The other morning when a friend and I had breakfast, we were talking about the early church, and how quickly there was disagreement and division entering into the Church, and I had a funny thought - Do you ever wonder if maybe Jesus was sweating blood in the garden because He knew He had to leave the Church to us? It made us both laugh out loud, and obviously is a joke, and in no way meant to diminish the suffering that Jesus endured for our sake. However, there is always a bit of truth in the best humor, and in this case that is true.
Recently I have been spending time just looking at situations described in scripture, and in the Gospels, and sometimes you just have to wonder, What was God thinking? We are often so focused on our own stuff that we totally miss what the Lord is saying, and the apostles were prone to this same issue. I try to put myself in their shoes, and remove the hindsight that we have now from reading the record of their interactions with Jesus. I try to understand how they would have received what Jesus was telling them, and how they would have been thinking.
In the historical perspective, the coming of John the Baptist, and then Jesus, must have really caused a stir in the hearts of the Jews. There had been a multi-generation gap in the prophets, and Nehemiah was the last written book in the Protestant version of the Old testament, written about 400BC, and the last Minor Prophet was Malachi - written in 433-424BC. There were other books that were written later that are included as Apocryphal books, and some of those were written in the hundred years prior to Jesus' coming, but there hadn't been a real Prophet for many years. The Jews were great at passing down the precepts of their faith to following generations, and yet, they clearly lost touch with the heart of their faith, relationship with God, for they were unable to recognize the Son of God when He came to earth. Regardless, the coming of Jesus must have been so exciting to them to have a man of God in their midst again after hundreds of years! However, they clearly didn't understand what Jesus was about!
In retrospect, we can wonder why they didn't see it clearly, but we have hindsight that helps us understand everything, and they were walking through the coming of Jesus in real time. For example, going back to the case of the apostles, they really were not tracking with Jesus comments about going to his death, and all of the Gospels include examples. Luke calls out two times specifically, first in Luke 9:43-46 NIV:
[43] "And they were all amazed at the greatness of God. While everyone was marveling at all that Jesus did, he said to his disciples, [44] “Listen carefully to what I am about to tell you: The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men.” [45] But they did not understand what this meant. It was hidden from them, so that they did not grasp it, and they were afraid to ask him about it."
[46] An argument started among the disciples as to which of them would be the greatest."
Now, we don't know for sure that verse 46 immediately followed verse 45 in real-time. There might have been a few days between them, but we can clearly see that they weren't thinking Jesus was actually going to die! They went on talking about which of them would be most important in His Kingdom, James and John even asked later if they could sit on His right and left hand (See Matt 20:17 - 28).
- and again Luke recorded the following in Luke 18:31-34 NIV:
[31] "Jesus took the Twelve aside and told them, “We are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written by the prophets about the Son of Man will be fulfilled. [32] He will be delivered over to the Gentiles. They will mock him, insult him and spit on him; [33] they will flog him and kill him. On the third day he will rise again.” [34] The disciples did not understand any of this. Its meaning was hidden from them, and they did not know what he was talking about."
I don't know about you, but when I read a statement like the above, I can't see how the disciples didn't understand it! Luke adds the note that the meaning was hidden, and I think there is truth in that, for what would they have done differently if they had suspected Jesus' life was in danger? Jesus specifically worked to disengage from the crowds, to to try and make it so they weren't trying to create an uprising against the Romans, which is what would have been required to re-establish God's earthly kingdom similar to what was established under Saul/David/Solomon. Jesus didn't want to lead his followers into a military slaughter, and that would have been the likely reality. If they had really understood what He was saying I think they (Apostles) would have completely mucked everything up, tried to raise an army of followers and started a major revolt, completely over-stepping their purpose and God's plans. The thing that saved them is the humility of Jesus, His complete obedience to the Father, and then the gentle guidance of the Holy Spirit, once Jesus ascended.
So my question this morning is what is the Lord telling the church that we are not understanding? What is He holding back in the way of understanding, so that we don't overstep His plans and purposes? What is Holy Spirit saying, as He guides us in our continued efforts to continue the ministry of Jesus?
I know I often think it would be so great if God would just show up and blow everyone's socks off with power and miracles, signs and wonders, and just completely take over. I think it would be so much easier, so awesome to ride that wave of Glory, watching as all the eyes are opened and seeing the works of satan tumbling down. I think this makes the most sense, and at that point I have diverged from God's plans and purposes, for His ways are not man's way, and His thoughts are higher than the heavens from the earth when compared to my thoughts (Paraphrase of Isaiah 55:8-9). When I start thinking I know better than God, I am clearly overstepping.
God has proven over and over that He operates differently than we think He will, so our primary mode of operation should be to go to Him and ask for His direction and guidance, for we surely cannot figure His plans out on our own. What gives me great Hope is the fact that God has a perfect, out-side of time, perspective, and He can see the beginning and the end and has a perfect plan, and He knows this path forward, this giving the Church into the hands of His Apostles, this depending on human to represent Him, this allowing man to choose, all of it is the best plan! He knows exactly what needs to happen when and He has already made allowances for all of our weakness, our misunderstanding, and lack of understanding!
I am encouraged that His plan is bigger than my ability to understand, and all I really need to do is my best effort in following His lead! I am grateful that He didn't shake His head at His apostles, and decide to get a whole new team that would actually understand Him. I am encouraged that Holy Spirit has proved Himself capable of growing the church. I am encouraged that He wants me to be a part of the overall plan and that He doesn't require my understanding to move forward, so neither should I. I can trust Him, and follow Him, for His plans far exceed anything I can even comprehend. His perfect plan will be perfectly fulfilled, even though He is using imperfect people!
Amen!
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