Tuesday - Opening Closed Minds And Penetrating Callused Hearts Series

A. Did you hear about the guy going around different towns and jabbing people with knitting needles?

1. The police believe he was trying to make a point and was following some sort of pattern.

B. The word “needle” can be used as a noun or a verb.

1. As a noun, a needle might be: a small slender usually steel instrument that has an eye for thread or surgical sutures at one end and that is used for sewing, or could be the hollow end of a hypodermic syringe, or a part of a record player, or the leaves of a conifer tree.

2. As a verb, a person might prick or pierce something with or as if with a needle, or they might provoke or annoy someone by continual criticism or questioning (needling).

C. Max Lucado tells a story from his childhood about something he did during worship one day.

1. As he sat in worship one day as a six-year old, his dad’s hand was in his lap to keep him from squirming.

2. Max’s dad was a mechanic, and Max became intrigued by his dad’s calluses – they rose on the palm of his hand like a ridge of hills.

3. The calluses were layer upon layer of nerveless skin that developed as a defense against the hours of squeezing wrenches and twisting screwdrivers.

4. Max noticed the attendance card on the back of the pew had a straight pin and red ribbon for visitors to wear.

5. Max thought to himself, “I wonder how thick dad’s calluses are?”

6. Without his dad noticing, Max began to insert the pin into his dad’s callus, going deeper every few seconds, watching for a response from his dad.

7. While the rest of the church was intent on the words of a preacher, Max was fascinated by the depth of a callus.

8. Deeper and deeper he pushed the pin, until his dad gave a sudden grunt and yanked his hand away.

9. His dad glared at him and Max knew that that same hand would be used later on Max to make a different point.

10. Max believes that what he did as a six year old with his dad’s hand is similar to what he does as a writer and a preacher trying to penetrate the calluses of people’s heart.

11. Of course, he uses a different kind of needle – his tool isn’t a metal pin, but the sharp edge of eternal truth.

D. Today, as we explore another day in the last week of Jesus’ life, we will notice that He spent the entire day trying to open closed minds and penetrate callused hearts with His final messages.

1. It was Tuesday, which means it was T-Minus 3 days until the crucifixion, and T-Minus 5 days until the resurrection.

2. Two Sundays, we explored Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem on that Sunday and last week we explored His cursing of the fig tree and cleansing of the temple on that Monday.

3. As we will see today, Jesus spends all day teaching – He taught His disciples on the way to Jerusalem and then He taught His disciples, the crowds and the religious leaders in the temple.

4. The Gospel of Matthew devotes 4 chapters to Jesus’ teaching that Tuesday.

a. The Gospels of Mark and Luke devote 2 chapters to Jesus’ teaching that day.

b. John’s Gospel doesn’t include this teaching section, rather John devotes a number of chapters to Jesus’ teaching of the disciples on that Thursday night after the Last Supper.

c. Luke ends his teaching section with these words: 37 During the day, he was teaching in the temple, but in the evening he would go out and spend the night on what is called the Mount of Olives. 38 Then all the people would come early in the morning to hear him in the temple. (Lk. 21:37-38)

d. So all that Jesus taught in these chapters may not have been taught just on that Tuesday.

e. We aren’t told about specific teaching times on Wednesday and Thursday, but what Luke recorded at the end of the teaching section may imply that.

5. We obviously don’t have time to cover in depth all that Jesus taught that Tuesday or during His final days, because there are at least 15 different topics or parables, and some of it is complicated and technical – like the section addressing the signs of the end of the age.

6. What I would like us to do is to get a sense of why Jesus was addressing those topics at that time in His ministry, and how those teachings would have impacted the disciples, how it impacted the crowd and the religious leaders, and how those teachings can impact us.