Daily Devotional for Tuesday, February 24

The Enemies Slander Jesus

“And he was casting out a devil, and it was dumb. And it came to pass, when the devil was gone out, the dumb spake; and the people wondered,” Luke 11:14.

A man made a sizeable donation to the local fire department during their yearly fundraising drive. Word got out about his generosity, but some of the words were negative. Some were outright slanderous. In a meeting with city officials, the mayor commented that he thought the man’s donation was from embezzled funds. He requested an off-the-books investigation from a friend at the courthouse. He was sure wrongdoing would be discovered. Instead, they found the man had received an inheritance from his uncle months earlier. The man innocently and generously shared part of his inheritance with the city.

In Luke 11, a man was unable to speak because a mute demon possessed him. Although we do not have details, the man had an encounter with Jesus. The demon was cast out, the man was able to speak again, and people marveled. Some among the crowd grumbled and slandered Jesus. They claimed He cast out demons by Beelzebub, the chief or prince of demons.

Did those men really believe the accusation they made of Jesus? If they followed their own logic, they would see that does not make sense, especially when they, too, were able to cast out demons.

Others in the crowd took a different approach. To tempt and trap Jesus, they asked for a sign from Heaven. They were not on the pinnacle of the Temple when Jesus sternly reminded Satan of Deuteronomy 6:16: tempting God is forbidden. The enemy just changed to an indirect approach.

For ambassadors of Christ, there will always be people who misinterpret our good deeds or misconstrue our faith. People will be quick to discredit Christ’s work. They may try to explain it away. If they did it to Jesus, we can expect it to be done to us.

THOUGHT

“And Jesus answering said unto him, It is said, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God” (Luke 4:12).

Kelli Reynolds