Daily Devotional For Tuesday, February 4, 2025
Good morning Southside! Happy Terrific Tuesday. We live in a culture where people, even some Christian people, want a Jesus they can tame and shape into their own image. Many people, including some Christians, want a meek and mild Jesus. And this means they have not read or taken seriously Matthew 18:5-6:
“And whoever receives one such child in My name receives Me; (6) but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck, and to be drowned in the depth of the sea” (NASB).
In Jesus’ day the average millstone weighed around 1,500-1,600 pounds. It was used to grind grain. The phrase “little ones” does include children, but it also includes new and young disciples. Children are trusting by nature. They trust adults; and because of that trust, their capacity to trust in God grows. God holds parents and other adults who influence young children and young believers accountable for how they affect these little ones’ ability to trust God. To cause a child or any fellow disciple to sin or fall away from the faith means to purposely put a “stumbling block” in the way to make him or her trip and fall. Jesus warned that anyone who turns believers away from him will receive severe punishment.
That is some weight. The deepest part of the sea is the Mariana Trench, which is around 26,850 feet deep. With a rope tied around your neck and a 3,000 pound stone at the other end, Jesus’ point is death by drowning is the best option for someone who causes a “little one” to stumble. This does not seem like a Jesus who is “meek and mild.” This is not the Jesus most people want or like.
Rome often took the worst criminals out to sea and tied huge rocks and weights to ropes and then tied those ropes around that criminal and then threw them overboard. It was death by drowning. So, for Jesus to use this picture was something His disciples knew was a form of capital punishment by Rome.
Anyone who says “Jesus is all about love” has not read this passage of Scripture. Jesus says very clearly that He values children. He says that if you do anything to cause one of them to choose ungodliness, you’re going to find yourself in a really bad place. Our culture has increasingly shown itself willing to sacrifice children to all kinds of evil and deprivation—physically, mentally, and emotionally.
Jesus has given His people an assignment to protect, care for, and nurture children, and I think we will be called to account for that. I don’t mean just the children in your family or the children who attend your church. I mean all the children. That advocacy will look different for every person and in every community, but the responsibility is ours.
Also, Jesus commands us more mature disciples to protect new and young disciples. To cause them to stumble and no longer trust God is an egregious sin and will not go unpunished by God. This means we must be intentional to not allow stumbling blocks into our own lives. Such sins are a “domino effect.”
We don't’ like a Jesus who gets angry. We don’t like a Jesus who turns over tables of moneychangers and drives sheep, oxen, other animals and religious leaders out of the Temple. We want a sweet looking Jesus, but the reason we have the emotion of anger is because we are created in God’s image. God gets angry.
Christian author Fleming Rutledge writes this in his book:
“On September 2, 1990, a murder occurred in New York City that horrified the nation. The Watkins family from Provo, Utah, a father and mother with their two barely grown sons, had come joyfully to the city for a long-anticipated trip to attend the US Open tennis matches. While waiting on the subway platform for the train to Flushing Meadows, the family was assaulted by a band of four youths. The older of the two sons went to his mother's rescue as she was being kicked in the face, and he was killed in the attempt. The judge, Edwin Torres, sentenced all four attackers to life without parole, the toughest sentence possible in New York at that time, and in doing so issued a striking statement expressing grave alarm for a society in which "a band of marauders can surround, pounce upon, and kill a boy in front of his parents [and then] stride up the block to Roseland and dance until 4 a.m. as if they had stepped on an insect. [These acts were] a visitation that the devil himself would hesitate to conjure up. That cannot go unpunished."
It makes many people queasy nowadays to talk about the wrath of God, but there can be no turning away from this prominent biblical theme … If we are resistant to the idea of the wrath of God, we might pause to reflect the next time we are outraged about something [much smaller than a murder but still worthy of our anger]—about our property values being threatened, or our children's educational opportunities being limited, or our tax breaks being eliminated. All of us are capable of anger about something. God's anger, however, is pure … The wrath of God is not an emotion that flares up from time to time, as though God has temper tantrums. It is a way of describing his absolute enmity against all wrong and his coming to set matters right” (Source: Fleming Rutledge, The Crucifixion, pp. 130-131).
This judge ruled that his decision to put these four boys behind bars for life was upholding the doctrine of divine retribution. God never loses His temper like we do. God never loses control like we do. God is never caught off guard. He sees the future and knows the future. He is never surprised as we are by people’s thoughts and actions. So, when God does get angry, His anger is righteous and justified. There are some things that, biblically, draw a response of God more quickly than any others. One of those is targeting children. God will not remain silent on the sidelines when we surrender our children to evil!
Questions To Consider
- We are warned by Jesus not to cause a child or a new disciple to stumble. He says that what awaits them in eternity is far worse than here. Yet, Jesus gave a picture that His disciples were well aware of in their day. Why do you think we do not hear much about this kind of Jesus?
- When you are around children and/or new believers, are you conscious and intentional about not being a stumbling-block to them? Why or why not?
- I have seen children grow up and walk away from God due to their parents. I have seen new believers walk away from their new faith in Christ due to controlling, domineering and self-righteous church members. How would you recommend, winning these back to the Lord?
- What do you think of the judge’s decision above and why? Do you agree with him? Too harsh? Or do you think his sentence was justified? Why?
Scripture To Meditate On: Romans 15:1, “Now we who are strong ought to bear the weaknesses of those without strength and not just please ourselves” (NASB).
Prayer To Pray: “Heavenly Father, I intercede for the unborn, for the children, for the next generation to be protected from the destructive forces that are arrayed against them. Help Your people surround them with effective prayers for deliverance into Your purposes for their lives. Please help me not to be a stumbling-block to them. In Jesus’ name, Amen.”
I love you Southside!--Pastor Kelly