Jesus Asks a Question: “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord’ but don’t do what I say?”

Jesus Asks a Question: “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord’ but don’t do what I say?”

“Have I been with all of you for so long a time and you still do not know who I am? Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father. So how can you say then, ‘Show us the Father?’ Do you not believe that I am in the Father and that the Father is in Me?” (Jesus asking three straight questions of His disciples in John 14:9-10).  

Messiah Jesus was a Master of asking questions: some were open-ended, others were very pointed; some were out of curiosity, others were challenging; some seemed rhetorical, others seemed painfully obvious; some were to reveal Himself, others were to guide the other into self-understanding; some were intentionally provocative, others were to kick-start a conversation; some questions were asked to explore a topic to deepen understanding and stretch toward the truth; some were leading questions that He designed to suggest a particular answer, and others were questions in response to questions asked of Him; some were hypotheticals to stimulate the imagination, other questions were used  by Him as stepping stones to think logically from one point to the next. Jesus used questions to dignify the listener, letting that person know that He is taking that person seriously and listening carefully. Many of His questions were acts of friendship and used to pursue a more profound intimacy with someone. Jesus asked very few yes-no questions, and since time was usually irrelevant for Him when He was with people, He rarely asked a “when” question. Several biblical scholars have studied the gospels with Christ’s questions in mind, and they have literally counted a total of 307 questions in His various conversations. It seems that a worthy spiritual exercise when considering the many questions of Jesus is that we should take them personally, as if He was asking us that question right now.

“Why do you call me ‘Lord, ‘Lord’ and not do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me, and hears my words, and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house…” (Luke 6:46-48).

Mavis Staples & Levon Helm – “You Got To Move”

The Question. “Why do you call Me, Lord, Lord,’ but you don’t do what I say?” (Luke 6:46).

Context. “Now during those days Jesus went out to the mountain to pray; and He spent the night in prayer to God. And when day came, He called all His disciples and chose twelve of them.” (Luke 6:12). Jesus just came down from His all-night mountaintop prayer with the Father, seeking His guidance on the members of the Twelve, who will go on to change the course of history in due time. At the bottom of that mountain is a wide level plain, and there are multitudes of people gathering around Him… the Twelve whom he has just chosen, the growing number of followers, and a big crowd that probably included everything from Jews to Gentiles, from cynics to the curious to newly convinced believers to simply those who sought healing. “ … who came to hear Him and to be healed of their diseases. And those who were troubled with demonic spirits were cured. And all the crowds sought to touch Jesus, for power came from Him and He healed them all.” (Luke 6:17-19).

Sermon on the Plain. Luke’s version of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) seems like a summary of Matthew’s account, and not an attempt to duplicate it. Here in Luke 6, he only records about one-third of Matthew’s Sermon, and has only four Beatitudes, each followed by a woe. Luke’s seemingly abbreviated Sermon here is probably reporting some of Jesus’ teachings that He no doubt taught elsewhere on a number of occasions. To different crowds, Jesus surely must have spoken similar truths.

“Why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord’ but don’t do what I say?” (Luke 6:46).

In other words, Jesus is asking a pointed question… What good does it do for you to say I am your Lord and Master if what I teach you is not put into practice? Is it worth anything for you to claim my Lordship, to pay me mere lip service, but have no intention of acting on my words? Can’t you understand that it isn’t worth a thing to talk a good faith without actually living out my teaching in your life? Do you think I’m just looking for empty words of commitment from you and not a life based on those words? Can’t you see that a respectful but distant confession of belief in me is meaningless without a life that personally matches your confession?

Jewish Roots to Jesus’ Question. There is a profound physicality to the Jewish faith. Truth is not limited to the intellect, and must be acted upon in the flesh. Faith in God is embodied, and a believer must provide proof of belief by living out those beliefs. The most essential prayer in the Hebrew Bible is the “shema.” It forms the world view of every believing Jew, and it still does. Found in Deuteronomy 6:4, the opening word of this prayer, shema, is usually translated “hear,” but actually means hear and do, listen and obey, hear and respond, listen and take action, absorb these words and take heed. There is a traditional Jewish saying that “to hear God is to obey God, and to obey God is to hear God.” Hearing and doing are two sides of the same coin of faith, and is a vital aspect of biblical spirituality. So with His question in Luke 6:46, Jesus is standing on the shoulders of every rabbi since Moses. His question here is the most Jewish question He ever asked.

The Shema: “Hear, O Israel! Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone! And you shall love Yahweh your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words which I am commanding you today shall be on your heart; you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way, when you lie down and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and shall be immovable before your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” (Deuteronomy 6:4-9).

Descriptions of the Shema: 

1. the foremost of biblical commands in the Hebrew Bible;
2. the biblical Pledge of Allegiance;
3. the central creed of the pre-Christian faith;
4. Scripture’s “greatest commandment,” according to Jesus Christ (22:36-40, Mark 12:29, Luke 10:27;
5. Judaism’s most essential prayer, the first prayer taught to children;
6. a believer’s statement of faith, prayed twice daily, sunrise and sunset;
7. the marching orders for a faithful parent in the home, placing each parent as the child’s first pastor in the passing on of the faith;
8. the most important passage in Deuteronomy, Moses’ final address to the Israelites as they prepared to enter the Promised Land. It laid the groundwork for how the people were to live out their faith in their new homeland.

The Conclusion to the Sermon on the Plain. (Luke 6:46-49). As in Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount, Jesus closes with words that were a fair warning to all Christ-followers. Mere God-talk is vanity of vanities. Mouthing piety is missing the point. Holy-rollers sadly end up being the Great Pretenders, going down the spiritual drain. In Matthew’s account, Jesus gives us an even finer point to this (Matt. 7:21-27) … Evidently one can have a powerful ministry, even prophecy and exorcism, and still not be known by God. Apparently, one can do great things for God but still not truly know God. One’s whole identity could be wrapped up in doing things for the Lord, but not with the Lord. It comes down to working God’s words into your personal life, as Eugene Peterson once said. The bottom line is developing a committed friendship with the Lord, a relationship in which you really do know each other.

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.” (Matt. 7:21). And what is God’s will, His desire for each of us? Perhaps the prophet Hosea said it best… “My will, my desire is that you show mercy and you grow in knowledge of Me.” (Hosea 6:6).

Knowledge: The Hebraic-Christian understanding of “know” is not at all limited to an intellectual or mental knowledge. To know someone in the Biblical sense is to experience that person in a deeply intimate way. Know, whether with ‘yadah’ (Hebrew) or ‘ginosko’ (Greek), is a relationship word, and involves knowledge that comes from personal experience. To know involves a deeply personal union with someone. To know someone in the Biblical sense is to literally participate in a profound relationship with someone, to establish an ongoing union with a person, to be personally invested to an intimate degree with someone. Limiting our knowledge to religious principles, doctrinal statements or theological propositions doesn’t go deep enough. Too many of us love to talk about God theoretically, instead of talking with God heart to heart. Intellectual knowledge is a dead end if disconnected from a personal relationship with God.

“And then I will tell them to their faces, ‘Get away from Me! I never knew you!” (Matthew 7:23-24).

I never knew you! In this closing scene of Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, He has just finished saying that whoever does what His Father in heaven wants, whoever does His will, will sure enough be able to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. But then at the Judgment throne came many powerful miracle-workers to claim that they have indeed expelled many demons, spoken profound prophecies, and demonstrated other miracles, all in God’s name. They assumed that those powerful deeds were what Jesus meant by doing God’s will. But Jesus told them in no uncertain terms… But I was never a part of those miracles. We never had a relationship together. So I had nothing to do with any of those powerful works. Those works were counterfeit, because my power was not used in them. My awesome power comes out of a personal relationship. You knew about Me, but you didn’t know Me! You didn’t understand that the first order of business in doing my Father’s will is to establish union with me, that we join together intimately and engage in a personal, spiritual friendship with each other. That is my Father’s starting point in doing His will. It is impossible to do His will without personally knowing Me! We were not familiar with each other in the slightest, and in fact I don’t even recognize you at a meaningful level. So, go away from Me! I never actually knew you!

Surface Knowledge. The Bible has a lot to say about the meaning of know, including the usual suspects: memory of a fact or event; possession of a technical skill; a perception of a piece of reality; an intuitive awareness; a mastery of a particular subject; an understanding of something; a personal familiarity with something. That’s all good. Nothing new there. But now the fun begins.

Intimacy. A spiritual relationship with God seems best understood in the context of “knowledge” in the biblical sense, a deep union involving spiritual relations between God and the believer. In the same way that Adam and Eve “knew” each other physically, God wants to “know” us spiritually, and for us to know Him at that same level. To walk with the Lord is to grow in our “knowledge” of Him, to experience spiritual relations with Him in an intimate way. The biblical view of knowing includes images of intimacy, of union with something, of personal commitment and intense focus, of a literal participation and involvement in something. In fact, to know means to have intercourse, sex, “carnal knowledge.” Check out Genesis 4:1, “Adam knew Eve,” and Matthew 1:25, Joseph did not know Mary until she gave birth to a son, Jesus.” That is why a marital union remains the best picture of the type of relationship God wants with each of us.

That Story that Illustrates the Point. This parable by Jesus must have been the best way that Jesus could think of to complete His teaching, to wrap it up and send it home to each listener. It’s a summing up of what He wants the audience to take away after all those words in those sermons. Hear and do. Listen and practice. Believe and obey. Build on the Living Stone. It’s the story about two builders:

THE BUILDERS. The prudent, sensible, practical, wise builder had the good sense to dig below the surface of the ground until he found the rock. He then built his house on the rock foundation. The Holy Land has rock everywhere. Some rock is just below the surface, and other rock may be ten feet down. Everybody knows that the builder doesn’t stop digging until you hit the rock. The stupid, lazy, foolish, impractical builder didn’t bother digging at all. He just built his house on the sand or clay at the surface of the ground. Seriously unwise.

BUILDING THE HOUSE. Since everything was built by hand, including the digging and the construction, house-building was only accomplished by rigorous work, strenuous effort. Building a home was very difficult, and even dangerous. Much building was done in the summer, although the hardened ground was like iron to dig. Home builders wanted to get the job done before the winter rains. If the foundation was not on a rock foundation, then the rain would soften the ground, the walls would weaken, and the house would collapse. Only an extremely foolish person would build right on the ground with no rock foundation.

No Exemptions from Difficulties. Both houses were hit by storms. Both experienced challenges and difficulties. Following Jesus doesn’t mean we are magically protected from life’s storms. One home was unshakeable, the other wasn’t. When we build our lives on the true Rock, the spiritual Foundation, and we will be left standing strong, regardless of the strength of the storm.

The Foundation. There’s a reason this parable was spoken by Jesus at a crucial time in his teaching, after His big sermons in Matthew (on the Mount) and in Luke (on the Plain). There was no doubt in the Early Church’s mind that Jesus fulfilled the messianic prophecies of Isaiah 28:16, Psalm 118:22, and Zechariah 10:4, that Christ came out of Zion to be the Foundation Rock upon which to build one’s life and salvation. Jesus Himself claimed to be the Living Stone, the Cornerstone that the builders rejected in Matthew 21:42. Paul says so in Ephesians 2:20 and 1 Corinthians 3:11. Peter says so too, in 1 Peter 2:4,6. And Luke repeats all that in Acts 4:11. Many who were in Jesus’ audience in this parable of the two builders, believed the story to be messianic, fulfilled in Jesus, that He is the Foundation Stone upon which the wise builder built his house. And true to His Word, when we build on Him, we are unshakeable. Let us dig deep till we find this Foundation. Then let us build our house, through God’s strength, through thought, word and deed. Let us build our lives on the Living Stone by working His words into our lives, every day. As Jesus exclaimed directly after His most Jewish of questions, we will build a storm-proof house when we “come to Him, listen to His words, and does them.”

From Jewish Roots to Christian Faith. It’s no surprise that James, directing his letter to Jewish Christ-followers in various churches, uses Jewish reasoning and writes from a completely Jewish perspective in his letter, from beginning to end. Naturally, then, he would drive home the vital point of the “shema” lifestyle, of listening and responding, of hearing the truth of Jesus and fleshing it out, of not letting His words go in one ear and out the other:  “Be doers of the Word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves... What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone says he has faith, but does not have works? Can that faith save him? Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead… Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless? So as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.” (refer to James 1:22 and 2:14-26).

Finally, listen to the words of the Lord to His followers as we finish this little study:

“Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.” (John 12:17).