From Luke chapter twelve the Rev. Mike Malone elaborated persuasively regarding the necessity of reading the times with spiritual insights. Jesus’ rebuke in Luke 12:56 serves as an immediate reminder of the confusion existing in the present Christian era. Jesus said: You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time (here the Greek “kairos” has a theological redemptive significance).
Rev. Malone carefully developed this point by noting that they (crowds) could read physical signs, but they could not read the spiritual signs. That is, they were unable to understand the times which transpired before their very eyes. The hubris of their abilities to understand the physical signs led them to foolishly miss the pictures of real spiritual power demonstrated in the signs of the birth of the Messiah (Galatians 4:4), the signs of Christ’s miracles, the storms being silenced and a myriad of other fantastic revelations of power and mercy from the Christ.
In God’s Holy Sabbath, are His people so devoid of spiritual insight that they are unable to see the greatness of worship and the greatness of Christ’s presence in the elements they partake so casually? Can they by faith see the realities of communal singing, prayers, adoration, confession, and thanksgiving? Perhaps Jesus’ words strikes the believer even more severely today, than the mixed mass in the first century.
The present spiritual manifestations of our Lord are not similar to an enigmatic novel; rather it can be understood because Christ desired that His people be not driven away or enamored easily by commonality (being the expressions of humanism) at the expense of spirituality (being the revelations of God to His people through the means of grace and other ordained means).As the text later reveals, those who were unable to understand spiritual realities in their very eyes came to a faltered approach to the theology of judgment. So too, in our day, the need to read the times with insight becomes an even greater task; since the signs are no longer in our presence (in flesh and blood), we are called to be even more cautious.
The insights usually do not come through flesh and blood anymore, but they do come in
the symbolic nature of the elements, the control of God over the affairs of men and through various means established by God to His church. Christ has not left us seeking hints to fill our spiritual gaps, but He showered us with both visible and invisible signs, with His presence among us in Sabbath worship, and through the faithful preached Word. The Sabbath is properly observed when realize these insights and it will be properly loved when God’s people understand the true signs of the times.
