Archive for category: GAMEtime Sharing

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is Luke 5:27-39.  There are so many lessons we can learn from today’s passage.  Let’s go!

Luke 5:27-28 (NIV) 
27  After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting at his tax booth. “Follow me,” Jesus said to him, 
28  and Levi got up, left everything and followed him. 

On verses 27-28:  Back in Jesus’ time, tax collectors were despised in Israel.  That is because tax collectors had a reputation for being crooked and money hungry, known for charging Jews more taxes than they actually owed to the Roman government and pocketing the difference.   Jewish tax collectors were seen as traitors, since they were working for the Roman emperor while profiting at the expense of their fellow Jews.  Levi was one such Jewish tax collector.  Notice, however, that Levi’s occupation, background and reputation did not keep Jesus from inviting Levi to follow him.  It also did not keep Levi from leaving everything to follow Jesus.  Levi (also called Matthew) would become one of Jesus’ first disciples and apostles, and would go on to author the gospel of Matthew, the first book in the New Testament.

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is Luke 5:1-11.  Let’s go!

Luke 5:1-2 (NIV) 
1  One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the people crowding around him and listening to the word of God, 
2  he saw at the water’s edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets.
 
On verses 1-2:  I like this observation by Pastor Jon Courson: he notes that back in Jesus’ day fishermen would regularly wash their nets and stretch them at the end of each work day.  That way the net would not stink or rot and would remain useful for the long-term.  Likewise, if we want to be effective nets that God can use to bring people to Him, we need to be regularly washed with the water of God’s Word and stretched by His Holy Spirit often. 

Luke 5:3-11 (NIV)  
 3  He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat. 
4  When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.” 
5  Simon answered, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.” 

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is Luke 4:25-37.  Let’s go!

Luke 4:25-30 (NIV) 
25  I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land.
26  Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon.
27  And there were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed–only Naaman the Syrian.”
28  All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this.
29  They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him down the cliff.
30  But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way.

On verses 25-30:  Previously in verse 24, in response to the rejection he felt from his own hometown, Jesus says, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown”.  Jesus then gives two examples of that from the Old Testament.  First, Jesus cites the Jewish prophet Elijah and how, at a time when the ancient Middle East was enduring a famine, Elijah was not sent to help anyone in Israel but instead was sent to help a Gentile (i.e. non-Jewish) widow in the region of Sidon (v26, see also 1 Kings 17:7-24).   Second, Jesus cites the prophet Elisha, Elijah’s successor, and how even though there were many people suffering from skin diseases in Israel, God used Elisha only to heal a Gentile from Syria called Naaman (v27, see also 2 Kings 5).

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is Luke 4:1-13.  Let’s go!

Luke 4:1-13 (NIV) 
1  Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert,
2  where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry.
3  The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.”
4  Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone.'”……

On verses 1-13:  After having been baptized in the Jordan River, Jesus is led into the desert where he is tempted by the devil for 40 days.  Notice that each time Jesus is tempted by the devil, Jesus fights back by quoting Scripture.  In response to the devil’s first temptation Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 8:3 in the Old Testament.  In response to the devil’s second temptation Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 6:13.  In response to the devil’s third temptation Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 6:16.  What is Jesus doing?  In response to each specific temptation he faces, Jesus recites a verse from Scripture that helps him to do the right thing in that situation.  In all likelihood Jesus is reciting these verses from memory, since the only place you could read a copy of Scripture back in Jesus’ time was in the synagogue.

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is Ezekiel 35:1-9.  Let’s go!

On verses 1-9:  In these verses the Lord gives Ezekiel a message for the nation of Edom, whose nickname is “Mount Seir”.  The message is that because the nation of Edom, who “harboured an ancient hostility” (v5) against the Israelites.  What ancient hostility is the Lord referring to here?  Keep in mind that the founding father of Edom was Esau while the founding father of the nation of Israel was Jacob, Esau’s twin brother.  Esau and Jacob had one of the most infamously hostile sibling rivalries in the Bible.  This hostility would be passed down from generation to generation after Esau and Jacob, leading to a bitter rivalry between two nations, the Edomites and the Israelites.  Because of the grudge that the Edomites harboured toward the Israelites, the Edomites “delivered the Israelites over to the sword at the time of their calamity” (v5).  In response to harbouring this grudge, God would give the nation of Edom over to bloodshed as well (v6), turning Edom into a desolate waste (v7), not to be inhabited again (v9).

What can we learn from this?  Do you hold “an ancient hostility” or a grudge against someone?