Wednesday, November
7, 2018
As soon as Judas left the room, Jesus said, “The time has come for the Son of Man to enter into his glory, and God will be glorified because of him. And since God receives glory because of the Son, he will give his own glory to the Son, and he will do so at once. Dear children, I will be with you only a little longer. And as I told the Jewish leaders, you will search for me, but you can’t come where I am going. So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.” Simon Peter asked, “Lord, where are you going?” And Jesus replied, “You can’t go with me now, but you will follow me later.” “But why can’t I come now, Lord?” he asked. “I’m ready to die for you.” Jesus answered, “Die for me? I tell you the truth, Peter—before the rooster crows tomorrow morning, you will deny three times that you even know me. “Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me. There is more than enough room in my Father’s home. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am. And you know the way to where I am going.” “No, we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We have no idea where you are going, so how can we know the way?” Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me. John 13:31 – 14:6(NLT)
To say the least, it was a little confusing at times
following Jesus. At this last supper (of
course the disciples didn’t understand it would be the last) they
heard the Lord say: you can’t come,
then, you will, then, not now. Peter wanted to know why and where. Thomas finally nailed it with: Would you just tell us, Jesus? The fact is we don’t have a clue! And then Jesus said it plainly; He IS
the answer … to everything!
It’s like the old sermon illustration
about the children’s sermon. The pastor
asks the little ones: what’s
grey, with a long fuzzy tail and runs up and down the trees saving up nuts for
the winter? 5-year-old Tommy
raises his hand and says: Jesus!
The crowd gasps; Tommy’s Grandmaw has a
spell, and the pastor, hesitating, asks his little student: Uh, why would you say that, Tommy?
Says the budding theologian, Aw,
preacher; I knowed you was talkin’ ‘bout a squirrel, but this here’s church; all
the answers are ‘bout Jesus.
I believe Tommy may have been on-to something. I have sat for hours and watched squirrels darting
around, playing and fighting with other squirrels, gathering nuts and
scampering up the tree to their nest. It
looks quite confusing to a human, although it’s quite natural for a squirrel,
no matter what a human thinks!
With all the confusion DaVinci portrayed
at that upper room table, many critics of Scripture can’t wait to get to this
passage. They love to point out the so-called
contradictory nature of Jesus’ teachings; first he says “yes” then “no” then “wait”.
But, like life, leading a group of
no-nonsense fishermen, former tax collectors, and generally uneducated young
nobodies out of their all over the map squirrel-kind
of thinking about God, into the God’s kind of love which will grow into an
all-consuming passion for the kingdom requires a lot of course-correction. Jesus was leading them on a complicated
mission that has one, very UNCOMPLICATED conclusion,
that Jesus is the Christ, God-in-flesh, come down to BE our answer.
And if you get THAT … you won’t get much
else wrong.
For You Today
Advent is just around the corner; God
makes His presence known in unexpected places like stables, crosses, and the
face of your next-door neighbor.
No comments:
Post a Comment