
Luke 13:31-35: At that very hour some Pharisees came and said to him, “Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.” And he said to them, “Go and tell that fox, ‘Behold, I cast out demons and perform cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I finish my course. Nevertheless, I must go on my way today and tomorrow and the day following, for it cannot be that a prophet should perish away from Jerusalem.’ O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! Behold, your house is forsaken. And I tell you, you will not see me until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!’
And so we see in this passage that the opposition of Israel continues to grow. Despite this, Christ is determined to finish the work He came to do and nothing, not even a king is going to stop Him. As Jesus speaks of finishing His work, He knows that this means Israel is going to reject Him and kill Him. He laments over this because He knows that it will bring judgement upon them as a nation. Although there is judgement, there is also hope. Jesus earlier said that if anyone is to enter the kingdom of heaven, it must be by the narrow gate. We have come to know that this narrow gate is faith in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. This faith is required because God gave us His Law, but we each break it by worshiping things other than God. Because we do this, we deserve the penalty of death. We see that the sin of Israel had real consequences, both in this life and for eternity. Since we all have sin, we cannot please God in any way, therefore the only way we could have relationship with God is if our sins are forgiven. Jesus lived a life without sin, fulfilling God’s law in every way. Then He was put to death not because He did wrong, but because God had a plan. In Jesus death, He took mans place as a substitute to atone or pay for their sins. This substitution allows for God to forgive sinners of their sin and still be holy and just as the penalty is paid. He could not overlook our sins if they have not been paid for because of His nature. Since, Christ has paid for our sins by dying in our place,we can be forgiven when we place our faith in Jesus. Then Jesus rose from the grave proving that He was the Son of God and that He has power over death. This means that anyone who believes has eternal life and does not need to fear death.
If you believe this message, we are called to follow in Jesus footsteps and declare this truth to those around us. As we seek to do this, we should consider some of the truths taught in the passage we studied today.
God is
This truth gives us comfort as we seek to share the gospel with the world around us. God is in control of our lives, and as we see in Romans, He is working all things together for our good and His glory. This does not mean that hard times will never come in our lives, but as Jesus did, we can trust that God has a plan for the trials that come our way. We can also find comfort in the fact that the work has been completed. Jesus has accomplished the work of redemption on the cross, now He is using us to spread this message to the world. If God is sovereign, and He says the work is complete, then we can trust that it is done. This takes the weight off of our shoulders in some respect as we understand that salvation is in God’s hands. He did the work, our responsibility is simply to proclaim the message He has given us. God is going to do what He is going to do, so we can proclaim truth with boldness and sincerity. When we face opposition, we can be confident that God is control and so we do not have to back down for fear of man. Just as Jesus knew that Herod could not stop God’s plan, so we can be confident that no man can stop God’s plan in our lives. Earlier in Luke 12, Jesus taught that we should fear God who can kill body and soul and not fear man who can only kill the body. We know that we are redeemed by Christ’s finished work so we do not need to fear man, for even if they kill us, we will live forever with Christ. This gives us a confidence that cannot be stopped by schemes of men or the devil. This does not mean that we are to go around telling others that they are going to hell, but rather it should remove our fear of sharing the gospel, even when it feels awkward or people push back. This brings us to our next point.
God is
We know that we can be bold because our God is in control, but that does not mean that we should be without compassion for the lost. We don’t need to create posters and stand at street corners seeking to scare people into belief. We need to be bold, but we need to be driven by compassion. There will be times when there are people who oppose us for some reason or another, and as Christ did, we should grieve over their hardness towards God and pray that He would soften them. This is not easy to do, as our pride will often feel attacked as people reject Christ. They are not really rejecting us but God. We see in Christ that God’s heart is broken over the rejection of Israel. Just as God’s heart breaks for the lost, so we should have broken hearts for the lost. This is not something that will happen naturally in our lives, but as we look to Christ we will be transformed by the gospel and our hearts will feel as God’s does. Brokenness paired with boldness will lead to a genuine presentation of the gospel, imploring people to believe in Christ that they might be saved from their sin and restored to relationship with the God of the universe. This is what we should strive for, but we must remember that it is Christ who gives us the strength and the character to do so.