The disciples were pretty much confused, I think. Jesus was telling them what was going to happen, but they had always been told that Messiah would come as a conqueror. They expected Jesus to raise an army, but He was saying other things. The mother of James and John even asked Him to put her boys in the prime spots of His kingdom. There may have been a feeling of disillusionment, as well. Judas Iscariot had betrayed Him. It would be just a short time and Thomas would be expressing his doubts. The disciples were heavy with grief.

Of all people, you would have thought Mary would be on top of it. The angel had come to her to announce the birth, she had spent decades with Him, she had given Him motherly direction, as when He turned the water into wine. She may have understood more than most, but she was still a little in the dark.

The cheering crowds of a few days before really had no clue, and neither did those who had condemned Him. They cursed Him, they mocked Him, they called for His death. The guards at the tomb should have expected something great, but when the angel appeared, they fell to the ground in a faint. It was all a spectacle. Something to do and to see before the heat of summer set in. Stonings and executions always drew a big crowd. Say what you wanted to about the Romans, but they always put on a great show. 

There were those who stayed true. Those who risked their own lives to prepare His body. Those who had loved Him and had come to the cross to grieve. But still, there wasn't real understanding. The women who went to the tomb to anoint His body went early on Sunday in accordance with the law, not to witness the Resurrection.

All of these people were Jews! They had heard the words of the various prophets! They had heard Isaiah's words about the horror of His death! They had the information! But traditions and reasonings had swayed them all.

And, of course, there are those today who, even with the whole story, still follow the traditions and reasonings rather than feel the power. The new dress and the sharp necktie and the easter egg hunt and the easter basket with candy takes on as much significance, and perhaps greater significance, than the Word of God. And the true meaning become murky.

But in that moment before the light of the rising sun, something began to happen. The earth began to shake. A sound, a grinding noise was heard in that cemetery as the stone rolled away. A white light with the image of a man in it began to descend from heaven. The guards saw it and collapsed from fear. As the morning mist began to thin, women approached the tomb with their burial oils. There they saw the gleaming figure sitting atop the stone. Fear came upon them. And then the angel said, Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus, Who was crucified. He is not here, for He has risen, as He said. Come, see the place where He lay!

What more do we need? At Christmas we have an amazing story, yet we seek to dress it up in pretty wrappings. Why? And now, as we look at the greatest moment in all of history, we attach other worldly things to it, even calling it by a name that is an insult.  The greatest words in history are the words of Jesus as He gave up His life; It is finished! And as the women approached the tomb and the angel said, Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus, Who was crucified. He is not here, for He has risen, as He said. Come, see the place where He lay!

And just like that, the world changed. He is risen from the dead! Make the Resurrection count for something great this year. Don't worry about your church. Focus on the job He gave you and the church will take care of itself.

Blessings. 

Oh, my! Do you love the election cycles as much as I do? All the information and insight we receive thanks to the media and the campaigns of various candidates! Truely, we live in inspired times! 

My usual thing I do leading up to an election, in my case that would be the primary election in Ohio on March 19, is to do some research on the various candidates and issues on the ballot. But, more and more, I wonder why I bother to research at all. I mean, all the information you might need is on the commercials. 

On election day I was on the road and was listening to the channel I get the traffic information on. An ad came on the radio. It started by saying a candidate's name. The announcer let disgust drip off every syllable of the man's name. He went on to trash the candidate for crimes he had been charged with in a different state as well questionable political failures. I was a little alarmed to hear these things. My research had turned up some personal mistakes from decades ago, but he had been acquitted. This was new information and I was so glad to have found out before I cast my vote. Next was a commercial for a tire company and then an announcer began to extoll the virtues of a candidate. Without mentioning his name, the announcer told us how wonderful he was, a loving husband and father, a man who truly deserved our vote. The peaceful music in the background made you know this was a quality man. As the ad ended, the announcer said, "Good for Ohio, good for America." I was filled with pride! And then he finally spoke the candidate's name. It was the same name as the previous commercial! WHAT! How could this be?

Politics as usual. Every two years we are caught up in it. Every four years we have the presidential election. And every election, whether for city council or county commissioner or various national offices, are said to be the most consequential election of our time. Only doom and gloom results if you don't vote as I say.

Politics has always been around. Even in the days of absolute rule by a king there were politics. Behind the scenes there was scheming going on just to gain the king's ear. The book of Esther is full of political intrigue. The pages of the Bible and all history drip with political desire. We look at our time now and think that the world has never seen such turmoil. Why, our politics pale when compared to the Roman Empire and even, if you read your American history, our own past. The Burr-Hamilton duel in 1804 comes to mind. Our politics? Child's play. It is always ugly. 

Let's look at the first century Israel. The Pharisees, arch conservatives, facing off against the Sadducees, the liberals. The Scribes, who tended to go whichever way best suited them. Then you had the splinter groups; the Zealots and the Essenes. The Zealots were even more conservative than the Pharisees. They were militant. The Essenes felt they were above it all and went away to copy Scripture (it is to these folks we owe thanks to for the Dead Sea Scrolls). There was constant conflicts between them all. 

And then Jesus came along and all these groups joined together. Not to praise Jesus, but to hate Him. With a mere parable, He was able to cut to the core of their politics. Though they all hated each other, they were all fearful of Jesus. And so, they all formed a common bond. They met, they schemed, they weighed their options. And the more people began to follow Jesus, the more their options focused down. Finally, there was just one answer; Jesus had to die.

And He did and all those backroom deals paid off. Now they could get back to what they were good at; hating one another.

Except, the grave could not hold Him. Jesus arose! Hundreds of people saw Him! The leaders came up with lies (they were, after all, political animals). But it was too late to put the cork back in the bottle. 

We need Jesus again today in our politics. Not as someone to scorn and hate, but as One we can praise and worship. However, when Christians get just as political as the non-believers, do we gain? We often say, "He has good Christians values" but is that really enough? Do they really believe? 

Of course, go vote. But also pray. Turn that hate you might feel into love for these people. Then, and only then, will it be the most important election ever.

Blessings.

I am usually more careful. I really am. No one likes to feel like that, but......

I am allergic to pork. It didn't start affecting me until I was a middle aged adult. It started slow. At some point I realized that I got sick whenever I ate ham.  In time, maybe ten years or so, the only pork I could eat was bacon, which was fine. After all, what is life without bacon? After moving to Indiana, I found out what life without bacon was like. Imagine, no bacon! Well, there is turkey bacon, but really?

The last real bout of pork sickness came at Wabash hospital in Indiana, where I was a patient for a few days. I was feeling pretty good and I ordered potato soup for lunch. I asked the lady on the ordering phone if there was bacon in the soup and I was assured there was not. And it was good! Very good! And a few hours later I got sick. Sicker than I ever remember being. Everyone was alarmed. They kept me an extra day, I suppose because they thought I was going to die. The next day I was still sick and in so much pain I could hardly move. An aid came in and suggested I eat some soup, and then the light came on. I asked if the potato soup had bacon. She pulled out a list that had all the ingredients to the food in the kitchen. Bacon wasn't listed. At that moment a nurse came in to do vitals. She was drawn into the conversation, and she left for the kitchen. There she found the box of mix for the soup and right on the list on the box it said bacon. That is how I am affected.

So, I check labels. Pepperoni has pork in it, so only vegetable pizza. No eggs cooked in bacon grease. No little bits of bacon in a salad. I never want to be that sick again.

Saturday a lunch companion and I went to a Chinese buffet restaurant neither of us had been to. I happen to love egg rolls and so I took two. I have eaten at two such buffets since returning to Ohio and have had no problems. I never thought about it. I was halfway through my second roll when my friend said, "I thought you couldn't eat pork." "I can't. No pork on this plate." "You didn't see the sign above the rolls? 'PORK FRIED EGG ROLLS.' Go look."

A couple of hours later I started getting sick. By 9PM I was buried under covers. Sunday morning, I hurt so bad I didn't want to move. It lasted till around Monday noon.

While I was agonizing, my brain still functioned. Mostly it was saying 'YOU IDIOT YOU IDIOT YOU IDIOT YOU IDIOT!' But there were a few normal thoughts, as well. I knew I would survive, so at one point the thought came; 'This is how we enter into sin. Satan puts sin in front of us and we avoid it. But then he puts it in something that is pleasurable. Cheating a few dollars on our taxes, feeling flattered when someone from the opposite sex compliments us, breaking the speed limit on that lonely stretch of road, losing our temper because we were provoked. Then, once we have sinned, we realize it and feel badly. But then, we get over it and we find out that it did feel good!' And sin has entered into our lives and has gained a foothold. 

Hebrews 12:1---Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight that so easily besets us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.

Even a tiny sin is sin. Set it aside.

As the betrayal of Jesus was at hand, He took Peter and James and John with Him and went to pray. Matthew 26:36-40 records the event; Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and He said to His disciples, “Sit here, while I go over there and pray.” And taking with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, He began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then He said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with Me.” And going a little farther He fell on His face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.” And He came to the disciples and found them sleeping. And He said to Peter, “So, could you not watch with Me one hour?

This is a sad moment in the Bible. Jesus tells them His heart is aching. He asks them to 'watch' with Him. The word 'watch' simply means to stay awake. It was night, the men were tired and, although we only have a short snippet of His prayer, He chides Peter for not being able to make the hour. So, Jesus is in emotional agony and is praying alone for at least an hour, and all He wanted His friends to do was wait for Him, maybe stand guard, and they couldn't do it. Mercy, there are several sermons right there! But that is not the point to this blog.

Jesus was in so much grief it was about to kill Him. He asks His Father to remove the cup from Him. He goes on and assures His Father that He will do the will of His Father. The troubled soul of our Savior is on full display. But what was troubling Him so?

The easy answer, and perhaps the most considered, is that Jesus was both God and man. Because of this, He fully knew of the suffering that awaited Him. He fully knew that at some point He was going to take on the sins of the world. He knew that at some point He would cease to be covered by hand of God. (Remember, He called out asking His Father why He had been forsaken.) He knew the pain that was coming. This is what we usually see.

But we are just human. We look at things only as we see them. I have never understood how a woman can have a baby and go through that intense pain and agony and then want another. They know the pain because they have experienced it, yet they want to go through it again. It is because they have never known such love as when they hold that newborn in their arms. Jesus, the great God/man, fully understood what He would experience. However, He also knew what was on the other side of that torment. Reunion with His Father. The beauty of His home, heaven. Hearing the angel chorus. All the pleasure of being in His realm again. I had always wondered about the agony in the Garden.

And I believe there is another explanation.

Jesus was close with His disciples. He loved them. He called them friends. And He would have understood exactly what was about to happen to them. I think (and this is just me, if you feel different, I am not saying you are wrong) that the agony was for His disciples first and also for those who would be real followers later. 

There is a whole branch of Christianity that says if you really believe, your life will be one of joy and wealth. Just so you know, Biblically speaking, that is Satanic. Who in the Bible, those men and women of great faith, does that apply too? Paul, Peter, Daniel? No, suffering is a part of Christian life just as it is in worldly life. Grow up.

I think Jesus knew what was to happen to His friends. He was God, after all. And He knew that what was to happen to them was because of their extreme faith and obedience to Him. I think that His agony was for all the true faithful and the trials they would face. Being human, those faithful could never really understand the reward because they had never experienced it, yet they would be faithful.

I believe Jesus was grieved because Judas was a betrayer. I believe He knew Peter would deny Him and would later deeply regret that denial. I believe His heart was breaking because He knew James would be horribly killed for his faith. This we know from the Bible, but the deaths of the other disciples we know from records. We know that John, the favorite of Jesus' disciple band, died a relatively peaceful death, but before that he was placed in a vat of boiling oil and lived. The Romans, impressed because he lived, then sentenced him to exile on an island. Think of the burns and then the scars. Did his ears and nose burn away? Was he blind? I read one writer who detailed the result of the botched execution, and then said that John's writing of the Book of the Revelation was after that and therefore should be considered to be the writing of a crazy man. But he didn't seem crazy in the Book of John or in First and Second and Third John, and he wrote them during the same period. Jesus would have known of the coming suffering of John. Jesus would have known that Peter and Nathaniel and Phillip and Andrew would all be crucified, and He would have known that before he was crucified, Nathanel would have skinned alive. He would have known that Thomas would be sold into slavery, been faithful in his witness and would have died in India, of all places. Jesus would have had on His heart the knowledge that Matthew would be stabbed to death in the house of worship he started in Ethiopia. Jesus would have been able to see in His mind that the other Judas and Simon Zeolotes would be beaten to death by angry crowds, Judas in Edessa and Simon in Babylon. And He would have seen each stone hurled at James the Lesser as he was stoned to death on a street in Jerusalem. And for Jesus, it would not have stopped there. All those that were to put Him first, He would know their sufferings. And He would also know and see those who would back down in the face of persecution. 

And so, Jesus said to His friends, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death;" And He says that to us now. Watch and pray and be strong.

Blessings.