Frank Harber, Guide to Christianity

Submitted by: Dr Frank Harber

Author: David Hopkins

THE GOOD SAMARITAN

While Jesus was teaching one day, a man in the crowdtried to test him to see if he would give a wronganswer. He asked Jesus, what he must do to inheriteternal life.

Jesus, who knew the man was a lawyer, told him tofollow the law, which says to love God and love yourneighbor. In order to justify himself, the lawyerasked who his neighbor was. Jesus then responded withthis parable.

Luke 10:30-37 And Jesus answering said, A certain manwent down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell amongthieves, which stripped him of his raiment, andwounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. Andby chance there came down a certain priest that way:and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, cameand looked on him, and passed by on the other side.But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came wherehe was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him,And went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring inoil and wine, and set him on his own beast, andbrought him to an inn, and took care of him. And onthe morrow when he departed, he took out two pence,and gave them to the host, and said unto him, Takecare of him; and whatsoever thou spendest more, when Icome again, I will repay thee. Which now of thesethree, thinkest thou, was neighbor unto him that fellamong the thieves? And he said, He that shewed mercyon him. Then said Jesus unto him, Go, and do thoulikewise.

To the Jews of Jesus’ time there was no such thing asa “good Samaritan.” Jews and Samaritans hated eachother for religious and political reasons. The factthat it was a Samaritan who helped the Jewish manshows we are all neighbors. It also shows that God isinterested in showing mercy rather than maintainingprejudice.

Not to mention the fact that the Jewish priest andLevite who are temple assistants, and are usuallyrecognized as servants of God didn’t lift a finger tohelp the man who was badly beaten.

Then since this is the case our first priority shouldbe to ensure that justice is carried out around us,that we show mercy to our “neighbors,” and that wepractice our faith and not just talk about it, whileletting go all stereotypes, forms of discriminationand hatred.

TREASURE IN HEAVEN

A rich young man was wealthy enough for this life buthe wanted to know about eternal life. He was unsure ofhis destiny and came to Jesus seeking security for hisfuture.

Luke 18:18-25 And a certain ruler asked him, saying,Good Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good?none is good, save one, that is, God. Thou knowest thecommandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Donot steal, Do not bear false witness, Honour thyfather and thy mother. And he said, All these have Ikept from my youth up. Now when Jesus heard thesethings, he said unto him, Yet lackest thou one thing:sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor,and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come,follow me. And when he heard this, he was verysorrowful: for he was very rich. And when Jesus sawthat he was very sorrowful, he said, How hardly shallthey that have riches enter into the kingdom of God!For it is easier for a camel to go through a needle’seye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom ofGod.

Notice how Jesus did not challenge the young ruler’sclaims about his life, but said that he still lackedjust one more thing. He then told the young man tosell all that he had, distribute to the poor, and hewould have treasure in heaven.

This focused on his wealth and caused the rich man tobecome very sorrowful because his money was obviouslymost important to him.

However, Jesus clearly makes service to others thelast indication of fitness for eternal life aside fromkeeping the ten commandments.

Submitted by: Dr Frank Harber

Author: Arnold Ahlstrom

The records of Jesus’ prayers constitute a priceless document of one perfect being expressing himself to another. Though Jesus must have been involved in prayer all the time, all we have in the Bible is six prayers of Jesus. There are three kinds of prayers, and we know for sure that the mortal Jesus was involved personally in two of them. The three types of prayers were:a. Personal prayers, offered by an individual in seclusion.b. Public prayers, where one person acts as the voice of the group.c. Set prayers, offered up only in connection with sacred ordinances, such as the ordinances of the temple.Jesus taught us how to pray in public, and we know that prayer as “the Lords Prayer”. “Lead us not into temptation”, “Give us today our daily bread”, etc, are givaways that it is a public prayer. There is not one single mention of first person in singular, showing that it is, in deed, a public prayer.But we will not look at the public prayers of Jesus in this article. We shall look at the two privately uttered prayers that we have in writing. We do have a couple of private prayers that was uttered in public, but we must consider them as teachings of the crowds, and testaments to the history of man, as much as personal prayers.The two genuinely personal prayers that we have access to are his intercessory prayer, offered shortly before he entered into the Garden of Gethsemane and his heart-rending plea to his Father that the cup, if possible, would pass him by. The intercessory prayer we appear to have in its fullness, but Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane must be but a fragment of the entire prayer (remember that there was time enough for the disciples to fall asleep).Why do we have one prayer from A-Z, and only a fragment of the other prayer? In order to answer that question there is one thing we must realize. Since Jesus was all alone when he offered up these two prayers, there was no-one present to record them for inclusion in our Scriptures. If no-one was present to record the prayers, how come we still have them today?In order for us to have access to these two prayers of Jesus today, God must have revealed the content of them to someone who was worthy to view these holy moments, and who could be trusted to accurately record the occurrences. No doubt, this trusted man was a prophet, seer and revelator. This prophet was obviously permitted to view and record the entire intercessory prayer of the Lord, and recorded it to our benefit. The content of this prayer is doctrinally important, since it declares how the Father and the Son are one, and that every believer can become one in the exact same way. There is no room for a dissection of the entire prayer in this article, but it can be found in John 17: 1-26.Whether the prophet who was invited to view the personal prayers of the Master was permitted in his revelation to witness the entire suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane we know not, but it is clear that only a small portion of Jesus’ prayer was public domain;”And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt”. (Mathew 26:39) Perhaps the words of the suffering God were so poignant that we could not bare to hear them. Perhaps such a moment is too sacred to be had among the children of men, who will not shun to make light of the most sacred of things. Perhaps we should rejoice that the words of that pivotal moment never could become part of “The Life of Brian”.