On Line Bible Study - For the week October 11-17, 2010

Lesson 461

Luke 10: ¹³"Woe to you, Korazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. ¹⁴But it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you. ¹⁵And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted up to the skies? No, you will go down to the depths.

I recall my brother-in-law saying: If frogs had wings they would fly.

IF ....

Tyre and Sidon were notorious cities - intimately associated with the Philistines (see Jeremiah 47:4), they were cut off, laid waste (see Isaiah 23:1ff). But Jesus states it will be more bearable for them than for the cities in which he has preached and healed where his message has not been received.
The Jesus who makes this statement is speaking the truth - a hard truth that is truer than if it were literally true. Lest we focus on what is going to happen to "them", it ought to give us pause and wonder what will happen to us. IF we have heard the message, and IF we have experienced the healing presence of Christ, and IF we profess to receive such miracles and believe such messages, THEN what difference is it making?
This is the critical question for people of faith.
In her book The Case for God Karen Armstrong reviews the philosophical history of the ancient Greeks. Armstrong points to the rites of initiation that were part of the religious system, suggesting that one had to experience prior to being expected to believe. Having fasted and marched and being subjected to various other physical and psychological hardships bordering on torture, the mystai - that is, those being initiated - were brought to a state of mind in which they would "see the light". After a point there was no turning back. There was no pretending they had not seen, or had not heard - because the had seen and they had heard.
We aren't held accountable for what we don't know or for what we have not experienced, only for what we have.
Assuming that Jesus is speaking in the hearing of the seventy being sent out on the mission, they also hear what he says next -
¹⁶"He who listens to you listens to me; he who rejects you rejects me; but he who rejects me rejects him who sent me."

This is one of those places where the gospel doesn't let us off the hook.
Have we heard Jesus' message? If so, what difference is it making in our lives?