who knew exactly what to do. They jumped in and splinted the leg and got him on a bus and then several of our team rode with him to the hospital.

We had a nice lunch and were pleasantly surprised when Teresa, the president of Foundation Amparo De Ninos, arrived to share lunch with us. She is a very powerful person in Colombian politics and a great friend to Orhan Hope Intl. We had a great talk with her about future strategies as we work together to help the children of Colombia. The team came back from the hospital to let us know that Nicolas was resting well and the orthopedic surgeon was coming tomorrow to fix his leg. After lunch we took a nice walk in the pasture and checked out the orphanages little dairy and got to see them milk some cows.

Then we headed to the chapel for some worship and a gospel message. Jair led in several songs and then the little boys went with Lilliana and the ladies and the big boys stayed with the men and Pastor Hector gave a powerful gospel message. Nearly every one of the 40 or so older boys came forward to commit their lives to following Jesus. I was so blessed to get to pray over Juan David as he buried his face in my chest and squeezed me ever so tightly. He was so sweet today. He served me all day long and wouldn’t let me do anything. Every once in while he would come up and lay his head on my shoulder. He is 14.

After the service we broke out the treats that we had brought. We had chips and soda. Mike Ford brought a Texans jersey for every boy that YMCA donated and we gave those and several suitcases of clothes to the boys and then it was time to go. As I was hugging my dear friend Magnolia, the director of the orphanage, goodbye she pointed to Juan David and said, “Tu Ahijado?” (Your Godson?) and I said, “Yo quiero!” (I want Him to be). She smiled and said, “I will email you.” Juan David gave me the biggest hug and then held my hand as we walked to the bus and then we were gone. God is doing many mighty things with many of the team members here but I won’t steal their thunder. I will say that it seems that Orphan Hope International will have some young men living in Bogota full time and working with us very soon.

One of the things that we noticed over the last two days was the terrible condition of the boys shoes. We tried to figure out how we could come up with the $1000.00 dollars it would take to buy each of the 100 boys shoes. Sandy Byrd struck upon a great and radical idea. If we skip buying the nice dinner for the team on Thursday that we had planned and we all fast that one meal then we could do it. So that is what we are going to do. We will buy the shoes and have them delivered to the orphanage tomorrow. To God be the glory!