Nick Poindexter

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Tag: Matthew (Page 2 of 4)

Religious Fashion Shows

October 27, 2010 / / 0 Comments

Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.
-Deuteronomy 6:8 (NIV)

In the Jewish culture, statements like these in scripture were often taken literally. Very literally. Jewish men would sometimes wear what’s called a phylactery, a small box containing scrolls of scripture that were attached to their hands and foreheads. The purpose behind this verse in Deuteronomy was to symbolically keep their faith in God close to their hands and minds, but many Pharisees and scribes acted it out for notoriety. That’s why Jesus calls them out on this practice in Matthew 23:5. The Message describes them as “religious fashion shows.” Ouch.

Whether we admit it or not, just like the hypocritical Pharisees and scribes, we ultimately want it to appear that we’ve got it all together in the religion department as well. If I’m honest with myself, I wonder how many “symbols” of my faith are really just there for show…

Do I really use that enormous, 8-inch thick Bible on the coffee table, or do I just want others who enter my home to think I’m a consistent Bible reader? Do I really wear that cross necklace as a reminder of Christ’s sacrifice, or do I just want others to think I’m a “good guy”? Do I really listen to Christian music as a way to worship my God, or do I just not want others to think I listen to the “bad” stuff? Do I really bring my Bible to church every Sunday morning because I desperately want to dig into the Word, or do I just want others to be impressed? Do I really want to show thankfulness to my Father for taking care of my every need, or do I just not want the booth next to me at the restaurant to think I’m an unbeliever?

When things that are supposed to remind us of God instead become things to draw attention to ourselves, then the original purpose is completely disgraced. Whether its a phylactery or a coffee table Bible, the intent has to be about remembrance, not reputation.

Otherwise, it’s just a religious fashion show.

$9 Billion In Debt

August 18, 2010 / / 0 Comments

“Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt… But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay what you owe.’
-Matthew 18:23-24, 27-28 (ESV)

In Matthew 18, we find Jesus telling a story often referred to as The Parable of the Unmerciful Servant. The servant has a debt to the king of 10,000 talents, which is generously pardoned. That same servant, who was just freed from his bondage of debt, immediately tracks down another servant who owed him money, specifically 100 denarii.

The true essence of this parable can be lost if you don’t understand the significance of those two amounts.

First of all, a talent wasn’t a physical coin, but was considered to be 20 years worth of wages. For example, in the United States today, the average person makes $46,000 per year, which is $920,000 over 20 years. And this servant owed 10,000 times that amount… $9.2 BILLION! As for the 100 denarii, 1 denarius was equal 1 day’s wages, so that was equivalent to about 20 weeks worth of wages. Using the same $46,000 average would come out to about $18,000.

Look at it this way: the servant was over $9 billion in debt. That’s more than the gross domestic product of Madagascar! Or let me do the math for you: $18,000 is less than 0.000002% (2 millionths) of what he owned the king.

I know, I know… $18,000 is still a lot of money. When someone does you wrong, it hurts. No doubt about it. But it’s nothing compared to $9 billion.

Like the servant to the king, we were so far in the red to God that there was no way we could ever pay it back.  But he has wiped clean our insurmountable debt. Amazingly, instead of vengeance, God chose forgiveness.

So we must have that same attitude of mercy and grace toward others who are indebted to us. Because God has already done it for us on a much larger scale.

It’s the least we can do.

How You Should Pray

August 1, 2010 / / 0 Comments

“This, then, is how you should pray:
” ‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
-Matthew 6:9 (NIV)

Here we find Jesus teaching the disciples about prayer. He concludes the talk with a prayer template, if you will, which starts off with the phrase, “Our Father”. The original Aramaic word here is “Abba”, which means “Daddy” in today’s language. So Jesus says first and foremost, prayer should be a simple conversation with your Daddy, not thoughtless babbling with an impersonal god.

But do we really treat it that way?

I know that I often find myself using words during prayers (especially those given out loud) that I would never use when speaking to a friend, let alone my daddy. It’s like I have some magic formula that I have to follow, repeating specific lingo and phrases a specific amount of times for it to be a “good” prayer. I mean, “hallowed”, really? What does that even mean?

It’s kind of ironic that a verse about prayer not being mindless repetition is arguably one of the most repeated verses in the Bible.

As a youth minister, I am constantly asking teenagers to pray out loud. Whether its during prayer requests or to close out a Bible study, more often than not I get silence and stares at the ground.

But some of the time I do find a youth that will pray, and it’s almost always sloppy, candid, and uneloquent. And I absolutely love it.

Prayer isn’t about being poetic. Prayer isn’t about impressing others. Prayer isn’t about getting people to say, “Hmmm” or “Amen”.

Prayer is about warm, intimate, face-to-face conversation with your Daddy. And that’s almost always sloppy, candid, and uneloquent.

As Jesus said, that’s how you should pray.

What You Do With What You Have

October 25, 2009 / / 2 Comments

“Then the man who had received the one talent came. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.’

“His master replied, ‘You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest.
-Matthew 25:24-27 (NIV)

In this story known as The Parable Of The Talents, Jesus tells of three servants who were made caretakers of different amounts of money (talents). The first two doubled their money, while the third chickened out and buried his in the ground. He is then immediately showered with flattering adjectives such as “wicked”, “lazy”, and “worthless”. That’s gotta sting.

Honestly, a part of me has always had a difficult time with this passage. On first glance, it sounds like the master was a little bit harsh. The servant gave him all of the money back, right? I mean, it’s not like he lost it all!

By comparison though, the two other servants were not referred to as “shrewd” or “profitable” as one would think, but were simply called “good” and “faithful”. Praise was given to them for their faithfulness, not their results. The point? What was wicked about the third servant was his inaction. In the eyes of God, that’s worse than us trying something on faith and completely messing it up.

We are called to invest what we’ve been given, whether that’s big or whether that’s small. How much we have is irrelevant. And if we do nothing with the God-given abilities, efforts, and finances that he has entrusted to us… If instead we hoard it up and hide them in the dirt… Then we are wicked, lazy, and ultimately worthless.

Because it’s not about what you have… It’s about what you do with what you have.

Share The Load

July 6, 2009 / / 0 Comments

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
-Matthew 11:28-30 (NIV)

The audience in Jesus’ time would have latched on to this farming analogy instantly. A yoke is a wooden harness that fits over the shoulders of an animal, such as an ox. A piece of equipment is then attached to the yoke and the animals pull it around. It’s big. It’s heavy. It’s tiring.

In their day, being “yoked” to something was also a slang term for anything that was a burden. Specifically, it usually was a reference to Jewish laws and traditions, but also things such as sin and persecution, which we can relate to today.

No matter what it was, the point of Jesus’ comparison here was that being yoked to anything is exhausting. It wears us out, controls our lives, and is defeating. Simply put, we can’t carry the burden alone or we will fall short.

Jesus says that his yoke is easy, but does that mean that belief in him will instantly make your life simple? No, not at all. It’s still a yoke, and by nature yokes are uncomfortable and cumbersome. But the difference is that its a shared yoke… We have the unique opportunity to walk side by side through life with the world’s greatest partner. He is offering strength and companionship to help us keep moving forward.

Christ, whatever I am yoked to, whatever in my life is a burden, whatever is wearing me down… I’m officially unhooking myself from it. Thank you for desperately wanting to share the load.

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About Nick

// Disciple of Jesus

// Husband of Twinkle

// Daddy of Blaise, Justice & Trinity

// Teaching Pastor of Collide Church (Yadkinville, NC)

// Lover of 90s music/television, useless trivia, Cheerwine, Krispy Kreme & Chick-fil-A

// Fan of the Tar Heels, Panthers, Hornets & Braves

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