And they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem[1],
and Jesus was walking ahead of them. And they were amazed, and those who
followed were afraid. And taking the twelve again, he began to tell them what
was to happen to him, saying, “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son
of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they
will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles. And they will
mock him and spit on him, and flog him and kill him. And after three days he
will rise. Mark 10:32-34 (see also, Matt. 20:17-19,
Luke 18:31-34)
Love
does strange things to us. On one hand it brings us joy but on the other it can also grip us with fear. As Jesus
continues traveling south along the Jordan, He is ‘going up’ to Jerusalem (whether
south, north, east or west, the Jew’s always ‘go up’ to Jerusalem, which is on
a hill). As He travels He invokes two, quite varied responses – ‘amazed’ and ‘afraid’. We are not privy as to who gives these - whether the whole of them give both or whether they were divided by group – but my suspicion is the crowd was amazed and the disciples
were afraid.
Now I really believe the disciples loved Jesus. But when we love someone we can also be gripped by fear. We can be afraid we might lose them or
that something might happen to them - or fear
that something might happen to us because of them. This is what I think is
going on. The disciples knew the ‘Jews’ were conspiring to trip Jesus up –
even kill him. This had been their plan since the raising of
Lazarus. Their loyalty and love kept the disciples with Christ but their fear over what might happen made them cautious. In
response Jesus tells them plainly - “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be
delivered over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him
to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles. And they will mock him and spit
on him, and flog him and kill him" - which
is opposite of what we think He should say were He wanting to comfort
them. Then adds - "And after three days he will rise" - and we can only wonder whether they understood Him, or what
they even thought at all of this.
Indeed, the crowds were amazed but the disciples afraid.
Do you ever find yourself afraid in following after Christ?
Has He asked you to follow Him into places and though circumstances that you
fear? He has me. Many times! As humans we may fear, but in Christ we
can be assured that ‘perfect love cast’s out fear.' (John 4:18) And though we are not perfect this side of glory – Christ is, and His
perfect love wins. Always!
Pastor
Sam
[1] A T Robertson footnotes in his A HARMONY OF THE GOSPELS FOR STUDENTS OF THE LIFE
OF CHRIST, that Jesus had ‘left Galilee in § 122, crossing the Jordan
into Perea, probably in company with many Jews from Galilee (who regularly went
this way to Jerusalem), and will now soon cross the river again and reach
Jericho (§ 126).
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