Keep The Main Thing | Matthew 21
Matthew 21
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Chapter Notables:
People receive Jesus with “Hosanna” - verses 1-11
Jesus overturns tables in the temple - verses 12-17
Jesus curses the fig tree - verses 18-22
The chief priests and elders question Jesus’ authority - verses 29-34
Sharper Image | Lemuel Ayudtud
Keeping the main thing the main thing is an art. It’s an exercise in mental focus. When you’re wanting to keep the main thing the main thing, you need to have the intentionality of narrowing down on exactly what you need. You can’t be distracted.
That was the issue of the Pharisees. With all the laws, and the regulations that they had added on top of them, they veered off from the essentials. Instead of majoring in the majors, they majored in the minors. What happened? In Jesus they saw a menace instead of Messiah. Why? Because they saw Jesus as a disruption to what they were doing as opposed to what He was actually doing which was reestablishing the fundamentals.
When Jesus came into Jerusalem and the city went into an uproar shouting, “hosanna in the highest.” Instead of seeing the fulfillment of the prophecy, the Pharisees saw an encroachment to their programs. So instead of glorifying God for what’s currently happening, they bemoaned the people for what they were doing. Their focus was totally out of whack.
In their actions, we find a truth: if we spend our time out of focus, watching those things we’re not supposed to watch, making unimportant things important, we will miss the moment. That moment could be the moment when everything changes. But because we’re so distracted, we will go on with our lives and not even realize we have missed our mission or our moment.
Take for instance the commerce that was happening in the temple. After Jesus was celebrated as the king of Israel, he went into the temple to pray. Upon entering the temple Jesus saw priests and elders of Israel selling their wares inside the temple. There were moneychangers in the temple. There were traders in the temple. There were people that were supposed to be religious making merchandise out of God’s temple.
With zeal igniting Him as written by the prophet, Jesus drove out the money changers, overthrew tables, disrupted the exchange of doves and animal sacrifices by the priest (who were merchandising the laws of Moses), and cried out, “My house is supposed to be for prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.” This moment marked the point when Jesus emphasized the focus of God‘s house. While the priest and those that were in the temple made it into a marketplace, Jesus, in no uncertain terms, redirected the focus back to the major mission of the temple: prayer!
There are so many things that we do while living for God. Our focus can be missed if we don’t understand the core of what God has called us to be. In fact, the mission of God is not to make us do things, His mission is to transform our lives to become. We follow Jesus not just for the mission of winning lost souls to Him—we follow Jesus because God has reconciled us to become sons and daughters. And as sons and daughters we then exercise those things that our Father directs His household to be.
If we’re not careful, we can really major in the minor things: focusing on external or less important aspects of Christianity and miss out on the deeper things that God calls us to be. For instance:
GIVING
The heart or focus of giving is the spirit of generosity. We can look at the amounts we give financially, or the hours we spend, or the gifts we give out (when it comes to our talents); but those are all surface things. They all are reflection of the core thing. That core thing is the spirit of generosity.
When that widow woman who gave almost nothing was spied by Jesus and the disciples, Jesus said that she gave more than anybody else gave that day. Why was that? It’s because, He said, that that woman gave from her need as opposed to her abundance. She gave beyond what she could afford. So it wasn’t the amount she gave, which was little compared to those that gave that day, her generosity was what Jesus saw. The ratio between what she had versus what she gave was a reflection of her understanding of the foundation of giving: it’s not the amount, it’s the spirit.
SERVING
The Pharisees spent time showing to everybody how they were more pious than the rest of the population. They would showcase their work so other people can applaud them. Sure they were doing fantastic things to reflect their righteousness, but most were doing it with applause in mind.
In the previous chapter we understand that the mother of the sons of Zebedee requested that James and John would sit at the right hand and the left-hand of Jesus in the coming kingdom. But Jesus corrected the disciples to let them know that for those who want to follow Him, it’s the servant that is magnified.
The core of doing things for God is not to have people applaud us. It’s not so someone can say how good and how awesome we are. It’s not so people can celebrate us and make us out to be some “godly“ person. The heart of doing things for God is to serve others in humility. The focus of serving is to express humility. Much like when Jesus washed the feet of His disciples, He expressed to them that serving is what He came to do. So if we are to be the followers of Jesus, our hearts have got to be about serving others in humility.
CHURCH
We all have messed up in someway when it comes to “church“. We’ve either made it about programs, policies, procedures, committees, groups, meetings, and all other ancillary things that run an organization or some other “essential”. But what is actually the heart or focus of “church”?
Firstly the church is not a building, it’s not an organization, it’s not a company, it’s not a corporation, or business. The Church is the people of God. It’s the community; it’s the Body of Christ together. Whatever it is that we do, the most important thing is being together—edifying and building up one another in the bonds of love.
Yes, we should have policies, programs, committees, meetings, boards, etc.; but all of those are supplemental, they are created to support the main mission of the church. They are not the main thing. They are not the major thing. They’re important, of course, but the main focus of the church is you and me honoring God and serving each other. We organize because people are important. We organize so that we can be more effective. We come together so that we can have more impact when it comes to the mission: which is reconciling lost sons and daughters back with the Father. Without an organized effort, there will be disorganized chaos. But just because that’s true, it does not mean it’s the focus.
LOVING GOD
The Bible tells us that we are to love God. And in loving God, we should be obeying his commandments. Many people over the life of the church have seen obedience to the commands of God as the main focus for the love for God. The missed focus happens when we take our obedience to the commands of God and pit it against the people of God. Meaning: we belittle and disparage people because we are wanting to pursue rightfulness with God. On surface that sounds correct, but God loves people so if loving God makes us distance ourselves from people, then the major thing is lost.
If there were any righteous people during the time of Jesus, they would’ve been the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Yet, Jesus throughout his recorded ministry rebuked and corrected and even confronted them. And what was his reason? They loved obeying the laws of God, but they were careless about the people that God loved.
The cross was the expression of God‘s deepest love. Jesus died at Calvary to express that love of God. And what is that? His love for people. Of course the death of Jesus was to meet the demands of God for perfection, correction, and obedience to the laws of God; but the heart of the laws of God, and if we can dare say, the main agenda or focus of God, is bringing back people to Himself. We can definitively say that when we look at loving God and obeying His commandments it is for the well-being of others. The main focus of loving God is loving people.
There are other areas that can be discussed, and if we do deal with them they’d be their own blog series, so we’re not gonna do that here. The conclusion is: we have to take time to focus on what is really important. External things, physical things, actions, dos and don’ts, they’re all good; but the spiritual things, the heart things, the core things are what’s most important.
When we’re doing things remember to sharpen the focus, make clear the image, keep focus on the reasons why lest we find ourselves pursuing things rather than becoming the people God has called us to be.
Lord, help me to focus my mind on you. With so many things I can do, and even are called to do; help me, Lord, stay focused on who I’m becoming rather than what I am doing. Jesus, lead me to walk in grace and humility. Direct me, Lord, to reflect your heart in everything that I do. Teach me every day to walk with a mindfulness and a death that is rooted in the main calling for me in this world. I am your child, your ambassador, your witness, your emissary. Help me to do all of those things in light of Your love for people. I ask this in Your most splendid Name, Jesus, amen.
