Daily Devotion for March 11, 2006

To Jerusalem with the ComPASSIONATE Christ
Day 11

 

Scriptures Fulfilled

 

Every day I was with you, teaching in the temple courts, and you did not arrest me. But the Scriptures must be fulfilled."  Mark 14: 49

 

It would have been the easiest thing in the world for the authorities to have taken Jesus while He was in the temple teaching. Most recently, at least, He had been there ‘day by day.’ Instead, the chief priests and scribes made their move in the middle of the night, in an olive grove. Why? Two reasons are apparent.

 

"But not during the Feast," they said, "or there may be a riot among the people."  Matthew 26:5 and Mark 14:2

 

First, they were afraid of the crowds. Palm Sunday was apparently not an abnormality. Jesus did enjoy enormous popular respect, especially from those that were outcasts. Many people followed Him and paid attention to His teachings. Rather than face the very real possibility of a riot in the temple courts, they decided to move against Him when the crowds would be absent. Fear drove them.

 

Second, it happened as it did because it was part of God’s plan for it to happen that way.  When Judas went to arrange for Jesus to be handed over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law, they specifically told him that they did not want it to take place during the Feast! (Mark 14:2)  But man’s plans are not God’s plans, and HIS plans always win out.  It was in the upper room, when Jesus was with the disciples, that he told Judas that now was the time (John 13:27). 

 

As much as each of us likes to think that we are in control, that we are in charge of things, that we can determine our destiny – we are painfully confronted with the reality that the only plans that matter, the only plans that will come to fulfillment, are the plans that God has.  His WILL BE DONE!

 

Prayer
Dear Lord, help me be submissive to Your will, to Your way, to Your walk.  Only in You, will I find fulfillment and happiness and eternity for my life – life with You!  Amen

 

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Tim Hetzner - President - Lutheran Church Charities
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