Daily Devotional for Wednesday, October 25

The Conflict

“And say unto him, By what authority doest thou these things?
and who gave thee this authority to do these things?” Mark 11:28.

If you spend much time in the comment section of social media, you know people ask many questions. And I do not mean they are trying to learn and gain new information. Usually, their questions have some ulterior motive. The Internet world is full of people who consider themselves very smart and also feel that one of their major missions in life is to “make people think.” In other words, we are ignorant and they are smart. So when they ask us questions, it is only to help us become smart also. Is that not nice of them? 

Jesus always had people asking Him questions, and this episode was no different. The intent was never to learn from Jesus, but to trick Him into saying something that could be used against Him. Of course, that had never worked, nor did it this time either. In this case, Jesus simply refused to answer their question. He turned the tables and asked them a question that clearly revealed their hypocrisy. At that point, there was no need to answer their question. This is actually an effective way to deal with questions sometimes.

In general, people do not really want to hear the gospel, especially that part about sin and repentance, because it bothers them. It should not surprise us then with their attempt to hijack the conversation and take it in another direction. People may try to discredit you also, so as to discredit the messenger which often discredits the message. While we are told to always be ready to explain our faith to people, we are also told not to take part in arguing over vain genealogies. You will never go wrong by sticking to the basic gospel message.

 
JUST A THOUGHT: We do not have to follow non-believers down every rabbit hole that they want to take us down. While you are chasing them, some other person cannot hear the gospel message.

Wally Fry