(Ron Carpenter- “Dealing with Difficult People”- Week#2 ). (Some of this message is quoted from his message and some is not; but, I give him the credit for these thoughts until at the bottom where you see: “me”. Ron’s message is POWERFUL STUFF!)
John the Baptist has to recognize he has got to navigate through his time in prison as if John is experiencing a time without Jesus
( “are you the one?”). Jesus has not the time or energy to give to John as he demanded! It is a story to tell us that humans will divide their time, attention and efforts in seasons BUT IT HAD BETTER NOT CHANGE THE RELATIONSHIP! It was John leaving Jesus because John was offended by Jesus’ change in attention with him. Jesus now has 12 disciples when there was just a time of him and Jesus! Wow! Jesus was NOT LOVING HIM LESS! LOVE (1Cor. 13) is patience, kind, long-suffering, not easily provoked, it keeps no record of wrong, it hopes all things, and it believes all things. Love matures like that and blooms only when “one can NOT OFFENDED YOU”! IF YOU MAKE ME COME TO THE POINT to not believe in you, I WILL believe all things. If you come to the point where you haven’t changed I will endure and love you A VERY LONG TIME!
“AND YOU TELL JOHN NOT TO TAKE THE BAIT”! SCANDAL BRINGS ENTRAPMENT!
BLESSED IS HE IF HE CAN NOT TAKE THE BAIT!
(me)
Jesus LOVES WITH NO FAULTS!
WE, humans, can not love without faults; but, if we are a Christian we have to grow like the orchid on ” Dennis the Menace”( time to wipe your tears moment after listening to Ron’s message). That orchid was babied, pampered and almost worshipped by Mr. Wilson to be able to witness that once in a lifetime opportunity. Mr. Wilson “loved hard” and expected something different. He expected to be not distracted. He expected the flower to bloom for him and him only; he tried sharing and that was a failure. Mr.Wilson expected expectations and the flower produced for everybody else BUT, HIM! It was not the flower that did not bloom, it was Mr. Wilson who took the bait and when failure came he blamed the flower and cursed it.
John the Baptist was human and had faults even as a prophet, Christian, disciple and very close friend of God in the flesh. Think about this: Malachi 11:4-6; John 1:21; Matt. 17:9-13; Matt. 11:4-6. Abram claims Sarah is his sister and yet she was his wife. But, Abram did not lie. The same is true for John the Baptist as not being Elijah, as the person in the flesh, but, as the person in the spirit which the priests would not accept because of their own misinterpretation of Malachi 4:5-6. The angel Gabriel told John’s father Zacharias (Luke 1:17) that his son would go in the power of the spirit to fulfill Malachi 4:6, not Malachi 3:1. The proud, righteous, blood heirs of heaven believed God was to raise Elijah from the grave(or some think possibly reincarnated)! God had “chosen” a different vehicle of communication and it was to deliver the message of Elijah through John the Baptist, not Elijah in the flesh. The point to this reference is not to study John the Baptist but the alike humanistic desire of the flesh to overstep boundaries and twist love into something it should not. John’s PERSPECTIVE was completely WRONG with God’s( Luke7:19-20). John used to be Jesus’ only “buddy” and now Jesus did not have the same amount of time for him the season had changed John is frankly jealous! It turns out that you can only discern John’s question if you throw it back in his own lap! Isn’t that how teenagers act? They do and say stuff that they really are guilty of but, accuse others of the same to make them look innocent? John the Baptist fulfilled the prophecies of Malachi and Isaiah right in front of them but, THEY WERE BLIND (they expected reincarnation or raising of the dead instead of spiritual understanding)! Jesus told them they did not know God because they didn’t know him. That is the quintessential statement of one person looking for “fleshly” proofs to questions; but instead, God seems to always use that different language (spiritual and heart) the spiritually dead refuse to accept. How could they know Jesus, when he accuses them of not knowing him? Did he spend time with them like the disciples? Jesus was revealing the truth, as well as John the Baptist, and Abram. Abram was wise as it states in Proverbs 12:22-23. You must read these stories searching the discernment on the spiritual radio and not with flesh and blood understanding that one would see with eyes or hear with ears. God shows us love thru Jesus. Jesus showed the love of God in complete absolute parallel but in THE FLESH AND NOT AS THE JEWS DEMANDED! Jesus IS LOVE! Many people put a LOT of confused and unGodly expectation on John the Baptist as they did Moses! Jesus like many parents has more than one child. Parents don’t love two children less than one just because it is impossible to give each 24 hours of attention in one day. Jesus has many, many, many children, as many as the grains of sand on the seashore. Jesus can and DOES LOVE EACH EQUALLY. IT IS each of us that must love and accept his love even as a season. Jesus came with missions and human characteristics to show to mankind a real physical relationship that bonds humans like that of marriage. John was being selfish and demanding for things that were not of God. We must endure the TEST OF OUR LOVE FOR HIM AND IN LIKE MANNER WITH OTHERS. We are not capable to love as an omnipresent God. We must love purely as much like Jesus while enduring seasons (temporary changes in life on earth)!
We are all loved; we must learn to live as mature loving Christians without getting caught in the traps of this world, our flesh, or Satan’s. You will benefit from seasons both spiritually and mentally as one does from summer to fall and so forth. If you demand from God or a friend on earth for a one season relationship that is not supposed to have grounded values like the ability of an AC unit providing heat or cooling during different times, you are “loving” only when the weather goes your way (fair weathered friend).
