Matthew 20:18, 19

“We are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified. On the third day he will be raised to life! ~ Matthew 20:18, 19

 

Jesus had predicted this journey before. They had been many times up to Jerusalem, but this would be their last time with their Lord. This is the third time Jesus had told his disciples about his passion, but all too often they had let it slip from their memory. Jerusalem would be the scene of His suffering, and His thoughts were to warn His disciples, to prepare them for what was to come. In detail Jesus tried to tell his disciples the outcome of this final trip. Too much they could not understand, too much they let slip past their mind’s eye, too much went past them without thought of what it all really meant. Would we have been any different? Are we now any different? A sacrifice such as this is still beyond our comprehension. To willingly give up one’s life, to undergo this intense torture, to withstand the ridicule and mocking would be more than we could tolerate, how then could He? Yet, for them and for us and for those to come, He did, and willingly, sacrificially, faithfully He went toward the cross. Coming this Sunday is when as a Church we would think upon Christ’s entrance into Jerusalem on a colt, marking the beginning of the week of preparation and revelation of His Passion. This year will be different as we will have to contemplate the events in our own homes and in our own way, without the church surrounding us. Perhaps its meaning will take on a new light, away from the Easter Bunny and the candy in a basket. Perhaps this year the world will join in on what this last visit to Jerusalem meant in a first century world, and in a 21st century people. Perhaps too, when Resurrection Sunday arrives, people will know the depth it represents to those of us who understand that His Resurrection means eternal life for all His followers.


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