Yeshua is the long awaited Messiah! He is the ultimate prophet, priest and king! He was the first prophet who was among the Chosen Nation in 400 years. He was the first miracle-working prophet in maybe 800 years! He is our greatest teacher who has given us the clearest and most profound teachings!

He is the Savior of Israel and the nations. First He came to provide salvation for our greatest needs – overcoming Satan, sin and death. He will come again to provide the other aspects of salvation – economic and political victory over poverty, hunger, injustice and war.

Yeshua was very popular among many of the common Israelis of His day. Many were attracted to Him, and His great messages and His miracles. Many started following Him in a serious way, and became His disciples.

Messiah Himself first went through Israel, preaching and teaching and healing. Then, when His first 12 foundational disciples were trained, He then sent them out to do miracles, and tell people about their need to be transferred from the kingdom of the adversary to the kingdom of God. Now He expanded that group of 12, and sent 70 on a similar mission – to do miracles and tell a needy Israel about the King.

Now after this the Lord appointed seventy others (Moses appointed 70 elders to assist him; Israel’s ruling body, the Sanhedrin, had 70 leaders. These 70 formed the new and legitimate leadership of the faithful remnant of Israel. Don’t look to the confused “rabbinic leaders” for solid teaching that will save. Don’t give spiritual authority to those whose teachings are a mixture of truth and very deadly error! Look to the leadership of the faithful remnant!), and sent them in pairs ahead of Him to every city and place where He Himself was going to come.

God is a God of order. Regarding the evangelism of Israel, Yeshua was not haphazard. He was organized. He had a plan. He knew what cities He wanted to go to. These 70 were His forerunners who He sent ahead of Him to get the people of the cities ready for the coming of Rabbi Yeshua. The 70 went out in groups of two, so that one could encourage and support the other.

First there was One. Then there were twelve. Then there were 70. That’s good, but even 70 was not enough! The task is far too great for 70. And He was saying to them, “The harvest is plentiful (Israel is big. The world is even bigger! There are a lot of Jews and Gentiles who need to be reached and gathered in, and become the glorious and eternal and precious sons and daughters of God!), but the laborers are few (there are not enough men and women who are qualified, trained, ready and willing to go and reach this big world.

What are we to do? We do what we can to go and reach them ourselves, and support those who are reaching out to the lost, and nurturing them when they come to know the Lord. And, we also pray!). Therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest. The eternal God is very much concerned about and involved with the harvest of humanity. The Lord of the harvest is in control of the harvest of humanity. The Lord of the harvest is able to raise up human beings who are able and willing to assist Him with the harvest of humanity.

The Lord of the harvest knows which humans need to be reached and gathered in. There are many human beings whom He has foreknown, who are chosen, who belong to Him, who are part of His eternal plan of salvation. He has His great and eternal plan for the salvation of certain human beings, but He has also chosen to use some of us who know Him to be part of the instrumentation of His plan of human salvation. What an honor! What a high privilege! We should want to be part of that, and work together with the Lord in this greatest and more honorable of tasks! We should want to work and give and support and pray for this great endeavor!

Messiah wants us to know that harvesting will not be easy. In a fallen, demonically-controlled world, going and proclaiming the truth and calling people to repentance and gathering people into the kingdom of God is a difficult, dangerous task! It is not for the faint of heart!

Go; behold, I send you out as lambs in the midst of wolves. So many of the people in this fallen, anti-God, anti-Messiah, anti-followers of Messiah world are like vicious wolves. But we are not to be like wolves – using threats and violence. We are to be like lambs – not using physical coercion, but the gracious weapons of truth and love and humility and endurance.

When I read this, this is what I think: Lord, we are like lambs, and You are sending us into the middle of the wolves? Lord, we trust You that this must be important. This must be necessary. Lord, we trust You to protect us. Lord, we trust You to help us endure the pain the wolves may inflict. We know that Your grace will be sufficient for us. Help us to be faithful to You and the mission, in spite of the worst the wolves can do!

Messiah has some specific instructions for these 70 traveling evangelists. While these were specific instructions for these people at this time in this place on a short-term missions trip, there are principles that we can apply to us.

They were to depend on God, who would work through good human beings among the chosen people, to supply their needs for this short term mission. Those whom the Lord calls, He supplies. If God asks you to do something, He will supply the resources to accomplish that task. Carry no money belt, no bag, no shoes. They were not to be living large, but living as small as possible, keeping their needs to an absolute minimum. They were to be focused on their mission, not material things.

They were to stay focused on the mission and not be distracted by the wrong people who were not part of their target area. There was very important work to be done, and time was limited and precious. And greet no one on the way. They were not to dawdle along the way, stopping to chat with people. They had a specific city and goal to accomplish.

It’s not that they weren’t to be friendly with others. When they got to their target area, they were to locate the home of a good man who might give them hospitality, and allow his home to be used as the base of operations in that city, and warmly greet him. Whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace be to this house.’ If a man of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; but if not, it will return to you.

Even though they were unsure of the response they would receive from the family of the home they were entering, they were to take the initiative to be friendly, and show graciousness, and pray for their peace. Isn’t that what God, who is love, is like, and how He relates to us? He takes the initiative to go to us, and show Himself friendly to us, and wants to extend peace to us. Their warm greeting and prayer for peace would not be in vain. It would not be wasted no matter what the response.

One they were accepted into a home, they were not to look for better accommodations – better housing and better food. They were on a purpose driven mission. The goal was not their personal comfort. That was not what was important. Stay in that house, eating and drinking what they give you; for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not keep moving from house to house. Whatever city you enter and they receive you, eat what is set before you; and heal those in it who are sick, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’

What is important is bringing healing to sick and dying humanity. What is important is telling people about the High King, God the Father, and His Son, King Yeshua; telling them that when we are born into this world, we do not start in the kingdom of God, but because of the Fall, and the sin and the rebellion that each one of us have become part of, we are part of the kingdom of the devil and his fallen angels. But, if we turn to the King, and renounce the dominion of darkness and its evil and rebellious ways, we will become part of God’s eternal kingdom, and live forever with Him!

Amazingly good and eternal blessings will come to those who listen to the 70, and to us, and terrible woes and troubles and pains and sufferings and judgments and punishments will come to those who ignore Messiah’s representatives! But whatever city you enter and they do not receive you, go out into its streets and say, ‘Even the dust of your city which clings to our feet we wipe off in protest against you; yet be sure of this, that the kingdom of God has come near.’

We must take the initiative and go into the world and tell people the Good News about the kingdom of God, and the complete forgiveness of all of their sins, and the Messiah, and salvation, and eternal life, and the New Jerusalem, and a great and lasting and wonderful and eternal inheritance! We must tell them the Good News! And, we must fulfill our full duty and warn them that if they reject the Good News, and if they reject us, and if they reject the One we represent, a very sure and severe judgment is coming to them!

If they were rejected by the city which the Son of God sent them to, the 70 were to go out – not privately and quietly, but publicly and loudly into the streets of the city, and tell the people of that wicked place they had the opportunity to enter God’s kingdom, but they refused to become part of it, and they were not part of the blessed kingdom of God. They were part of the kingdom of the Adversary. They were still active participants in the ancient rebellion against God involving fallen angels and wicked men. Then the 70 were to wipe off the little pieces of dust that were clinging to their feet. That was a pronouncement to the city that the judgment of that city was sure, and terrible, and the 70 didn’t want to experience the least little dust-like amount of their coming judgment.

To whom much is given, much is required; and the more you know, and the more truth you are exposed to, the greater the punishment for rejection. These Jewish cities had been given the greatest amount of truth! Immanuel and His representatives had been with us, teaching us and doing miracles! Messiah declared that the rejection and subsequent judgment and punishment of the cities of the Chosen People will be worse than on some of the worst Gentile cities! I say to you, it will be more tolerable in that day for Sodom than for that city. Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles had been performed in Tyre and Sidon which occurred in you, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the judgment than for you. And you, Capernaum, will not be exalted to Heaven, will you? You will be brought down to Sheol!

There are degrees of reward for faithful service, and there are degrees of punishment for various sins. One of the very worst sins is rejection of the wonderful and precious Messiah, God’s beloved Son, mankind’s only Savior and Redeemer, and rejection of His representatives. That crime of rejection and unbelief is worse than the paganism of ancient Tyre and Sidon and the greed and homosexuality of wicked Sodom and Gomorrah. That sin of rejection and unbelief is an attack on the very person of God Himself! That rejection and unbelief is a continuation of the ancient rebellion against God.

While is grieves me to say it, Metro Detroit, and the state of Michigan, and the rest of the United States of America are very close to being one of those Messiah-rejecting cities! Up until 1960 or so, for the most part we welcomed the preaching of the Good News. Our laws, our media, many of our institutions reflected Christians values. But for the past 50 years we have been rejecting God and biblical truth. The majority of society is post-Christian, turning more and more against God, Messiah, true Christians and Messianic Jews and the Good News we bring. Therefore, don’t be surprised if more and more judgment falls.

There are some in the Messianic Movement who are wickedly and perversely and heretically teaching that the Jewish rejection of Jesus is really a yes to God! Compare that to what the Son of God declares here. The one who listens to you listens to Me, and the one who rejects you rejects Me; and he who rejects Me rejects the One who sent Me.”

There is a divine chain of command. There is a divine order of representation. God the Father sends the Son, who represents the Father. The Son of God sends the disciples, who represent the Son. We are the Creator’s representatives to this world. We are the ambassadors of the Most High King, emissaries of the kingdom of the Most High God! To reject us is to reject Messiah which is to reject God the Father! Don’t tell me that the Jewish no to Yeshua is really a yes to God!

Those whom God sends, He provides for. He provides all of the resources necessary to accomplish the task He is asking them to do – the material resources and the spiritual resources. The seventy returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name.” They had all the spiritual power they needed, and the spiritual resources they required to get the task accomplished because they went in the Lord’s name – because they were sent by Messiah; because they represent the Son of God; because they were obedient to the King; therefore they were empowered by the All-Powerful!

Why were the 70 able to cast out demons? Why are the evil spirits still subject to the control of Yeshua’s disciples? Because, with the coming of the Messiah, a greater power is here! The Son of God, by means of His coming into this world, and His Incarnation, and His identification with humanity, and His perfectly lived life, and His voluntary sufferings and death; and His burial and resurrection, is in the process of crushing the head of the ancient serpent! The Seed of the Woman is destroying the devil and his evil works! The Lord of Heaven and Earth is undoing the dominion of darkness. A uniquely victorious man, the God-Man, has come. He is greater than the chief Adversary and all of his demons! And He gives the authority and the power to His representatives to overcome the powers of darkness!

And He said to them, “I was watching Satan fall from Heaven like lightning. Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing will injure you. We can’t be truly harmed by rebellious angels or wicked, wolf-like men. Physical pain, even death, can be inflicted, but something that can genuinely harm us? No! Way! Impossible!

The powers of darkness can’t re-control us, re-acquire us and re-enslave us in the satanic slave-market of sin and death! They may cause us trouble. They may have us made fun of, mocked, persecuted, insulted, arrested, impoverished; they may end our earthly lives, like they did to Yeshua Himself, but truly harm us, and cause us to miss out on salvation and being reconciled to God, and the happiness that comes from knowing Him, and eternal life? No way! Impossible!

Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are recorded in Heaven.”  Don’t follow the Lord because of the allure of spiritual power. The pursuit of power, even spiritual power, is seductive. Let the source of your happiness not be present power over evil spirits, but the knowledge that you are reconciled to God and will enjoy eternal life!