Jaw-dropping Jewels about Jesus
Rarely does Jesus, God the Son, do exactly what we expect of Him. It seems odd that He so frequently surprises us, given that He never changes. Hebrews 13:8 makes this absolute statement: “Jesus the same yesterday, and today, and forever.” Still, though He is blessedly consistent in His goodness, Jesus does unforeseen things. Even when He does what is expected, He does not always do it in the way that we anticipate. Let us join with Jesus on a jaw-dropping journey. (I will be using this opening paragraph for each of the brief messages in this series. The following material will change daily.)
When we began our study of the Gospel of Mark in January, we looked first to the following verse: “For even the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many” (10:45). This statement characterized all that Jesus did (“to minister”) and what He accomplished during Holy Week (“to give His life a ransom for many”). I think often of the perfect purposefulness of our Savior. One of the verses that I most frequently reference is Luke 9:51: “And it came to pass, when the time was come that He should be received up, He stedfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem.” Jesus knew that Jerusalem would be the place of His crucifixion, yet here He shifted the focus of His ministry to head there. My human reaction is to say, “That would be the last place that I would go.” However, Jesus – fully human and fully divine – did not shrink even slightly from His mission. As we approach Good Friday and Easter, may we be humbled by Jesus’ steadfast approach to Jerusalem to die that we might live forever.