Motives

What’s Your Motive for Following Jesus - John 6:28 – 6:40 (commentary)

The sixth chapter of the Gospel of John is the setting for one of the great discourses of our Lord, “bread of life.” This discourse takes place in the synagogue at Capernaum. The people demanded that Jesus perform a greater sign than Moses (vv. 30-35). They must have felt that the feeding of ...

Motives of Service - Matthew 8:18 – 8:27 (commentary)

In this section Matthew gives two illustrations of men who said they wanted to follow the Lord and serve Him but had the wrong motives.Desired fame - Because great crowds followed Jesus and there had not been much opposition up to this point, many expressed a desire to follow Him …

The loyality of people to each other. - Numbers 32:1 – 32:15 (commentary)

The Israelites had been camped in the plains of Moab. From this position, they were ready to enter the Promised Land. Up to this point, all the tribes of Israel had fought together, traveled together, and sometimes had sinned together. But now things were changing as two of the t …

Paul Surrenders His Rights - I Corinthians 9:11 – 9:18 (commentary)

Different people serve God for different reasons. We know that there are definitely some motives that people have for serving God that are unacceptable. Jesus made it clear that striving for position and popularity are unacceptable motives for ministry. Greed is also an unacceptable motive for ...

The New Rulers - I Kings 22:30 – 22:53 (commentary)

Jehosaphat and Ahab went up to Ramoth-gilead to face Ben-hadad II, King of Aram. Ahab devised a plan to go into battle disguised as a regular soldier (v. 30). Jehosaphat did not realize that this tactic would put him in greater danger. Ben-hadad wanted to kill Ahab because he k …

David Defeats The Ammonites - I Chronicles 19:1 – 19:19 (commentary)

This chapter includes the insulting of David’s ambassadors by the Ammonites (vv. 1-5), Israel’s victory over the Ammonites under Joab’s leadership (vv. 6-15) and Israel’s campaign against the Syrians (vv. 16-19). The King of Ammon had died, and David had sent a delegation to comfort ...