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“It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” And they were exceedingly astonished, and said to him, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God.”

Rimshot! Jesus had a good sense of irony. People with money, I mean ‘real money,’ are accustomed to making things happen their way. Just ask a Billionaire (maybe one running for President) when the last time He/She said “I’m sorry” or asked for forgiveness… There is an entitlement that comes along with money and power. It is hard to admit you cannot pay your way to righteousness. The more money you have and the higher your position, the less likely it is that someone will put you in your place. Be careful… “rich” is something we all tend to think is someone else. If you’re able to read this blog post, changes are, you have more individual wealth than 99% of the rest of the world. Trust in God. Realize our true identity is of a beggar relying 100% on God’s grace for salvation. 

And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one ‘s wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘ Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh ’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” They said to him, “ Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?” He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.

What are what are usually referred to as “biblical reasons” for divorce? Well, Jesus tells us there’s one reason for divorce, and it’s not what you think… “hardness of heart.” Usually when people ask about divorcing their spouse, they’re looking for a kind of loop-hole to allow them to walk away. Yet, Jesus has a very high view of marriage. When the Pharisees asked Jesus for some excuses to divorce, He didn’t play their game. Elsewhere (like 1Corinthians 7) the Bible acknowledges there are times when you can’t help what happens to you. Getting a divorce isn’t the unpardonable sin. It’s not the scarlet letter. There is grace and hope after divorce… but we do need to take marriage seriously. Marriage is the uniting of two people into one, that means divorce is like killing a person, sometimes it is necessary to kill (but not murder), but that’s the rare exception, not the rule. So to with marriage, sometimes divorce is forced upon you, but that’s the rare exception. Don’t be hard hearted, and don’t let a divorce rob you of what God has in store for you today and all the days to come…

And he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart. He said, “ In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected man. And there was a widow in that city who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Give me justice against my adversary. ’ For a while he refused, but afterward he said to himself, ‘ Though I neither fear God nor respect man, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice, so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming. ’” And the Lord said, “ Hear what the unrighteous judge says.

Don’t give up on praying. Pray until God changes your circumstances or He changes you! He will.

Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice; and he fell on his face at Jesus ‘feet, giving him thanks.

We should be grateful. God sent His Son for you and me. 10 people were healed, only one came back with grateful thanks, be that 1%.

Jesus wept.

Sometimes we have the false idea that if we’re a Christian, the world around us won’t get to us, that’s just not how it works. We’re created as emotional beings. We’re meant to love and care and that means, sometimes, we get hurt. Don’t let your feelings take over, but you’re meant to feel. Love, be happy, rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep. When a friend is experiencing joy, be happy for them, don’t be envious. When tragedy strikes, weep… Jesus did. But just like He knew Lazarus would be alive again, we don’t weep with no hope. Laugh, cry, live life to the fullest.