Who Is This Guy?

April 27, 2026, Monday Message:

Mark 11:27-28 NLT: “Jesus and the disciples were walking through the Temple area, when the leading priests, the teachers of religious law, and the elders came up to him. They demanded, “By what authority are you doing all these things? Who gave you the right to do them?”

Those posing the question didn’t really like Jesus. They were prejudiced against him. He was a threat to their authority and income. So they asked him kind of a trick question. If Jesus said he was on his own, he wouldn’t possess the authority to demand compliance. If he said he was sent by God, they would demand proof.

Jesus answers their question with one of his own, like the storybook troll asking you to solve a riddle before crossing a bridge. “I’ll answer your question if you can answer mine. What about John the Baptist? Who gave him authority?”

The priests and teachers didn’t know how to answer. They hadn’t obeyed John, so they couldn’t admit that his words were heaven-sent. On the other hand, they didn’t want to say John was merely human, because most people thought John was a prophet. So this collection of the greatest religious minds in all of Israel finally answered, “We don’t know.” Duh!

Consequently, Jesus refused to give them an answer. To him, the answer should have been obvious. Who would know all of God’s laws, the best way for us to live? Who could heal any malady, making people as good as new? Who could raise Lazarus from the dead? Everyone may not have known that Jesus is God’s Son, but they should have been able to discern that his actions were heaven-sent.

Jesus wants us all to answer that question, “Who do you believe he is?” Read and re-read the eyewitness accounts until you get it. Jesus is the heaven-sent Son of the Most High, who was sent here to rescue mankind. His mission was successful!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

The Father’s House

Jesus In the City Fellowship

Truth & Freedom Church

Holy Saturday!

For Holy Saturday, April 4, 2026:

Matthew 27:64 NLT, asking Pilate: “We (the leading priests and Pharisees,) request that you seal the tomb until the third day. This will prevent his disciples from coming and stealing his body and then telling everyone he was raised from the dead! If that happens, we’ll be worse off than we were at first.”

The leading priests seemed unconcerned with spiritual authenticity, unconcerned with truth. To them, Jesus was a threat to their power and money. People had left the Synagogue to follow Jesus, and their tithes had gone to Jesus rather than the Temple. Because Jesus was a perceived threat, the leading priests and Pharisees plotted to kill him, which goes against everything they stood for. Now they were worried that Jesus’ prophecy would come true, that he would rise in three days. Men were sent to guard the tomb so that no one could steal the body and falsely claim that Jesus was alive.

The Great Exchange: Remember that while on the cross, the sins of the world were heaped upon Jesus, and His innocence was imparted to believers. That’s a massive amount of forgiveness, but that was the Father’s plan to bring believers home. That was Jesus’ mission, to rescue mankind from Satan’s territory. You could say that Jesus was on a mission trip to planet Earth!

One more thing: Many of us learned the Apostles’ Creed growing up. There’s a mistranslation that has always bothered me. The creed states, “Jesus was crucified, died and was buried; he descended into hell.” Friends, Jesus did not go to hell. He went to Sheol, a place for the dead. It is not heaven, and it is not hell. It may involve judgment, since Moses wrote, “The anger of Yahweh is a flame which burns in the ‘depths’ of Sheol.” But believers are already forgiven by the work Jesus did on the cross.

I suspect that not much happened on Holy Saturday, since that day is the Sabbath for Jews. It’s the Lord’s day, not a day for customary work. Jesus will be back to work tomorrow, walking away from his grave. Christians worship on Sunday, the day we realized that Jesus had conquered sin and death at the same time! In the meantime, "Shabbat Shalom!"

Pastor Norton Lawellin

The Father’s House

Jesus In the City Fellowship

Truth & Freedom Church

Conspiracy!

For Thursday, May 29, 2025:

Luke 11:53-54 NLT: “As Jesus was leaving, the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees became hostile and tried to provoke him with many questions. They wanted to trap him into saying something they could use against him.”

Nowadays, we hear a lot of talk about conspiracy theories as a reason for bad things happening. When we see this, realize that something didn’t just accidentally go wrong. There’s always an evil advance plan, a plot designed to bring about the desired result. Today’s scripture describes the conspiracy against God’s Son.

The religious teachers and Pharisees perceived Jesus as a threat to their established religion. Tithes regularly flowed into the Temple, but now some tithes were going to Jesus. These leaders had agreed on false teaching, but this Jesus, the new guy, was rocking the boat, attempting to get his fellow Jews back on track, believing the way God intended. Agreeing with Jesus’ teaching would have meant the Pharisees abandoned their position in the driver’s seat and openly admitted that they were wrong. Mankind doesn’t do that easily!

Rather than welcoming the Son, our scripture says the religious teachers and Pharisees were hostile toward Jesus. They tried to provoke him, to make him angry. That wasn’t in Jesus’ nature. They tried to trap him with questions designed to be used against him. And they would eventually create a scenario that would end with Jesus’ demise. That’s the conspiracy!

But it wasn’t the end! God’s vast eternal plan knew the future. When the Pharisees thought they had won, Jesus would take the sins of the world to the place of the dead. Sin was conquered! Three days later, Jesus would rise from his tomb. Death had been conquered! And in forty days, Jesus would ascend to the Father’s Kingdom to prepare for the arrival of believers! The door had been opened to eternal life!

Pastor Norton Lawellin

Jesus In the City Fellowship