Five Groups of People Jesus Met Daily #1

When Lord Jesus was on this earth, and during the course of His 3 ½ years of ministry, He met different types of people.

Many of them He touched, many of these He influenced, some He rebuked also. What's very interesting is that all these types of people that Lord Jesus encountered can be categorised into five groups.

The Bible says in Hebrews 13:8, "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever."

Malachi 3:6 tells us "For I am the Lord, I do not change..." This means that if Lord Jesus encountered five types or categories of people, then it means that even today, He would be encountering the same types.

Very often, the trend is to examine others. We train all our spotlights on others. The congregation trains their spotlights on the pastor, saying, "If only our pastor was like that and so forth". The staff puts the spotlight on the boss, saying, "If only my boss was like this, then things would have been different for me." I believe it's time to examine ourselves in the light of God's word. This is the purpose of this teaching.

And why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, 'Let me remove the speck from your eye, and look, a plank is in your own eye? Hypocrite! First, remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye. (Matthew 7:3-5)

I believe this teaching will help you to do two things:
1.Remove the plank from your own eye. It will help you see clearly. In other words, It will give you clear spiritual vision.

2.It will also help you remove the speck from your brother's eye. Notice, I said help, not condemn your brother or sister.
 
1.Family
The first group that Lord Jesus encountered was the 'Family'. Lord Jesus had a family. He had a foster father – an earthly father; he had a mother; He had brothers and sisters.

Scripture says, "So He (Jesus) came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up. And as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up to read." (Luke 4:16)

Nazareth was the hometown of Lord Jesus. This was where the boy Jesus had become the man of God Jesus. After being filled with the Holy Spirit and His encounter with the devil in the wilderness, the first place that Jesus went to in the power of the Spirit was his hometown Nazareth. He went to meet His family.

You share your joys with your family. If something exciting or bad happens, you want to first tell your family because this is the closest group of people that you have on this earth.

So also Lord Jesus, after having a power encounter, went to His hometown and what better place than the house of God where He regularly worshipped His Heavenly Father even as a boy.

As He entered the synagogue, He was handed the book of the Prophet Isaiah. And when He had opened the book, He found the place where it was written:

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me,
Because He has anointed Me
To preach the gospel to the poor;
He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted,
To proclaim liberty to the captives
And recovery of sight to the blind,
To set at liberty those who are oppressed;
To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord." (Luke 4:17-19)

Here we see Lord Jesus standing up to read from the scrolls of Isaiah the Prophet. In the verses that followed, He defined His mission – the reason He was sent on this earth for. Surely His family must have also been there in that local synagogue. Surely they must have heard what He said.

Now, if we had been there and heard Lord Jesus speaking in this manner, we would have whistled, shouted, clapped etc. But you see, these people that Jesus was encountering were family.

Luke 4:22 records their reaction, "So all bore witness to Him, and marvelled at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth." [In other words they agreed that what He was saying was significant and not ordinary] And they said, "Is this not Joseph's son?" (Luke 4:22)
 
Look at the manner in which they spoke of Him. "Is this not Joseph's son? Is this not the carpenter's son" They did not receive Him. They rejected Him. This is the same case even today.

Maybe you are a person who serves and loves the Lord with all your heart. You are ready to do anything for God. However, right in your family there could be some person who may be persecuting you, mocking you, someone who constantly makes fun of your faith.

No matter how many powerful spiritual truths you share with them, they don't listen to you. You wonder why these people don't understand. The sad part is, you cannot even ignore this group because it's your family.

Two things you need to understand:
1. If Jesus was persecuted, then His disciples, too will be persecuted
Remember the words of Jesus' A servant is not greater than his master.' If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. (John 15:20)

2. If our Lord was persecuted, then He perfectly knows what you are going through.
The people of Nazareth had such a wonderful opportunity to learn from Jesus, but they missed it big time.

Likewise, I have seen so many times that the closest people to a man of God never receive anything much. The reason is they take the man of God for granted. When someone comes from abroad with a big 'title' these same people will lap up anything that is dished out – they don't care whether it is in line with scripture or not.
 
Look at the life of Judas. He was so close to Jesus and yet so far. All he received was 30 pieces of silver and suicide in the end.
 
Look at Gehazi's life, the right-hand man of Prophet Elisha – so close and yet so far. Elisha had received a double portion of Elijah's anointing. If Gehazi would have been diligent, he would have received four times what Elijah had but do you know what he received?– leprosy.

If you have a person in your life who prays and seeks the Lord on your behalf, then dear child of God, learn to receive from that person while they are still around. They may not be perfect, but God has placed them in your life.
 
A word for those who are being persecuted. Earnestly pray for your family members. Don't hate your family. God knew where He was putting you. You are God's tool to turn them towards Him.

A word for men and women of God whom people are taking for granted inspite of serving faithfully. Your reward is from the LORD.