Then Jesus *said
to him, "Put your sword back into its place; for all those who take up the
sword shall perish by the sword. "Or do you think that I cannot appeal to
My Father, and He will at once put at My disposal more than twelve legions of angels?
"How then will the Scriptures be fulfilled, which say that it must happen
this way?" Mat 26:52-54
Imagine that you had the gift of knowing exactly when your
life was going to end? You knew that you
only had 7,200 minutes – five days – left on this planet. Would that affect how you acted and what you
did? Jesus knew that He was living in
the last five days of His life. He knew
His time was running out and He was getting down to business.
In the last six months before He died we witness intense
training of his close followers and deliberate, slow-but-sure movement toward
Jerusalem. Jesus knew that the time had come. The cross was looming larger. To
avoid premature arrest and death, He hung around the territory east of the
Jordan River. Luke is the writer who records many of his teachings during those
final months. As this last portion of his ministry was about to begin, Luke
informs us, “Jesus
resolutely set out for Jerusalem”(Luke 9:51), literally, “Jesus set his face to go to
Jerusalem.”
We may not know what Jesus looked like, but that passage says a lot about what
Jesus came to do.
Although He did perform some little miracles, for the most
part Jesus did not perform any miracles the last week of His life. After He went into Jerusalem He spent a lot of
time in prayer and teaching. I can
imagine He wanted to reach as many with the gospel as He could. He was betrayed at every turn - by the
teachers in the temple who were looking for ways to bring charges against Him, by
Herod and by Judas Iscariot. He knew
this was all part of the plan. He knew
what was going to happen and He let it happen so the scriptures would be
fulfilled.
Herod and the Pharisees could scheme all they wanted, but
they wouldn’t take his life till he was ready to lay it down. And he said unto them, Go ye,
and tell that fox, Behold, I cast out devils, and I do cures today and
tomorrow, and the third day I shall be perfected. Nevertheless I must walk to
day, and tomorrow, and the day following: for it cannot be that a prophet
perish out of Jerusalem. (Luke 13:32-33)
He had power to determine the right time, his time.
There is an interesting passage in the book of Isaiah. The
Savior was speaking in prophecy, “Because the Sovereign LORD helps me, I will not be disgraced.
Therefore I have set my face like flint”(Isaiah 50:7). Flint is a very hard stone. Jesus
had set His face to go to Jerusalem with an unflinching purpose. Can you see
his face?
I think that must be harder than knowing you only have 7,200
minutes left to live. Knowing what is going to happen would make me
want to change it, especially if I were the Son of God who had the power to
change things! But Jesus was all about
doing His Father’s will and also about sacrificing Himself for all of us.
Would you be so willing?
Would you readily give up your life for complete strangers? Would you go without complaint to the hill
called Golgotha and allow yourself to be beaten, stripped of your dignity and nailed
to a cross? Would you not run the other
direction if you knew this was coming? Most of us would live selfishly if we knew we
only had five days left. Of course we
might think first of family and friends and
spending time with them but the thoughts would quickly go to our bucket list,
greatly abbreviated of course. Jesus
didn’t have a bucket list. He was born
and lived His whole life as a sacrifice for you and me; to fulfill the scriptures.
Scripture to Claim:
No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My
own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take
it up again. This commandment I received from My Father." John 10:18
