Dan Sullivan

Jesus Breaking Bread with the Devil

Published on 1/26/2010 in Bible Study. 0 Comments Tags: Jesus, John, Passover, power.

“What you are going to do, do quickly.”
These are pretty disturbing words from Jesus. Satan himself has just entered into Judas and Jesus doesn’t say, “Come out of him!” or any of the things He ever said to demons. There was a time and a place for casting out evil and liberating individuals, but now the Father wanted Him to liberate people in a different way. If it was hard for Jesus to keep it together as He washed their feet, it must have been 100x more difficult when Satan was now there at the table, in their midst.

Even a bigger deal than His words, Jesus’ actions are amazing.
v. 30 “So, after receiving the morsel of bread, he immediately went out. And it was night. “
To share bread with someone was fellowship, communion. Communion was a precious thing. To share in a piece of bread with someone else was fellowship, acceptance, and peace. That’s why the Pharisees got so mad about Jesus BREAKING BREAD with sinners and tax collectors. It was like wearing the same gang colors, or wearing orange in Lexington.
Jesus, in all of His trust in the Father and compassion towards Judas, is not affected by the ultimate leader of all enemies sitting with Him at the table. He knows what is to be done, and He knows that it must come via betrayal by a friend.

The Never Underesteeming, Always Luring Teachings of Jesus

Published on 1/25/2010 in Bible Study. 0 Comments Tags: church, grace, Jesus, John, teaching.

John 13:26-28 26 Jesus answered, “It is he to whom I will give this morsel of bread when I have dipped it.” So when he had dipped the morsel, he gave it to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot. 27 Then after he had taken the morsel, Satan entered into him. Jesus said to him, “What you are going to do, do quickly.” 28 Now no one at the table knew why he said this to him.

The more I look at this the more interesting things pop out of it. It seems like Jesus is really obvious about who is going to betray Him, right? “He to whom I will give this morsel to bread when I have dipped it.” and then Jesus hands it over to Judas. So why didn’t they get it? I wonder if they couldn’t believe it. Or if they had pegged somebody else as the one in their heads, and none of them had pegged Judas. I wonder if the news that Judas would betray Jesus fell on their ears like Jesus’ words that He would die fell on Peter’s ears and caused Peter to rebuke Jesus. So foreign, so far out from what they conceived about the Messiah and about Judas, that they couldn’t even understand when it was told to them clearly.

All of this just shows off how merciful and amazing Jesus is. How often do we not say something or tell someone something because we think “They wouldn’t understand.” or “They’re not ready for that.” Jesus told the disciples stuff they weren’t ready for all of the time. He seems like He lived in a constant state of being around people that “didn’t get it” and He never flipped out or belittled them for it. (Once he was angry at the hardness of heart of the Pharisees, but never at His disciples. He was angered at the unwillingness to learn, not the inability to learn.)

Many times, in fact, Jesus told people something that confused them until something significant happened hours, days, or even years later.

Tough Truths about Finding a Community

Published on 1/15/2010 in Bible Study. 5 Comments Tags: discipleship, Jesus, Urbia.

I was at the ECLC today and realized that if you pray for God to put you into a community of people, you had better check to make sure you are humble enough to be a part of whatever community He puts you in.

I’m not sure I’m ready for Him to answer me, honestly.

Are you too proud to associate with homeless people? What about African-americans or Latinos or Whites or Chinese? What about crazy people? If you find that you’d rather not be around those kinds of people, then don’t pray and ask God to put you in community somewhere. Just find people you like to be around; people that will mirror your ideas, thoughts, and beliefs.

Go find them and die.

Giving and Receiving in Humility

Published on 12/31/2009 in Bible Study. 2 Comments Tags: discipleship, grace, humility, Jesus, leadership, service.

John 13.8 “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.”

There is a humility that is beyond the humility that somebody can tell me I need to have or that I can see and grasp. It’s beyond a virtue or anything that you can talk about, I think. Jesus doesn’t talk about being humble, whatever that means, but He always talked about the actions and the fruit of the humble.
humble yourself like a little child
the one who leads should be like one who serves
the greatest among you will be the servant of all
For he who is least among you all—he is the greatest.

If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all.

There is no way at all that you can muster up humility in yourself and BING! be humble.

So being humble is an activity. It can be shown with activity, though that is never the point, and it can be cultivated with activity. At the same time, it can be shown and cultivated by receiving activity. Peter was NOT going to let Jesus wash his feet, but to talk that way to Jesus was the opposite of humility and submission to Him. Peter really shows off our pride of self-inflicted devotion at the Last Passover. If he really cherished and honored Jesus, he would let Him do whatever He wanted. If he really believed that Jesus was always right and wise, then he wouldn’t have argued when Jesus said, “all of you are going to fall away,” but instead he jumped in with great declarations of devotion that Jesus knew he wouldn’t keep.

There is a humility in just letting Jesus do His thing with us. It’s not found in us trying to show Him (or anyone else) how devoted we are or how GLORIOUS we think He is. It’s a humility that let’s people serve you and looks for the way to serve others and never notices either way.

I’m not there yet, but Jesus is, and I’m following Him.

We Think We’re All or Nothing, but We’re Really Just Selfish

Published on 12/29/2009 in Bible Study. 0 Comments Tags: communion, discipleship, giving, Jesus.

John 13.6-9 He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, do you wash my feet?”

Jesus answered him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand.”

Peter said to him, “You shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.”

Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!”

I can relate to Peter here. I will either deny Jesus’ help, with an attitude of “I can figure this out/ do this myself.” or with the opposite “DO EVERYTHING!” Sometimes it’s a little too easy to not submit to God and just tell Him what we think needs to be done, as if the point is really getting our feet washed. The great thing I see here from Jesus is that He corrects Peter but then continues with the plan anyway. He doesn’t say, “Since you didn’t listen, you don’t get your feet washed” or anything like that. God has a deep enough keel to continue on the course regardless of our distracting demands or selfish zeal.

Jesus is the Ultimate Untopper/Topper

Published on 12/27/2009 in Bible Study. 1 Comment Tags: discipleship, Jesus, mercy, Passover, works.

All of the disciples are sitting around arguing about who is the best and who Jesus loves the most, all the time getting ready to eat the passover with dirty feet.

Jesus alone gets up to wash the feet, and surely nobody noticed what he was doing until He started, because no one questioned or protested until His activity was already in progress.

“How could they have not even noticed what He was doing if He undressed and wrapped Himself in a towel!?” you may ask. All I know is we miss a lot of what Jesus is doing when we are focused on ourselves.

Then Jesus begins to wash their feet, every one of them, and tells Peter, “Afterward, you will understand.” Jesus had told them that the greatest among them would be the servant of all, but they still hadn’t gotten it. They were still thinking like their contemporary rabbis–serving themselves. Life, today too, is so much about prestige and position and authority levels, that they still hadn’t gotten out of thinking about others as greater than themselves. They had to be shown how to do it.

Once you’ve washed a person’s feet, I’m speaking literally here, you have pretty much degraded yourself to them as far as you can go. Even in today’s culture. It’s a pretty humiliating thing.

While the disciples were racing to the top, Jesus, their teacher and rabbi, was racing to the bottom. And not an overly pious, condescending ‘least of these’ position, but the real, tangible, scandalous low position.

The flipping irony of this whole thing, though, is that I’m sure the disciples, just like me, would then say, “ok, that means if I want to be the greatest, I need to outserve everyone else!” and then there would be a fight over the basin and towel to wash feet. Jesus was racing for the bottom, but His eyes were on the goal of loving the Father above. He wasn’t racing against others, he was just rushing to get to the Father.

The Father draws us, and attracts us to Him, but always desires to remain the goal, the destination, the end. He does not take pleasure in activity for the activity’s sake. Peter’s clean feet didn’t change anything, and Jesus’ washing activity or exact method of washing didn’t make anything magical or mysterious happen. It was Jesus, following the Father’s lead to show the disciples that they should serve each other and love each other, that taught and transformed the start of that final Passover meal.

John 13:15-17 (ESV) I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.

Short, Late night thoughts on Christmas

Published on 12/24/2009 in Bible Study. 0 Comments Tags: history, Jesus.

It says there was no room at the inn.
If they went to Joseph’s hometown to be counted in the census, then he’d be there with his extended family,
Unless there were none left (orphaned?)
Or none would accept him into their house (pregnant betrothed? adulterer?)

In ancient times the status of a people or a city was built on their hospitality. It was shameful for a visitor to not have a place to stay.
“There they stopped to spend the night. They went and sat in the city square, but no one took them into his home for the night…
No one has taken me into his house. We have both straw and fodder for our donkeys and bread and wine for ourselves your servants—me, your maidservant, and the young man with us. We don’t need anything.”
“You are welcome at my house,” the old man said. “Only don’t spend the night in the square.””
(Judg 19:15-20 NIV)

The origins of the Messiah are tricky.

He has to be a Nazarene, but He needs to be born in Bethlehem, the city of David. He has to be lower class, so that none can say He had it easy, but he has to be brought up out of Egypt, which would be an expensive trip to get to in the first place.

He has to be a priest (line of Levi via Aaron)
and a king (line of David)
and a prophet.

The fact is, no city or nation, no house nor inn, no social class or ancestry can contain Him. He is the King of Kings, and the Lord of all Lords.

Merry Christmas

Jesus made them clean, but not all of them got clean.

Published on 12/24/2009 in Bible Study. 1 Comment Tags: Gospel, grace, Jesus, John, works.

John 13:10 ¶ Jesus answered, “A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet; his whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you.”

Part of this verse shows why Universalism can’t be true. Yes, Jesus died for the sins of all people, but NO, that does not mean that everyone is saved. Judas didn’t accept the cleansing. He was still unclean in his heart and was conspiring to turn Jesus in even though he had been taught and shown and even ate dinner with The Truth.

It also shows that mere activity doesn’t make one clean. Judas was around and participated in the same activities as the other twelve, but that still didn’t make him clean in Jesus’ eyes. He even had his feet washed, which wasn’t an act of cleaning away dirt, but instruction on cleaning away pride. He didn’t learn that lesson either.

All of this comes as a warning to us. Let us not think that just because we are around disciples and just because Jesus has served us in many wonderful ways, that we are all set to do our own will and do our own thing and call ourselves clean friends of Jesus. It’s BEING His disciple and DOING His will that all of a sudden shows us that HE has made us clean.

Giving up on ‘working toward’ Holiness

Published on 12/22/2009 in Bible Study. 0 Comments Tags: grace, Jesus, salvation, works.

John 13: 9 Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” 10 Jesus said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, d except for his feet, [1] but is completely clean. And e you [2] are clean,

For a long time in my Christian life, I’ve been moaning and groaning the words of a Jennifer Knapp song:

Lord, come with your fire
burn my desire
refine me…

please come and free me
and rescue this child
for I long to be reconciled to yo-ooo-ooo-ooo

I was singing this song and thinking about John 13 and realized something.

I’ve already BEEN RECONCILED! And you know what else? I don’t need to have my desire burned. When Christ died on the cross, God reconciled Man to God. My sin was cleansed and when Jesus was raised from the dead, we who are in Christ were raised with Him.

It seems to me that there is this hyper-pious teaching that tells us to cry out to God to be made holy. Another song

Holiness, holiness is what I long for
holiness is what I neeeeed
Holiness, holiness, is what You want from me.

it even says at one point

Righteousness, righteousness, is what You want from me.

God doesn’t want our righteousness or our holiness any more than I want my 2 year old to give me a dirty diaper for a Christmas present!

The fact is, a person that has had a bath only needs to wash their feet. We have been made clean by the life and death of Christ. Sure, our feet still get dirty as we walk around in the world, but the part of us that matters the most to God, the part that is out of this world (which David Crowder says as soon as you leave the ground you’re in the sky, right?!) has been made clean.

So let’s change these silly songs.

Let’s quit yearning for holiness when it’s already been served up to us on a platter!

Give up on your silly, dirty-diaper holiness and have faith in Jesus!

True Authority and Power on Display in John 13

Published on 12/14/2009 in Bible Study. 1 Comment Tags: discipleship, Jesus, power, submission.

3 Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God;4 so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist.

Here you go world, it’s not as if Jesus was slowly realizing who He was, as so many people write or imply. Jesus was fully aware of His position, of His origin, and of His destination. Jesus knew that He had full authority over the entire world, and in the very next verse He strips down to the most shameful costume of a servant. Not just a servant, but a footwasher. If anyone were to touch any unclean thing, they would become ceremonially unclean. If anything were to be found on the road that was unclean, it would have been on the bottom of Peter’s feet.

But here is Jesus, all authority in Heaven and earth and under the earth, and he bears himself more than would be normal for dinner, and begins to wash feet. Feet of men who were competing and arguing about who was the best. Men who had stolen from Him and the others. Men who had tempted Him to sin against the Father. Men who told mothers to get their children away from Jesus. Men who would later that night swear upon something greater than themselves that they had no connection with Him.

Here is what the Lord looks like. This is True Power. This is True Authority and Beauty.

“Why do the nations conspire and the peoples plot in vain?

The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the LORD and against his Anointed One.

“Let us break their chains,” they say, “and throw off their fetters.”

The One enthroned in heaven laughs;

the Lord scoffs at them.

Then he rebukes them in his anger and terrifies them in his wrath, saying, “I have installed my King on Zion, my holy hill.””

(Psa 2:1-6 NIV)

He will be installed at Calvary on a cross, and with it He will swallow up sin, death, and false authority for all time.

John 13:3 Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God;4 so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist.