The Learner

 DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW

THE LEARNER

Matt 10:24-25

24 "A student is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master. 25 It is enough for the student to be like his teacher, and the servant like his master. If the head of the house has been called Beelzebub, how much more the members of his household!

NIV

It is interesting that this version is the only one that translates the Greek word, mathetes, as a student. The other translations use the word disciple. However, this Greek word carries the meaning of learner or pupil. Although it is true his disciples learned from Jesus and were in fact his pupils, throughout scripture, this word is translated as a disciple. So we can say that being a disciple of Jesus is being his student or being his pupil. The point Jesus was making is that we certainly cannot be above him as he is the almighty God and we are his creation. However, it is enough for us to want to be like Jesus. This being like Jesus is not the desire to be like God but to take on the character of Christ in our life to respond to people like Jesus did and to love people like Jesus did. The reason we study or become scholars of the word is to learn all about Jesus and how he interacted with people. Jesus makes a statement about the head of the house being called Beelzebub that all the members of the house would be called the same thing. Again, it is interesting the Greek word here translated as belzebub is really beelzebul which the Jews knew as the dung god. Perhaps this was the worst thing they could call Jesus is to be the God of the dunghill and not necessarily Satan although, this word has been used as the name of Satan. Seeing in the way that Jesus meant it would mean that as he is Christ, we who are of his household would be called Christians. We should not take that title unless we truly want to be Christ-like or like Christ. This would also mean that we would be learners or scholars who study the scriptures looking for all the ways in which we should be like our teacher. Another interesting comparison that we can see is the difference between what the world is called and what we are called. We could say the world is it dunghill, a catcher of flies. This would imply the world stinks and we should have nothing to do with it. Although it is true that we live in the world but we are not of this dunghill, we have been called forth and have become a member of the family of God. We also need to remember that we will always be a student or a learner. We will never attain the perfection of Christ, so we continue to learn, and continue to study in an effort to be more like Jesus.