Stories Jesus Told, Part II - Reservoir Church
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Stories Jesus Told, Part II

January 22, 2017

We’ve started a winter series at Reservoir, “Stories Jesus Told.” As I shared in our first talk, the idea is that the most striking thing about Jesus as a teacher is that he mainly taught by telling stories. I reminded us that of the many stories Jesus may have told, his four original biographers passed down 45 to us. And quoting my friend Carl Medearis, I mentioned that these 45 stories that Jesus told are stories we might want to listen to, to know, to tell to other people.

The second thing that might strike us is how odd and at the same time commonplace these stories are. Drawn from everyday working and family and social and situations, they seem to indicate that God doesn’t want to draw us out of our lives to a higher plane but to engage us in our ordinary lives with how we think and relate and manage them. The stories aren’t always clear, but they are ultimately pretty intriguing.

And maybe that’s the point – to intrigue us, to get us asking questions of ourselves and our community and God, to engage with Jesus as a teacher and to see what we learn as we do so.

In that spirit, I’ve taken quite a few liberties and rewritten Jesus’ stories in 140 character or less form. They’re going up daily on twitter, but in digest form, here are the second bunch. For the first batch, go here.

God’s land is a woman tucking yeast into her dough and working it all the way through. And Jesus always talked like this. (Matthew 13:33, Luke 13:20-21)

kneading dough

Wheat and weeds grow together in my field. I’ll take care of it later; there’s nothing you can do about it. Let it be. (Matthew 13:25-30)

God’s land: like a net, bulging with fish. The fishers collect the good, throw out the bad. So will the angels at the end. (Matthew 13:47-50)

Gill_Net_Full_of_Fish

Don’t fall asleep on the job. Your boss is watching and might show up at any moment! Stay awake! (Mark 13:32-37)

No one knows when Jesus’ll show up. People’ll be working and eating, and -boom- Jesus will show up and change everything! (Matthew 24:36-44)

Your boss could show up at any moment, like a nighttime thief. Be ready, because he wants to get on his knees and serve you! (Luke 12:35-40)

servant

Again, follow me on twitter for these every day for a few weeks.