You will see heaven opened.  Under a fig tree.   That’s where Nathanael (Bartholomew) was when Jesus “saw” him.   What was he doing there?   Maybe eating lunch or thinking about his to-do list.   Maybe daydreaming.   Some have speculated that because it was traditional to study the Scriptures under a fig tree, Nathanael may have been meditating on God’s promises.   If so, it was the perfect prelude to meeting Jesus. For centuries, God’s...

How is it that you came in here without a wedding garment?  Suppose you’re invited to a good friend’s wedding.   After the ceremony, you enter the reception hall and you notice another guest, his face unshaven, wearing blue jeans and a tattered T-shirt, greedily piling food on his plate and getting into arguments with the other guests.   Feeling hurt and insulted, the groom walks over to him and says, “How could you?   Please leave!”   You’re...

Am I not free to do as I wish with my own money?  Imagine the following impossible scenario:  you walk into a car dealership and say, “I want to buy one of your cars, but I only have five dollars.”   Then the dealer hands you the keys to a brand-new Mercedes- Benz and says, “It’s all yours.”   You stand there in complete astonishment for a moment.   Then you ask the dealer, “Why did you do that?”   And the owner says, “I’m so rich that I just...

It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for one who is rich to enter the Kingdom of God.  Why do you think Jesus made such a strange, disquieting statement about the wealthy?   Did he disdain the prosperous and abhor their affluence?   No, Jesus had wealthy friends like Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, along with a group of wealthy women who supported his ministry.   He didn’t think that the rich are inherently more...

“Shallow men believe in luck. Strong men believe in cause and effect.” -Ralph Waldo Emerson