“The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in the field, which a man found and hid; and from joy over it he goes and sells all that he has, and buys that field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking fine pearls, and upon finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had, and bought it.” (Matthew 13:44-46 NASB)

I received many moving letters last week as we celebrated the crucifixion and resurrection of Messiah Jesus. Here are a few that I hope challenge and encourage you as they did me.

Treasure

From a friend who wished to remain anonymous:

Wayne, considering the idea that Jesus is always the prime mover in the Matthew 13 parables, that He is the merchant & the man, I was blown away by the truth that He sees me as treasure worth His all! All week I have been singing that early Chris Tomlin song “You are my treasure,” changing the words a bit to fit Matthew 13 – “I am your treasure.” In case you don’t remember the words:

Faithful Lord, fill my cup

With your grace and love

The treasure that this world’s full of

Could never be enough

‘Cause I’m created for You alone

Bought with a price I’m not my own

Seated in the heavenlies

There’s no place I’d rather be

Than with You, forever, Lord

‘Cause I am Your treasure.

Good Friday

This note comes from Linda Brucato, a missionary friend in Italy:

Last week as I was writing in my journal I began reflecting on what made me consider a day to be “good.” Were days good based on the weather? Or were they good when they brought me pleasure? Or perhaps when I accomplished something worthy? After some thought I concluded that “good” days were days that were “significant,” which of course brought me to consider how I decided what significant was. In the end my conclusion was that “significant” days were the days when I “saw” God.

Today is called by many “Good Friday.” In keeping with my definition of a “good” day it fits perfectly! Could there ever have been a day that was more significant than the day that God the Father manifested His eternal love for man by sacrificing His only begotten Son for our atonement? Could there ever have been a day that we “saw” God more? Today I am writing in my journal, “It is a GREAT day!”

Real World

Finally, a comment from my friend Wendy Balivet, a lady talented as both physician and writer:

Amazing Good Friday service tonight. On a night like this i feel that the whole world has been opened up, the lid torn off, so that the Real World rushes in for a moment, and we could sense the Reality if we knew where to turn. i look around, and the glimpse has vanished, leaving behind it an echo, and the whisper of a scent that Someone was here. i didn’t miss it, but its stay was so brief that it feels as if i did, and i’m left with the ache that we’re not There yet, and the assurance that we will be One Day. He knows that his glory is too much for our feeble spirits to encounter for long, so he lets us feel the hint of his presence as he brushes past. More than that we cannot take, although we long for it in our deepest places. A snatch of music faintly carried to our ears is all that we can safely experience of his song, elsewise we perish from the sound of it.

God bless,

Wayne

“And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost!’ “(Luke 15:6 NASB)

 God loves YOU!

When we were studying the amazing parables of Luke 15 with our church, I received a number of insightful and stirring notes. Here’s one that blessed me deeply, sent by my pulpit team collaborator Randall Satchell:

These three parables illustrate three different aspects of being lost. The sheep is lost through waywardness, no doubt honestly searching for a green pasture, and, at least initially, unaware it is moving further away from the protection of the shepherd and the unity of the flock. The coin is lost to use; that is, it hasn’t really gone anywhere, but until it is found it cannot achieve the purpose for which it was saved. The son is lost through outright rebellion and self-will, until he finally bottoms out in utter desperation. But the amazing truth is that through these three parables, Jesus tells us in each case that we remain objects of God’s active, redemptive grace and love. None of these things can “separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” [Romans 8:39]

Holy Week

I sincerely hope each of us is moved and blessed by the worship of the Lord this week. If you are in North Texas this weekend, I would love to meet you at one of our gatherings. Learn more.

• Good Friday – a communion service at 7pm
• Sunrise – 7am Sunday, a brief celebration followed by an egg hunt for youngsters and snack brunch for all
• Resurrection Celebration – 9:15 and 11:00 am Sunday

So you, my child, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And entrust what you heard me say in the presence of many others as witnesses to faithful people who will be competent to teach others as well. (2 Timothy 2:2 NET)

 Sick and…

Today I grew officially tired of answering questions. Sometimes it seems as if that’s all I do. (That sound you hear is the dry snort of commiseration from parents and teachers everywhere.) In the midst of answering yet another query, my e-mail in-box dinged. I clicked over, grateful for an excuse to stop writing yet another answer.

Only this note wasn’t an additional question. It was an invitation to a memorial service for Roy Zuck. Dr. Zuck helped me found the first higher education extension that I led. Thinking for a moment on his life and incredible work led to considerations of his entire generation of Christian leaders. Richard MacAfee, Sumner & Celeste Wemp, John Reed, Stan & Max Toussaint, Dwight Pentecost, Jim & Ruth Pryor, Howard Hendricks, Don Campbell, John Stott, Neil & Joanna Ashcraft, John Corts, Bob Lightner, Wendell & Martha Johnston, Bob & Bill McKenzie, Jonathan Garnett – each of these wonderful people invested in me, some of them heavily. No doubt I am forgetting to list some of this remarkable generation who blessed me, an oversight for which I deeply apologize in advance. Yet despite any oversight, the powerful point remains: there exists a large group of wise people who worked hard to help me grow up in Christ.

They answered my questions – thousands of questions! They cared for this young pup who didn’t know a thing, who wasn’t even born when most of these saints already had more than 20 years of great ministry under their belts. They reached across the generations and shepherded my soul. Many taught me. Some chastised and corrected me. Others supplied funds for my education and enterprises. A few were mentors of a very intentional nature. Most importantly, they taught me to lead by following Jesus and expounding His fantastic scripture.

The Glory of Their Times

Roy Zuck was actually one of the ones with whom I interacted the least. Yet his passing coupled with the recent departure of Prof Hendricks hit me hard. I felt the separation Lawrence Richards described – a sense of loss that propelled Larry to write the greatest baseball book ever penned, The Glory of Their Times. (Read it!) I don’t have time to write the histories of these precious leaders, though they were (and those living still are!) the glory of their times. I hope one of you does write that book.

I do, however, have time to continue their legacy. I have time to pay forward their remarkable gifts to me. I have time to happily answer more questions.

God bless,

Wayne

He told them, “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parables.” (Mark 4:11 NIV)

Jesus’ parables & the prophets

Jesus’ parables are very often tied to prophetic OT scripture. This is one of the most intriguing and deepening aspects of Jesus’ teaching. Jesus the King is carrying through the four main aspects of what He began through Isaiah and the other prophets. Read the prophets and you see four activities regarding the kingdom:

#1 – announcing God’s kingdom

#2 – exposing those who reject God

#3 – concealing God’s truth from them, and

#4 – revealing God’s will to those made holy as His remnant.

Now, look at those four activities. Those themes appear repeatedly in the prophets, and they appear in Jesus’ words – especially in His parables. Thus, one cannot escape the truth that Jesus was establishing a revolutionary new form of the Messiah’s kingdom. This form was promised and prophesied about, but not fully revealed until Messiah Himself came and instituted it.

Revolution

Speaking of revolutionary, many of the parables address the way Jesus’ new kingdom is different from the work that has come before.

And they said to Him, “The disciples of John often fast and offer prayers; the disciples of the Pharisees also do the same; but Yours eat and drink.” And Jesus said to them, “You cannot make the attendants of the bridegroom fast while the bridegroom is with them, can you? But the days will come; and when the bridegroom is taken away from them, then they will fast in those days.” And He was also telling them a parable: “No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it on an old garment; otherwise he will both tear the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old.” (Luke 5:33-36 NASB)

The great Scottish preacher Alexander Bruce addressed the impact of this in his wonderful old book The Parabolic Teachings of Christ:

Jesus was defending His disciples for divergence from the religious customs, not of the Pharisees only, but of the Baptist’s followers. From this it follows, that the religious movement inaugurated by Jesus was a new thing, new wine, a new garment, in reference even to the religion of the Baptist-circle. Much is implied in this. If Christ had called his religion new as compared with Pharisaism it might have signified no more than that His religion was Judaism reformed, for Pharisaism was Judaism deformed. But John’s religion was itself a reformed Judaism; if therefore Christ’s was new in comparison with it, it must have been something more than a reform – a revolution, an absolutely new thing, having its roots in the Old Testament doubtless, but radically diverse in spirit, principle, and tendency, from the whole religious life of the age whether deformed or reformed.

As you and I study Jesus’ parables, I pray we embrace Jesus’ continuous revolution within. I pray Paul’s nifty summary: that we “walk in newness of life.” (Romans 6:4)

He spoke another parable to them, “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three pecks of meal, until it was all leavened.” (Matthew 13:33 NASB)

The Matthew 13 parables

Every one of Jesus’ parables answers a significant life question. That question is usually made evident by the surrounding narrative context – the dialogue or action sets up the big idea Jesus then addresses through His memorable story. And in Matthew 13, the big idea is as big as they come!

Matthew 12 records the final rejection of the Messiah by the national leadership of Israel. Then Matthew 13 launches a spate of parabolic teaching designed to answer the huge query, “What is God doing now that the promised physical kingdom hasn’t come? The expected millennial kingdom is obviously delayed. Does that mean Jesus is off-track?”

And the answer is: “Not at all!” Jesus is actually fulfilling scripture related to the Gentiles and a form of God’s kingdom that is not inherently physical. The scribes called this “musterion,” a mystery form of the Messiah’s kingdom in which Gentiles also participate. Jesus is introducing the kingdom in a form predicted by the OT prophets but not fully grasped until now. Jesus is indeed building His kingdom.

That’s why Matthew 13 is full of statements like, “The kingdom of heaven is like…” Jesus is teaching His followers what this form of the kingdom is like. For example, in the leaven parable, we learn that God’s kingdom is inexorably and indomitably rising. Yes, Jesus will still establish the promised millennial kingdom to come. But He is also building a form of His kingdom now – one that will shoot through all the world and raise all of life.

So what?

I encourage us to think this all through, since doing so is amazingly encouraging. Because of the big Q&A in Matthew 13:

1. We know God is at work according to His plan. I just got off the phone with a lady who has every reason to feel as if her world is falling apart. Yet she closed our chat by saying, “I’m so blessed to know God is in charge and working His sovereign plan. I don’t know how people survive without that assurance.”
2. Gentiles and Jews can join in Jesus’ kingdom now. There is no waiting period, no hoops to navigate. One simply believes in Jesus to be made right before God.
3. The reports of our death have been greatly exaggerated. (nod to Mark Twain) Sure, this world is full of wretchedness. So are our bodies & souls, which await the later kingdom for complete renovation. Things are dark and ugly all around and within. Yet, the doomsayers are utterly mistaken when they assume Jesus’ kingdom (as seen especially in His churches) is failing. Do not despair! Just because you can’t see leaven working, doesn’t mean the bread won’t rise.

God bless,

Wayne

Rev. Dr. Michael Wayne Braudrick | Senior Pastor | Frisco Bible Church | 972.335.8150 | www.friscobible.com
“The goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith.” I Timothy 1:5
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