Peter began to say to him, “See, we have left everything and followed you.” Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”
Comment: At first reading it sounds that if you give up any of the mentioned things for Jesus that you will certainly be living in the midst of great prosperity – a hundredfold is a great profit margin! How does the new young Muslim who has become a believer in Jesus who is burnt to death by family or other religious leaders? Possibly having been given a short chance to relent, which they refused to take. Certainly you become a member of God’s family and have many brothers sisters and other relatives in the faith. But you may find yourself financially very poor and living on the smell of an oily rag on the street kerb. It is true to say that ‘I’d rather have Jesus than to be the king of a vast domain’. And certainly the bit of the ‘Age to come’ is a sure and certain promise for the believer’s future. I am left thinking that the true believer counts what to others might seem his loss, as his gain, because of becoming a child of God.
Prayer: There are things hard to understand about the Bible, Father. Clear my vision, please!
As I read it! 
Thank you Barry for your comments on this passage. I feel that we can never truly understand the things which Jesus said. They are beyond my understanding. I can only ask God’s Holy Spirit to lead and guide me as I seek to follow Him each day. God bless you.
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