“Who do you say I am?” Jesus asked this question of those few men who walked with, talked with, ate with, learned from, spoke for, left home and families for, suffered with, did miracles with, and generally misunderstood Him. He first asked who others thought He was, the answers ranging from the John the Baptist to Elijah, Jeremiah or one of the other prophets. Cleopas asserted on the road to Emmaus that ‘… (Jesus was) a prophet strong in what he did and what he said, in God’s eyes as well as the people’s… We were hoping he was the one who was to come and set Israel free’. Peter got it right that He was in fact the Christ, (the long awaited liberator of the Jewish race), the son of the living God, but his political filter impacted the larger implication. He needed Jesus to “open (his) mind so that (he) could understand the scriptures”. This question is the most important one we will ever have to answer as well. Who do we say that He is? Most of us are also, like those first followers, “… foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken!” (Jesus)
Jesus extravagantly loved these men, eagerly anticipating a last meal with them before His execution. He ended His time with them in the same manner He had walked with them, revealing His heart and warning of an impending reality that undercut all they had learned as mere mortals. He laid out the mindset and lifestyle of a glorious kingdom and perfectly modeled it as the King of that coming age. Even at the end they focused on greatness rather than service, resistance rather than submission, and self preservation rather than loyalty. Yet these are the same men who Jesus commended as being “those who have stood with me in all that I have gone through”. Granted, this was before the very end, but He promises them thrones, even knowing that they would abandon Him in His darkest hour. Wow – even more amazing!
Look at those last moments before the cross. He invites them to pray with HIm. They fall asleep. He is betrayed to the prince of darkness by the kiss of a friend. One of His disciples lashes out with sword when Jesus’ path was compliance. All fled, one even leaving his cloak and running naked. And Peter, the ‘rock’, denied with curses even knowing Jesus. The countrymen who had hailed Him as king six days earlier called for His blood to be upon them and their children. Some watched from a safe distance the horrifying treachery towards an innocent man. Others taunted His lack of power in the face of suffering. We can arrogantly look down on these people thinking we would never have responded like this. Really?
Upon reflection we might agree that just like them we fall asleep when He asks us to pray. We rush to violence rather than yielding to the will of God. We betray Him to embrace our own version of ‘right’, doing things our own way because we distrust His. We have fled from standing in the cultural embarrassment of being His follower. We have probably, perhaps less dramatically, denied we even know Him. We have stood silently by while evil triumphs. Our voices have mingled with the crowd’s “Crucify Him!” as we refuse His commands. We have spat upon His sacrifice by insisting on our own moral goodness. We have mocked His wounds by minimizing the guilt of our sin. And, just like the disciples, we question His version of truth when He confronts evil with an “unrealistic” approach. We have no comprehension of the depths of emotional, spiritual, and physical pain He endured to reset our hearts towards His Father. He did not have to redeem us, He chose it. And we replace His cross with our religion, our morality or our contempt.
But what are His last words, knowing every sin, every doubt, every dodge, every slight, every self-righteous religious or irreligious dismissal of His loss on our behalf? “Father forgive them!” I weep at my callous hard heart. I fall in worship and admiration of this singular Man. I take joy that He calls me by name, and is not ashamed to call me His own. How pitiful and pathetic my perceived goodness seems now. How incomprehensible that He would have to pay such an awful price for my sin that broke not just His law but His heart, the sin I so easily dismiss. How inconceivable that still I am precious to Him and He invites me to His world, where wonders without end await. My only qualification is my need, and He runs towards and not away from my brokenness. He knows about sins that I have repressed, hurtful attitudes that I don’t recognize, pain that I have unknowingly caused, kindness and justice that I have failed to show, the snark and unforgiveness that are the undercurrent of my soul. And yes, He knows about all the sins that I have confessed and yet still struggle not to repeat. And yet He invites me to walk with Him every day. Like the two traveling the road to Emmaus so long ago, it is easy to miss the unfamiliar form of our Jesus, present with us even now. But I want to respond to such a gracious invitation with a resounding “YES”!
Shalom dear ones!
SALTSHAKER 