Articles

Even Jesus Couldn't Please Everyone

In Luke 7:31-35 (KJV) the Lord asked, "Whereunto then shall I liken the men of this generation? and to what are they like? They are like unto children sitting in the marketplace, and calling one to another, and saying, We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned to you, and ye have not wept. For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine; and ye say, He hath a devil. The Son of man is come eating and drinking; and ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners! But wisdom is justified of all her children." The same people who criticized John for his ascetic practices, criticized Jesus for being the opposite. In the very next verse we read of an invitation from a Pharisee to Jesus. While he is in the man's house eating, Jesus is criticized for not rejecting the intrusion of a sinful woman. "And, behold, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster box of ointment, And stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment. Now when the Pharisee which had bidden him saw it, he spake within himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is that toucheth him: for she is a sinner" (Luke 7:37-39).

Sometimes we are amazed at the way people react to efforts to do the Lord's work. Like the mule, some of us seem to be in the "objective case and the kickative mood." Much of our controversy revolves around who did it, said it, planned it, etc. I am convinced that one of Satan's greatest tools for destroying faith in Christians is the super-critical attitude that we sometimes express. Let us all try to examine ourselves before we try to get the speck of sawdust out of someone's eye. That log (beam) in our eye just might distort our view of things. And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins 1 Pet 4:8 (KJV).

Kenneth L. Thomas