Taking
the twelve disciples aside, Jesus said, “Listen,
we’re going up to Jerusalem, where all the predictions of the prophets
concerning the Son of Man will come true. He will be handed
over to the Romans, and
he will be mocked, treated shamefully, and spit upon. They will flog him
with a whip and kill him, but on the third day he will rise again.” But they didn’t
understand any of this. The significance
of his words was hidden from them, and they failed to grasp what he was talking
about. Luke 18:31-34 (NLT)
One would think that the disciples
might have had something of a clue.
How could they be so totally dense
after three years of following Jesus around, never having heard something false
drop from his lips, or have him predict something that didn’t come to pass;
there were miracles to back it all up, and the truly astounding fulfillment of
God’s promises standing before them.
Still, they were clueless.
God was setting in motion a cosmic
struggle for the souls of all people, past, present and future. Jesus had told his disciples on more than one
occasion not to expect an easy ride, or anything less than rejection. They might have seen this coming had they not
been so vested in their own ideas of what the kingdom was supposed to look
like.
And how could they? They were simple men, not skilled
theologians. The common understanding of
Messiah
was that when He arrived He would be a mighty son of King David who would sit
on Jerusalem’s throne. How did flogging
and death fit with that?
Clueless!
But before we judge the denseness of
Peter, John, James and the rest, we might remember that the so-called skilled
theologians also missed it. Everything
Jesus did, miracles, teaching, and even rasing people from the dead was done
publicly. The ruling elders of Israel
knew the Scriptures and all the prophecies, yet they too were clueless.
(Perhaps, in their case, it was less
that they missed it, and more like they dismissed it.)
The rulers were vested in their own
idea of God’s Kingdom on earth; that clouded their judgment, rendering them as
clueless as the disciples, because they pictured themselves as an important cog
in the wheel of Messiah’s kingdom. Their
self-poprtrait of their self-importantance told them they were entitled to a
little more respect than having to cow-tow to a lowly carpenter’s son
turned preacher.
And what about us?
Two thousand years after the
resurrection of Jesus his disciples still wander around clueless at times. Jesus gave us a mandate to proclaim the
Gospel, and yet what generally dominates the news reports about what the church
is doing has little to do with the open arms of Jesus to receive sinners. More its about the struggle caused by the
rejecting spirit of people who want control.
It’s pretty tough to get a good look
at the cross when you’re having a tug of war in the mud pit. Today’s mud pit is the back rooms of church
buildings and courtrooms where the slug-fest between heterosexual and
homosexual kicks up enough dirt to obscure any Jesus-sightings at all.
And so it goes.
People trying to figure-out what
Jesus is doing are legion; the disciples had trouble understanding that Jesus
was talking about himself when he pointed to the temple being destroyed and
raised back up in three days. Nicodemus
was confused about being born again physically, when Jesus was talking
spiritually. The woman at the well
thought of wet water, while Jesus offered a baptized soul, spirit and
mind. The disciples couldn’t get their
minds around Jesus being bread to eat, or that Lazarus was sleeping in death,
and needed an awakening.[2]
And we probably miss a whole lot more
than we see too. Especially when we
begin to lose sight of who is really in control.
For You Today
How about starting this day with a prayer that says
something like, Dear Father, you are God and I am not; help me keep that straight.
I love your turn of phrase, telling God's truths that hook into my head.
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