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Another P from the ministry of Jesus that intrigues and convicts me and brings tears to my eyes is Personal touch. If we are to be His hands in our world we must imitate this.

Matt. 8:3 Jesus stretched out His hand and touched him,

Matt. 8:15 He touched her hand,

Matt. 9:25 He entered and took her by the hand, and the girl got up.

Matt. 9:29 Then He touched their eyes,

Matt. 14:31 Immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and took hold of him,

Matt. 17:7 And Jesus came to them and touched them and said, “Get up, and do not be afraid.”

Matt. 19:13 Then some children were brought to Him so that He might lay His hands on them and pray; and the disciples rebuked them.

Matt. 19:15 After laying His hands on them, He departed from there.

Matt. 20:34 Moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes;

Mark 1:41 Moved with compassion, Jesus stretched out His hand and touched him,

Mark 7:33 Jesus took him aside from the crowd, by himself, and put His fingers into his ears, and after spitting, He touched his tongue with the saliva;

Mark 8:22 And they *came to Bethsaida. And they *brought a blind man to Jesus and *implored Him to touch him.

Mark 10:13 And they were bringing children to Him so that He might touch them; but the disciples rebuked them.

Luke 5:13 And He stretched out His hand and touched him,

Luke 7:14 And He came up and touched the coffin; and the bearers came to a halt. And He said, “Young man, I say to you, arise!”

Luke 13:13 And He laid His hands on her; and immediately she was made erect again and began glorifying God.

Luke 18:15 And they were bringing even their babies to Him so that He would touch them, but when the disciples saw it, they began rebuking them.

Luke 22:51 But Jesus answered and said, “Stop! No more of this.” And He touched his ear and healed him.

Jesus not only touches people with compassion and tenderness, He allows others to touch Him with the same healing result.

Matt. 9:20 And a woman who had been suffering from a hemorrhage for twelve years, came up behind Him and touched the fringe of His cloak; 21 for she was saying to herself, “If I only touch His garment, I will get well.”

Matt. 14:36 and they implored Him that they might just touch the fringe of His cloak; and as many as touched it were cured.

Mark 3:10 for He had healed many, with the result that all those who had afflictions pressed around Him in order to touch Him.

Mark 6:56 Wherever He entered villages, or cities, or countryside, they were laying the sick in the market places, and imploring Him that they might just touch the fringe of His cloak; and as many as touched it were being cured.

Luke 6:19 And all the people were trying to touch Him, for power was coming from Him and healing them all.

Luke 7:39 Now when the Pharisee who had invited Him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet He would know who and what sort of person this woman is who is touching Him, that she is a sinner.”

Luke 24:39 “See My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; touch Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.”

Touch is a wonderful part of love and compassion. Mother Teresa exemplified this. Paul E. Miller in his book Love Walked Among Us has this to say of her,

“The image of her holding a destitute and dying person — not repelled by the squalor of feces, vomit, sputum, and blood — elicited love and admiration from the whole world. Mother Teresa said, ‘We train ourselves to be extremely kind and gentle in touch of hand, tone of voice, and in our smile, so as to make the mercy of God very real.’ She consciously imitated Jesus’ touch.”

If we are to do what Jesus would do, we are going to have to get used to touching people and being touched by them. Paul Miller goes on to say,

“When Jesus touched people, he gently intruded into their lives. Whatever He touched became clean and whole. He touched the blind, the deaf, and the lame when He healed them. He moved toward people that others pulled away from. He couldn’t seem to keep His hands off lepers.”

I have always thought that a pastor should have a shepherd’s gentleness of touch and be quick with a hearty hug or arm around the shoulder. Churches that I have pastored have been known for their love and familial relationships. We have also been marked by robust hugging. Imagine how elated I was to run across this quote from one of my heroes, pastor John Piper. It sums up beautifully what I feel about the pastoral hug.

“I think there are many people in the world who probably haven’t been hugged for ten years. I had a woman in her fifties say to me one time—she had been a widow for probably about ten years—and she said to me, ‘I haven’t been hugged for a long time.’ And it was just so revelatory for me for a moment that there are people who actually go through life—and they are good people! They’re not eager to jump into bed as a prostitute or to fool around on the weekend. They know they’re going to be pure—but they’re not ever touched. Nobody ever touches them.

And so I thought, “Boy. God, make me a good hugger. Make me a good, clean, pure, trusted, pastoral hugger.”

I just love that. I can’t count the times in my ministry that someone, man or woman, has wet the front of my shirt with their tears because I was available with a hug. There is an anointing of the Holy Spirit and when it is upon you, your touch can be healing. Sometimes physically but many more times spiritually and emotionally.

We must keep ourselves pure. We must keep our hands, hearts, and minds pure so that when Jesus wants to hug someone He can use us to do it for Him. Paul Miller reminds us,

“Of course, some people touch inappropriately. When talking about the danger of sexual lust, Jesus exaggerates for the sake of emphasis, ‘If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off’ (Matthew 5:30). Our hands are meant to gently touch with love. How can you even think of using your hands to touch people as objects?”

If we are to do what Jesus would do, we must reach out our hands and touch people in love.

In my work among the orphans of Colombia, one of the things that I never cease to be amazed by is their hunger and thirst for adult affection. Without a mommy and daddy to meet this deepest of human needs, they become famished for love and attention. Often our team members will have five or six children hanging on them, holding their hands, asking for a kiss on the cheek, and touching their face. Yes, we tell them about Jesus over and over again but it is an unspeakable blessing to be able to imitate Him and hold them and touch them and bless them. The first time I was there I came away with a whole new appreciation for the sweet God-Man of Mark 10:13-16

Mark 10:13 And they were bringing children to Him so that He might touch them; but the disciples rebuked them. 14 But when Jesus saw this, He was indignant and said to them, “Permit the children to come to Me; do not hinder them; for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. 15 “Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it at all.” 16 And He took them in His arms and began blessing them, laying His hands on them.

Lord, help us to “see”, “feel”, “do”, and “touch” and “be touched” like Jesus!

In part 3 of our look at a P from Jesus’ ministry, Passion, we see that Jesus’ seeing and feeling led to action. He didn’t just see and feel compassion and then do nothing about what He saw and felt. Jesus saw, felt, and then acted. If you look at every one of the scriptures that we have cited in the last two posts about how Jesus saw and then how He felt, you will find that the next phrase tells you what He DID about it. There is a very concise statement in the book of Acts that gives us, I think, great insight into the life of Jesus and consequently into how our lives should be.

Acts 10:38 “You know of Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.

These phrases “doing good” and “good works” are general descriptions of the work that we are to be about as Christians. The scriptures use these frequently. Let’s look at some of the passages.

Psa. 34:14 Depart from evil and do good;

Psa. 37:3 Trust in the LORD and do good;

Psa. 37:27 Depart from evil and do good,

Psa. 119:68 You are good and do good; Teach me…

Psa. 125:4 Do good, O LORD, to those who are good

Eccl. 3:12 I know that there is nothing better for them than to rejoice and to do good in one’s lifetime;

Isaiah gives us a little idea of exactly what this phrase “do good” means:

Is. 1:17 Learn to do good;

Seek justice,

Reprove the ruthless,

Defend the orphan,

Plead for the widow.

Jesus rebukes the Pharisees because they were more interested in their rules than they were in seeing a man healed on the Sabbath,

Matt. 12:12 “How much more valuable then is a man than a sheep! So then, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.”

Paul encourages us to “do good” and to keep “doing good.”

Rom. 2:7 to those who by perseverance in doing good seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life;

Rom. 2:10 but glory and honor and peace to everyone who does good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.

Gal. 6:9 Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary. 10 So then, while we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, and especially to those who are of the household of the faith.

2Th. 3:13 But as for you, brethren, do not grow weary of doing good.

1Tim. 6:18 Instruct them to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share,

Heb. 13:16 And do not neglect doing good and sharing, for with such sacrifices God is pleased.

Eph. 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

Col. 1:10 so that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God;

2Th. 2:17 comfort and strengthen your hearts in every good work and word.

1Tim. 2:10 but rather by means of good works, as is proper for women making a claim to godliness.

1Tim. 5:10 having a reputation for good works; and if she has brought up children, if she has shown hospitality to strangers, if she has washed the saints’ feet, if she has assisted those in distress, and if she has devoted herself to every good work.

2Tim. 2:21 Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from these things, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified, useful to the Master, prepared for every good work.

2Tim. 3:17 so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.

And finally John sums it up for us,

3 John 11 Beloved, do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. The one who does good is of God; the one who does evil has not seen God.

The evidence of the genuineness of our conversion is not merely our subscription to a set of beliefs or our having responsively quoted a certain “sinner’s prayer” on a certain date in history. No! The evidence of the genuineness of our conversion lies in our actions. At the great white throne judgement all men will be judged by their works.

Rev. 20:11 Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. 12 And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds. 13 And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them; and they were judged, every one of them according to their deeds.

What is it that Jesus says to the righteous and the unrighteous in Matthew 25?

Matt. 25:31 “But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne. 32 “All the nations will be gathered before Him; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats; 33 and He will put the sheep on His right, and the goats on the left.

Matt. 25:34 “Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 ‘For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; 36 naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me.’ 37 “Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You something to drink? 38 ‘And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You? 39 ‘When did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ 40 “The King will answer and say to them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.’

Matt. 25:41 “Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels; 42 for I was hungry, and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink; 43 I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.’ 44 “Then they themselves also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?’ 45 “Then He will answer them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ 46 “These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

If we are truly Christians and the Spirit of Jesus Christ dwells in us, then our lives will be characterized by “doing” “good works.”

John 5:19 Therefore Jesus answered and was saying to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner. 20 “For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself is doing; and the Father will show Him greater works than these, so that you will marvel.

John 14:12 “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works than these he will do; because I go to the Father.

Lord, help us to “see”, “feel”, and “act” like Jesus!

Passion For People Continues With Feeling

In my last post we looked at how Jesus passion began with seeing. The next thing we see in the life of Jesus is that His “seeing” resulted in feeling. He didn’t just see and then remain unmoved and untouched by what He saw. Here are a few places where the scriptures give us insight into the heart of Jesus.

Matt 8:9 He marveled

Matt 9:36 He felt compassion for them

Matt 15:32 “I feel compassion for the people

Matt. 20:34 Moved with compassion, Jesus

Matt 26:38 “My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death

Mark 1:41 Moved with compassion, Jesus

Mark 3:5 After looking around at them with anger,

Mark 3:5 grieved at their hardness of heart,

Mark 6:34 He saw a large crowd, and He felt compassion

Mark 8:12 Sighing deeply in His spirit

Mark 10:13 He was indignant and said to them

Mark 10:21 Looking at him, Jesus felt a love for him

Luke 7:8 He marveled at him,

Luke 10:21 He rejoiced greatly

Luke 22:44 And being in agony

Luke 22:44 He was praying very fervently;

John 11:33 He was deeply moved in spirit and was troubled,

John 11:35 Jesus wept

John 11:38 So Jesus, again being deeply moved within,

John 13:21 He became troubled in spirit

The Lord Jesus Christ was the opposite of apathetic! He not only saw, He felt strongly about the needs of the people around Him. This was not a man who was afraid of passion in His ministry! His fervor was so great that those around Him noticed it enough to comment on it when they wrote their gospel accounts long after the events had actually taken place.

Yet in religious films today, Jesus is nearly always depicted only as meek and quiet and He seems to be moving in slow motion. One person has pointed out that if you look closely, Jesus never blinks, He never cries, He never gets angry, He never smiles in these movies. The cinema version of Jesus is not the Bible version.

Jesus was a man who felt deeply and expressed His feelings openly. If Jesus was walking the earth today many churches and Christians would consider Him fanatical, unstable, crazy, or worse, just as they did in His own day.

Mark 3:21-22 When His own people heard of this, they went out to take custody of Him; for they were saying, “He has lost His senses.” 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.”

I believe that we should be worried about the authenticity of our conversion if we can preach about, sing about, and believe in things such as heaven and hell, sin and death, poverty and disease, Satan and evil without becoming passionate about it. If we can look around at the suffering in our world and not be torn up about it, if we can read about human trafficking and not weep, if we can see pictures of hungry orphans around the world and not be moved to give and/or go, does the Jesus of the Bible really live inside of us? Because when He saw, He was “moved with compassion.”

An 18 year old girl who my family is ministering to recently sent me this message that touches perfectly upon this subject with a boldness that is refreshing…

“We call ourselves Christians…We profess to know Christ…What then is wrong in churches today? What causes such turmoil…such overthrow of harmony…such strife and malice…? What is it that is the deciding factor of the prosperity of the Church today as we know it? It is simply this: If we want to allow pharisees to lurk in the dark corners of the church and sulk in the shadowed pews…we should quit calling ourselves “Christians”…it is at this miserable point that we should give up…we cannot allow apathy to poison our churches…for by simple inaction on our part, we petition satan to come sit on our doorstep…we plead with him to make himself at home in our god-forsaken churches…we unashamedly invite him to join in our “worship”…by our apathy…we call down the wrath of God…”For you were neither hot, nor cold, but lukewarm…therefore I shall spew you out of my mouth, saith the Lord”…Look around you friends…are you beckoning the Lord’s anger? Can you in good faith call yourself a “Christian”? Do you have a zeal for God that consumes you…this is where I want to be…I want to be so consumed with Christ that it would appear that our candles are melting into one…our hearts kindled together into one flame…This is the vision…who will pursue it?”

Lord, help us to feel like Jesus!

On the second day of our recent trip to Colombia I shared another “P” from the ministry of Jesus, Passion, and I would like to expand on that topic further in the next few posts.

Jesus’ Passion is People and begins with Seeing…

Another of the “P’s” from the ministry of Jesus that the team and I explored on our recent trip to Colombia was Pleasure. If we want to have a ministry like Jesus ministry then we must have His pleasure. Our motivation for ministry must be our joy, delight, and pleasure in God. Duty will never suffice as a suitable motivation for missions…

Enjoyment empowers effort. Doing is the fruit of delighting. Performance is energized by pleasure. – Sam Storms

I want to elaborate on that thought some more. God was motivated by joy, delight, and pleasure, first in Himself, and then in us…

God’s complete joy in Himself as a Trinity led Him to want to double that joy by extending it beyond Himself to the human beings He created. Likewise, we will want to double our joy by seeing how adequate God is to meet our need – love as we use our resources to perform the greatest service to others – helping them to experience the joy in believing in God’s wonderful promises, guaranteed by the finished work of Christ. – Daniel Fuller

The Father’s pleasure is His people…

Psalm 149:4 For the LORD takes PLEASURE in His people;

He will beautify the afflicted ones with salvation.

Therefore He found great pleasure in His plan to draw us back to Him by the sacrifice of His beloved Son…

Isaiah 53:10 But the LORD was PLEASED to crush Him, putting Him to grief; if He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, and the good PLEASURE of the LORD will prosper in His hand.

The Bible says in Hebrews 12:2 that we are to look to Jesus as our example and then it goes on to say that Jesus’ motivation for enduring the cross and despising the shame was the JOY that was set before Him.

fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the JOY set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

That joy was redeeming us back to Himself! So the Father’s pleasure and the Son’s pleasure is the redeeming of lost sinners. And He wants us to share in His pleasure by first knowing and loving Him,

Psalm 16:11 You will make known to me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of JOY; In Your right hand there are PLEASURES forever

Psalm 36:8 They drink their fill of the abundance of Your house; And You give them to drink of the river of Your DELIGHTS.

John 15:11 “These things I have spoken to you so that My JOY may be in you, and that your JOY may be made full.

John 16:24 …so that your JOY may be made full.

John 17:13 “these things I speak in the world so that they may have My JOY made full in themselves.

I bear my testimony that there is no joy to be found in all this world like that of sweet communion with Christ. – C.H. Spurgeon

The most precious truth in the Bible is that God’s greatest interest is to glorify the wealth of His grace by making sinners happy in Him. – John Piper

and second by sharing Him with others. When we are full of Him, His love and joy will naturally spill out on others. I think Joni Eareckson Tada says it so well…

“God happily shares His gladness, His joy comes flooding over heaven’s walls filling my heart in a waterfall of delight, which then in turn always streams out to others in a flood of encouragement, and then erupts back to God in an ecstatic fountain of praise. He gets your heart pumping for heaven. He injects His peace, power, and perspective into your spiritual being. He puts a song in your heart. I want to know God like this! Shove me under the waterfall of the Trinity’s joy, which splashes and spills over heaven’s walls. If He’s always in a good mood, I want to catch it”

But how do we stay under this waterfall? John Piper says it like this…

“Grace is power from God to do good things in us and for us. It is an ever cascading, infinitesimal waterfall. How then do you serve God? You posture yourself, and you maneuver your life, and you devote energy and effort and time and creativity to positioning yourself under the waterfall of God’s continual blessing, so that he remains the source and you remain the empty receiver. You remain the beneficiary, he remains the benefactor; you remain hungry, he remains the bread; you remain thirsty, he remains the water. You find out where the waterfall of grace is falling and you get under it. When it moves, you follow it so that you stay wet. And usually it takes you overseas…”

Our joy in God is magnified and doubled when we share it with others in missions and evangelism…

For all of us it should be unthinkable to keep to ourselves the knowledge that God’s ultimate delight is to do the greatest good for others by letting them share in the supreme joy He has in Himself. How could any of us enjoy heaven unless we mobilized our time, talents and treasure to do our utmost to get the good news to the rest of the world? – Daniel Fuller

Missions is the automatic outflow and overflow of love for Christ. We delight to enlarge our joy in Him by extending it to others. As Lottie Moon said, “Surely there can be no greater joy than that of saving souls.” – John Piper

Missions is the overflow of our delight in God because missions is the overflow of God’s delight in being God. – John Piper

Most men are not satisfied with the permanent output of their lives. Nothing can wholly satisfy the life of Christ within His followers except the adoption of Christ’s purpose toward the world He came to redeem. Fame, pleasure and riches are but husks and ashes in contrast with the boundless and abiding joy of working with God for the fulfillment of His eternal plans. The men who are putting everything into Christ’s undertaking are getting out of life its sweetest and most priceless rewards. – J. Campbell White, The Laymen’s Missionary Movement, 1909.

I believe that I have experienced in 28 years of ministry a little taste of joy in God both by knowing Him and by sharing Him with others. I have stood in the pulpit and felt His mantle on my shoulders. I have seen Him do incredible things and I have enjoyed seeing His fingerprints all over my ministry. I have walked through the orphanages and felt His presence so thick I thought I could reach out and touch Him. I have seen Him in a thousand faces. But I want more… so much more…