How often did the first followers of Jesus misunderstand his message?

Abomination is a powerful word. What comes to mind when you think of abominable things? Perhaps some of the more unsavory aspects of society, things that we want to steer clear of and are abhorrent to us.

The gospel record of Luke is full of couplets, two elements that Luke uses to describe a connection or contrast. When you compare or contrast two things, you’re better able to see the principle being taught.

It is terrifying to contemplate standing in front of Jesus at the judgment and him saying to us, “I don’t know who you are.” That’s far worse than hearing him tell us how sinful we were during our lives and missed so many opportunities to serve him.

When we think of what went on in the wicked city of Sodom, our minds naturally go to the account in Genesis, and the horrible immorality recorded about the men of the city. However, what is intriguing about the sin of Sodom is what is recorded in the two main commentaries on Sodom’s sin outside of Genesis.

The last few verses of Luke 9 mentions three people who want to follow Jesus and are challenged by him to do so. What Jesus wanted them to think about, and for us too, is whether we are willing to put following him first, above everything else.

If you look through today’s reading from 2 Kings 22-23, you’ll find a simple term keeps cropping up – “words.”

There was something remarkable about the faith of the centurion Jesus encountered in Luke 7. After the conversation he had with the centurion’s emissaries, Luke notes, “When Jesus heard these things, he marveled at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, said, ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’” (v9).

As if being besieged by a superpower wasn’t enough to test Hezekiah, in today’s reading from 2 Kings 20, he learns that he is going to die. God sent the prophet Isaiah to tell him, “Thus says the Lord: Set your house in order, for you shall die, you shall not recover.” (v1).

Being besieged by a superpower is something of a problem. Nothing had stood in the way of Sennacherib and his army. As the Rabshakeh asked, “Has any of the gods of the nations ever delivered his land out of the hand of the king of Assyria?” (2 Kings 18:33). They had decimated everyone else, and now it was Jerusalem’s turn.

One of the things Hezekiah did when reforming the kingdom of Judah, aside from cutting down idols, was “he broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan).” (2 Kings 18:4).

The first verse and a half of Luke 3 should be read with a commanding voice, kind of like introducing dignitaries at a function: “In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas” (Luke 3:1-2).