Dealing with misunderstanding and disappointment is one of the hardest things to do. The two men on their way to Emmaus, along with the rest of Jesus’ followers, thought that Jesus was going to be the Jewish Messiah. They thought that they knew what that would look like. And indeed, they were right in their understanding of who He is, what they did not have right is what that would look like. They thought He would rise up militarily and overthrow the unrighteous governmental system over Israel. But God just doesn’t do it that way. His plans always involve changing people’s hearts and releasing them to take over by changing the structures from the inside out.
Replacing one overpowering government with another is not a good change. Infiltrating the systems and mentalities of culture is the only truly effective way of to change a culture, a nation or a planet. That is exactly what He intends to do now in our culture, our nation and our planet. Christians will be up in arms until abortion is made illegal, all abortions, all the time. One problem with that is that people will still get abortions if it is illegal. This is because the hearts of the people have not changed, just what they are allowed to do without getting in trouble. I am not saying that abortion is a good thing at all, what I am saying is that ending abortion means transforming how people think about it. Even if abortion is legal or even encouraged, people will not do it if their hearts desire their seed to be perpetuated. Abortions don’t happen in groups that want children. Islam is taking over Europe by having half a dozen babies per family, encouraged by the religious leaders. In one generation they will be able to vote in whom ever they want into any governmental position, because the current generation is not aborting their babies and is raising them with their values.
When God does something different from the way that we want Him to do it, the problem is not with His ways, but with our understanding. When we get offended because God is not doing something, and we think that our anger is righteous anger, I believe that it is wiser to step out and change what we don’t like rather than get upset. Jesus said that He was the light of the world while He was in the world. But now we are the light of the world, we are the sons into whose hands the earth has been given. It is our responsibility to change and transform culture through stepping into it and effecting change, not by complaining and hoping that our whining is going to reach the right ears to change something. There is a place for intercession, but the Lord told His disciples to pray for laborers, people who would do what is needed for a harvest. We need laborers.
In principle, no one would disagree with how the Lord does things. No one would say that He is doing something the wrong way, at least not openly. But in our hearts we question His ways more than most of us would like to admit. We know that, just as the Scriptures say, “He is righteous in all His ways”, but we don’t know what to do with the government officials He allows to get into office or the injustice of a friend or family member dying when they die. Even disasters are from the Lord according to Amos chapter three, verse six. At some point we have to come to a place of humility where we can honestly say “I don’t understand You, but I trust You and I love you. I’m sticking with You no matter what.” We will not always get it, nor will we always agree with what or how he does something, but we know that He is good. And if that is true, then we can rest assured that He does everything from a place of goodness and love.
*Lord, we trust You, help us grow to trust You more and more easily. Amen.*
He who was going to redeem Israel (Luke 24:21)
Jesus’ Desire for the Revolution
As I was reading Luke today I ran across a curious statement that Jesus makes.
“I have come to cast fire upon the earth; and how I wish it were already kindled!
But I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is accomplished.”
Luke 12:49-50
We talk about the fires of revival, God releasing power through the people of God to show His love. I believe that Jesus was at least partially talking about this. John the Baptist was obsessed with the coming of a Messiah that would baptize God’s people with fire and not merely water. The revolution of the human race was what John was longing for, as was Jesus here in Luke 12. Jesus wanted so desperately to give mankind His Spirit. The kindling of the revolutionary fire would be on the day of Pentacost when manifest tongues of fire would spark on 120 people’s heads.
Then Jesus says that He has a baptism to undergo. Paul talks about being burried with Christ in baptism. Jesus had to be put into the earth and conquer death on our behalf SO THAT He could rise up in resurrection power with us soon to follow. When Moses and Elijah spoke with Jesus on the mount of transfiguration, they talked about Jesus’ departing from the disciples. Jesus was rearing to get going so that He could let an army of resurrected, invincible lovers of God and man go into the world and take it over.
The wording didn’t seem to make sense to me, though, in verse 50. I just cannot connect Jesus and distress, it doesn’t seem like His nature. Distress sounds like stress and worry. So I looked at the original language of this section. Luke uses a word that comes from two words, one meaning “to hold” and another “together”. Jesus essentially says “I’m just trying to hold Myself together until I can go through this baptism of Mine.” Jesus and the Holy Spirit were united, just like we are united with the Spirit, the difference between us and Him is that in His case, there are two FULL Presences of God. Imagine trying to hold two full manifestations of God in one human body. You would be bursting at the seems, too. Jesus longed to release His Spirit to His people so that the flames of the revolution might be kindled and the spark-heads could take over the earth.
Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word in the sight of God and all the people (Luke 24:19)
Have you ever heard of someone meeting a famous person and not realizing that they are who they are until afterwards? Maybe you have actually done it yourself. These two guys were on a road to a city just 7 miles from Jerusalem, they encounter someone that they don’t recognize, but something is different when they are around Him. He seems not to know about the intense and astonishing things that have happened in Jerusalem in the previous few days. So they “enlighten” this Stranger, who just so happens to be the very One about whom they are talking. They were describing Jesus to Jesus Himself, and they called Him “a prophet mighty in deed and word in the sight of God and all the people.”
It has been that intercession is a hard thing to do, this is partially because of the mental blockage that comes up when you stop to realize that what we are doing is telling God what He tells us to tell Him, or ask Him for things that He has told us to ask Him for. It just doesn’t make sense to us. But imagine you are telling the all-knowing God who He is. That is a whole other level. It almost seems pointless, like repeating His attributes to Him over and over, as if reminding Him what He is like. The issue is not His lack of understanding or revelation, obviously, but our own lack. We need to know.
Though uninformed about the Recipient of their tale, they were absolutely right about what they were saying about Him. He was mighty in deed, before God and all the people. He was mighty in word before God and all the people. Rather than drawing on the awesomeness of His deeds and words, it is important to see how we fit into this part of His identity. We were made in His image, we are being made into the reflection of the Son, just as He is the Perfect reflection of the nature and character of the Father. As we look at Him, we are becoming more and more like Him. So when we see that He was mighty in deed and word, wisdom says “you will be greater in deed and word”. John 14:12 says that we who believe will do greater works than He did. Our deeds and words will be greater than His. That seems impossible, but if the Bible then we must change.
As I write this, I am enrolled in a missions department at a ministry school. This is my second year in the program and there are first year students that are under us that are learning from our example. It has often come up in discussion that the first year students have a far greater potential than we do, and we have positioned our hearts and set our goals to advancing them far beyond us. A good leader does not bring those under them up to their level, but rather lay their lives down, running for all they are worth, to become a launching pad for the next generation that they are leading to accelerate past them. Jesus did the very same thing, He made it possible for those who follow Him to go further than He went. He gave all His authority to his followers. He left the world in our hands. In a way, though a pre-tribulation rapture theology has its flaws, the situation is similar. We really have been left behind, but not so that we can cower in fear and wait for Him to come rescue us out of the world. We have been equipped and left behind to fix the world, save it and redeem it in preparation for His home-coming.
We prepare the earth for that final touch down of the Son of God on the Mount of Olives that the prophet Zechariah spoke of by doing the works of the Kingdom. We live lives that speak as loudly as the Gospel we preach. Our deeds back up our message.
*Perfect your image in us, show us how to be just like you in deed and word. Amen. *
