21:24-27
When people are rebelling against God they are always operating from unstable ground. God is God, that is the most fundamental fact of the universe. So there will always be fundamental weaknesses in the position of the rebels. So here Jesus exposes the weakness of the religious leaders. They wanted to know by what authority Jesus was doing what He was doing, but the truth was that they were the ones who had lost authority and could not answer questions on authority. So Jesus asks them by what authority John the Baptist did what he did. They had not believed John the Baptist or followed his teachings, so they could not say that John was acting under God’s authority. However, the people all thought John was a prophet, so they could not say John was acting out of his own authority. You see, the basis for the religious leader’s authority was within themselves, so they were in a very weak position. If we act and live under God’s authority then we are always in a strong position. The world may oppose us, even violently so, but we have God behind us, and the world is operating from a foundation of sand.
No comments:
Post a Comment