Studies by Book
Luke 11 29-32 The sign of Jonah Sign of Jonah 1
📖 Luke 11:29-32
*To be pleasing before God* _Luke 11:29-32_
While the crowds were thickly gathered … This is what many of us are running after in life. We use different terms for this phenomena, such as scale of impact, branding, positioning, posturing, presenting etc. These become our drivers for our ministry. What we see in the ministry of our Lord Jesus is radically opposite.
Here in Luke 11:29, our Lord is telling them, plainly, that this is an evil generation that is looking for a sign. The crowds had come to be impressed and entertained with miracles and wonders, performed before their eyes. This would give them the excitement that they wanted in their otherwise, dreary and rootless, life.
_Is it anyway different now? Isn’t that what we too pander for in our ministry?_ Our Lord desires that we seek Him from our inner most being, that our love for Him is not an outward show but to love Him with all our heart, soul, mind and strength.
Our Lord warned us not to fall into the leaven of the Pharisees _Luke 12:1._ What is this leaven of the Pharisees? It is to appear righteous on the outside but inwardly to be unyielding to the ways of God _Matthew 23:28. If we were to measure ourselves against the leaven of the Pharisees, would we be free of this leaven? I wonder!? As I look into my own heart, I realise the deceitfulness there and I’m always seeking His empowerment to make me victorious, within._
Jesus presented the cost of following Him, to the multitudes that went with Him _Luke 14:25-26._ _How often do we teach and preach the cost of discipleship to the people, who come to us?_ People want to be impressed, entertained and sensationalised. Is that what we provide for them in our ministries? _Let us realise that by entertaining people, we will only make them more open to the attack of the enemy._
As Paul and the team ministered in Thessalonica, they presented the gospel message in such a way that the people received the gospel in much affliction, with joy _I Thessalonians 1:5-6._ The Thessalonian believers thus became a model for all the churches, in the entire region _I Thessalonians 1:7-8._
Paul mentoring Timothy, challenges and encouraged him to accept persecution as part of the journey of living a godly life in Christ Jesus _II Timothy 3:10-13. Do we teach our people that they must be prepared to experience persecution, to live a godly life in Christ Jesus?_
*Thought to ponder*
```The teachers and preachers of the gospel of Jesus Christ, will be more severely judged James 3:1```